Intel Announces Full Lineup of Kaby Lake Processors for iMac, MacBook Pro, and More

[Wowereit]

This is the whole problem Intel (and Apple) are facing. If you read a bit more you'll find Intel claims the S-series i7-7700K CPU is 25 percent faster than the i7-4770K. - That's 25% gain in 3 years for the desktop chips. The laptop chips are even worse at 20% improvement. Why would anyone with a working 2013 computer upgrade for that? Processing power increases are grinding to a halt...

25% faster compared to a 3 and a half years old chip.
And that's under ideal conditions, real life is probably more about 10 to 15%.

Remember the good old times when 25% real life gain compared to a chip released 8 months ago was "okay but nothing special"?

 

[ginuz]

Now, this IS stupid... Apple release a long time awaited mbp update, let's say four years since last significant update, and, after less than three months, new processors that promise lot of power more and probably allow more RAM face up with just that little late that could upset almost everyone? congratulations

 

[SamVilde]

And it's why I suggested that a friend of mine wait on replacing her 2009 MBP until Kaby Lake's came out.

If you have a 2009 macbook ... or a 2008 macbook like mine ... waiting is really hard. It sucks when your phone is 1000% more capable than your computer, and the great photos you take with your great phone's new great camera look like crap on your 2008 computer screen.

[I'm not 100% sure I'm waiting for Kaby Lake - just something to improve the battery issue]

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

Kaby Lake does not support LPDDR4.

That's what I keep hearing go this way and that way.

 

[Rayleigh]

If apple knew about this new processors why they adamantly rushed with a previous gen processors!

 

[theluggage]

I don't know what Apple can do for it other than updating it with two year old chips to replace the 4 year old chips it is currently using.

The moral of that story is that they should have updated it 2 years ago... then it wouldn't be so desperately out-of-date now.

Or, just release a tower system built using generic, but top quality parts that could economically be kept up-to-date without needing bespoke circuit boards and fancy heatsinks that made it dependant on Intel and AMD releasing exactly the right chips. 5-10 years ago, it might have cannibalised MacBook/iMac sales - now, mass-market consumers don't want tower systems, so it would just stop power users abandoning the platform or resorting to Hackintoshes.

 

[jscooper22]

Cook needs to remember pro users won't buy Mac "just 'cause." It needs to be better enough to offset the downside of running a system that's less than 10% of the computer market share (I'm guessing at the number, but it's something like that I think). Two year old Mac HW is still preferable to new Win machine IMHO, but not at such a premium $. I'd have been perfectly willing to buy a mini and pro last month even as old as they are, if Apple were willing to drop the price significantly ... and I'd STILL buy a new one when they came out. I don't get what they don't get about that.

 

[TigerWoodsIV]

If you have a 2009 macbook ... or a 2008 macbook like mine ... waiting is really hard. It sucks when your phone is 1000% more capable than your computer, and the great photos you take with your great phone's new great camera look like crap on your 2008 computer screen.

[I'm not 100% sure I'm waiting for Kaby Lake - just something to improve the battery issue]

I had the added fun of not even being able to fit anything else on my 2008 MBP. I had already upgraded to a 250 SSD a few years ago, didn't want to pay for a 500 for a machine that old. I'm enjoying my 2016 so far. Could the battery be better, sure, but I'm enjoying everything else.

 

[jhudgins]

At today's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, Intel formally announced its full lineup of 7th-generation Intel Core processors, known as Kaby Lake. Kaby Lake low-power Y-Series and U-Series processors were announced in late August, but today's unveiling covers notebook and desktop chips that could be destined for many future Apple Macs.

Intel's 7th-generation processors are built on the "14nm+" process, introducing new optimizations compared to previous 14nm Broadwell and Skylake chips.

According to Intel, Kaby Lake will bring "double digit productivity performance increases" of up to 20 percent for gaming notebooks and 25 percent for desktops, compared to 2013 Haswell chips from Intel's prior release cycle. With 4K and 360 degree content, customers can expect up to 65 percent faster performance on notebooks. Enhanced security, a new media engine, and improvements in VR and gaming are all advertised features.

