2018 i9 MacBook Pro throttling discussion [merged]

[leman]

No idea if this has already been posted, but it seems relevant:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Some-...nning-any-faster-than-a-Core-i7.317268.0.html

It seems that the problem with i9 less-then-expected performance is not limited to Apple. Only very few laptops have power delivery and cooling to handle these CPUs.

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

I love people who tell people to get a 2,2ghz i7 instead of paying 300$ more for an i9. (Because the 2,2 is good enough?)

If people want the i9, let them? The i9 is going to be the best machine in the end.
People who buys apple’s MacBook Pro have the money for it. I dont get it how people can get so frustrated over someone spending 300$ more or less. It’s not even your own money?

I rather see people coming with solutions in this thread than people telling other people to buy something else

I couldn’t agree more. I mean if they say they’re on a budget And if they don’t need the performance of the i9, I’ll them to get the 2.2 i7. But then we have a bunch of people who say stuff like, “get the base Mac, best value for money” or “get the i7 base model, it throttles less”

Well it’s funny because the joke’s on them because despite the throttling, the i9 is still generally the most power you can get out of all the MacBook Pros available.

 

[Jorg1312]

Well it’s funny because the joke’s on them because despite the throttling, the i9 is still generally the most power you can get out of all the MacBook Pros available.

I’m no expert but reading some other posts here and test results say otherwise.
In some long term hardcore tests the i9 throttled so much that I performed the task slower than the i7. If that’s what you mainly do then the i9 isn’t necessarily the MacBook Pro with the most power for you.

I’m just repeating from what I read in this thread.

I’ll wait a bit longer until I make my decision.

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

I’m no expert but reading some other posts here and test results say otherwise.
In some long term hardcore tests the i9 throttled so much that I performed the task slower than the i7. If that’s what you mainly do then the i9 isn’t necessarily the MacBook Pro with the most power for you.

I’m just repeating from what I read in this thread.

I’ll wait a bit longer until I make my decision.

I think you might need to reread a bit and of course watch some of the latest comprehensive video tests being done, and no I’m not talking about Dave’s singular test video as everyone seems to be fixated on that.

But hey, it’s your money, and your decision on what you want to buy and which reviews you want to listen to.

 

[Jorg1312]

I think you might need to reread a bit and of course watch some of the latest comprehensive video tests being done, and no I’m not talking about Dave’s singular test video as everyone seems to be fixated on that.

But hey, it’s your money, and your decision on what you want to buy and which reviews you want to listen to.

Hence me saying I’ll wait a bit longer.

I’ll wait until the noise starts to fade and we have some clearer information on what’s actually going on.
I prefer to get my information from as many sources as possible and try not to disregard any of them. At the moment it seems all a bit chaotic though.

 

[Elektrofone]

I think you might need to reread a bit and of course watch some of the latest comprehensive video tests being done, and no I’m not talking about Dave’s singular test video as everyone seems to be fixated on that.

But hey, it’s your money, and your decision on what you want to buy and which reviews you want to listen to.

So far we’ve still only seen real world comparisons between the 2.2 and 2.9 models. I’m still not sure the 2.9 is really worth the extra money, but we just need more benchmarks to see for sure. I basically have this week to return the i9 so I gotta make a decision soon. Hopefully someone comes along with more analysis in the next few days.
[doublepost=1532346945][/doublepost]

Okay, what will you use your MacBook Pro for?

If you want the most power you can possibly get, get the i9. If you want most bang for your buck get the base 15 inch. Still works great.

I’m not sure this is great advice. We still don’t have real world tests for the 2.6 model.

 

[M.Rizk]

Someone posted that Volta got updated to allow for power limits up to 90W btw if anyone is interested in trying a higher value for the i9.

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...es-engineering-f.2128936/page-3#post-26276809

 

[MrGimper]

I'll be honest, I'm not in the market for a new MBP, and if I was I wouldn't be going for a 15", so this doesn't affect me.... I'm only "intrigued" by what's happening. However, I'm surprised how many people believe that this will be fixed by a firmware update. How exactly are people expecting firmware to change the laws of physics and chip design?

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

I'll be honest, I'm not in the market for a new MBP, and if I was I wouldn't be going for a 15", so this doesn't affect me.... I'm only "intrigued" by what's happening. However, I'm surprised how many people believe that this will be fixed by a firmware update. How exactly are people expecting firmware to change the laws of physics and chip design?

I don’t think people are looking for complete fix but somewhat a more reasonable throttling rate giving us ever slightly more umph out of our machines.

 

[MrGimper]

I don’t think people are looking for complete fix but somewhat a more reasonable throttling rate giving us ever slightly more umph out of our machines.

But isn't the throttling rate based on the temperature of the chip and the thermal solution in the machine? It throttles so it doesn't burn out.

