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2016 Macbook Pro 15" will be a lagfest in Parallels

D

dark_mark

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Nov 5, 2016
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As we all know the new 15" MacBooks Pro has dual graphics which are:

Integrated Intel HD 530
And dedicated Radeon Pro 450-560.

We all know that dedicated GPU will only kick-in in GPU intensive applications such as Final Cut, Premier and etc. For everything else, which is 99% of the time, we will be using the integrated HD 530 graphics.

In other words dedicated GPU will never kick in when you are doing regular tasks, like resizing windows, browsing the web and etc.

Now here is the performance comparison between 2015 Macbook Pro integrated graphics and 2016 Macbook Pro graphics:

New 2016 MBP 15" model uses Intel HD 530 which has performance of 441.6 GFLOPS
2015 MBP 15" model uses Iris Pro Graphics 5200 which has performance of 832 GFLOPS.

So, it looks like the new model is twice as slow as 2015 model. And 2015 model barely passes as a fluid experience in Parallels. Which means that 2016 model will be a major lagfest in Parallels.

Now let's compare 2012 MBP 15" performance to 2016 performance:

Intel HD 530 inside 2016 Macbook Pro 15" has performance of 441.6 GFLOPS
Intel HD 4000 inside 2012 Retina Macbook Pro 15" has performance of 332.8 GFLOPS

Looks like performance of 2012 Macbook pro is very close to that of 2016 model and we all know how 2012 Macbook pro ended up being a lagfest when scrolling in Safari with heavy websites with a lot of images and stuff (aka Facebook and etc).

Really this 2016 model is a huge downgrade from 2015 model. There's barely any CPU performance difference and 2016 Integrated GPU is twice as slow as 2015 model.
 
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dark_mark said:
As we all know the new 15" MacBooks Pro has dual graphics which are:

Integrated Intel HD 530
And dedicated Radeon Pro 450-560.

We all know that dedicated GPU will only kick-in in GPU intensive applications such as Final Cut, Premier and etc. For everything else, which is 99% of the time, we will be using the integrated HD 530 graphics.

In other words dedicated GPU will never kick in when you are doing regular tasks, like resizing windows, browsing the web and etc.

Now here is the performance comparison between 2015 Macbook Pro integrated graphics and 2016 Macbook Pro graphics:

New 2016 MBP 15" model uses Intel HD 530 which has performance of 441.6 GFLOPS
2015 MBP 15" model uses Iris Pro Graphics 5200 which has performance of 832 GFLOPS.

So, it looks like the new model is twice as slow as 2015 model. And 2015 model barely passes as a fluid experience in Parallels. Which means that 2016 model will be a major lagfest in Parallels.

Now let's compare 2012 MBP 15" performance to 2016 performance:

Intel HD 530 inside 2016 Macbook Pro 15" has performance of 441.6 GFLOPS
Intel HD 4000 inside 2012 Retina Macbook Pro 15" has performance of 332.8 GFLOPS

Looks like performance of 2012 Macbook pro is very close to that of 2016 model and we all know how 2012 Macbook pro ended up being a lagfest when scrolling in Safari with heavy websites with a lot of images and stuff (aka Facebook and etc).

Really this 2016 model is a huge downgrade from 2015 model. There's barely any CPU performance difference and 2016 Integrated GPU is twice as slow as 2015 model.
Click to expand...



I think we're at a point you should just be grateful they didn't stuff the packaging with thousands of wasps.
 
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I have a 2013 13" with the Iris 5100 running Windows 10 in Parallels and it doesn't lag one bit... Running at 2560x1600 with 150% scaling too, not an issue.

Heck, I had a 9400m in a 2008 MacBook that ran it just fine back in the day. Granted it was pushing far less pixels.

If it bothers you that much you can tell it to always use the dGPU in System Preferences under the Energy Saver pane.
 
BrettApple said:
I have a 2013 13" with the Iris 5100 running Windows 10 in Parallels and it doesn't lag one bit... Running at 2560x1600 with 150% scaling too, not an issue.

Heck, I had a 9400m in a 2008 MacBook that ran it just fine back in the day. Granted it was pushing far less pixels.

If it bothers you that much you can tell it to always use the dGPU in System Preferences under the Energy Saver tab.
Click to expand...

Pre-retina, MacBooks never lagged in Parallels because it didn't have to push twice as many pixels.
Your 2013 didn't lag because it has HD 5100 which has 768 GFLOPS, which is almost twice as fast as 2016 15" model.
 
I know it can be a reason to stress, considering the following:

The HD4000 has: 16EU's maxing out at 332GFLOPS (5.18MP resolution)
The HD 515 (12"rMB) has: 24EU's maxing out at 384GFLOPS (3.3MP resolution)
The HD 530 (15" rMBP) has: 24 EU's maxing out at 442GFLOPS. (5.18MP Resolution)

the 15" RMBP has around 1,56 times more pixels, the GPU is around 1,15 times faster. In the case of the 12" the CPU was the limiting factor with some heavier tasks and switching, causing hick-ups. Hopefully the 15" doesn't suffer the same fate.
 
