YouTuber Claims 15-Inch MacBook Pro With Upgraded Core i9 Chip is Severely Throttled Due to Thermal Issues

[gnipgnop]

The same test results attained by Dave2D were attained by Lisa at MobileTechReview:

Doesn't sound like it to me. She says putting the laptop in a freezer is a "silly gimmick", that you can install 3rd party fan control apps to change Apple's built-in thermal constraints and get higher clock speeds, then goes on to admit that you would really need to buy a gaming specific laptop in order to get the high-clock speeds of the i9 to operate more often in a PC...and that a gaming laptop typically becomes extremely hot on the bottom when doing it (which is going to kill your mobile battery lifespan, but gamers are typically going to plug in most of the time for best performance).

I think that's the main thing people are forgetting: the more excess heat there is and the more often it occurs, the shorter the lifespan of your battery is going to be. Heat is one of the biggest concerns when it comes to battery life. These are supposed to be mobile devices, right? So viewing a laptop as your go-to for long renders is not such a "pro" idea.

 

[belvdr]

This is an issue in almost every laptop the i9 is in, though.

It's still the manufacturer's choice of CPU. If they choose a particular chip, then they need to provide adequate cooling for it. They know the thermal specs before engineering the design.

 

[[AUT] Thomas]

Define who is a Pro user. I use my laptops for everything and like to have a capacity to run whatever I need at the moment. So what category am I? And I still was aiming at getting i9. Not happening now.

That's called pro-sumer. A consumer with elevated requirements. Typically that's equipment that can deliver professional results but isn't designed to be as durable as professional stuff, as there are tradeoffs for design, weight,...
The MacBook Pros are exactly that. And that is also the difference between the old Mac Pro and the new trash can.

 

[gnipgnop]

It's still the manufacturer's choice of CPU. If they choose a particular chip, then they need to provide adequate cooling for it. They know the thermal specs before engineering the design.

If you watch the video on page 45, it explains that you can override Apple's thermal constraints with a fan control app and that will allow the i9 to run at higher clock speeds more often. It isn't really that the laptop isn't "adequately cooled", but rather that Apple is trying to protect the battery life. The more excess heat there is, the the faster the battery is going to degrade. That's why it's really only PC gaming laptops (where users aren't really that concerned with the life of the battery because they plug in all the time) that run the i9 at it's higher clock speeds on a regular basis.

 

[CJLika]

Hi all,

I have had 3 MacBook pro's in a row, 2010, 2013 and 2016... I am considering a 2018 one, but this issue is more than off-putting. I use it for Photography tasks only (plus standard web and documents etc) and wondered what people think about the overheating and throttling when using only photoshop?

What would your opinion on specs be?

 

[belvdr]

If you watch the video on page 45, it explains that you can override Apple's thermal constraints with a fan control app and that will allow the i9 to run at higher clock speeds more often. It isn't really that the laptop isn't "adequately cooled", but rather that Apple is trying to protect the battery life. The more excess heat there is, the the faster the battery is going to degrade. That's why it's really only PC gaming laptops (where users aren't really that concerned with the life of the battery because they plug in all the time) that run the i9 at it's higher clock speeds on a regular basis.

Agreed, and it's even further to my point that the manufacturer must provide adequate cooling. It's not the fault of the chip or its manufacturer.

 

[falainber]

If you watch the video on page 45, it explains that you can override Apple's thermal constraints with a fan control app and that will allow the i9 to run at higher clock speeds more often. It isn't really that the laptop isn't "adequately cooled", but rather that Apple is trying to protect the battery life. The more excess heat there is, the the faster the battery is going to degrade. That's why it's really only PC gaming laptops (where users aren't really that concerned with the life of the battery because they plug in all the time) that run the i9 at it's higher clock speeds on a regular basis.

Are you saying that Apple should have used a proper cooling system to accomodate i9 without degrading the battery?

 

[Vasilioskn]

I’m glad that the rabid Apple fanboys who are trying to spin this as “business as always” is at a minimum here. Progress. Or should I say... courage.

 

[fooyork]

This all takes me back. The 2003 12" PowerBook G4 had this problem. Apple's solution back then was a firmware update which made the fans run full speed at all times. The little thing sounded like it would take off.

