Waiting for gen 2 of rMB?

[Fuzzball84]

Food for thought - I'd argue that the 2008 MBA didn't really get perfected until 2013, and even significant improvements took two (IIRC) revisions after the 2008 introduction.

Yeah, looking back at the models... I think it was Haswell in the 2013 refresh (I bought a 2014 11 inch air) that made me want it, due to the combined performance and battery life... thats where I think it really took off in terms of setting the standard for a portable road warrior device.

If only they had put a slightly better screen in it during the past few years, it didn't even have to be retina lol

 

[KPOM]

You make it sound like these things take forever. They don't. Certainly on a store machine all of that is done.

A store machine could be running a demo and have a browser with 50 tabs open, as well.

I've used the MacBook, and came from a 13" rMBP. I can certainly tell it is slower, but for the light usage the original poster was describing, it should be fine.

 

[Fuzzball84]

A store machine could be running a demo and have a browser with 50 tabs open, as well.

I've used the MacBook, and came from a 13" rMBP. I can certainly tell it is slower, but for the light usage the original poster was describing, it should be fine.

Whenever Ive tested new machines in a store I make sure to reboot them and then hang around a short while, so that background tasks on startup shouldn't be an issue affecting performance. Then i play around to see what its performance is like. Like starting with a clean slate, as much as possible...

N.B. I wouldn't do that in a place thats too busy, can be a little anti-social if you have a line of people wanting to check out the device lol

 

[iRun26.2]

Food for thought - I'd argue that the 2008 MBA didn't really get perfected until 2013, and even significant improvements took two (IIRC) revisions after the 2008 introduction.

And it still didn't a retina display.

 

[Axeros]

Waiting for Skylake

Whilst the rMP design is highly seductive, I'm not yet persuaded.

I have a MBP and a Mac Mini, both with 16 GB memory. I'm waiting for the v.2 of the rMB. My reasons are as follows:-

- Performance/RAM: if the rMP is even slightly slow when running Yosemite, I'm concerned about how it will deal with subsequent OS X releases. I've been running OS X since Snow Leopard, and every new version is more resource hungry. If the rMP is struggling at all right now, how will it be in a couple of releases? My 2011/2012 model Macs have survived in part because could be upgraded, e.g. to 16GB RAM.

- MagSafe: I'm disappointed that the rMP doesn't have Magsafe. Magsafe is an elegant design solution to a real world problem. Even this week my Magsafe connector has saved me a couple of times. Anyone who's had older laptops, knows how easy it is to damage the power connector. Why would Apple suddenly do an about turn here? One possible idea, below...

- Thunderbolt: I would like to connect the rMP to my Thunderbolt monitor - it's a definite minus not being able to do this.

- Skylake: Intel is reported to be moving extremely fast with the Skylake tock - e.g. see

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylake_(microarchitecture)

"An unusual feature of Skylake's release timing is that it follows very closely on the release of its predecessor, Broadwell, which had suffered from launch delays.[30] Intel commented in 2014 that moving from 22 nm (Haswell) to 14 nm (Broadwell) had been "their most difficult process to develop yet", causing Broadwell's planned launch to slip by several months;[31] yet, the 14 nm production was back on track and in full production as of Q3 2014.§

If this is the case, we could see a Skylake rMP much sooner than expected.

- More speculatively: Skylake is reported to bring Thunderbolt and wireless charging support for mobile processors.
- IF either of these made it into a rMP 2.1 then it would be far more interesting. A one port rMP with wireless charging would make sense: but I don't see how this will work with the metal case.

So after much consideration, what I really want is an 11" rMBA with 16GB memory (MagSafe and Thunderbolt included).

 

[newellj]

Yeah, looking back at the models... I think it was Haswell in the 2013 refresh (I bought a 2014 11 inch air) that made me want it, due to the combined performance and battery life... thats where I think it really took off in terms of setting the standard for a portable road warrior device.

If only they had put a slightly better screen in it during the past few years, it didn't even have to be retina lol

I completely agree, but I'm not running Apple...

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A store machine could be running a demo and have a browser with 50 tabs open, as well.

