Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Waiting for Broadwell MBP Thread

AAtte said:
Do you think Iris Pro Broadwell (6200) will be powerful enough to run games like Assassin's Creed Blag Flag and the forth coming Assassin's Creed games? That game series is the only one important to me. Of course a little Battlefield 4 now and then wouldn't hurt me... Or should I buy the 15'' Retina 750M model now? I would love the battery life upgrade that comes with Broadwell. Maybe 10 hours? Even the current model does 9 hours, even though Apple says 8 hours. That is the only reason I'm thinking of this.

So.. Thoughts. And knowledge, if there are.. :)
Click to expand...

If the new Iris Pro hits the +40% improvement promised it should provide similar fps to a 750m. The 850m will produce higher fps.

Assasins Creed Black Flag: iris Pro Haswell
14.8 fps high details 1366 x 768 : So + 40% = 20.72 fps(750m= 23.4 fps)(850m = 32.8 fps)
28.5 fps med details 1366 x 768 : So + 40% = 39.90 fps(750m= 38.1 fps)(850m = 47.2 fps)
 
So, it seems like it is best to wait for the Broadwell Iris Pro 6200 and the better battery life. It would be stupid to take the one with dGPU and worse battery life. Discrete GPU starts to sound a little antique-ish. Or then hunt a used deal for the 850M.
 
AAtte said:
Discrete GPU starts to sound a little antique-ish. .
Click to expand...

I don't think dGPU can be described as antique-ish until the iGPU is at least on par. dGPU still crushes iGPU in performance.

At the mo Intel iGPU looks to be about 1 generation behind. Intel are getting 40% jumps per gen nVidia are getting 50%. Looking at the nVidia roadmap, for Intel to win at some point they have to pull off a 100%+ performance improvement to get level performance with current gen Nvidia dGPU.

(not to mention all the bells and whistles you get with nVidia:
g-sync
stereo 3d
multimonitor gaming
geforce-experience
extra performance on driver updates
.....
)
 
I understand that. But reading things like ''use gfxcardstatus to decide which card to use to not lose too much battery'' sounds a little weird. I think it is enough if the iGPU 6 months from this day is on par with the dGPU that you would buy today.
 
whitedragon101 said:
I really don't think we have to worry about iGPU only for all models. Apple have already made the decision with Haswell and Kepler. We know the numbers for then and we know the numbers now.

Last time:
Haswell iris Pro vs Kepler 750m
The 750m had 25%-75% better performance in 3D games
Apple chose to use a 750m

This time:
Broadwell iris Pro vs Maxwell 850m
iris Pro performance could be up to +40% over Haswell Iris Pro
850m performance is already benchmarked at +75% over 750m
850m has lower heat and power consumption than 750m
Apple will choose? (odds stacked even more towards dGPU than last time)
Click to expand...

The implicit premise here is that Apple care only about relative performance, which I don't believe at all. Absolute performance is more important. The question is whether or not Intel's integrated GPU is fast enough. If the iGPU is fast enough, then it doesn't much matter how much faster a discrete GPU would be.
 
mcarling said:
The implicit premise here is that Apple care only about relative performance, which I don't believe at all. Absolute performance is more important. The question is whether or not Intel's integrated GPU is fast enough. If the iGPU is fast enough, then it doesn't much matter how much faster a discrete GPU would be.
Click to expand...

Fast enough for what? and how fast is fast enough?
 
I would be very happy buyer if the new Iris Pro would be running BF4 at 1080p with medium, which would be good enough, for an integrated graphics 2014. I think the current one does that well at 720p.
 
thinking about buying my first Macbook Pro, coming from Windows.
I had my eyes on the rMBP 13" but considering it's from October '13 I'm skeptical buying a machine that's rather old. Do you think a refresh of the rMBP is possible before October?
Do you think the changes are gonna be so dramatic that it's wise to wait? I don't need the Mac for gaming at all, I still have a Windows desktop PC for that.
 