The thermal solution can't keep the chip cool at higher (what's expected for an i9) frequencies, so the only solution is to back off the frequency

 

[ashcairo]

Alright guys, seen playing with it for 24 hours straight. Here's my findings for my i9.

Turbo Boost Switcher - disabling turbo, gets you 284% more perf playing games in a virtual machine. 17% doing a ffmpeg h265 encode, and cools the cpu when running the iOS Simulator.
Volta - Undervolting + TDP limit allows you to keep Turbo Boost, which gets 23% doing an ffmpeg h265 encode and keeps your single core speed in Geekbench.
Intel Extreme Tuning - Allows you to mod the i9 but I didn't play with it, don't know how it'll affect my warranty.
Windows - Playing games I ran into no throttling, Task manager reports the CPU goes at 4.3Ghz, you can turn off turbo and it downclocks to the base 2.9ghz with no noticeable fps drop. They're all GPU bound. You can get it to thermal throttle with a Stability Test, but you can also disable turbo and get it to run fine too.

Once you get into a bad thermal throttle state, if you turn off Turbo, it usually settles back at the base clock speed. Eg. If you're compiling a big project and it starts to throttle after 90 seconds, just turn off turbo and it'll settle to 2.9ghz.

There are throttling states which it can get into which aren't thermal related, eg. if you run more than one instance of ffmpeg using all the cores, it'll throttle due to excessive context switching, google drive is also a culprit of this.

Should be an easy fix for Apple if we can somehow convince them to fix it. I know they clock down their CPUs in the iMac Pro, so maybe if they never had to rush this one out, they'll clock it down soon here too.

Also finally, the 4.8Ghz advertised clock speed is correct, but it only goes 4.8Ghz when using 1/2 cores according to Intel XTU, its max clock speed at 6 cores is 4.3ghz, which like I said I hit completely fine in Windows playing games.

Posted a vid on my channel with the visuals, but that's the summary.

 

[M.Rizk]

But isn't the throttling rate based on the temperature of the chip and the thermal solution in the machine? It throttles so it doesn't burn out.

The thermal solution can't keep the chip cool at higher (what's expected for an i9) frequencies, so the only solution is to back off the frequency

From the community findings, the throttling wasn’t due to the actual CPU overheating. The extreme throttling was due to the VRM overheating as Apple left the entire thing unlocked without limiting the max power the 8th gen CPUs can ask for. Apparently the 8th gen asks for more power than the VRM Apple has can deliver in total to the entire system causing it to overheat and throttle insanely forcing CPU into idle frequencies (800 MHz)

Enforcing a resonable power limit will help resolve the issue. This can be done simply with Volta (moderate performance), or the Voltage Shift which gives the performance you would expect out of an Apple standard, well, the old standards at least because now they got none.

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

But isn't the throttling rate based on the temperature of the chip and the thermal solution in the machine? It throttles so it doesn't burn out.

The thermal solution can't keep the chip cool at higher (what's expected for an i9) frequencies, so the only solution is to back off the frequency

@M.Rizk has answered this for me.

 

[mattieb]

From the community findings, the throttling wasn’t due to the actual CPU overheating. The extreme throttling way due to the VRM overheating as Apple left the entire thing unlocked without limiting the max power the 8th gen CPUs can ask for. Apparently the 8th gen asks for more power than the VRM Apple has can deliver in total to the entire system causing it to overheat and throttle insanely forcing CPU into idle frequencies (800 MHz)

Enforcing a resonable power limit will help resolve the issue. This can be done simply with Volta (moderate performance), or the Voltage Shift which gives the performance you would expect out of an Apple standard, well, the old standards at least because now they got none.

Is this likely something that can be fixed with an official firmware update?

 

[lambinho]

Is this likely something that can be fixed with an official firmware update?

Yes.

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

Alright guys, seen playing with it for 24 hours straight. Here's my findings for my i9.

Turbo Boost Switcher - disabling turbo, gets you 284% more perf playing games in a virtual machine. 17% doing a ffmpeg h265 encode, and cools the cpu when running the iOS Simulator.
Volta - Undervolting + TDP limit allows you to keep Turbo Boost, which gets 23% doing an ffmpeg h265 encode and keeps your single core speed in Geekbench.
Intel Extreme Tuning - Allows you to mod the i9 but I didn't play with it, don't know how it'll affect my warranty.
Windows - Playing games I ran into no throttling, Task manager reports the CPU goes at 4.3Ghz, you can turn off turbo and it downclocks to the base 2.9ghz with no noticeable fps drop. They're all GPU bound. You can get it to thermal throttle with a Stability Test, but you can also disable turbo and get it to run fine too.

Once you get into a bad thermal throttle state, if you turn off Turbo, it usually settles back at the base clock speed. Eg. If you're compiling a big project and it starts to throttle after 90 seconds, just turn off turbo and it'll settle to 2.9ghz.

