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colinwil

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 15, 2010
299
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Reading, UK
So I ran Geekbench 4 on my new base model i3...

Mac Mimi Geekbench.png

Not too shabby - seeing as my 2016 MBP i7 gives single core:4288, multi core:14819
 
Yea, I put that i3-8100 in my plex server from a microcenter $90 deal earlier in year. It's a beast. Runs last years i5's into the ground.
 
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Even the base model looks like a fine update to both the 2014 dual core and 2011/2012 quad models for CPU tasks.
People need to get passed that it's called an i3. There are a lot of folks dismissing it and jumping straight to the i5 out of habit.

Those are some solid scores indeed.
 
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Something is a bit weird though...the i5 mid-range model is identified as a i5-8400 @2.8Ghz.
I'm pretty sure it was expected to be the i5-8500B @ 3.0Ghz.
View attachment 802092
[doublepost=1541602190][/doublepost]These are the correct processor stats here:
https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/search?q=i5-8500B
Well, looks like we were all wrong on that one, or the GeekBench is wrong.

If it was identified as 8400B, that would be OK, but this is identified as the 8400, which goes on LGA mount.

EDIT: OK, just saw your addition to this post, nevermind.
 
Any chance you'd be willing to perform a Handbrake test on both systems so we can see how it handles throttling (if it does so)?
 
Well, looks like we were all wrong on that one, or the GeekBench is wrong.

If it was identified as 8400B, that would be OK, but this is identified as the 8400, which goes on LGA mount.

EDIT: OK, just saw your addition to this post, nevermind.
Yeah...sorry about that. Geekbench must just have an error in their final aggregate table.
 
People need to get passed that it's called an i3. There are a lot of folks dismissing it and jumping straight to the i5 out of habit.

Those are some solid scores indeed.
The i3 is fine at a certain price point, as was the dual-core i5 in the 2012 Mac mini (comparable CPU performance to a 13" MacBook Pro).

But $799 in 2012 bought you a quad-core, and comparable CPU performance to a 15" MacBook Pro. Today that's a multi-core score of almost 20K, only attainable with an i5 or i7 in the Mac mini.

So please stop defending Apple's decision to solder the cheapest possible 8th-gen processor into an otherwise solidly-specced $799 base model Mac.
 
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The i3 is fine at a certain price point, as was the dual-core i5 in the 2012 Mac mini (comparable CPU performance to a 13" MacBook Pro).

But $799 in 2012 bought you a quad-core, and comparable CPU performance to a 15" MacBook Pro. Today that's a multi-core score of almost 20K, only attainable with an i5 or i7 in the Mac mini.

So please stop defending Apple's decision to solder the cheapest possible 8th-gen processor into an otherwise solidly-specced $799 base model Mac.
You're not wrong, but I think the 2012 mac mini was a bit of an anomaly. In 2011 to get the quad core (comparable to a 15 inch MBPro) you had to spring for the $999 server version - which with inflation is the same as the current £1099 price point of the i5 model.

2012 was just a very good (value) year for Mac minis. :)
 
You're not wrong, but I think the 2012 mac mini was a bit of an anomaly. In 2011 to get the quad core (comparable to a 15 inch MBPro) you had to spring for the $999 server version - which with inflation is the same as the current £1099 price point of the i5 model.

2012 was just a very good (value) year for Mac minis. :)
There is a difference between admitting the 2012 was a better value, and openly defending the i3 processor in the 2018 as @BillyBobBongo did above. There are some things worth defending with this Mac mini refresh, but following the base price increase to $799, the i3 is not one of them.

