Intel has lifted the embargo today on 32nm Intel Sandy Bridge benchmarking, so there is a lot of good information out there now. If you are in the market for a new laptop in the near future, I would be looking for a system with an Intel Core i7-2820QM processor, which will give you significantly better performance than any system with the older 45nm “Clarksfield” Core i7 mobile CPU, along with much better battery life.

The i7-2820QM (for mobile CPUs) seems to be the sweet spot in terms of price/performance ratio, since it costs $568 vs. $1096 for the i7-2920XM.   It appears that, depending on the chipset, you will also get 6Gbps SATA III support. This would let you take full advantage of a 6Gbps 256GB Crucial RealSSD C300 SSD to put together an extremely fast mobile system.

You could spec out a i7-2820QM system from your vendor of choice, with the cheapest HD they offer, and then replace it with a Crucial RealSSD that you buy separately from someone like NewEgg , then do a clean OS install and be off to the races.

Here are some of the more interesting reviews:

Intel’s Sandy Bridge: Upheaval in the Mobile Landscape

Intel Core i7-2820QM Mobile Sandy Bridge Performance Review

Intel Core i5 2500K and Core i7 2600K  (Desktop)

One thing to keep in mind is that the server versions of Sandy Bridge (Sandy Bridge-EP and Sandy Bridge-EX) are not supposed to be available until around the middle of 2011. I have heard that there may not be as much of a delay between the two-socket EP version and the four (or more) socket EX version of Sandy Bridge as has been the case for Nehalem and Westmere.