semptron opertron turion duo........ I want to get a laptop that can still do cfd if need be. Ive used a p4 machine well. what should i avoid?

Can I infer from your comment that the p4 is not a good fit for scientific computing? please elaborate, thanks As far as I know the opteron is behaving well

I think its good! I did my whole thesis research with one. Once I heard that the celerons had some math functions removed. But really I don't know much of anything about the differences between chips. So does anybody know which is best for cfd of the new crop of intel and amd laptop and desktop chips?

for CFD programs, Fluent for example, they are more RAM intensive and video RAM intesive that processor intensive. If you are going to spend some money on a laptop I would make sure that you get a 64bit chip. Make sure that the video is AT LEAST 256k RAm, and make sure you get a decent sized video screen. That will bring the price up, but without that the CFD programs are tough. Have a gig of ram too.

www.tomshardware.com is a great website to visit for the latest in computer news. I have strictly AMD processors in all my computers. I have never been a fan of intel. But, that is just me.

Also, I am a big fan of MSI MBs. I think the MBs come loaded with great northbridge processing, and good RAM networking. Plus, their pinging of the MSI server to make sure you have the latest drivers is nice.

Why would you want to spend a fortune on a laptop that can run CFD?

Buy a cheap laptop and a stationary and save money instead of buying a CFD laptop.

Finally, do not expect www.tomshardware.com to solve your questions regarding CFD-optimal CPUs. It will give you a hint though how well different CPUs match up against each other when it comes to standard benchmarks (mostly written to benefit either Intel or AMD).