Of the chips announced today, the 28-watt U-Series chips are appropriate for a future 13-inch MacBook Pro update, and we could see the 7267U/7287U/7567U used in 13-inch MacBook Pro machines this year. Those same chips are likely what Apple would use in a Mac mini update, as the Mac mini and the 13-inch MacBook Pro have traditionally included the same chips.

Intel's 45-watt H-Series chips are appropriate for a future 15-inch MacBook Pro update. The 7700HQ would be ideal for entry-level machines, while a mid-tier machine would use the 7820HQ and the top-of-the-line MacBook Pro would use the 7920HQ.

There are multiple potential upgrade options for the 27-inch iMac, but the S-Series desktop chips (7500/7600/7700K) are the straight upgrade path from the current Skylake chips used in 27-inch machines.

For the 21.5-inch iMac, Apple normally uses chips with higher-end integrated graphics, but Intel has not released Kaby Lake chips that are a clear upgrade for the smaller iMac machines. Apple could choose to use Skylake chips instead of Kaby Lake chips for the 21.5-inch iMac, and in that case, would likely adopt the 6585R, 6685R, and 6785R chips, released six months ago.

With today's announcement, Kaby Lake chips that are clear upgrades for the iMac, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini will be available to manufacturers in the near future and will be available for Apple's planned 2017 upgrades. Kaby Lake chips appropriate for future MacBook updates are already available.

Rumors suggest we will see refreshed iMacs in the spring, which is also when we may see new MacBooks, and in the fall, we expect to see Kaby Lake refreshes for the MacBook Pro lineup.

Article Link: Intel Announces Full Lineup of Kaby Lake Processors for iMac, MacBook Pro, and More

So the MBP will get these in March, along with a 32GB memory option.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

.

I see no performance gain. Here's a just released ARS Technica article about Kaby Lake. Disappointing.

Intel has been a huge let-down over the last few years.

Darn those laws of Physics!
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Engineers typically get samples to work with. Sometimes these can be an issues because the production fabs do not have the same level of controls that the engineering fabs do. But, before Apple ships a product they need to ensure that the production chips work as expected with the design.

Right.

And if you think WE'RE all tapping our collective-feet, waiting for Intel to release the next. Gen. of CPUs, think of how Apple's R&D Department feels, having had Engineering Samples of these chips (and the ones one or two generations beyond those!) in their hands (and sitting WORKING in Prototype and Mock-Up designs) for over a YEAR...

 

[Firebrand]

If you have a 2009 macbook ... or a 2008 macbook like mine ... waiting is really hard. It sucks when your phone is 1000% more capable than your computer, and the great photos you take with your great phone's new great camera look like crap on your 2008 computer screen.

[I'm not 100% sure I'm waiting for Kaby Lake - just something to improve the battery issue]

Well, anything you’ll buy sure will be a major improvement.

Battery improvements are tough, knowing that extra fuel doesn’t go unused...
Can’t you simply buy a second battery?

Or try using multiple devices. (go mobile, but do magic desktop style)

 

[b0fh]

So, what's the max RAM supported for LPDDR3? Still 16G? Or 32G or 64G? Couldn't find that information with a couple of quick google searches.

 

[SamVilde]

I had the added fun of not even being able to fit anything else on my 2008 MBP. I had already upgraded to a 250 SSD a few years ago, didn't want to pay for a 500 for a machine that old. I'm enjoying my 2016 so far. Could the battery be better, sure, but I'm enjoying everything else.

I am almost there. I just.
If the battery winds up failing in three years because of this and I get a 3-year life span out of a 2K 2016 computer on the heels of getting a 8-year + lifespan out of a $1400 2008 computer, I'm going to kick myself.

And the 2-year old SSD is still svelte and fast. It's still [hungry, near-desperate] want from me, not actual need.