I've used the MacBook, and came from a 13" rMBP. I can certainly tell it is slower, but for the light usage the original poster was describing, it should be fine.

Or it could have had someone like one of us here go by and change a bunch settings. Maybe you guys don't do that, but I do, and I don't always get a chance to undo everything when I'm done.

 

[dexterbell]

I know this will be a contentious issue...

I decided against buying the rMB last night... I have tried a few rMB in Apple and BB stores to make my mind up... I am going to stick with my 11 inch 2014 air and Pro and wait for gen 2 of the rMB...

Im sold on the size, screen, keyboard, trackpad etc even the ports, I think its fine given its intended usage model

Im not sold on the general performance (and I mean for web browsing, word, excel etc... light use)

What hit me is that when i went over to the Surface 3 and played about for a few minutes I instantly realized how laggy the UI is with the rMB (even with latest updates). The Surface 3 was fluid and responsive in its use for general interaction including web browsing, documents, window resizing, scrolling etc and the machine was still cool. Every rMB I have used starts to warm up significantly with the lightest of interaction.

This is just my 2 cents... what are other peoples opinions? anyone else decided to wait out for the second rMB? or see what happens of the rMBP?

The Surface 3 has a much lower resolution display, a junk plastic keyboard you have to pay an extra $130 for, a garbage plastic trackpad made for kids sized fingers and the display is tiny, hardly bigger than my iPad Air 2. No thanks. Have fun with it though, bye! I'll keep my MacBook and then sell it when the next gen comes out and buy that one

 

[Fuzzball84]

The Surface 3 has a much lower resolution display, a junk plastic keyboard you have to pay an extra $130 for, a garbage plastic trackpad made for kids sized fingers and the display is tiny, hardly bigger than my iPad Air 2. No thanks. Have fun with it though, bye! I'll keep my MacBook and then sell it when the next gen comes out and buy that one

Fair enough

I didn't actually buy the Surface 3, it was just a comparison... its not available until the start of May if anyone is interested... it as an interesting although quite different alternative. I think its well worth a look in, especially for those people looking for a device around the $500 mark.

I did, however, own a Surface 3 Pro last year but I sold it in favor for a Macbook Air 11 inch... the keyboard on the Mac and battery life plus performance was just ideal for my usage of office and web browsing...

I think one of the aspects the rMB has over the surface is that its keyboard appears to be much more comfortable (for such a small device) to type on for long periods...

 

[dexterbell]

Fair enough it as an interesting although quite different alternative. I think its well worth a look in, especially for those people looking for a device around the $500 mark.

Add on another $130 for that awful keyboard and tax and you are looking at more like $700, and you only get 64GB storage and 2GB RAM. Ripoff for $700

 

[Fuzzball84]

Add on another $130 for that awful keyboard and tax and you are looking at more like $700, and you only get 64GB storage and 2GB RAM. Ripoff for $700

You can add on all sorts of costs far various devices depending on your specific needs... with the rMB after tax and a dongle or two... the cost also increases

But some people may be well provided by other portable alternatives... with the surface 3 there is the possibility of connecting a keyboard and mouse you already own etc... ok, it won't be as nice looking as the rMB but it is an alternative. I personally like the Surface series (Surface Pro 3 and Surface 3) in addition to the rMB lol

 

[MacBoook160]

Food for thought - I'd argue that the 2008 MBA didn't really get perfected until 2013, and even significant improvements took two (IIRC) revisions after the 2008 introduction.

Good point.

 

[Superfuture48]

I've ordered a 1.3ghz, 500gb in SG. Total is a little over $1900 including tax.

I'm looking to upgrade to the 2nd gen once it comes out if it's a big improvement performance wise.

How big of a jump will Skylake have in terms of performance in regards to the 2nd gen rMB. It's all speculation but I'd like to hear best guesses.

Also, would I still be able to get half of what I paid for if I decide to sell my rMB once the 2nd gen comes out?

 

[Miltz]

Ill let you know tomorrow when mine comes. Im gonna wipe it and do a fresh install then write a 12 page assignment on it.

why are you doing to wipe a new macbook and do a fresh install?

 

[Fuzzball84]

I've ordered a 1.3ghz, 500gb in SG. Total is a little over $1900 including tax.

