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cstm

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Original poster
Jul 1, 2012
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How do the new graphics compare to vega? Is there gonna be new "vega" options in three months like last year, or are these new ones comparable to the vega?
 
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Hakiroto

macrumors 6502a
Jul 8, 2011
641
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Good question about the performance. All I know is what I can see on their website:

The AMD Radeon Pro 5000M series delivers the most graphics horsepower ever in a MacBook Pro. The 16-inch MacBook Pro base model is over two times faster than the previous-generation base model, for seamless playback and faster rendering of ultra-high-definition video. And with the optional 8GB of GDDR6 VRAM, you’ll get up to 80 percent faster performance when executing tasks like color grading in DaVinci Resolve compared with the Radeon Pro Vega 20.
 
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donawalt

Contributor
Sep 10, 2015
1,280
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How do the new graphics compare to vega? Is there gonna be new "vega" options in three months like last year, or are these new ones comparable to the vega?

Rene Ritchie said this:

Graphics start with AMD's new 7 nanometer Radeon Pro 5300M with 4GB of GDDR6 memory, and go all the way up to Radeon Pro 5500M with 8GB of GDDR6 memory. They've got 1.5 times more performance per watt and a wider architecture with more compute unites and stream processors.
Apple says that tops out at 80% faster performance than the previous Radeon Verga Pro 20.
 
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leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,494
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Is there gonna be new "vega" options in three months like last year, or are these new ones comparable to the vega?

The 5300M should be comparable to Vega Pro 16 (maybe faster) and 5500M should be faster than Vega Pro 20. It is very unlikely that a new GPU option will pop up any time soon because:

a) These GPUs are very new
b) There is no faster video RAM in the pipeline than what they use

So you can buy with confidence :)
 

SuprUsrStan

macrumors 6502a
Apr 15, 2010
715
1,015
Yeah, the 5500m was announced like last month, just in time for the original purported launch of the 16”. It looks to be faster than the GTX 1650 but slightly behind the 1660. Overall it’s a good upgrade and looks to be a good GPU.
 
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827538

Cancelled
Jul 3, 2013
2,322
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~4.7 TFLOPs single point so the top end card is pretty impressive for a mobile chip.
 

Joker.89

macrumors newbie
Oct 30, 2019
5
0
so could we see 13 or 14 inch with dedicated GPU after all enhancement in 16 inch internals.
 

Thysanoptera

macrumors 6502a
Jun 12, 2018
910
873
Pittsburgh, PA
5500m is 80W chip, unless Apple downclocks it, it should be a little slower than 1660Ti, so anywhere between 40% to double performance of Vega Pro 20 depending on task. Question is cooling, the current 15 inch maxes out at 50W sustained between CPU and GPU.
 

Krevnik

macrumors 601
Sep 8, 2003
4,101
1,312
5500m is 80W chip, unless Apple downclocks it, it should be a little slower than 1660Ti, so anywhere between 40% to double performance of Vega Pro 20 depending on task. Question is cooling, the current 15 inch maxes out at 50W sustained between CPU and GPU.

Apple's claiming an extra 12W sustained handling due to the improved thermal management, supposedly.
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,494
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5500m is 80W chip, unless Apple downclocks it, it should be a little slower than 1660Ti, so anywhere between 40% to double performance of Vega Pro 20 depending on task. Question is cooling, the current 15 inch maxes out at 50W sustained between CPU and GPU.

You can’t compare the 5500M Apple uses to the “standard” 5500M. It’s a different GPU. Apple uses the full Navi 14 chip (where the regular 5500M has two CUs disabled), most likely binned and probably with additional optimizations. It is going to be way more energy-efficient. The GPU is likely much more power efficient than what you think. Vega Pro 20 too was only 50W.

I should get mine by the end of the month and I’ll give it a test run :)
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so could we see 13 or 14 inch with dedicated GPU after all enhancement in 16 inch internals.

Not much point. The integrated GPUs have already caught up with low-end dedicated ones. Next year Intel iGPUs are supposed to get another 2x boost — and we are getting HBM3 that solves the cost issues of its predecessor.
 
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MrGunnyPT

macrumors 65816
Mar 23, 2017
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You can’t compare the 5500M Apple uses to the “standard” 5500M. It’s a different GPU. Apple uses the full Navi 14 chip (where the regular 5500M has two CUs disabled), most likely binned and probably with additional optimizations. It is going to be way more energy-efficient. The GPU is likely much more power efficient than what you think. Vega Pro 20 too was only 50W.