 

[barefeats]

If the MacBook Pro's thermal throttling hampers your workflow, there is always the iMac Pro and Mac Pro cylinder. They both "take a licking and keep on ticking" -- at full Turbo Boost.

 

[shadowmatt]

This is exactly the reason I went for a 13" last time around. The integrated GPU and 35 watt CPU is actually capable of mostly running within the thermal constraints in that chassis.

Anything that needs more grunt than my 13" can run is better off on a desktop. Like the one in my sig. That I built for less than Apple want to charge me for a 5 year old 6 core Mac Pro.

The Mac Pro at this point is a joke, I think Apple is just trolling Pro's / Developers after their outrage over the lack luster iMacs and laptops.

There is a point in every Apple product where they discontinue support for old products, something like 5 years after last sale. At this rate they will discontinue support before they stop selling the damn thing.

 

[barefeats]

NotebookCheck.net tested the 2018 15in MacBook Pro 2.6GHz 6-core using repeated Cinebench cycles: https://www.notebookcheck.net/The-n...nd-clearly-beaten-by-the-XPS-15.317264.0.html

They compared it to the Dell XPS 15. Worth a read.

 

[Val-kyrie]

Doesn't sound like it to me. She says putting the laptop in a freezer is a "silly gimmick", that you can install 3rd party fan control apps to change Apple's built-in thermal constraints and get higher clock speeds, then goes on to admit that you would really need to buy a gaming specific laptop in order to get the high-clock speeds of the i9 to operate more often in a PC...and that a gaming laptop typically becomes extremely hot on the bottom when doing it (which is going to kill your mobile battery lifespan, but gamers are typically going to plug in most of the time for best performance).

I think that's the main thing people are forgetting: the more excess heat there is and the more often it occurs, the shorter the lifespan of your battery is going to be. Heat is one of the biggest concerns when it comes to battery life. These are supposed to be mobile devices, right? So viewing a laptop as your go-to for long renders is not such a "pro" idea.

You need to stop dustorting the facts!

Lisa states she has done a variety of benchmarking tests (Final Cut Pro, exporting video,etc) and "the Mac [with an i9] does not spend much time in turbo boost mode" but rather spends most of its time at base clock speeds. She asks, "Why is it not turbo boosting? Because this laptop is too thin and doesn't have adequate cooling to run at higher clock speeds."

She also mentions that the Dell XPS 15 and the Razor Blade get very hot because like the MBP they lack adequate thermal cooling. BY CONTRAST TO PCs which boost and run hot, Apple's solution is to not allow the CPU to turbo boost very much and it still runs hot!

Her recommendation is to override the fan control with a third party program.

This is the same problem reported by others: Apple is selling a CPU which is not performing as advertised due to lack of adequate cooling.

 

[hydzior]

If you watch the video on page 45, it explains that you can override Apple's thermal constraints with a fan control app and that will allow the i9 to run at higher clock speeds more often. It isn't really that the laptop isn't "adequately cooled", but rather that Apple is trying to protect the battery life. The more excess heat there is, the the faster the battery is going to degrade. That's why it's really only PC gaming laptops (where users aren't really that concerned with the life of the battery because they plug in all the time) that run the i9 at it's higher clock speeds on a regular basis.

Are you saying that 2.2 Ghz with 90-100 degrees celcius is ok to prevent the battery life from degrading to fast ? Sorry but this gaming laptops are running this CPU higher and cooler. Macbook is cooking the CPU and the internals around. With GPU at full force the throttling is even worse and the temps even higher...

 

[DanBig]

So for users who purchase the i9 - generally its a faster CPU, we know that. But it throttles under 100% utilisation.

So, for a typical FCPX user, for example, while editing and rendering short clips etc, wouldn't the i9 still perform better (especially if using a fan control software like that mentioned in the above video) and it would then throttle when exporting the final video only since that's when it will hit high utilisation for a longer period of time??

Or do I have it wrong?

Well yes & no! Fan control software is a band-aid for a failed design. We've worked through lots of these systems which because of the failed design cooked the logic board to the point it was killed (even with the fan software). In addition even pushing the fan full throttle to make up for the failed design will prematurely kill it! So double dammed!

The right answer starts at the first CAD drawing of the new system, sizing the frame correctly for what will go inside. Sometimes it's a mis with the first draft then you go back and adjust the design sometimes you over did it other times you under did it! Every progression of the design is a tweak.