I'm looking to upgrade to the 2nd gen once it comes out if it's a big improvement performance wise.

How big of a jump will Skylake have in terms of performance in regards to the 2nd gen rMB. It's all speculation but I'd like to hear best guesses.

Also, would I still be able to get half of what I paid for if I decide to sell my rMB once the 2nd gen comes out?

My guess is that a skylake update of the rMP will provide a small but significant boost to performance while driving down the heat produced by the CPU to a significant extent. It would appear driving down the heat produced by tablet and small form factor ultrabooks is a major aim of the new architecture together with wireless and other connectivity options.

More significantly and probably what everyone would want (in terms of optimizing the UI experience) is an updated GPU (and optimized drivers) to sort out any graphics issues for the retina screens of future notebooks of this class.

----------

I've ordered a 1.3ghz, 500gb in SG. Total is a little over $1900 including tax.

I'm looking to upgrade to the 2nd gen once it comes out if it's a big improvement performance wise.

How big of a jump will Skylake have in terms of performance in regards to the 2nd gen rMB. It's all speculation but I'd like to hear best guesses.

Also, would I still be able to get half of what I paid for if I decide to sell my rMB once the 2nd gen comes out?

I can't really say what you might expect to get back if you sell in the future, it would depend on the market and how the next generation of devices perform against this generation.

I will say this, Apple products are better than most at holding value...

I would say that Skylake verses Broadwell may be like what Haswell was to Ivy Bridge in terms of vast improvements to power consumption and battery life.

 

[dexterbell]

How big of a jump will Skylake have in terms of performance in regards to the 2nd gen rMB. It's all speculation but I'd like to hear best guesses.

Also, would I still be able to get half of what I paid for if I decide to sell my rMB once the 2nd gen comes out?

Its a "tock" update so it will bring increased CPU/GPU performance. Of course you can still get half of what you paid for your MacBook lol. People are still getting well over half what they paid for 5 year old MacBooks.

 

[Superfuture48]

Its a "tock" update so it will bring increased CPU/GPU performance. Of course you can still get half of what you paid for your MacBook lol. People are still getting well over half what they paid for 5 year old MacBooks.

I apologize but I'm a layman in regards to anything techie with computers. What do you mean tock update?

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My guess is that a skylake update of the rMP will provide a small but significant boost to performance while driving down the heat produced by the CPU to a significant extent. It would appear driving down the heat produced by tablet and small form factor ultrabooks is a major aim of the new architecture together with wireless and other connectivity options.

More significantly and probably what everyone would want (in terms of optimizing the UI experience) is an updated GPU (and optimized drivers) to sort out any graphics issues for the retina screens of future notebooks of this class.

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I can't really say what you might expect to get back if you sell in the future, it would depend on the market and how the next generation of devices perform against this generation.

I will say this, Apple products are better than most at holding value...

I would say that Skylake verses Broadwell may be like what Haswell was to Ivy Bridge in terms of vast improvements to power consumption and battery life.

Thanks for the great info. I'm moving from a 2011 11" MBA. I hope it's not a downgrade in performance.

 

[dexterbell]

I apologize but I'm a layman in regards to anything techie with computers. What do you mean tock update?

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/silicon-innovations/intel-tick-tock-model-general.html

 

[PDFierro]

The Surface 3 has a much lower resolution display, a junk plastic keyboard you have to pay an extra $130 for, a garbage plastic trackpad made for kids sized fingers and the display is tiny, hardly bigger than my iPad Air 2. No thanks. Have fun with it though, bye! I'll keep my MacBook and then sell it when the next gen comes out and buy that one

Good points. I'll add another: some of us can't even begin to consider a Surface. Not only do I hate hybrid devices like that, but I'm tied to OS X. About 75 percent of my apps are exclusive to OS X. So I can't just go consider a Surface or a Windows laptop such as the new Dell one.

 

[Superfuture48]

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/silicon-innovations/intel-tick-tock-model-general.html

Thanks, I'm glad I'll still be able to resell the rMB when the 2nd gen comes out. I didn't know the resale value was that high.

 

[PDFierro]

Thanks, I'm glad I'll still be able to resell the rMB when the 2nd gen comes out. I didn't know the resale value was that high.

