Haswell Prediction Poll: Sept? dGPU?

[Mattsasa]

Where is this whole no dgpu idea coming from?

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6993/intel-iris-pro-5200-graphics-review-core-i74950hq-tested

eg.
Image

The 5200 is well off the previous generation 650M. I know the 750M isn't a HUGE increase, but the potential for having 2GB VRAM is there with the 750M.

It is a pro machine, having iGPU only would rule out the machine for use by many professionals including someone like me who needs it for video editing.

As Anand concludes

"For the past few years Intel has been threatening to make discrete GPUs obsolete with its march towards higher performing integrated GPUs. Given what we know about Iris Pro today, I'd say NVIDIA is fairly safe."

Everything this you said is True. No one is saying that an iGPU is a suitable replacement for a dGPU. And yes removing the dGPU will make apple lose professional sales and make a lot of people angry who needed and dGPU.

The reason many of us believe there will be no GPU in the MBP, is because of the geekbench benchmarks leaks of the MBP with Intel iris 5200. It must no longer worth it to apple I'm their cost benefit analysis. Since it uses more space and costs money and consumes extra battery. So they are trading all those things and losing functionality/performance.

 

[draculr]

The reason many of us believe there will be no GPU in the MBP, is because of the geekbench benchmarks leaks of the MBP with Intel iris 5200. It must no longer worth it to apple I'm their cost benefit analysis. Since it uses more space and costs money and consumes extra battery. So they are trading all those things and losing functionality/performance.

It makes sense to me that they'd have an igpu only version to replace the cMBP and hit the same price point. The current CMBP just has half a gig vram that it already isn't up to the task for pro apps anyway so no one will care if they have to skip the dGPU to hit that price.

Apples own pro apps make very heavy use of the GPU and they went all out GPU wise on the mac pro. The no dGPU speculation for higher end RMBPs just makes so little sense that it cannot be true. I heard people speculating that they'd drop it from the iMac too.

There is NO WAY given the direction Apple has gone with it's own apps that they'd drop dGPUs on it's biggest selling machines.

 

[ValSalva]

October and there will be a dGPU on the 15" rMBP. Not every configuration is going to be geek-bench tested, at least I hope not. It's just a year too soon to go iGPU only and I think Apple knows this. That's not to say there won't be an iGPU only option though.

 

[Sunday Ironfoot]

• October
• NO dGPU
• Significantly faster version of the Iris Pro 5200 Intel GPU (there's a MacRumors article about it somewhere)
• 12 hours battery
• Thinner/lighter 13"
• 16GB option for 13" version (Please!!)
• Thunderbolt 2.0 support
• 4K external monitor support (hence the 3rd item on the list)

I admit this is more of a wishlist than a prediction

 

[thundersteele]

They might just skip Haswell. Bring on Broadwell!

With the overstock of Ivy Bridge CPUs, the slow rollout of Haswell laptops (except for the low ULV chips), and the overall decline of the PC market, I expect Broadwell only very late in 2014, or even delayed to early 2015. So there is absolutely no reason to skip Haswell.

and that sentence makes no sense, because I have an improved igpu I won't have a dgpu? that doesn't even compute, the difference in power is tremendous

Iris Pro costs CPU power... the HD 4600 models are clocked significantly higher. It makes no sense to cut back on CPU power to get a better iGPU when you have a dGPU to do the heavy lifting.
And that's not even taking into account the additional cost of the Iris Pro CPUs.

 

[powerslave12r]

I don't understand why people jump to the conclusion that there will be no variant of the rMBP with a discrete GPU, just because ONE variant showed up in geekbench?

Why is it so hard to imagine that there could be variants that have and do not have the discrete GPU? Is there some architectural limitation?

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

Where is this whole no dgpu idea coming from?

From facts.

It is a pro machine, having iGPU only would rule out the machine for use by many professionals including someone like me who needs it for video editing.

Obviously not. Here are some OpenCL benchmarks (Apple & Adobe Pro Apps use OpenCL):

and

Source:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6993/intel-iris-pro-5200-graphics-review-core-i74950hq-tested/17

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I don't understand why people jump to the conclusion that there will be no variant of the rMBP with a discrete GPU, just because ONE variant showed up in geekbench?