What happened here is they put a blindfold over their eyes and assumed the TDP Intel gave them being the same as the i7 would allow them to ignore sound design principles! Always VERIFY the DESIGN! Again, TDP is not the end all of measure. Thats where Apple failed and in some ways Intel did as well as they clearly didn't tell any of the systems makers the limits basing their design strictly on TDP alone!

 

[Martius]

I think you should separate out compromises with deterioration of quality. Apple products have always had compromises but has high standards for quality. I am disappointed about the throttling and keyboard issues.

Butt never forget antenna gate happened under Steve jobs watch and your holding it wrong

Steve made mistakes, but talking about that "holding it wrong" thing over and over again won't change anything. He even didn't say exactly that, he just answered an email where he was saying, that "the email author" should avoid holding it that way. You know, you are Steve Jobs, you are sitting in an office, receiving tons of emails like that, you are stressed about it and just have to release your anger... I don't really think he was 100% serious. And the times were different, iPhone 4 was really an amazing device. Apple was trying really hard and did a mistake, but also did a lot of great things like the retina display which was the first high-res display in mobile phone, I guess (or maybe first high-res display in mass-produced mobile phone)?

Tim Cook just lives in a bubble... when you listen to Steve, you know that he knows what is going on, you hear the real passion. He was not always right, but he tried hard. I like companies that are trying hard even for the price of making mistakes. The worst thing is just being lazy.

 

[Baymowe335]

Not really, even notoriously low quality hardware OEMs are putting out more competently designed gear than apple are in the notebook space today.



This isn't the only issue with new machines from apple (in general).

• Lack of upgradability
• lack of memory capacity
• lack of high end GPU options
• promoting thunderbolt as your expansion route then basically putting out no first party thunderbolt peripherals to do said expansion for 6-7 years
• thermal throttling on any of the high end machines for the past few years
• bad, high return rate keyboard that a large number of people dislike to use even if it doesn't fail
• mandatory touch-bar (with cost increase), gimping any machine that doesn't use it
• priority of style over performance (iMac Pro, Mac Pro, current Macbook Pros in general)

It is not this hard. They had workable designs for their Mac Pro and Macbook Pro lines. The form factors were fine for those market segments. All they needed to do was perhaps make minor changes to the cooling, and use the space freed up by smaller component designs for more battery.

But they went chasing thin and light or small form factor on machines where this is not really relevant, to the detriment of cooling and processing power. It's not like Apple started out behind. They had a lead and they didn't just sit still, they went backwards relative to the market.

If you want a high end mobile "workstation" for example, you can order a PC based notebook with anything up to dual geforce 1080s in it. Sure the case won't be as nice, but the keyboard will work and the performance will blow anything apple has (even their iMac Pro, on GPU accelerated tasks) into the weeds.

Case in point.

 

[neil.r.benson]

To be fair, this isn't so much Apple's fault as it is Intel's. Intel has really dropped the ball in the past couple of years. If they don't right the ship soon, AMD will take over the CPU game for a while. They are late with everything and are having lots of trouble shrinking the dies.

I don't see how this is the fault of Intel. Intel will release the chip with a spec sheet detailing thermal performance and then its up to the computer vendor to make sure their design can deal with that amount of heat at power and be able to dissipate the heat in the design. Clearly, Apple failed to do this. Given that the chassis is the same as last year this is hardly surprising.

 

[cfdlab]

I dont think apple did not know about the thermal issue. They were caught with their pants down because intel did not release their 10nm chips even in 2018. The 2016 was never designed with these power hungry 6-core in mind. Apple prematurely went with a thinner design in 2016. And they dont want to increase the thickness in 2018, so they are hoping to ride a year or two on the same design, hoping nobody will notice. That is of course stupidity. Atleast they should not have offered the i9 in this thin chassis.

 

[DanBig]

You need to stop dustorting the facts!

Lisa states she has done a variety of benchmarking tests (Final Cut Pro, exporting video,etc) and "the Mac [with an i9] does not spend much time in turbo boost mode" but rather spends most of its time at base clock speeds. She asks, "Why is it not turbo boosting? Because this laptop is too thin and doesn't have adequate cooling to run at higher clock speeds."

She also mentions that the Dell XPS 15 and the Razor Blade get very hot because like the MBP they lack adequate thermal cooling. BY CONTRAST TO PCs which boost and run hot, Apple's solution is to not allow the CPU to turbo boost very much and it still runs hot!