Macs hold their value very well. You can usually sell on eBay and not lose much.

 

[magbarn]

My guess is that a skylake update of the rMP will provide a small but significant boost to performance while driving down the heat produced by the CPU to a significant extent. It would appear driving down the heat produced by tablet and small form factor ultrabooks is a major aim of the new architecture together with wireless and other connectivity options.

More significantly and probably what everyone would want (in terms of optimizing the UI experience) is an updated GPU (and optimized drivers) to sort out any graphics issues for the retina screens of future notebooks of this class.

----------



I can't really say what you might expect to get back if you sell in the future, it would depend on the market and how the next generation of devices perform against this generation.

I will say this, Apple products are better than most at holding value...

I would say that Skylake verses Broadwell may be like what Haswell was to Ivy Bridge in terms of vast improvements to power consumption and battery life.

I'll be surprised if skylake makes a big improvement in power use/heat as it's built on the same 14nm process as broadwell. Usually the biggest reduction in power/heat comes with a new process. Broadwell to Skylake is nowhere near the upgrade we got from going from P4 to C2D. Haswell's biggest improvement over Ivy Bridge was the 'free' screen refresh which allowed the cpu/gpu to sleep much more than previously.

 

[flur]

The 2016 redesigned MacBook Pro will borrow heavily from the design of the 12" MacBook so I am going to wait for that. It will be 2-3mm thinner than the current Pro models and will pack a 'proper' 15w/28w Skylake based CPU, not a fanless solution.

The second generation 12" MacBook will be exactly the same as the current model but will have the Skylake CPU that it was actually designed for. The Broadwell part inside the current machine will look like an absolute joke compared the the Skylake chip. I think it's going to annoy quite a lot of first-gen adopters, especially as it's not that far away from release.

Source? Or are you guessing?

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so after much consideration, what i really want is an 11" rmba with 16gb memory (magsafe and thunderbolt included).

+1

 

[Fuzzball84]

I'll be surprised if skylake makes a big improvement in power use/heat as it's built on the same 14nm process as broadwell. Usually the biggest reduction in power/heat comes with a new process. Broadwell to Skylake is nowhere near the upgrade we got from going from P4 to C2D. Haswell's biggest improvement over Ivy Bridge was the 'free' screen refresh which allowed the cpu/gpu to sleep much more than previously.

But again Haswell was based on the same node as Ivy Bridge (both 22 nm) but Haswells new architecture (added sleep states etc) enabled much better power, and hence thermal management... better battery life

I think Skylakes new architecture on the 14 nm node will improve power management while the system is under load... so that when the system does do work, it uses less power, less heat produced and resulting in even longer battery life.

Pentium 4 net burst architecture was like having a space heater in your room lol

 

[PDFierro]

The 2016 redesigned MacBook Pro will borrow heavily from the design of the 12" MacBook so I am going to wait for that. It will be 2-3mm thinner than the current Pro models and will pack a 'proper' 15w/28w Skylake based CPU, not a fanless solution.

The second generation 12" MacBook will be exactly the same as the current model but will have the Skylake CPU that it was actually designed for. The Broadwell part inside the current machine will look like an absolute joke compared the the Skylake chip. I think it's going to annoy quite a lot of first-gen adopters, especially as it's not that far away from release.

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Trolling? He asks a good valid question.

That's kind of a ridiculous assumption to make. No way is Skylake going to make the first-en rMB obsolete. The rMB has already proven that it has enough performance.

 

[magbarn]

But again Haswell was based on the same node as Ivy Bridge (both 22 nm) but Haswells new architecture (added sleep states etc) enabled much better power, and hence thermal management... better battery life

I think Skylakes new architecture on the 14 nm node will improve power management while the system is under load... so that when the system does do work, it uses less power, less heat produced and resulting in even longer battery life.

Pentium 4 net burst architecture was like having a space heater in your room lol

I hope you're right, Intel's GPU performance hype has been only hype so far. If a modern game is getting 10fps on HD4000, even the latest Broadwell GPU's still can't push it over the 30fps barrier. Only Iris Pro with cache has given somewhat decent performance.