Here are a few more reasons for not defending the i3:
  • Intel's mobile processors are generally more expensive than comparable desktop processors, due to the focus on power efficiency. So, putting in a desktop hex-core i5 in today's Mac mini would actually cost less than putting in a mobile quad-core i7 would've cost in 2011 or 2012.
  • After the $200 upgrade to the i7, I calculated the difference between a Mac mini + eGPU and comparably-specced 21.5" iMac + dGPU to be about $200. That's $200 for a 4K display, Magic Keyboard, and Magic Mouse 2. With the i5 at $799 and i7 at $1,099, that difference would be a more-reasonable $400.
  • With eGPU and external storage effectively making those components upgradable, and socketed RAM making RAM upgradable (though with some difficulty), the CPU is the only component left as non-upgradable, and the i3 will show its age much sooner. Hex-core is replacing quad-core as the new high-performance standard.
  • The base model coming with a Core i3 seems to contradict that model being pro-focused. After the price increase to $799 which puts it out of the range of most basic users (or the previous targeted group of Windows-to-Mac switchers), I'm starting to wonder who the $799 Core i3 model is targeted at.
  • The Core i3-8100 is a budget CPU available in budget Windows desktops in the $400-500 range. Not exactly what someone wants to hear after spending $799 on a Mac mini.
 
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There is a difference between admitting the 2012 was a better value, and openly defending the i3 processor in the 2018 as @BillyBobBongo did above. There are some things worth defending with this Mac mini refresh, but following the base price increase to $799, the i3 is not one of them.

Easy there fella, you're quoting me out of context. I said nothing about the price of the processor. What I said was that there was nothing wrong with the performance of the base model processor and that people dismiss it in the basis of it being called an i3 and go directly to the i5 (out of habit). But hey...that's all down to Intels confusing naming scheme for their 8th generation processors.
 
Easy there fella, you're quoting me out of context. I said nothing about the price of the processor. What I said was that there was nothing wrong with the performance of the base model processor and that people dismiss it in the basis of it being called an i3 and go directly to the i5 (out of habit). But hey...that's all down to Intels confusing naming scheme for their 8th generation processors.
Dismissing the i3 and going to the i5 still provides two more cores and considerably better multi-core performance, so if that was the reason people were dismissing the i3 before, it remains just as valid today.
 
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There is a difference between admitting the 2012 was a better value, and openly defending the i3 processor in the 2018 as @BillyBobBongo did above. There are some things worth defending with this Mac mini refresh, but following the base price increase to $799, the i3 is not one of them.

Here are a few more reasons for not defending the i3:
  • Intel's mobile processors are generally more expensive than comparable desktop processors, due to the focus on power efficiency. So, putting in a desktop hex-core i5 in today's Mac mini would actually cost less than putting in a mobile quad-core i7 would've cost in 2011 or 2012.
  • After the $200 upgrade to the i7, I calculated the difference between a Mac mini + eGPU and comparably-specced 21.5" iMac + dGPU to be about $200. That's $200 for a 4K display, Magic Keyboard, and Magic Mouse 2. With the i5 at $799 and i7 at $1,099, that difference would be a more-reasonable $400.
  • With eGPU and external storage effectively making those components upgradable, and socketed RAM making RAM upgradable (though with some difficulty), the CPU is the only component left as non-upgradable, and the i3 will show its age much sooner. Hex-core is replacing quad-core as the new high-performance standard.
  • The base model coming with a Core i3 seems to contradict that model being pro-focused. After the price increase to $799 which puts it out of the range of most basic users (or the previous targeted group of Windows-to-Mac switchers), I'm starting to wonder who the $799 Core i3 model is targeted at.
  • The Core i3-8100 is a budget CPU available in budget Windows desktops in the $400-500 range. Not exactly what someone wants to hear after spending $799 on a Mac mini.

If you can't defend the i3 price, you'll find it even more difficult to defend the i5: i3 +$220 for 128GB more storage (as i5 processor is only $80 more than i3, at Amazon, so even less for Apple)
 
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Going i5 to i7 gives less than a 20% performance increase in single and multi-core testing but I am trying to understand the real world performance difference because the i7 includes hyper-threading. How big of a difference does hyper-threading make?
 
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Dismissing the i3 and going to the i5 still provides two more cores and considerably better multi-core performance, so if that was the reason people were dismissing the i3 before, it remains just as valid today.
I guess I'll stick my head out too: I also think the i3 is an excellent spec baseline for the Mac mini. I'm tempted to get a few for my lab to replace the 2011 Mac minis. Dirt cheap (for a Mac) and also better performance than those that are plugging in dual core MBPros from 2015/2016 and MacBooks.