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BrettApple said:
If it bothers you that much you can tell it to always use the dGPU in System Preferences under the Energy Saver pane.
Click to expand...

Yes but we shouldn't be sacrificing battery life to get acceptable performance. Besides, they are not supposed to be downgrading GPU in a new model. I thought new models are supposed to be better? No? Not twice as slow.
 
I share your concerns regarding the integrated GPU. It's even slower than the Iris Pro in my late 2013 15". And it's three years old. But I may think that this is a true ****-up by Intel. We haven't seen the CPU lineup with the newer Iris Pro, I mean, do they even exist in real life or only on some sheets?
 
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Pootmatoot said:
I think we're at a point you should just be grateful they didn't stuff the packaging with thousands of wasps.
Click to expand...

They changed the included Apple stickers. This is the new ones:
tim-cook.jpg
 
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Two questions:
1) Why wouldn't the dedicated GPU kick in for Parallels if it is so GPU intensive?
2) If it's only running on the integrated GPU, who much of a difference does the CPU clock speed make?
 
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laser71 said:
Two questions:
1) Why wouldn't the dedicated GPU kick in for Parallels if it is so GPU intensive?
2) If it's only running on the integrated GPU, who much of a difference does the CPU clock speed make?
Click to expand...

1) GPU will not kick-in in Parallels when you are not running GPU intensive tasks. If you launch Premiere inside Parallels, it will, but not in other applications. Parallels has no access to underlying hardware, it just delegates to host OS to decide which graphics card to use.
2) We are not comparing clock speeds, we are comparing GFLOPS which is more indicative of real world performance.
 
What exactly do you want Apple to do? Intel isn't bringing Iris Pro to Kaby and probably still having yield issues with Iris Pro skylake, so even if it's the best iGPU in the world, it doesn't matter if availability is an issue. Apple dropping Iris Pro means that the 15 can move lock step with every other vendor.
 
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killawat said:
What exactly do you want Apple to do? Intel isn't bringing Iris Pro to Kaby and probably still having yield issues with Iris Pro skylake, so even if it's the best iGPU in the world, it doesn't matter if availability is an issue. Apple dropping Iris Pro means that the 15 can move lock step with every other vendor.
Click to expand...

How about including HD 550 inside 15" model like they do in their 13" model? HD 550 is twice as fast as HD 530 they are using in 15" model.
Their are penny pinching to the absolute extreme.

HD 550 is widely available. It makes absolutely no sense not to use it in 15" model. Yes they are being greedy!

In fact HD 550 is comparable to Iris Pro 5200 of 2015 model, but they decided to save a few cents and use 530 which is twice as slow as 2015 model.


And I bet, they will proudly announce next year that they were able to improve integrated GPU performance by 100% and will raise the price by another $200.
 
Last edited:
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My 2013 11" MacBook Air runs Parallels on a 27" Thunderbolt display without stuttering. I wouldn't expect a 2016 MacBook Pro to have any problems.
 
Compute performance of the GPU has minor bearing on its desktop compositing performance. Memory/texturing bandwidth is much more important here. And the 2016 model has faster RAM.

dark_mark said:
H
HD 550 is widely available. It makes absolutely no sense not to use it in 15" model. Yes they are being greedy!
Click to expand...

Excuse me? So you suggest that Apple uses dual core CPUs for the 15" model? Because you know, there are no quad cores with HD 550?
 
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Can you not just force the use of dGPU in power settings? I know it may not be what you want when not plugged in though, but still
 
leman said:
Compute performance of the GPU has minor bearing on its desktop compositing performance. Memory/texturing bandwidth is much more important here. And the 2016 model has faster RAM.



Excuse me? So you suggest that Apple uses dual core CPUs for the 15" model? Because you know, there are no quad cores with HD 550?
Click to expand...
Savage.
 
dark_mark said:
How about including HD 550 inside 15" model like they do in their 13" model? HD 550 is twice as fast as HD 530 they are using in 15" model.
Click to expand...

You would trade down to a dual core chip instead of quad core for a slight increase in iGPU perf? Particularly when you have a decent dGPU?

No? Yeah, no one would. If HD 550 were available in quad core configs, they would probably use it. You're saying penny pinching but your beef is with intel.
 
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leman said:
Excuse me? So you suggest that Apple uses dual core CPUs for the 15" model? Because you know, there are no quad cores with HD 550?
Click to expand...

What are you talking about? HD 550 is available for quad core CPUs. Just because Apple hasn't ordered it doesn't mean it's not available.
 
Also, I'm using Parallels 11 on my rMBP and it's as fluid with HD4000 as it is with 650M. I haven't seen any lag from HD4000 in a while on El Capitan or Sierra (don't remember how it was before, but perhaps it was fine too). And I remember the lag when rMBP was introduced, it was obviously a software issue.

Also, you can always force dGPU in your energy saving preferences.
 
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