I should get mine by the end of the month and I’ll give it a test run :)
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Not much point. The integrated GPUs have already caught up with low-end dedicated ones. Next year Intel iGPUs are supposed to get another 2x boost — and we are getting HBM3 that solves the cost issues of its predecessor.

Keep us posted please, I’ll waiting to decidé which I go with
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
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Keep us posted please, I’ll waiting to decidé which I go with

I will only be able to test the 5500M unfortunately, so I don't know how much help it will be. Also, it will still take two weeks that I get it. But I promise to write up a report here :)
 

MrGunnyPT

macrumors 65816
Mar 23, 2017
1,313
804
I will only be able to test the 5500M unfortunately, so I don't know how much help it will be. Also, it will still take two weeks that I get it. But I promise to write up a report here :)

I might just go for it so I can play World of Warcraft on holidays without an issue lol
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,494
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I might just go for it so I can play World of Warcraft on holidays without an issue lol

Let me put it like this: I think that 2 more cores, 5500M and 512 extra GB of SSD are a fantastic upgrade for $400. So if you are eyeing the 16" anyway... :D
 
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donawalt

Contributor
Sep 10, 2015
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From Anand:

A much more significant change, however, is on the GPU side of matters. The new laptops continue to use discrete mobile GPUs, and for their new laptop Apple is tapping AMD’s newest Radeon Pro 5300M and Radeon Pro 5500M mobile GPUs. These are based on AMD’s 7nm RDNA architecture, offering significant gains in performance and power efficiency over the Radeon Pro 500 (Polaris) chips that they replace.
AMD Radeon Mobile Specification Comparison​
AMD Radeon Pro 5500M​
AMD Radeon Pro 5300M​
AMD Radeon RX 5500M​
AMD Radeon Vega Pro 20​
CUs
24​
20​
22​
20​
Boost Clock
~1300MHz​
~1250MHz​
1645MHz​
1300MHz​
Throughput (FP32)
4.0 TFLOPs​
3.2 TFLOPs​
4.6 TFLOPs​
3.3 TFLOPs​
Memory Clock
12 Gbps GDDR6​
12? Gbps GDDR6​
14 Gbps GDDR6​
1.5 Gbps HBM2​
Memory Bus Width
128-bit​
128-bit​
128-bit​
1024-bit​
Max VRAM
8GB​
4GB​
4GB​
4GB​
Architecture
RDNA (1)​
RDNA (1)​
RDNA (1)​
Vega
(GCN 5)​
GPU
Navi 14​
Navi 14?​
Navi 14​
Vega 12​
Launch Date
11/2019​
11/2019​
Q4 2019​
10/2018​

As these are Apple-specific SKUs, AMD doesn’t offer a whole lot of details about the new chips, but the specifications are similar to AMD’s Radeon RX 5500M, which was announced last month. Notably, Apple’s Radeon Pro 5500M SKU has 2 more active CUs than the open market Radeon RX 5500M, however overall throughput is lower, as Apple surely running their SKUs at lower TDPs. Joining this is also the Radeon Pro 5300M, which is the base SKU for the new MacBook Pro. On paper, this chip offers around 20% performance than the 5500M. Meanwhile Apple is also segmenting their GPU options by VRAM; while the 5300M comes with just 4GB of GDDR6 memory, the 5500M comes with a rather unique to Apple 8GB of VRAM.
Overall, Apple is claiming that the new GPUs offer a significant improvement in performance over Apple’s previous generation 15-inch laptop. The Radeon Pro 5300M should be 120% faster than the Radeon Pro 555X used in the last-generation base models, while the Radeon Pro 5500M is said to offer 80% more performance than the outgoing Radeon Pro 560X.
 

MrGunnyPT

macrumors 65816
Mar 23, 2017
1,313
804
Let me put it like this: I think that 2 more cores, 5500M and 512 extra GB of SSD are a fantastic upgrade for $400. So if you are eyeing the 16" anyway... :D

I’m coming over from a 13” 2017 TB... It’s a insanely huge upgrade for me especially since I do tons of virtualization while connected to dual 4K displays!

Should I pick the 8GB 5500M? Or 4GB
[automerge]1573674267[/automerge]
From Anand:

A much more significant change, however, is on the GPU side of matters. The new laptops continue to use discrete mobile GPUs, and for their new laptop Apple is tapping AMD’s newest Radeon Pro 5300M and Radeon Pro 5500M mobile GPUs. These are based on AMD’s 7nm RDNA architecture, offering significant gains in performance and power efficiency over the Radeon Pro 500 (Polaris) chips that they replace.