Between now and the end of the year there may be a minor speed increase. Broadwell is only really expected at the beginning of 2015.


Barney
 
Quu said:
As fast as Apple determines obviously. We do not have insight into what they consider good enough.
Click to expand...

Thank you, that was rather my point. We don't know what they consider fast enough. But we do know last time they had Iris Pro vs dGPU they thought Iris Pro was not 'fast enough.'

McCarling has taken a stab at what he thinks fast enough is :

mcarling said:
Fast enough to support the MBP's Retina display plus an external 4K display. Anything faster than that is superfluous for 99% of users and drives up the cost with no benefit.
Click to expand...

I think Apple showed their commitment to dGPU last refresh. There were conversations just like this. Will they use Iris Pro and kill dGPU or will it be the non Iris Pro CPU and a dGPU? Everyone was fully on the no dGPU bandwagon and discounted both (dGPU+iPro) as an option as it did sound crazy. Apple put in both. Three paths :

Iris Pro = poor
Iris + dGPU = good
Iris Pro + dGPU = awesome and never going to happen

Apple chose number 3
 
I wonder if the 10.10 announcements hint at something touch-screeny. The reason are the new "write on stuff" features, that allow you to draw e.g. on pdfs or on pictures that you attach to emails.
It is nice and fine to use the touchpad for this, but it would make even more sense with a touch-screen enabled device. Maybe not the MBP, but the retina Air or whatever the rumoured new device will be could have such abilities.
 
whitedragon101 said:
If the new Iris Pro hits the +40% improvement promised it should provide similar fps to a 750m. The 850m will produce higher fps.

Assasins Creed Black Flag: iris Pro Haswell
14.8 fps high details 1366 x 768 : So + 40% = 20.72 fps(750m= 23.4 fps)(850m = 32.8 fps)
28.5 fps med details 1366 x 768 : So + 40% = 39.90 fps(750m= 38.1 fps)(850m = 47.2 fps)
Click to expand...

Even if it has a 40% improvement, it will still throttle and will have worse drivers than the 750M.

----------
AAtte said:
I understand that. But reading things like ''use gfxcardstatus to decide which card to use to not lose too much battery'' sounds a little weird. I think it is enough if the iGPU 6 months from this day is on par with the dGPU that you would buy today.
Click to expand...

850M is out today and other manufacturers are using it in computers. Apple just hasn't upgraded their laptops with it yet. That makes the dgpu competition even wider.
 
whitedragon101 said:
I think Apple showed their commitment to dGPU last refresh. There were conversations just like this. Will they use Iris Pro and kill dGPU or will it be the non Iris Pro CPU and a dGPU? Everyone was fully on the no dGPU bandwagon and discounted both (dGPU+iPro) as an option as it did sound crazy. Apple put in both. Three paths :

Iris Pro = poor
Iris + dGPU = good
Iris Pro + dGPU = awesome and never going to happen

Apple chose number 3
Click to expand...

That's not at all what happened. There was a whole range of opinions here from Apple will put discrete GPUs in all MBPs, some MBPs, and no MBPs. Apple chose to reduce the range of MBP models with a discrete GPU. Now all 13" and most 15" rMBPs are sold without a discrete GPU. That is a continuation of a trend that started several years ago.
 
62fd87ca-76ec-4d21-8405-62375299b36d.jpg


Have you guys seen this yet? It looks like the Boadwell U-Processors coming out sometime in Q3, so perhaps we'll have new rMBPs before Christmas.

Source:http://hexus.net/tech/news/cpu/70961-intel-roadmap-leak-broadwell-k-cpus-arrive-early-2015/
 
if skylake stays on schedule, its due for release in 2q 2015, with product soon afterwards.....

if this is true, the broadwell mpb would be quite short lived...seems a bit of a downer if true
 
Freyqq said:
850M is out today and other manufacturers are using it in computers. Apple just hasn't upgraded their laptops with it yet. That makes the dgpu competition even wider.
Click to expand...