There are throttling states which it can get into which aren't thermal related, eg. if you run more than one instance of ffmpeg using all the cores, it'll throttle due to excessive context switching, google drive is also a culprit of this.

Should be an easy fix for Apple if we can somehow convince them to fix it. I know they clock down their CPUs in the iMac Pro, so maybe if they never had to rush this one out, they'll clock it down soon here too.

Also finally, the 4.8Ghz advertised clock speed is correct, but it only goes 4.8Ghz when using 1/2 cores according to Intel XTU, its max clock speed at 6 cores is 4.3ghz, which like I said I hit completely fine in Windows playing games.

Posted a vid on my channel with the visuals, but that's the summary.

Apple needs to hire some of you guys as consultants. Well done. Thank you for going through the trouble.

 

[sp3ctre]

Is this likely something that can be fixed with an official firmware update?

I wonder if this is the exact reason my order for an i9 has sat at “processing” for a week now. Feels like they have halted production to do something?

 

[Russ1234]

I have the new 2018 i9 on order and after seeing all of this overheating and throttling drama i'm a little worried now...
I'm in dire need of a new portable computer as my 2011 iMac is on it's last legs!
I use my computer for music production and 3-4 minute videos on premiere pro (not very big files, no 4k etc.)

My question is, is it worth me getting the i9? Is there a possibility an update will come out that will give it a little fix? or should i just go for the 2.2 or 2.6 i7? I plan on having this laptop for a good while and i don't want to after a couple of years have my self outdated due to not getting the i9 and getting the i7 instead, but also i don't want to get the i9 and the thing not work properly!

Also does the i9 heat up at a not normal amount during just general web browsing and doing emails etc? I think one of my biggest turn offs with the new i9's heat problems is the fact my girlfriend has an iMac which will overheat, fans won't be able to keep up with it, and it'll just switch off, and apple won't help fix it! I know her iMac issues probably have nothing to do with the new mbp but you can see my hesitation!

Any response would be very helpful, thanks!

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

I wonder if this is the exact reason my order for an i9 has sat at “processing” for a week now. Feels like they have halted production to do something?

I doubt it honestly but I expect that Apple are looking into this update and should have an update this week to next week.

 

[lambinho]

I wonder if this is the exact reason my order for an i9 has sat at “processing” for a week now. Feels like they have halted production to do something?

I’m in the same boat as you. Processing since i put my order on the 13:th of july .

 

[mr.anthonyramos]

I have the new 2018 i9 on order and after seeing all of this overheating and throttling drama i'm a little worried now...
I'm in dire need of a new portable computer as my 2011 iMac is on it's last legs!
I use my computer for music production and 3-4 minute videos on premiere pro (not very big files, no 4k etc.)

My question is, is it worth me getting the i9? Is there a possibility an update will come out that will give it a little fix? or should i just go for the 2.2 or 2.6 i7? I plan on having this laptop for a good while and i don't want to after a couple of years have my self outdated due to not getting the i9 and getting the i7 instead, but also i don't want to get the i9 and the thing not work properly!

Also does the i9 heat up at a not normal amount during just general web browsing and doing emails etc? I think one of my biggest turn offs with the new i9's heat problems is the fact my girlfriend has an iMac which will overheat, fans won't be able to keep up with it, and it'll just switch off, and apple won't help fix it! I know her iMac issues probably have nothing to do with the new mbp but you can see my hesitation!

Any response would be very helpful, thanks!

First things first. All the 2018 MacBook Pros throttle. The 2.6 and the i9 in particular are pretty bad.

Is it hot? Oh these all run hot. My old 2014 MacBook Pro also ran hot it depends what you do BUT will not shut down. Your GF’s iMac probably needs to be checked. Something is wrong with that happening.

 

[maflynn]

I wonder if this is the exact reason my order for an i9 has sat at “processing” for a week now. Feels like they have halted production to do something?

Its not a hardware issue, but firmware, so I don't think its related.

 

[Ploki]

Its not a hardware issue, but firmware, so I don't think its related.

of course its a hardware issue, you could mitigate overheating with different materials, different (better) and more accurately applied thermal paste.

in its essence its a hardware issue, that can be mitigated with firmware, but not fixed.

 

[dan9700]

Got my i9 now maxed out wow its so fast but very hot but it is hot in london, one of my keys is sricky and load all others are really quiet its just my delete key that sounds loud would that get better with time

 

[maflynn]

of course its a hardware issue, you could mitigate overheating with different materials, different (better) and more accurately applied thermal paste.

in its essence its a hardware issue, that can be mitigated with firmware, but not fixed.

No its not a hardware issue, in the sense the CPUs are not functioning correctly. There's a lot of discussion showing that the TDP is set too high and the VRM is over-heating. Apple needs to adjust the settings internally so it pulls what it ought too.