But something's gonna give. And at that point, what will this period of anguished waiting have served me?
I'm so glad you are enjoying yours.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

True. Apple knows it and was looking for an improved batterij architecture, but that didn't come through. We'll probably see it this year.

Graphic performance, battery and software are, for me, the areas where we are going to see improvement...at least I hope.
In the background with iOS and OS X they are even closer to one os then we'd suspect/dream. Maybe marketing wise the won't converge but in the background they will.

I think Die-Shrinks are going to allow another level of Parallelization as far as CPU cores go, and we'll see hex and octal-core CPUs in about 2 years, and that's how we'll get our next performance gain.

At some point, CPUs will go the way of the GPU, and just support massive parallelization. But unfortunately, compilers, OSes and Developers all have to get on board (no pun) for that to work...

 

[cult hero]

When can we expect a quad core in the 13" and hopefully the Mac mini?

Quad Core 13" is my dream machine. I used to want dGPUs, but with eGPUs working over Thunderbolt 3 (and it's gonna happen more and more this year) I actually don't much care about the GPU anymore. Intel is good enough when I'm not at my desk.

Although, it seems like there would need to be some kind of architecture change for them to go quad in the 13" since thus far, they haven't.

Kaby Lake on the MacBook should mean Thunderbolt 3. I got my wife a used one about a month ago and man... I really love that form factor. It's just... one more port would make a world of difference.

 

[beaker7]

deleted

 

[shokunin]

Now, this IS stupid... Apple release a long time awaited mbp update, let's say four years since last significant update, and, after less than three months, new processors that promise lot of power more and probably allow more RAM face up with just that little late that could upset almost everyone? congratulations

Misinformation again..

Kaby Lake is not providing more power nor more RAM. Apple's insistence on LPDDR4 16gb limitations is still the same with Kaby Lake. The IPC (Instructions per clock) is nearly the same. TDP is a bit better, but the main performance over Skylake is in the GPU with hardware HEVC 4K decoding vs hybrid decoding in Skylake. If you doing lots of 4K HEVC video work, then Kaby Lake will perform better than Skylake's GPU. However, I'm not so sure how that even works or improves the MBP with the AMD dGPU.

Intel Optane looks very promising but it's not even out in mass scale, so that feature of Kaby doesn't really apply.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

God forbid Apple be in sync with the latest chip releases, or at least update their machines in real time instead of waiting for some grand ceremony to update their products.

Spoken like a person who has never developed a high-tech product.
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Apple has been leaving a ton of performance on the table in desktops/workstaions for years.

In moving to Windows, I just replaced a 12 core 2013 Mac Pro with a 2-cpu workstation that runs ~3.5x faster in cinebench.

Given that I do 3D rendering, my workflow just got 3.5x faster.

Have fun with Windows 10, Spyware Edition...

 

[cult hero]

Because mobile chips mean they can make it THINNER!!!!

And consume less power, which for better or worse, is one of their goals.

 

[beaker7]

deleted

 

[pentrix2]

Everybody here is really negative, but I'm a huge Apple fan and regardless if Apple is slow to updating their Macs, Macs are still everyone's preferred desktop machine.

I don't remember ever giving you permission to speak for me. "Everyone", haha

 

[cube]

Zen. PC.

 

[b0fh]

They've been waiting for Intel to get off their a** and release this stuff. No one can design for chips that don't exist yet.

Sheesh!

This is an idiotic argument. They get engineering samples precisely so that they can design for chips that "don't exist yet". They get design documents precisely so that they can design for chips that "don't exist yet".

 

[MarsViolet]

Everybody here is really negative, but I'm a huge Apple fan and regardless if Apple is slow to updating their Macs, Macs are still everyone's preferred desktop machine.

Which explains the Mac’s single-digit marketshare. . . .

 

[caelius]

If the new MacBook with Kaby Lake packs one TB3 port, it could be connected to an eGPU. How awesome would that be!