Yes there may be a lot to dislike about the i3 option.

I happen to think there is also quite lot to like about it too. :)
 
I guess I'll stick my head out too: I also think the i3 is an excellent spec baseline for the Mac mini. I'm tempted to get a few for my lab to replace the 2011 Mac minis. Dirt cheap (for a Mac) and also better performance than those that are plugging in dual core MBPros from 2015/2016 and MacBooks.

Yes there may be a lot to dislike about the i3 option.

I happen to think there is also quite lot to like about it too. :)
If the base dual-core 2.5 GHz mini in 2012 had been $799 instead of $599, I'm sure you would've made the same argument in favor of it. Fair enough then.
 
If the base dual-core 2.5 GHz mini in 2012 had been $799 instead of $599, I'm sure you would've made the same argument in favor of it. Fair enough then.
I don't thinks so...that would have seemed expensive I think.

I guess I just happen to think that single core scores of ~4700, and multi core of ~15,000 are pretty good for a base model computer. It is way ahead of the outgoing 2014 mini, and low-end machines like the MBair and the MacBook.

But maybe living and working with a 7 year old computer [mac mini 2011 quad] has just lowered my expectations haha!

But even the base model provides 2-3x performance upgrades over what model. I, personally, think that is pretty amazing considering I'm still happily using the 2011 model every day!
 
Going i5 to i7 gives less than a 20% performance increase in single and multi-core testing but I am trying to understand the real world performance difference because the i7 includes hyper-threading. How big of a difference does hyper-threading make?

For CPU limited tasks there is no difference. For tasks that spend more time waiting on cache misses than computation hyper-threading allows up to twice as many threads to run in the same time slot. In practice I usually assume hyper-threading allows +50% more threads before thread overhead outweighs the diminishing return of each extra thread for ~+30% overall multi-core performance.

However that guesstimate was based on grad-student server research. For a less squishy guesstimate I'd suggest looking at specific benchmarks for whatever software you intend to run.
 
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I don't thinks so...that would have seemed expensive I think.

I guess I just happen to think that single core scores of ~4700, and multi core of ~15,000 are pretty good for a base model computer. It is way ahead of the outgoing 2014 mini, and low-end machines like the MBair and the MacBook.

But maybe living and working with a 7 year old computer [mac mini 2011 quad] has just lowered my expectations haha!

But even the base model provides 2-3x performance upgrades over what model. I, personally, think that is pretty amazing considering I'm still happily using the 2011 model every day!
The scores coming from the dual-core i5 would've seemed high for someone still using a Core 2 Duo Mac mini in 2012. Comparing a 2012 Mac mini to a 7-year-old Mac mini would've meant comparing a dual-core i5 to a 32-bit PowerPC G4 or Intel Core Duo with an even bigger difference.
 
The scores coming from the dual-core i5 would've seemed high for someone still using a Core 2 Duo Mac mini in 2012. Comparing a 2012 Mac mini to a 7-year-old Mac mini would've meant comparing a dual-core i5 to a 32-bit PowerPC G4 or Intel Core Duo with an even bigger difference.
Yeah...I guess it is because these mini scores are putting it right back in contention with all the other top performing macs that it doesn't bother me so much.

In terms of the i3...I would not be surprised if the same processor doesn't find itself used in the next wave of iMacs, as a low-end option. The i3 is more or less the same as the current low-end i5 5K iMac option. Unless they all go to Gen9 chips of course.

I just can't, myself, now decide whether to go for the base i5 mac mini model, plus external SSD, or go all out and get the upgraded i7 with 1TB internal SSD. In both cases I'll probably do third party RAM.

Geekbench scores place:
i3 as high as 4800 single and 15,100 multi
i5 as high as 5400 single (+12%) and 22,700 multi (+50%)
i7 as high as 6000 single (+25%) and 27,000 multi (+75%)

So there really isn't a great deal between them.
The iGPU in the i7 is allegedly ~10% faster than the iGPU in i3 and i5 though...

EDIT: By contrast my 2011 quad mini scores ~2900 single and ~9000 multi
 
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