Pentium M still adequate for surfing?

[Darknite39]

I'm trying to find a cheap laptop for my g/f's mom (a novice computer user), and I'm eyeing a Thinkpad R52 or similar T-series from ebay (reliability is key). However, my R52 has been exclusively used as a DVR for OTA HD broadcasts for the past couple of years, so I have no clue if it's adequate for modern daily internet use and Skyping. I could test all of this out, but with finals coming up at school, I am hoping one or more of you might have first hand experience with this to save me some time. (Sorry if this is some kind of repost, but I searched here and over at hardforum and couldn't find anything recent.)

Thanks for any advice!

 

[jpiniero]

I don't see why not, provided it has enough ram. Hell, something like Dothan would be much faster than the ARM tablets out there.

 

[sangyup81]

Does this web surfing include heavy flash useage like youtube or facebook games? If not, it's enough

 

[Darknite39]

Flash is actually my biggest concern about modern browsing. I can assume that she'll want to be able to watch the occasional online video, but it's not a huge priority.

 

[repoman0]

I'd try for something newer like a T61. First of all because it's newer - if reliability is key, something like that will be better. Also it will use a C2D which will definitely be enough.

I had a T43 with a PM 1.8GHz that broke last spring. It was adequate, but still noticeably slow and rather unreliable due to motherboard problems. Replaced it with a $200 T61 with a 2GHz C2D and it's much, much faster. That may be the difference between 2GB and 1GB of ram though. Either way, a T61 will be more reliable and can still be had for cheap.

 

[SonicIce]

A Dothan Pentium M is roughly equal to an Athlon 64 clock-for-clock, and I use an A64 daily at 2.5ghz. Only the most extreme flashy websites lag. I can play 720p youtube videos smoothly though.

 

[Darknite39]

I'm actually on a T61 now, and I know it's more than adequate for this application.

I'm actually just hoping to save my g/f as much $ as possible...

If the machine can handle 720p YouTube, then it should be just what I need (thanks, SonicIce), but I'll take your advice into consideration, repoman0, and see if I can find a good deal during my searching.

Thanks to all for the replies! This saved me some real time.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Yep. My laptop is a 1.7GHz Pentium M. Works great for surfing!

 

[ther00kie16]

Just get a netbook, or one of the $300 or less laptop deals. Any dual core atom should be as fast as a Pentium M.

 

[yhelothar]

I got my X41 Tablet for $110 with a 1.6GHz Dothan. I'm on it right now.
It's awesome for web surfing. It runs 720p youtube videos ok, but slightly slow.

After I got a SSD for my tablet, it runs pretty much as well as my quad core desktop for just about everything that's not gaming.

Last I've checked, atoms haven't come close to dothan yet. Benchmarks?

 

[jhu]

Just get a netbook, or one of the $300 or less laptop deals. Any dual core atom should be as fast as a Pentium M.

Actually, the Atom, clock for clock, is even slower than a Pentium 4 (Povray 3.6, standard benchmark scene):

Pentium 4m, 1.5 GHz, Linux, gcc 4.6.1, -march=pentium4m
Parse Time: 0 hours 0 minutes 5 seconds (5 seconds)
Photon Time: 0 hours 2 minutes 8 seconds (128 seconds)
Render Time: 1 hours 5 minutes 36 seconds (3936 seconds)
Total Time: 1 hours 7 minutes 49 seconds (4069 seconds)

Atom N270, 1.6 GHz, Linux Ubuntu, icc 11.1, -xSSE3_ATOM
Parse Time: 0 hours 0 minutes 4 seconds (4 seconds)
Photon Time: 0 hours 1 minutes 31 seconds (91 seconds)
Render Time: 1 hours 23 minutes 16 seconds (4996 seconds)
Total Time: 1 hours 24 minutes 51 seconds (5091 seconds)

 

[nitrous9200]

I'm using a ten year old Pentium IIIm laptop (Compaq Evo n600c) right now to post this, and it's fine - replaced the hard drive a few years ago and I've bumped up the RAM to 768mb. It chugs along a bit trying to run Flash (especially full screen) but it handles it OK. Skype audio chat even works; CPU usage is a bit high but it works no problem. A Pentium M should be more than adequate for both of those tasks.
For an older machine, I would recommend a browser like Firefox/Chrome, Flashblock and maybe an ad blocker to speed things up.