This is a pretty generic question, and probably doesn't need any real hard technical stuff to answer. I just want to know the best processor for an XP Pro laptop. What is the best processor for power, and battery life, and what costs less and what costs more? Is Centrino a good technology? The processors I am taking into consideration is the Pentium 4, Pentium M and Celeron.

I have looked at other posts, they seem a little dated.

Well here is the bad news there is no current mobile processor on the market that can give you raw power and a lot of battery life at the same time.

If you are looking for a raw power mobile processor for games etc... go for a Pentium 4 or an Athlon 64 mobile processor.

If you are looking for an inbetween balance of both power and battery life from a mobile processor then an Pentium M or AMD's Turion should do the trick.

If you are looking for a mobile processor that is good or even great with battery life then go with a Intel Centrino.

If You are on a budget then Sempron mobile or a Celeron M would be your best choices.

Intel has promoted the Centrino so much that the populace thinks its a processor. Its a chipset optimized for battery operation and wireless operation. Most commonly used with versions of Celeron M.

Intel Celeron M and Intel Pentium M processors are designed for various notebooks with low power consumption and are usually sold under Intel Centrino brand-name being bundled with Intel chipsets and Intel wireless LAN controllers.

I made a mistake by saying it was a real cpu which it isn't because all it is, is a bundle wireless package that comes with some Pentium M's or some Celeron M's.

Thanks for the info! I think i'm going to go with Pentium M with Centrino.