Her recommendation is to override the fan control with a third party program.

This is the same problem reported by others: Apple is selling a CPU which is not performing as advertised due to lack of adequate cooling.

I'm not sure if Lisa fully understands the mechanics here as well as the risks of over-riding the SMC's controlling of the fans.

There are two factors the >Creation< of heat and the >Dissipation< of heat. A fan is only able to dissipate the heat it does not stop the creation. The creation is the bugaboo! This chip runs Hot when in full engagement. It makes perfect sense it would! Here we have six cores running full out, in an i7 we only have four! Basically we have half as much processing power creating heat!

>>> The thermal design for the i5/i7 models does not have enough headroom to pull this added heat. <<<

Now is the tricky part! We need to pull this heat off of the CPU as efficiently as possible! This is where the mass and radiators of the heatsink comes to play. Like a vacuum the heatsink pulls the heat, but just like a vacuum if the hose gets clogged you loose the suction so you're no longer cleaning. Here the heatsinks mass is just like the hose as once the sink has just as much heat as the chip its on it looses its efficiency.

This then get on how you move the heat from the heatsink onto a radiator system so the fan can then evacuate the heat. So if this heat transfer is limited to a value of A, and the chip is producing A then you have a balanced system. But as soon as the chip produces B and the heat sink also gets to B but the radiator/fan system is still only able to push A you get into this mess. Sure you can increase the fans ability to push the air so in theory B to B to B1 takes place but B1 has its limits! As the chip is still running at B! Which is too hot for it to sustain over time.

I did gloss over the math here trust me! Using a fan at a higher rev does help! But not for a sustained time. So what is too long? Knowing what I know in servicing systems I would say 10 minutes on this chip will reduces its life a bit and any longer will shorten it more so. The fan will also give out and as Apple does not believe in cleaning dust build up over time as well as refreshing the thermal paste (which they use is just junk) the entire system will fail that much sooner as it gets older!

A Pro using the system hard rendering video's and editing high def images in batch mode will likely burn it out in a year.

So this is a Pro's box - NOT!!

 

[Ploki]

I think that's the main thing people are forgetting: the more excess heat there is and the more often it occurs, the shorter the lifespan of your battery is going to be. Heat is one of the biggest concerns when it comes to battery life. These are supposed to be mobile devices, right? So viewing a laptop as your go-to for long renders is not such a "pro" idea.

should have a separate profile for AC and battery operation then.

also, it might be mobile, but its a pro machine, advertised usage is FCPX, Logic Pro X, VR, gaming...

They're mis-advertising it then. Also, misadvertising speed, since the cpu base-clock of 2.9 is not attainable.
[doublepost=1532005481][/doublepost]I was waiting for a year for this refresh, i'm waiting for more reviews rn and a statement from apple before i dive in.

This is highly unprofessional for a premium and very expensive product

 

[DanBig]

The i9 has blown way over your head.

There is a need for the i9, regardless of the enclosure.

That's why they released it.

Pro users aren't happy with just an i7.

More RAM more CPU more STORAGE.

Yeah baby!

Not denying the pro's need the raw horse power! I wanted this system too! But not when it is throttled like this!

Look at it this way... You don't buy a Maserati race car for the streets you buy it to race! Apple gave as a Maserati with a speedometer fixed at 60 MPH! Thats not what I want, I want it to got to the max 217 MPH! And cruise at 125 MPH.

When Apple gives us a real i9 system I'll buy it! This is not a real i9 system it's a wannabe!!

 

[ipponrg]

[doublepost=1531976818][/doublepost]
The operating system is responsible for providing a layer/interface between the application and the computer's hardware. An application should not talk directly to the CPU, the operating system should allocate CPU resources to the application as need. The same with throttling the CPU. The OS tells the CPU to throttle, not an (normal) application. It is most definitely Apple's fault for the CPU throttling, since MacOS controls the hardware.

I understand what you are trying to say, but what you are actually saying is wrong. Even if an application requires the use of 100% CPU (which, BTW, no application does unless there is a SERIOUS bug), it is the OS that decides whether or not to allocate it to the application. Here is a direct quote from Wikipedia if you don't believe me:

"The operating system provides an interface between an application program and the computer hardware, so that an application program can interact with the hardware only by obeying rules and procedures programmed into the operating system. The operating system is also a set of services which simplify development and execution of application programs. Executing an application program involves the creation of a process by the operating system kernel which assigns memory space and other resources, establishes a priority for the process in multi-tasking systems, loads program binary code into memory, and initiates execution of the application program which then interacts with the user and with hardware devices."