Why is it so hard to imagine that there could be variants that have and do not have the discrete GPU? Is there some architectural limitation?

Can you give us an example from the past?

 

[powerslave12r]

From facts.


Obviously not. Here are some OpenCL benchmarks (Apple & Adobe Pro Apps use OpenCL):

Image

and

Image

Source:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6993/intel-iris-pro-5200-graphics-review-core-i74950hq-tested/17

----------


Can you give us an example from the past?

I also don't have an example of a retina and non retina display MBP being sold side by side either. Or an MBP with upgradeable RAM/HDD vs a non-upgradeable RAM/HDD being sold side by side.

How does your statement make any sense? If you have technical reasons to support your arguments I'm more than willing to listen in. 'Because it's never happened in the past' is just a cop out.

I'm not even suggesting they won't do away with the discrete GPU. They might, but I am just curious how everyone is so confidently choosing one side over the other?


Personally going by the benchmarks from Anandtech it seems they can get away without a discrete GPU/

 

[Mr MM]

With the overstock of Ivy Bridge CPUs, the slow rollout of Haswell laptops (except for the low ULV chips), and the overall decline of the PC market, I expect Broadwell only very late in 2014, or even delayed to early 2015. So there is absolutely no reason to skip Haswell.

there is no overstock of anything, there is a very bad planned staggered launch made by a fairly, so far, incompetent new CEO

while paper launch is one thing, to actually have the availability of said thing is another

Iris Pro costs CPU power... the HD 4600 models are clocked significantly higher. It makes no sense to cut back on CPU power to get a better iGPU when you have a dGPU to do the heavy lifting.
And that's not even taking into account the additional cost of the Iris Pro CPUs.

not really, not really at all

 

[dusk007]

Iris Pro costs CPU power... the HD 4600 models are clocked significantly higher. It makes no sense to cut back on CPU power to get a better iGPU when you have a dGPU to do the heavy lifting.
And that's not even taking into account the additional cost of the Iris Pro CPUs.

The costs have been slightly exaggerated. The OEM's complained that it didn't come for free.
It is the difference between a $570 and $657 CPU. The cheaper models have even less difference with only about $60 in the 4700 series.
If you account for the not exactly cheap GDDR5, the whole assembly on the motherboard, mux chip and all; For how little do you think Nvidia sells its 650M chips.
That does not even account for the actual prices Apple probably pays Intel as a big customer of this very expensive CPUs. Other companies may have more volume but that is mostly in the cheaper CPUs. There are only very low volume gaming notebooks and some workstations that also use the expensive chips besides Apple.

ad speed.
The Airs 1.3Ghz chips are exactly as fast as the higher clocked 1.6ghz ones with HD 4400. The base clock doesn't mean much, they are only so low because the GPU CAN require more TDP to show its full potential. The Turbo clocks are not that different and the 4960hq is equally as fast as the 4900 in clocks, but then comes the 128MB edram which lowers latency a lot and probably benefits quite a few workloads.
If all that wasn't enough one can even up the TDP if the dGPU is removed.
One can complain about less gaming performance than a dGPU would offer but the CPU performance won't suffer. It will probably be quite a bit better in many video related tasks because of the edram.

 

[Krazy Bill]

Why is it so hard to imagine that there could be variants that have and do not have the discrete GPU? Is there some architectural limitation?

It's possible there my be variants but reading the tea leaves in conjunction with Apple's past leads me to believe they're actually arrogant enough not to care about the loss of a dGPU.

One need only recall the removal of the dGPU in the MBP13, the long hiatus of the MacPro, the discontinuation of the 17" MBP and of course, the metamorphosis of FCP into iMovie Pro to know who butters Apple's bread. It certainly isn't power users.

So let's say they do make one more attempt (cycle) to stave off all the pissing and moaning about the GPU? All their products will be "consumerized" eventually. If not soon... then soon enough.

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

How does your statement make any sense? If you have technical reasons to support your arguments I'm more than willing to listen in. 'Because it's never happened in the past' is just a cop out.

I thought we are on MR, not in a drama school.

 

[Kirihuna]

September due to Best Buy clearing stock and some Mac configs aren't available in store anymore. Maybe a silent refresh.

no dGPU. Iris 5100 for 13", Iris Pro 5200 for 15".

