Intel Core i7 4900MQ  vs 4800MQ 

For extreme gamers, money is no object. What's more important to them are the highest frames per second available, so that they can focus on getting the highest kills possible. For this matchup, we’re comparing two laptop CPUs which are one model apart: the Intel Core i7 4900MQ versus the Intel Core i7 4800MQ. Is the higher model worth the extra cost?

The 4xxxMQ series is part of the Core i7 brand, which is the fastest mainstream Quad Core offered by Intel. It’s geared towards users with an absolute hankering for speed. The MQ series stands for “Quad Core mobile” in laptops, while the model number denotes that it’s part of 4th generation Haswell, whose emphasis is on cool and long lasting battery life.

Going into specifics, the 4900MQ is clocked at 2.8 GHz, and can Turbo boost to 3.8 GHz. It has 8 threads, with 8MB cache and a power consumption of 47W. It’s also Hyperthreaded which effectively optimizes the efficiency of each processor core.

In contrast is the 4800MQ, the lower specced of the two. It’s clocked at 2.7 GHz and can Turbo to 3.7 GHz. It also has 8 threads, but less cache at 6MB. Likewise Hyperthreaded, it also consumes 47W of power.

Benchmarks show that the 4900MQ is slightly faster: it led by 8% in the PassMark test, and by 9% in the Single Core benchmark. Considering that CPUs at this level are likely to be bundled with discrete GPUs, gamers will see an increase of 2-3 FPS in favor of the 4900MQ. However, factor in the point that it’s $200 more expensive and it becomes apparent that the minimal speed bump is not worth it at all. Therefore, we recommend the Intel Core i7 4800MQ: it’s a blazing fast processor that’s good value for the money.