Tests Confirm Apple's Throttling Fix Improves Performance for 2018 MacBook Pro Models [Updated]

[thekeyring]

Just out of interest, are you calling someone who criticised Apple prior to this fix an "Apple Hater"? Because, you know, they paid (or considered paying) a huge amount of money for a laptop that wasn't performing to spec?

Posts like this, and the one you replied to using language like "Apple Hater" and "Apple Defender" or "Fan Boy" are juvenile and degrade this site. In my opinion, there are very few people (as in I can't recall blocking anybody because of it) that could be considered Apple-hating trolls; i.e. appear to be a paid-for Apple-basher who do nothing but attack Apple in baseless ways. Far more often I've found the reverse; those who seem to defend Apple no matter what and use language like "Apple Hater" as if to deny somebody's (or even everybody's) right to express criticism or dissatisfaction. That's my personal opinion from experience anyway; and it's probably to be expected given that it's predominantly Apple users (of which I'm one) who read and post here.

This is a pretty good turnaround time from Apple, as well it should be given the seriousness of the performance issues demonstrated. I tell you what, if I was D2D and paid that much for the laptop that needed to be in a freezer, I wouldn't have been as calm and grounded as he appeared to be on camera!

No, I wasn't replying to anyone specifically, and I'm all for criticising Apple in moments - like this one (pre-software fix) - where Apple deserve criticism. I'm just so tired of the continual anti-Apple bias in the media, and trolls who jump into forums straight away and ruin otherwise constructive criticism.

I'm talking about stories like "Apple Planning to Discontinue iPhone X" which is misleading, when the actual article describes Apple replacing iPhone X in September 2018 with another phone. (Like when they discontinued iPhone 5 after one year.)

Or stories like "Ex-Apple Exec says New Bad Thing About Apple" and it turns out the ex-Apple exec was fired in 1991.

 

[citysnaps]

If you want to plug in a USB-A keyboard and mouse it will only cost you $100 is dongles? Seriously your AppleFanWorship is a little blatant.

Dongles (or adapters in the adult world)?

Last year I purchased two USB-C to USB-A 3.1 cables for $9.99 each. And they work great. This year I could buy them for $7.99.

Easy. And professional.

 

[flat five]

Based on the videos I've seen, I'm still wondering if the advertised turbo speeds can reached on these laptops?

personally, i would imagine they can and will.. (or very close.. say, 4.6 - 4.7GHz with the i9)
all these videos are showing tests that max out all cores so you definitely shouldn't be expecting to see the processors hitting their max turbo speeds under those conditions..

one of the easier ways for someone to max one core would be to enter the following in Terminal.app:

yes > /dev/null &

monitor the frequency with a utility such as Intel Power Gadget.

report back

(just close the Terminal window when you want to stop the process)

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[EDIT] some links for reassurance that the code i posted isn't going to blow up your computer : )

http://osxdaily.com/2012/10/02/stress-test-mac-cpu/

here a link to power gadget:

https://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/intel-power-gadget-20

 

[RumorConsumer]

That's the more knowledgeable Apple users you want to shut up, how orange .

Done : Apple got a laptop working they delivered in a poor state - impressive .

To be done : Magsafe, keyboard fix, more varied and greater number of ports across the line, touchbar models must lose preferential specs and touchbar needs to become fully optional .

Non-soldered harddrives, user upgradable RAM and battery, ditch T2 chips .

Somebody get this man a Zip drive, a SCSI terminator, an ICQ client, an AOL CD ROM with 1000 free hours, and Star Trek with Patrick Stewart.

 

[TechGod]

That's the more knowledgeable Apple users you want to shut up, how orange .

Done : Apple got a laptop working they delivered in a poor state - impressive .

To be done : Magsafe, keyboard fix, more varied and greater number of ports across the line, touchbar models must lose preferential specs and touchbar needs to become fully optional .

Non-soldered harddrives, user upgradable RAM and battery, ditch T2 chips .

No. There is plenty of valid criticism leveled towards Apple like the throttling, keyboard issues, insane pricing, GPU issues that they always have etc.

But there’s a difference between those and calling Apple **** every time.

 

[VictorTango777]

Somebody get this man a Zip drive, a SCSI terminator, an ICQ client, an AOL CD ROM with 1000 free hours, and Star Trek with Patrick Stewart.

