Thank you for the detailed info. Unfortunately, Apple just removed the non-retina! My wife plans to lightly game on it, so I doubt that we will push it too hard...
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New 15-inch MacBook Pro and 27-inch iMac Expected to Launch This Wednesday
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Thank you for the detailed info. Unfortunately, Apple just removed the non-retina! My wife plans to lightly game on it, so I doubt that we will push it too hard...
The 680MX has all the SMD cores turned on (1536) like the 780M. The 680MX is literally an under clocked desktop GTX 680, which is why the 780M isn't all that much of an upgrade over it - it's the same chip with the same number of cores and the same memory bandwidth. The only improvement the 780 offers is a higher base clock (820 vs 720).
The 775 has fewer cores and a slower memory clock than the 680MX, although the base clock is higher.
If you run the 680 with a mild overclock you essentially have a 780M, just with half the VRAM.
Given the performance of it at stock clocks, though, you don't really need to. It's a bit of a beast, even today - a full Kepler chip (all cores, full speed memory) that runs at 122 Watts. It's a gem.
Not sure if you saw my reply on the other thread. You should still be able to pick up the dropped high spec, non-retina model in Best Buy/any retail store that isn't apple themselves. Sure you won't be able to upgrade it, but you won't have to pay extra for retina.
Don't give up hope! If you really want a non-retina, I bet they will show up on the refurb store for some time to come.
Well, the situation should be pretty clear now. Intel not releasing any updates to the status of Broadwell H and Apple not updating the CPU, while they could wait another two months for Broadwell H
There will never be Broadwell H!
Intel is going to skip Broadwell-H and deliver Skylake-H in the mid future instead, and my guess is a Late-2015 Skylake lineup. If Apple wants to push USB C, they have to deliver all their products with it. And Apple can't afford the MBP 13'' to be superior to the 15'' model (1866mhz-RAM). Thus, Apple will rush to Skylake, with a slightly redesigned chassis.
Then, there's the question to why Apple waited a month before refreshing the 15'' model. It could be production scaling issues for the rMB, or the dGPUs from AMD not ready, or Intel communicating that Broadwell-H isn't happening.
There will never be Broadwell H!
Intel is going to skip Broadwell-H and deliver Skylake-H in the mid future instead, and my guess is a Late-2015 Skylake lineup. If Apple wants to push USB C, they have to deliver all their products with it. And Apple can't afford the MBP 13'' to be superior to the 15'' model (1866mhz-RAM). Thus, Apple will rush to Skylake, with a slightly redesigned chassis.
Then, there's the question to why Apple waited a month before refreshing the 15'' model. It could be production scaling issues for the rMB, or the dGPUs from AMD not ready, or Intel communicating that Broadwell-H isn't happening.
There is no need to call. The Apple web site clearly says "fourth generation."
I think the 775M and 680M benchmark approximately the same and the 780M a bit higher which is interesting considering the less cores etc.
Edit: http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-775M.102532.0.html
Yes that's bacause the rollout of a processor generation takes about a year or longer.
Some people on this thread think, that once the first skylake processors come out, all of them will magically be available
You are right, there were some others that had iris pro last year before the 15MBP came out.
I am interested in what you say about the 28W chips, I believe you,
but can you show me some source that shows they perform worse or have less battery life than 15W + 840M
You were right. I still find it inexplicable why Apple didn't do this at the same time they introduced the 13" Broadwell MBP. Why wait until now? Maybe to clear inventory.
I think Apple usually does these interactive upgrades, no? The SSD and the higher end's AMD graphics are decent iterative upgrades. Waiting for Skylake to give it 12+ hrs of battery life.
It is puzzling. There is also the question of what I think was a silent refresh on the SSD in the 11" MBA, which reportedly got the same 4-channel PCIe upgrade that the 13" MBA and 13" rMBP got. Odd product management by Apple.
You're wrong. Apple waited a year to release a new iPad mini that was exactly like the last save for the Touch ID. Same situation (besides the fact it's the Force Touch with 15 Retina)
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Good point. But my Retina notebook arrived today and is way faster than my old 13" MacBook Pro from 2012... No regrets!
New model with force touch yes, but I didn't get the model with dedicated graphics.
You're trying to compare an IGP with a DGP, two GPUs designed for completely different scenarios? My point is that Intel GPUs are quite good for what they are: Low-power GPUs. Even an Nvidia IGP, if they still made those, wouldn't be that much faster than the Intel ones, if at all, based on the explosive performance increases Intel has shown. I believe AMD creates IGPs for their CPUs. That would be a fairer comparison.
Have fun.
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The necessary Haswell chips did not come out. Maybe they were holding out hope it would come out later. The fault lies with Intel.
At low load if display and everything else was the same the battery life would be similar as the 840M would be disabled.
Under full load they would again need about equal power.
Yet under normal medium load the 840M gets a lot more work done with the same power level. The 840M/940M get close to twice the performance of a 5100/6100 Iris chip.
Under medium load the 15W CPU + X40M combination will need less power to do the same work.
Under full load you get twice the performance for the same power budget.
Under low load you are running just on a smaller intel gpu with a cpu that keeps itself to 15W so if anything it will last a little longer.
Given that Turbo clocks aren't that far apart the only real advantage is sustained cpu performance with the Iris chip as the cpu can clock for longer at high clocks. And the saved logic board space.
Asus and Acer got notebooks that come with either but the Iris versions are the more expensive ones.
Acer Iris
Acer dGPU
Asus Iris
Asus dGPU
Asus dGPU Broadwell
They both got the high quality panels in the Iris model, ergo they aren't perfectly equal. The Asus are the most similar. But they are fairly similar.
At the end a 840M/940M + the 15W GPU just makes the better package and it is the cheaper model. Yes you get the panel upgrades and all but that is because the cpu is so expensive it has to come in the expensive package. Anyway the new zenbooks are Core-M like the Macbook so there isn't even a Broadwell version and there probably won't be one. Those chips are only used by Apple now. The two linked ones above are also the only non Apple Iris notebooks I can find, along with their respective business class versions. So 4 all in all.
Form what I understand Crystalwell is Haswell with Iris Pro graphics. It's really just the name of extra L4 cache which standard Iris does not have.
I am aware of all the notebooks you pointed out, I have used both of the Asus models.
However, I am still confused about power consumption. You describe at full load that the 15W + 840M use the same amount of power as iris.
But I do not understand, if the 840M uses about 30W. Then it would use about 15W + 30W at full load. so 45W which is 60% more than 28W.
Or am I missing something here.