You are absolutely correct that the OS is responsible for controlling CPU usage. However you are also wrong in that an application would not be able to use 100 pct of your CPU. Note that I did not say “require”. I also am explaining at a higher level, but if you want to dig deeper, we can do that too.

Look at your task managers. If you spawn multiple threads that are continuously processing data and using your logic, the OS may allow priority to that application such that it will make use of all the cores in a system.

Write a program that takes 4K video frames and transmuxes them into proxies. If you dedicate only 1 thread, the OS could very well max out one of its CPUs for this job. Now, fork a few more threads that can do parallel processing. Your results will be output faster at the expense of more cores with possible 100% cpu usage. Again, I ask that you write a program to see these results.

Is it wrong for the app to do this? That is subjective per use case. In our case here, rendering clips takes a lot of time. If I had to wait there for it to render 4K at a snails pace, it would be a terrible experience. In most cases, you want rendering to be faster not slower. Now if I wrote a Chrome plugin and had an infinite loop, then that would be pretty bad.

 

[DanBig]

should have a separate profile for AC and battery operation then.

also, it might be mobile, but its a pro machine, advertised usage is FCPX, Logic Pro X, VR, gaming...

They're mis-advertising it then. Also, misadvertising speed, since the cpu base-clock of 2.9 is not attainable.
[doublepost=1532005481][/doublepost]I was waiting for a year for this refresh, i'm waiting for more reviews rn and a statement from apple before i dive in.

This is highly unprofessional for a premium and very expensive product

I might add it makes no difference which power source is used the CPU's cooling has no bearing here.

The only thing Apple could do is cripple the CPU to four cores when on battery then you plug your system into a dock system which adds the needed cooling (liquid) to an external radiator system to then allow the system to go full bore! Gee, thats been done and it failed!

 

[bkkcanuck8]

There are two factors the >Creation< of heat and the >Dissipation< of heat. A fan is only able to dissipate the heat it does not stop the creation. The creation is the bugaboo! This chip runs Hot when in full engagement. It makes perfect sense it would! Here we have six cores running full out, in an i7 we only have four! Basically we have half as much processing power creating heat!

>>> The thermal design for the i5/i7 models does not have enough headroom to pull this added heat. <<<

Now is the tricky part! We need to pull this heat off of the CPU as efficiently as possible! This is where the mass and radiators of the heatsink comes to play. Like a vacuum the heatsink pulls the heat, but just like a vacuum if the hose gets clogged you loose the suction so you're no longer cleaning. Here the heatsinks mass is just like the hose as once the sink has just as much heat as the chip its on it looses its efficiency. This then get on how you move the heat from the heatsink onto a radiator system so the fan can then evacuate the heat. So if this heat transfer is limited to a value of A, and the chip is producing A then you have a balanced system. But as soon as the chip produces B and the heat sink also gets to B but the radiator/fan system is still only able to push A you get into this mess. Sure you can increase the fans ability to push the air so in theory B to B to B1 takes place but B1 has its limits! As the chip is still running at B! Which is too hot for it to sustain over time.

I did gloss over the math here trust me! Using a fan at a higher rev does help! But not for a sustained time. So what is too long? Knowing what I know in servicing systems I would say 10 minutes on this chip will reduces its life a bit and any longer will shorten it more so. The fan will also give out and as Apple does not believe in cleaning dust build up over time as well as refreshing the thermal paste (which they use is just junk) the entire system will fail that much sooner as it gets older!

A Pro using the system hard rendering video's and editing high def images in batch mode will likely burn it out in a year.

So this is a Pro's box - NOT!!

I rev'd my Mac Pro 2008 fans at higher than the default for more than 10 years and they never gave out. The only ones that can solve the heat 'creation' problem are Intel, anything after that is just pulling heat and dissipating it - whether it be a bigger heatsink or increased air flow. Apple DOES NOT run fans at their rated speed, they typically run them as little as possible as to reduce the sound. Some gaming laptops cooling can end up sounding like you are working on a jet engine.