Originally Posted by
wiredboy10003
Unfortunately, several things this article says are specific to desktops and are incorrect for laptops.
Originally Posted by
Efrem
1. The i5 has four cores, so it can run four programs at the same time. Taking advantage of this requires you to have four programs that want to run at the same time, or alternatively one program (such as Photoshop) that can split its work into four parallel threads. (Useful for applying an edit to a large photo.)
The OP was asking about laptops; all mobile i5 processors are dual-core (even with the upcoming -2xxx series.) For laptops, quad cores generally available on PCs right now are only available on a handful of very-battery-unfriendly i7 models (most mobile i7 models are dual core) -- with the -2xxx series (basically still "upcoming" although a few models are finally trickling out), roughly half of the models will be quads. Easy to spot in the model number as it's i7-2xxxQM rather than i7-2xxxM.
On the desktop, with the more common/older models the i5 can have either 2 cores (-6xx series) or 4 (7xx series) - both of which are still on sale. When the new -2xxx series starts selling in quantity in new systems, you're correct that virtually all desktop i5 processors will be quad core.