The model numbers manufacturers have definitely don't help. A friend recently bought an Acer Aspire E1, of which there are about a million different combinations. The range she got has model numbers like E1-472P-XXXX, where the last four digits mean "whatever configuration of components we plucked out of a hat". Her's is Core i5 4200U, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD - which I can't find anywhere online :D

As another commenter said Apple has it right in that it's easy to say "this is the 2013 model". I bought a TV yesterday, and although they seem to have confusing model numbers too, at least the shop displayed them saying which was the latest models and it was easy to see the difference between them (apparently "dual core CPU" is a feature of TVs now).

EDIT: Typos.

In the UK at least if you walk into a store you will find they have a confusing set of badly specced models of brands you probably shouldn't buy at prices you probably shouldn't pay.

I give a lot of credit to Apple in keeping their line fairly straightforward (usually only devs or photo/video people need upgrades) otherwise everyone gets the same base model for one of a tiny number of variants. The prices across channels and concessions are always the same too.

It isn't that different though. You still look at clock speeds on the CPU, as well as the burst speed for what it can ramp up to. So that's the 233/300/450 comparison done.

Then perhaps look at whether it is i3/i5/i7 - the higher ones are better.

But then instead of just thinking that your processor is one CPU, count how many logical processors are in there: dual core, quad core etc.

It's still the same - the higher numbers are better :-)

Of course, other things to take into consideration (like it has always been) are FSB speed, RAM clock speeds, disk cache size, disk type, amount of RAM, GPU processing capability (use the same rules as the CPU - count the RAMDAC speed, the amount of RAM, the number of cores), and so on.

I don't think it's changed that much. Just there are more brand names and model names on things now, perhaps?

Not sure why I was downvoted for my comment above?

Surely you just look at the numbers for everything - higher numbers of cores, higher numbers of model numbers, high numbers of CPU speed, higher numbers for RAM speeds and capacity, higher disk speeds etc. etc. etc. etc. ???

Realistically, consumers choose based on the clear numbers, disk space and memory. 1 TB disks and 8 GB of RAM have recently hit the low-ish end of laptops so at least there's that to go on.

Clear as mud!