I'm just wondering what people's experiences are with the new Vega 20 vs the 560X in terms of battery life. My current setup (i7, 560X, 32GB RAM) has really bad battery life (dead in around 4 and a half hours of light usage, during which it also gets very hot). By changing to a 16GB RAM + Vega 20 system (with the i7) will I notice any improvements in terms of heat and battery life? I potentially have the option to do this. Thanks.
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Battery life Vega 20 vs 560X
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I mean, the answer is really it depends. I'm speaking based on a technical background not experience here, but the Vega is definitely more effecient than th 560X, and if your Mac is using the 560X a lot (not the integrated GPU), and you're running bounded operations with the GPU (i.e operations that don't run indefinitely. A game with an unlocked frame rate that pushes the GPU and CPU to 100% would likely not be that different between the two GPUs in terms of battery life (though if the frame rate was limited that would be a different story). A Final Cut stabilisation would benefit since it would be able to complete faster).
The RAM configuration is likely going to make no difference whatsoever. If low power memry modules were used for 16GB configurations it'd be a different story (like last gen), but both 16 and 32GB models use full power DDR4 modules. There might be a small difference in practice, but probably nothing at all.
So depending on usage, I'd say you can get a difference of anywhere from 0 seconds to an hour and a half. Again that's a qualified guess, not experience
The RAM configuration is likely going to make no difference whatsoever. If low power memry modules were used for 16GB configurations it'd be a different story (like last gen), but both 16 and 32GB models use full power DDR4 modules. There might be a small difference in practice, but probably nothing at all.
So depending on usage, I'd say you can get a difference of anywhere from 0 seconds to an hour and a half. Again that's a qualified guess, not experience
Light usage as in simply web browsing, emails etc.
I’ve never tried doing more taxing stuff like photo or video editing without it being plugged in.
i7 2.6, 16gb, 512gb, 560x
My battery life is almost double than what you listed. Basically close to 8hrs. I use the GfxCardStatus app to keep it on integrated graphics when I'm on battery power, and keep the screen at 80% brightness.
As far as heat goes, it sometimes hits 80c when watching a youtube video that's 4K 60fps. But most of the time it stay in the 50s and 60s.
My battery life is almost double than what you listed. Basically close to 8hrs. I use the GfxCardStatus app to keep it on integrated graphics when I'm on battery power, and keep the screen at 80% brightness.
As far as heat goes, it sometimes hits 80c when watching a youtube video that's 4K 60fps. But most of the time it stay in the 50s and 60s.
The best way to improve battery life is to shut down some cores if you don't need them. It should also reduce the heat.
I didn’t know you could do this - is it possible to do this natively or only with the app?
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Similar to above - how do you do this? With an app I guess?
I don't think you can force integrated graphics if an app needs it.
anyway, for what you described as "light use", discrete GPU shouldn't even fire up, and consequently there should be no difference between Vega20 or 560X.
Regarding CPU:
https://volta.garymathews.com
as for cores, IIRC it's in Xcode somewhere.
Buying Vega20 for battery life seems to be... inefficient?
Are you using Chrome by any chance?
Compared to Safari, on macOS that thing is a resource hog.
anyway, for what you described as "light use", discrete GPU shouldn't even fire up, and consequently there should be no difference between Vega20 or 560X.
Regarding CPU:
https://volta.garymathews.com
as for cores, IIRC it's in Xcode somewhere.
Buying Vega20 for battery life seems to be... inefficient?
Are you using Chrome by any chance?
Compared to Safari, on macOS that thing is a resource hog.
I am using Safari - stopped using Chrome a while back. If I went for Vega 20 it would also be for the decrease in heat.
However having thought more about this I may be better off going for a 13 inch Pro with touchbar; because I only edit photos (videos very infrequently) I don’t think the Vega would give me that much of a boost in that sense...
Both are done with apps.
I'm not sure of the name of the apps that reduces core usage to four but I'm sure you can find it if you do a search. There was a thread recommending one of the apps when the 2018 MacBook Pro came out.
edit: Doing a quick search, I came up with a program called CPUSetter. As a disclaimer, I never used the program and have no idea if it works.
