How Does My 2012 cMBP 15" Compare to a 2015 rMBP 13"?

[Psyfuzz]

Hey guys,

I love my 2012 15" Macbook Pro unibody, and whilst I'm waiting for the rumoured redesign at WWDC before I make any purchasing decisions, the weight of the 15", low-res screen and general size is becoming a bit more of a nuisance for commuting etc. and I was looking to move to a 13" model with my next purchase.

However, how does the performance compare between the two models?

• 4 cores vs 2 seems to be giving my older laptop the edge in total Geekbench scores, how accurate is this in terms of real-life performance? a noticeable impact?
• How does the graphic performance compare? the latest modern-iGPUs on the 13 inch Pros versus my GT650M dGPU unit and HD Graphics 4000 iGPU.
• I've upgraded my hard drive to SSD so will Apple's latest flash storage for the MBPs offer a noticeably faster experience than I'm currently experiencing?

Cheers guys, just trying to gauge whether it's worth the upgrade cost on a performance level - or whether I'm inherently heading for a downgrade in performance by going for the smaller Pro.

 

[JTToft]

In terms of total raw CPU power, the 2012 will run circles around the 2015. How much that will show in usage depends on a lot of things.

 

[duervo]

For CPU, it really depends highly on the apps you will be using. If they are SMP aware, they will benefit from additional CPU threads. Otherwise, I think it would be pretty much a draw on the CPU power, but power efficiency is another matter. I think you will see some decent gains in battery life as a result.

RAM has lower latency since it's soldered. Arguable if you would notice a real world diff based on that alone.

SSD is PCIe-based vs SATA III in your existing unit. This will be the cause of most of the performance diff, and it will be significant IMO.

Of course, then there is the Retina display.

 

[Psyfuzz]

For CPU, it really depends highly on the apps you will be using. If they are SMP aware, they will benefit from additional CPU threads. Otherwise, I think it would be pretty much a draw on the CPU power, but power efficiency is another matter. I think you will see some decent gains in battery life as a result.

RAM has lower latency since it's soldered. Arguable if you would notice a real world diff based on that alone.

SSD is PCIe-based vs SATA III in your existing unit. This will be the cause of most of the performance diff, and it will be significant IMO.

Of course, then there is the Retina display.

Sounds like a decent upgrade, I do a lot of soundtracking so having a device that can keep up with my DAW demands is a priority - that said the only dramatically CPU intensive scenarios tend to be when exporting projects so I could see the differences in those circumstances.