AMD Radeon Mobile Specification Comparison​
AMD Radeon Pro 5500M​
AMD Radeon Pro 5300M​
AMD Radeon RX 5500M​
AMD Radeon Vega Pro 20​
CUs
24​
20​
22​
20​
Boost Clock
~1300MHz​
~1250MHz​
1645MHz​
1300MHz​
Throughput (FP32)
4.0 TFLOPs​
3.2 TFLOPs​
4.6 TFLOPs​
3.3 TFLOPs​
Memory Clock
12 Gbps GDDR6​
12? Gbps GDDR6​
14 Gbps GDDR6​
1.5 Gbps HBM2​
Memory Bus Width
128-bit​
128-bit​
128-bit​
1024-bit​
Max VRAM
8GB​
4GB​
4GB​
4GB​
Architecture
RDNA (1)​
RDNA (1)​
RDNA (1)​
Vega
(GCN 5)​
GPU
Navi 14​
Navi 14?​
Navi 14​
Vega 12​
Launch Date
11/2019​
11/2019​
Q4 2019​
10/2018​
As these are Apple-specific SKUs, AMD doesn’t offer a whole lot of details about the new chips, but the specifications are similar to AMD’s Radeon RX 5500M, which was announced last month. Notably, Apple’s Radeon Pro 5500M SKU has 2 more active CUs than the open market Radeon RX 5500M, however overall throughput is lower, as Apple surely running their SKUs at lower TDPs. Joining this is also the Radeon Pro 5300M, which is the base SKU for the new MacBook Pro. On paper, this chip offers around 20% performance than the 5500M. Meanwhile Apple is also segmenting their GPU options by VRAM; while the 5300M comes with just 4GB of GDDR6 memory, the 5500M comes with a rather unique to Apple 8GB of VRAM.

Overall, Apple is claiming that the new GPUs offer a significant improvement in performance over Apple’s previous generation 15-inch laptop. The Radeon Pro 5300M should be 120% faster than the Radeon Pro 555X used in the last-generation base models, while the Radeon Pro 5500M is said to offer 80% more performance than the outgoing Radeon Pro 560X.

Huge evolution over the 555X.... Insane numbers, Navi delivers on mobile
 

Thysanoptera

macrumors 6502a
Jun 12, 2018
910
873
Pittsburgh, PA
You can’t compare the 5500M Apple uses to the “standard” 5500M. It’s a different GPU. Apple uses the full Navi 14 chip (where the regular 5500M has two CUs disabled), most likely binned and probably with additional optimizations. It is going to be way more energy-efficient. The GPU is likely much more power efficient than what you think. Vega Pro 20 too was only 50W.

I should get mine by the end of the month and I’ll give it a test run :)
You're right, the Pro is downclocked with 24 CU. Some sites are claiming 50W TDP - if that's true I doubt Apple's claim of 80% increase short of some single specific benchmark. Let us know when you get yours, I checked the trade-in value and it came to $1500 for my 2.2/32/2TB 2018 config, I'm not in a rush to get it. The new one maxed out with 64GB and 8TB SSD for $6k is actually not that bad, my Blade 15 with 64GB/9.8TB /RTX2060 was like $3.5k total - but that's 6 core and no battery life to speak of.
 

MrGunnyPT

macrumors 65816
Mar 23, 2017
1,313
804
You're right, the Pro is downclocked with 24 CU. Some sites are claiming 50W TDP - if that's true I doubt Apple's claim of 80% increase short of some single specific benchmark. Let us know when you get yours, I checked the trade-in value and it came to $1500 for my 2.2/32/2TB 2018 config, I'm not in a rush to get it. The new one maxed out with 64GB and 8TB SSD for $6k is actually not that bad, my Blade 15 with 64GB/9.8TB /RTX2060 was like $3.5k total - but that's 6 core and no battery life to speak of.

We need benchmarks to see if the 5500M is a benefit or not
 

Thysanoptera

macrumors 6502a
Jun 12, 2018
910
873
Pittsburgh, PA
We need benchmarks to see if the 5500M is a benefit or not
Totally agree, this time I'm not going to be the first one to get it. There are some leaked ones, Time Spy looks like garbage, most likely drivers, two geekbench opencl scores, one 30k (garbage like the time spy) the other 103k - more realistic.
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,494
19,631
Totally agree, this time I'm not going to be the first one to get it. There are some leaked ones, Time Spy looks like garbage, most likely drivers, two geekbench opencl scores, one 30k (garbage like the time spy) the other 103k - more realistic.

I'd expect the Time Spy to be around 3800. Hope Mat will put up some new windows drivers fast :)
 
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