Any snide remark about someone holding onto outdated technology can be turned around and made into an equally snide remark about someone who latches onto every new fad because "newer is better". The so-called "fashionista", "futurist", "yuppy" who is walking around in his moon suit and proclaiming every year that cryonics and flying cars will be here next year. So Advantage:zero for both sides.

P.S.: Since we are so into the future, can we all agree that Apple should replace their old, outdated Lightning ports with the newer and therefore better USB-C?

 

[Petetastic]

Somebody get this man a Zip drive, a SCSI terminator, an ICQ client, an AOL CD ROM with 1000 free hours, and Star Trek with Patrick Stewart.

First off, Star Trek with Patrick Stewart was the best.

That said: we do need functioning keyboards; most of the world still uses USB-A drives (including the iPhone’s Lightning cable); I’m sure most people still need dongles or hubs; the touchbar is an expensive addition most people could live without; and MagSafe is important enough to Apple that they still haven’t released the patent which at the very least could save a lot of *other* laptops, wired headphones, and other corded devices. And upgradeability would be pretty sweet.

You don’t have a problem with losing that? Great! Many of the rest of us do. Your patronizing isn’t going to make us want or need these things any less.

 

[clystron]

I agree that base clock speed should be maintained for some time. But once the issue was found and corrected the goal post was moved to having that base clock speed or even turbo boost speeds maintained under all operating conditions. I guess definition of reasonable is subjective to all. I don't see why the cpu should never throttle in minutes to save itself or the system. The cpu is not the only thing that is generating heat when the computer is running task.

I never said there can be no throttling to save the system, I was talking about normal cirumstances with reasonable outside temps and the laptop sitting on a hard and flat surface. Yes there are other heat sources in the system but the cooling-system should be able to handle a workload that focuses on only one of the major heat-sources. I would not expect it to keep up with the CPU and GPU running full blast.

Whats reasonable also depends a lot on what the laptop is marketed for, I expect a mobile workstation to have more headroom and sustained relative performance than an ultrabook and it is OK that it is heavier and bulkier. In my eyes Apple has also positioned the 15" MBP in the mobile workstation segment so the pre-patch behaviour would not have been acceptable for me. It looks much better now but I lack personal experience with the machine.

 

[NT1440]

First off, Star Trek with Patrick Stewart was the best.

That said: we do need functioning keyboards; most of the world still uses USB-A drives (including the iPhone’s Lightning cable); I’m sure most people still need dongles or hubs; the touchbar is an expensive addition most people could live without; and MagSafe is important enough to Apple that they still haven’t released the patent which at the very least could save a lot of *other* laptops, wired headphones, and other corded devices. And upgradeability would be pretty sweet.

You don’t have a problem with losing that? Great! Many of the rest of us do. Your patronizing isn’t going to make us want or need these things any less.

When did you lose wired headphones and how is the touchbar losing anything?

What is nonfunctional about the 2018 keyboard?

 

[Hitrate]

I don't think it was a glitch. I wouldn't call it a band aid fix either though.

For example, 2017 non touchbar 13" MBP on notebook check.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple...017-i5-without-Touch-Bar-Review.234282.0.html

Scroll down to the bottom under Energy Management. Look at the Power consumption, Load Maximum compared to the Dell XPS 13. Obviously Dell put a much lower peak power limit on the CPU than Apple did.

As I said, I believe that Apple has historically & intentionally put in a big power limit to just let the CPU throttle on temperature. There isn't anything sinister about it. Do I think it's a great idea? Not really but it's not horrible either.

I think these 6 core CPUs kinda bit them in the ass on that and they now have to put in a power limit so it doesn't overload the VRM in peak power demand. It isn't necessarily a bad thing, they probably should have been putting in reasonable power limits all along.

Upsizing the VRM wouldn't likely change much really, you can't pull more power in the long term than the CPU cooler can dissipate.

Okay so what you're saying is it's a design error, ie no cpu cooling optimization other than lowering voltage, upping fan speeds etc. all band aids for a physical issue.

 

[Zq7r]

Because showing an actual problem with a new product is 'hating' now.
Geez, I thought the Tesla fanboys are the worst.