The 28nm version is out today. The version Apple would use is going to be based on the new 20nm process from TSMC which is on track for this year...

I doubt Apple is ready to drop their dGPU yet for the top end rMBP's. There's limits to how good Intel's integrated solution can get. They won't opt for dedicated VRAM so memory bandwidth which is really important to 3D gaming will always be limited by that. Adding more and more cores/pipelines/shaders etc isn't an option beyond a certain point as it means bigger and bigger chips which means less per wafer which means bigger cost. That just leaves architecture which can only be improved so much and in so many ways.

In essence Intel is going to have a harder and harder job to improve iGPU performance. Personally I think Apple should continue offering both iGPU and iGPU + dGPU that way consumers can decide based on their needs.

Also the 750M is pretty dam good as a chip, can happily play BF4, CoH2 etc. I'm looking forward to the 850M - 50% boost to performance with no increase to power consumption. Couple that with Broadwell chips consuming 30% less power and it's a compelling upgrade, especially for gaming.

Only other improvements I can realistically imagine Apple including are a 1080P FaceTime Camera (finally), well that's it really.

----------
thebrobrah said:
if skylake stays on schedule, its due for release in 2q 2015, with product soon afterwards.....

if this is true, the broadwell mpb would be quite short lived...seems a bit of a downer if true
Click to expand...

It won't be released in Q2, whenever the previous generation is delayed it pushes everything back. Intel is so far ahead of AMD it has no real reason to compete and by rushing out its Skylake chips it will only eat into their own profit margins. My guess Broadwell Q4 '14 and Skylake Q4 '15.
 
I'm currently trying to decide if it's worth waiting for the refresh or just get the current one. Realistically the refresh probably won't make much real difference, but the problem is the what if. What if it's bigger than we think.

I don't need a laptop yet, but I know I will soon, so I'll keep on waiting, but I know the need is coming soon, and I lose my university discount soon.
 
thebrobrah said:
if skylake stays on schedule, its due for release in 2q 2015, with product soon afterwards.....

if this is true, the broadwell mpb would be quite short lived...seems a bit of a downer if true
Click to expand...

Bet Skylake gets set back.
 
So here's a thought. If the iMacs are supposedly getting a minor spec bump next week, any chance this could indicate the same is planned for the mbp's. If not soon then at least in the fall?
 
gnrredphoenix said:
So here's a thought. If the iMacs are supposedly getting a minor spec bump next week, any chance this could indicate the same is planned for the mbp's. If not soon then at least in the fall?
Click to expand...

The iMac uses desktop processors and Intel just released a bunch of new ones and a new desktop chipset.

There is no refresh like that for laptops available so sadly we cannot extrapolate the iMac refresh timing to anything.

It's the same with the Mac Pro, this uses another architecture different to the one the iMac and the Laptops use so this too cannot be used to indicate anything in the other product lines.

Intel has currently three major CPU sockets that get new processors at completely different times, sometimes refreshes that are years apart. Those sockets are LGA 2011 (Mac Pro) LGA 1150 (iMac) and PGA 946 (Notebooks).

To give you some idea of what is going on with time frames, the LGA 2011 socket came out about three years ago with Sandy Bridge. It only just received Ivy Bridge processors about 6 months ago.

So by the time that LGA 2011 had an Ivy Bridge processor, 1150 (iMacs) already had Haswell. Right now LGA 2011 is still on Ivy Bridge and LGA 1150 has moved on to "Devils Canyon" aka Haswell v2. There is like a year or more of lag between processor architectures just from these two desktop platforms let alone Desktop to Mobile.

Hopefully we'll see Broadwell on the notebook side before the end of this year but it's really up in the air right now about whether that happens or if Intel will do a slight bump to Haswell and do a mobile Haswell v2 like they've done on the desktop side.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back