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If you're only getting 4 hours while just browsing the Web and sending emails, something is hogging resources and burning down your battery. Do you have a bunch of login items running in the background? There are all sorts of things that seem pretty innocent that can have a significant impact on your battery life. If you've got a bunch of stuff running in the background, try shutting them all off and see if that helps. If it does, then turn them on one by one until you find the culprit.
Also, Web browsing can be pretty resource intensive depending on what you're browsing. If we're talking a bunch of mostly text blogs, you'll last a long time. If it's sites like MacRumors, that's usually fine too unless you run into a poorly optimized ad (and there are plenty of those). If you're browsing Hulu and Netflix, expect that to give you a big hit on battery time.
fwiw, I returned my i9/560x because (on top of keyboard and screen issues (screen issues which turned out to be software) i thought it was running too hot.
If you go for the 13", get the i5.
I ran Logic for one hour straight yesterday (low buffer, 2 live inputs (recorded) + stereo playback), and the battery only dropped 30%, and fans didn't turn on yet.
My 2018 was getting around 4 hours (real world while surfing) and running very hot (50-60c)...to the point I considered returning it. Finally I just did all of the standard PRAM/SMC dance not expecting any improvement but to my surprise the result was dramatic. I immediately started reporting 10-15hours and getting a real world 9-10 while running cold with a 30-40c typical temp. One thing I noticed when I was doing this was that the 2018's have a different SMC reset that uses the right shift so many of us may be doing it wrong.
Worth a try.
Worth a try.
Marginal difference at best.
You might see a slightly better time out of the Vega 20 in controlled conditions...maybe. Those differences, if any at all, are going to come solely from efficiency increases.
You might see a slightly better time out of the Vega 20 in controlled conditions...maybe. Those differences, if any at all, are going to come solely from efficiency increases.
I never saw Safari fire up discrete GPU tho.
I just can't see how Vega could benefit in such a scenario
Are you running the dGPU most of the day? I have the same machine (except the stock 16GB model) and my battery life is excellent. I get 10 hours web browsing no problem.
I did have a battery problem at one point though and realized it was because some random process kept forcing the dGPU on. Once I figured that out it’s been great. Install gfxCardStatus and see if the dGPU is running when it shouldn’t be.
I did have a battery problem at one point though and realized it was because some random process kept forcing the dGPU on. Once I figured that out it’s been great. Install gfxCardStatus and see if the dGPU is running when it shouldn’t be.
That's the catch - if both computers stick with integrated graphics there will be NO difference in battery performance.
There are a lot of things that require and use the GPU though; Youtube being among them. It really comes down to usage.
If you took two laptops, one with the Vega 20 and one with the 560X, and ran them both on dedicated graphics, the difference would be small, if any was noticeable at all.
Interesting - I always thought the battery life on the 15 inch models was MEANT to be better. I guess it can vary then.fwiw, I returned my i9/560x because (on top of keyboard and screen issues (screen issues which turned out to be software) i thought it was running too hot.
If you go for the 13", get the i5.
I ran Logic for one hour straight yesterday (low buffer, 2 live inputs (recorded) + stereo playback), and the battery only dropped 30%, and fans didn't turn on yet.
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I’ve decided on this model which will also leave me with spare money to buy a monitor/keyboard/mouse for home! Hoping the lower clocked components also help with battery.
There won't be any practical difference since during normal operation you are using the iGPU anyway. Under heavy GPU usage, Vega 20 draws more power than the 560X.
This means is that there is some software that uses more CPU energy than expected. I had a case like this just the other day — one of our employees was complaining about bad battery life and it turned out that there were two rogue ruby processes running all the time, taking 200% CPU uptime. Where they came from - no idea. We killed them and the battery life normalised.
So yes, use Activity Monitor (CPU and Energy tabs) to check what software behaves improperly and that will hopefully help you identify the problem. Changing computers is not a solution: it might just work (since your software configuration will change), but if its a program that you use regularly, you'll still get bad battery.
hm, i don't remember Youtube firing up the GPU :/
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It is around 20% better under identical conditions, but 13" has a 28W SoC to cool and draw power, and the 15" has a 45W cpu + 35W gpu. when dGPU is enabled, 15" will draw power like crazy