The “hating” wasn’t that a bug was identified, it was all the conspiracy theories and bull **** moral indignation that apple crippled the macbook intentionally because they “hate” their users, or that apple was too stupid to understand how heat dissipation works. I don’t understand why people who hate apple so much spend so much of their time on a website devoted to apple.

 

[flat five]

most of the world still uses USB-A drives (including the iPhone’s Lightning cable

hey wait, Lightning is Lightning.. not USB-A


[add]
and Magsafe is surely the worst reviewed product at Apple (i'm guessing)

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that thing is unreliable.. i'll be glad to finally get rid of that one.
(personal feelings based on personal experience.. nothing more)

 

[VictorTango777]

Dongles (or adapters in the adult world)?

Last year I purchased two USB-C to USB-A 3.1 cables for $9.99 each. And they work great. This year I could buy them for $7.99.

Easy. And professional.

4 years ago I purchased the top end 15 inch MacBook Pro Retina for $2499. This year I can buy the equivalent model for $2799.

 

[PickUrPoison]

Quickly acknowledging and fixing a problem is the next best thing after not having a problem

Strangely, it turns out this is not true!

It may seem counter-intuitive, but it’s been shown that a customer who has a problem that is resolved to their satisfaction—especially if the company is perceived to have gone “above and beyond”—is actually a more-satisfied customer than one who never had a problem in the first place! They’ll also relay the story to others, which multiplies the good will that accrues to brands that know how to do customer service well.

 

[JohnnyGo]

I find it absolutely hilarious that so many here think that most people would prefer a laptop 2-3x as thick, in order to possibly get 10% more performance in very specific tasks. No, that's not a tradeoff most people would make or want. One of the strengths of the MBP is its incredible design/thinness/weight, and that has a ton of advantages. For most people (including pros), that's NOT worth sacrificing for a bit more clockspeed. And those that NEED the absolute best performance would go with another machine, like the iMac Pro. Its as if people here pretend to forget that the entire point of a laptop is high portability.

+1

Besides, why not have a cooling pad / elevated workstation to help out with the cooling in office settings to extract a 2-5% gain instead of always lugging the extra weight around?

 

[neutralguy]

Yet Dell still has yet to fix their i9 throttling issues. But no one is going to talk about that, right?

You are right. Because Dell CEO does not harp around saying we are magical!

 

[citysnaps]

4 years ago I purchased the top end 15 inch MacBook Pro Retina for $2499. This year I can buy the equivalent model for $2799.

I'm very happy for you and think you'll be quite pleased with your purchase!

 

[neutralguy]

Well done Apple, but it's very surprising they didn't notice this before.

They did. It's like iOS debacle all over.
[doublepost=1532549867][/doublepost]

I'm very happy for you and think you'll be quite pleased with your purchase!

And we thought with innovations, technology gets cheaper!

 

[artfossil]

Strangely, it turns out this is not true!

It’s counter-intuitive, but it’s been shown that a customer who has a problem that is resolved to their satisfaction—especially if the company is perceived to have gone “above and beyond”—is actually a more-satisfied customer than one who never had a problem in the first place! They’ll also relay the story to others, which multiplies the good will that accrues to brands that know how to do customer service well.

Because the test of a company, for me at least, is not what happens when things go right but what happens when something goes wrong.

 

[JohnnyGo]

This is my take.....

I believe that Apple historically has put in crazy high power limits for the CPUs, to move that limit up out of the way, so that the CPU will only thermally throttle when it needs to.

This works fine as long as your power delivery circuitry is sized to deliver the highest load the CPU could ever draw.

In this case however, an i9 with 6 cores @ full boost can overpower the VRM chip which leads to some nasty throttle behavior instead of the relatively smooth and stable behavior that you typically see with thermal throttling.

So Apple's fix was to put in a power limit for the CPU that keeps its peak draw within the limits of the VRM.

Yeah Apple's explanation is kinda bs but it's not exactly lying either. It's one of those explanations that's technically correct yet not really the full story.

Do you believe a better/upgraded VRM chip would lead to better performance or just less throttling ? others have pointed out that there isn’t any passive cooling system connected to the VRM inside the MBP as a potential mistake (and I tend to agree)

 

[fairuz]

If I had the luxury of purchasing one of these, I'd try to install a double boot with Linux on it just to see how the laptop performs on the Linux platform. Assuming one could get Linux to install (turn off T2 "secure boot" feature), I'm guessing Linux and Windows would have similar performance issues on the new MBP. Might try to see if one of these youtube testers would be interested in trying to install and test a Linux distro.