Would rather have the 650M instead of Iris Pro.

 

[powerslave12r]

It's possible there my be variants but reading the tea leaves in conjunction with Apple's past leads me to believe they're actually arrogant enough not to care about the loss of a dGPU.

One need only recall the removal of the dGPU in the MBP13, the long hiatus of the MacPro, the discontinuation of the 17" MBP and of course, the metamorphosis of FCP into iMovie Pro to know who butters Apple's bread. It certainly isn't power users.

So let's say they do make one more attempt (cycle) to stave off all the pissing and moaning about the GPU? All their products will be "consumerized" eventually. If not soon... then soon enough.

I hope they don't do something outlandish. I'm also considering the Thinkpad Yoga 2 and the UX301 with their higher res screens.

 

[Atomic Walrus]

I hope they don't do something outlandish. I'm also considering the Thinkpad Yoga 2 and the UX301 with their higher res screens.

I realize this is kind of off-topic, but I've looked at both of those and I'm wondering: Why are all the non-Apple laptops using 16:9? That's a terrible laptop ratio. Any real work needs vertical space, not so much horizontal, and 19:10 is a great compromise for reasonable form factor and extra vertical area. Is the assumption really that people are only watching content and playing games at this point?

 

[PDFierro]

I realize this is kind of off-topic, but I've looked at both of those and I'm wondering: Why are all the non-Apple laptops using 16:9? That's a terrible laptop ratio. Any real work needs vertical space, not so much horizontal, and 19:10 is a great compromise for reasonable form factor and extra vertical area. Is the assumption really that people are only watching content and playing games at this point?

Because Apple is really the only company that cares enough to keep the 16:10 ratio. Otherwise, 16:9 is standard.

 

[Pentad]

I thought we are on MR, not in a drama school.

Um, all the drama queens didn't give it away?

 

[powerslave12r]

I realize this is kind of off-topic, but I've looked at both of those and I'm wondering: Why are all the non-Apple laptops using 16:9? That's a terrible laptop ratio. Any real work needs vertical space, not so much horizontal, and 19:10 is a great compromise for reasonable form factor and extra vertical area. Is the assumption really that people are only watching content and playing games at this point?

I used to be a die-hard 16:9 hater until I realized it worked out to my advantage as I use split screen a LOT. I'll have half the screen with a browser or some video or something and the other half with some code editor or Lightroom or something.

Everything is better that way. Just a year ago, I would have bad mouthed the 16:9 like there's no tomorrow. Of course one has to be careful with comparing 16:9 and 16:10 for effective screen area depending on each laptop's spec.

 

[thundersteele]

there is no overstock of anything, there is a very bad planned staggered launch made by a fairly, so far, incompetent new CEO

while paper launch is one thing, to actually have the availability of said thing is another

I wasn't talking about Apple in particular. Overstock of Ivy Bridge laptops has been reported several times. It is also not surprising since the PC market has contracted by more than 10%. I expect delayed Broadwell so Intel can sell enough Haswell CPUs to make a decent profit.

not really, not really at all

Ah, now you convinced me...

The costs have been slightly exaggerated. The OEM's complained that it didn't come for free.
It is the difference between a $570 and $657 CPU. The cheaper models have even less difference with only about $60 in the 4700 series.
If you account for the not exactly cheap GDDR5, the whole assembly on the motherboard, mux chip and all; For how little do you think Nvidia sells its 650M chips.
That does not even account for the actual prices Apple probably pays Intel as a big customer of this very expensive CPUs. Other companies may have more volume but that is mostly in the cheaper CPUs. There are only very low volume gaming notebooks and some workstations that also use the expensive chips besides Apple.

ad speed.
The Airs 1.3Ghz chips are exactly as fast as the higher clocked 1.6ghz ones with HD 4400. The base clock doesn't mean much, they are only so low because the GPU CAN require more TDP to show its full potential. The Turbo clocks are not that different and the 4960hq is equally as fast as the 4900 in clocks, but then comes the 128MB edram which lowers latency a lot and probably benefits quite a few workloads.
If all that wasn't enough one can even up the TDP if the dGPU is removed.
One can complain about less gaming performance than a dGPU would offer but the CPU performance won't suffer. It will probably be quite a bit better in many video related tasks because of the edram.