I installed FreeBSD on my 2012 retina MBP once. It worked, but it had weird installation issues, and I was afraid to keep it running that.
[doublepost=1532550387][/doublepost]

hey wait, Lightning is Lightning.. not USB-A


[add]
and Magsafe is surely the worst reviewed product at Apple (i'm guessing)

View attachment 772746


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that thing is unreliable.. i'll be glad to finally get rid of that one.
(personal feelings based on personal experience.. nothing more)

Nothing was wrong with the MagSafe connection, just the stupid cables. Same with Lightning. I don't get why Apple's cable design is so shoddy.

I like that you can charge Macs from USB-C, but I wish USB-C had a MagSafe-like connection for safety.

 

[JohnnyGo]

Somebody get this man a Zip drive, a SCSI terminator, an ICQ client, an AOL CD ROM with 1000 free hours, and Star Trek with Patrick Stewart.

Don’t forget an old vitrola and a A-track tape

 

[fairuz]

I find it absolutely hilarious that so many here think that most people would prefer a laptop 2-3x as thick, in order to possibly get 10% more performance in very specific tasks.

Also hilarious that those people still complain about it here. Like, haven't they moved onto running Windows/Linux on custom hardware already?

 

[farewelwilliams]

You are right. Because Dell CEO does not harp around saying we are magical!

probably because it's obvious that dell's products are made without much thought.

 

[buststyles]

I never said there can be no throttling to save the system, I was talking about normal cirumstances with reasonable outside temps and the laptop sitting on a hard and flat surface. Yes there are other heat sources in the system but the cooling-system should be able to handle a workload that focuses on only one of the major heat-sources. I would not expect it to keep up with the CPU and GPU running full blast.

Whats reasonable also depends a lot on what the laptop is marketed for, I expect a mobile workstation to have more headroom and sustained relative performance than an ultrabook and it is OK that it is heavier and bulkier. In my eyes Apple has also positioned the 15" MBP in the mobile workstation segment so the pre-patch behaviour would not have been acceptable for me. It looks much better now but I lack personal experience with the machine.

I don't think the MacBook Pros are in the mobile workstation class or ever marketed that way. I remember the Dell ones that out the around the came with a super large duty power supply and was about twice as thick as a regular Dell. Those were right on the edge of what I would call mobile. Pro is Apple's definition of pro being can this machine perform tasks after and better than what ever tier is below in the hardware portfolio.

 

[farewelwilliams]

You seem to be under impression that this fix prevents throttling. It does not. It improves management. In cases that you referenced Dell laptop was running different load from what MBP was subjected to. In the similar tests, as per this article, Dell behaved as good as "fixed" MBP. Gaming laptops did better. The problem for Apple customers here is as follows. XPS is a consumer/lifestyle model. In addition, Dell have gaming laptops (Alienware) and Pro laptops/workstations (Mobile Precision) which have different form factors and much better cooling systems. Apple on the other hand sells only lifestyle models pretending they are professional devices.

No, I fully understand the situation. One of the links show the XPS throttling down to 0.78 Ghz. Tell me how is that behaving "as good as "fixed" MBP"? So far a "fixed" MBP has been maintaining around base clock under 100% load. Your statements are blatantly false.

The Alienware you're talking about also suffer from throttling issues, despite the thicker chassis and heavier cooling solutions. http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...-i9-8950hk-gtx-1080-but-still-like-it.816635/

Care to try again with your statements?
[doublepost=1532551552][/doublepost]

I get that, but seriously who would do serious video work on a battery???? All laptops, when on battery, default to lower speeds to preserve battery life. You can override this but if you are doing serious work that is very taxing you will plug in.

I was being generous with the 2 hour battery life. Dave's review of one of laptops showed 45 minutes under load, and over 1 hour on light use (when CPU runs at lower speeds and video is switched over to integrated graphics).

I use my MacBook to develop apps on battery all the time. I definitely don't get 10 hours of battery life, but the 4-5 hours just barely enough for me.