Not sure if this got lost in what I wrote, but I wasn't arguing for or against dGPU solutions. I was just trying to say that an Iris Pro + dGPU solution doesn't make sense to me.

I can agree that in practice, the speed difference between a 4900 and a 4950 (or 4960) could be negligible. But then I'm not sure if being "as good" is reason enough to choose a more expensive setup... maybe Apple found some magic tricks with the edram

 

[Mr MM]

I wasn't talking about Apple in particular. Overstock of Ivy Bridge laptops has been reported several times. It is also not surprising since the PC market has contracted by more than 10%. I expect delayed Broadwell so Intel can sell enough Haswell CPUs to make a decent profit.

since when one cites the intel staggered troublesome launch as the cause, you derive that one is talking about apple only? the OEMs are waiting for those higher wattage ulv parts. the usual quad models have already been launched and are selling for all OEMs except apple, the ulv ones are receiving updates as the time fits

broadwell shall have the same staggered launch that has been with intel for a long time, the interesting part this year was that quads launched at the same time as the ulvs (some of them), I will take that broadwell shall launch the Y series at the same time as the usual ulvs (or a slight lag) and they will sell the haswell Y at the same time for budget purposes and to take more of the tablet market

aside that the pc market has been shrinking steadily for some time now, those 10% figures where only noticed now, I don't know why

Ah, now you convinced me...


Not sure if this got lost in what I wrote, but I wasn't arguing for or against dGPU solutions. I was just trying to say that an Iris Pro + dGPU solution doesn't make sense to me.

I can agree that in practice, the speed difference between a 4900 and a 4950 (or 4960) could be negligible. But then I'm not sure if being "as good" is reason enough to choose a more expensive setup... maybe Apple found some magic tricks with the edram

and then we have the retina problem, the higher the gpu that is running it the better, bad coding has been responsible for what has been the retina launch, however there is only so much that a code can do. the 4600 is just 20% more powerful than the 4000

I dont understand how you can't see that.

 

[GSPice]

One need only recall the removal of the dGPU in the MBP13, the long hiatus of the MacPro, the discontinuation of the 17" MBP and of course, the metamorphosis of FCP into iMovie Pro to know who butters Apple's bread. It certainly isn't power users.

Wait, so Final Cut pre-X buttered Apple's bread? ::sigh::

I've used FCP through X.. and there are plenty more power users than I. Please insult FCP X users somewhere else, ok?

 

[The Leafs Fan]

iGPU for the win!!!!!

iGPU in both models and realistically, an October release. However, I'm really hoping for a September release, so I voted September.

 

[dusk007]

Not sure if this got lost in what I wrote, but I wasn't arguing for or against dGPU solutions. I was just trying to say that an Iris Pro + dGPU solution doesn't make sense to me.

I can agree that in practice, the speed difference between a 4900 and a 4950 (or 4960) could be negligible. But then I'm not sure if being "as good" is reason enough to choose a more expensive setup... maybe Apple found some magic tricks with the edram

Sorry I thought you are one of those who thinks the 4950/60 even without a dGPU would be more expensive. Yes a dGPU + Iris Pro wouldn't make any sense at all. The Iris Pro chip with edram isn't all that small either and graphics switching is just useless without a big performance delta between the two gpus. At what point would switching be worth it. With Apple's skill at graphics switching implementations that would just be a recipe for disaster. A complete joke.

 

[HolidaySeason]

They gonna wait till October for IGZO.

Kill MBP and only run rMBP.

dGPU gone. iGPU not as bad as everyone clamored. Only 3% of users impacted. (Enterprise user here won't mean **** to me)

Little thinner.

13" Quad Core

TPM chips re-introduced D I can dream can't I?)

 

[GSPice]

Sorry I thought you are one of those who thinks the 4950/60 even without a dGPU would be more expensive. Yes a dGPU + Iris Pro wouldn't make any sense at all. The Iris Pro chip with edram isn't all that small either and graphics switching is just useless without a big performance delta between the two gpus. At what point would switching be worth it. With Apple's skill at graphics switching implementations that would just be a recipe for disaster. A complete joke.

Yeah I think anyone who reasonably thinks there'll be a dGPU doesn't believe it'd be paired with a 4950HQ