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MP 7,1 Anyone seen a good/fair benchmark for the Afterburner's benefits

B

bxs

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Oct 20, 2007
1,151
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Seattle, WA
I continue to struggle with knowing the benefits (if any) of the Apple's Afterburner. (AB)

We have one included with our MP7,1 order and we're trying to figure out the best way for determining its benefits with our workload. Obviously we're are hoping it does provide benefits as it's not a $2 item.

Unfortunately, there's no Apple bundled application for measuring the AB's use. It is claimed to offload some of the work that otherwise would be given to the CPU and/or the GPU, but how can this be determined without some sort of measurement.

Apple's Activity Monitor provides insights to CPU use, RAM(memory) use, disk activities, file cacheing, and so on. I do wonder if Apple can find a way to also display what the AB is doing.

Of course one way to test the AB's benefits is to run a workload with it installed and run the same workload again without the AB installed. Such a comparative test needs to be setup carefully so there's no reason to doubt its results.

How will other determine the benefits of the AB ? Thanks... :)
 
Someone on youtube did a test, and was raving about it.

The main thing I want to know is if Adobe takes advantage of it (some here have claimed it will work with Adobe right out of the box).

Can anyone in this forum who uses Adobe advise?
 
There’s barely decent benchmarks for METAL to compare GPUs. Geekbench is not reliable. You will need to rely on something like a Puget system test or a BruceX style test that is actually purpose built to test the config with Afterburner card(s). Neither have true benchmark browsers either to compare results.

Adobe has NOT announced any support for Afterburner and would not expect any announcement until NAB 2020 at the absolute earliest. They just updated all video tools at MAX.
 
H. Flower said:
Someone on youtube did a test, and was raving about it.

The main thing I want to know is if Adobe takes advantage of it (some here have claimed it will work with Adobe right out of the box).

Can anyone in this forum who uses Adobe advise?
Click to expand...
I'm personally unaware of Adobe's support for the AB. However, in our line of work we use QT Player X a huge amount of our time during editing and playback time, and Apple has said QT can indeed benefit from the use of the AB. If this proves to be so and allows us to save wall clock time, that alone will be a huge benefit for us.
 
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I don’t think adobe needs to do anything to “support” afterburner, since they’re probably relying on Apple’s system wide QuickTime/prores libraries to Play-back prores. And it should be supported automatically..
The big question is- how much does it speed up transcoding other formats TO prores!
 
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chfilm said:
I don’t think adobe needs to do anything to “support” afterburner, since they’re probably relying on Apple’s system wide QuickTime/prores libraries to Play-back prores. And it should be supported automatically..
The big question is- how much does it speed up transcoding other formats TO prores!
Click to expand...

Good question.

Also, I don't know about your first claim. It would make sense. But then again, Adobe has been completely silent on the matter, which is a little suspicious.

We need definitive answers from Adobe.
 
H. Flower said:
Good question.

Also, I don't know about your first claim. It would make sense. But then again, Adobe has been completely silent on the matter, which is a little suspicious.

We need definitive answers from Adobe.
Click to expand...
I don’t understand why the YouTubers wo have one don’t just test it out properly.
But since Apple lists a couple of this party apps like the adobe suite s as fully prores compatible I absolutely EXPECT that afterburner will speed things up there as well.
And if not as of yet, Adobe would commit suicide if they wouldn’t implement it immediately.
[automerge]1577400577[/automerge]
Sadly I can’t afford an afterburner right now anyways, so I have time to wait out what it can and can’t do- I hope that the machine that’s in the berlin Apple Store since a few days has an AB installed so that I can get some answers after Xmas is over...
 
bxs said:
I continue to struggle with knowing the benefits (if any) of the Apple's Afterburner. (AB)

We have one included with our MP7,1 order and we're trying to figure out the best way for determining its benefits with our workload. Obviously we're are hoping it does provide benefits as it's not a $2 item.

Unfortunately, there's no Apple bundled application for measuring the AB's use. It is claimed to offload some of the work that otherwise would be given to the CPU and/or the GPU, but how can this be determined without some sort of measurement.

Apple's Activity Monitor provides insights to CPU use, RAM(memory) use, disk activities, file cacheing, and so on. I do wonder if Apple can find a way to also display what the AB is doing.

Of course one way to test the AB's benefits is to run a workload with it installed and run the same workload again without the AB installed. Such a comparative test needs to be setup carefully so there's no reason to doubt its results.

How will other determine the benefits of the AB ? Thanks... :)
Click to expand...

Are you working with ProRes or ProRes Raw? If yes, great, you'll benefit. If no, no, it doesn't do anything for you. Pretty simple.
 
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I emailed adobe about afterburner and this is what they responded :

We're looking into possibilities to enhance Adobe software with the Apple afterburner card. I can't comment on a timeline for an update but we're looking into it. Thanks.
 
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H. Flower said:
I emailed adobe about afterburner and this is what they responded :

We're looking into possibilities to enhance Adobe software with the Apple afterburner card. I can't comment on a timeline for an update but we're looking into it. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Ah, gotta love marketing. Anyone of us could have given that (non) answer and have been right on the money with it. :D
 
H. Flower said:
I emailed adobe about afterburner and this is what they responded :

We're looking into possibilities to enhance Adobe software with the Apple afterburner card. I can't comment on a timeline for an update but we're looking into it. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Wow, they actually responded! Well I think it‘s certain that they will utilize it, if it doesnt work out of the box. Probably they dont even have their hands on an actual device :D
I wish It was possible to already order the AB separately to just get one and try it out and if it doesnt do much just to return it.. guess it‘s gonna stay exciting for a bit.
 
chfilm said:
Wow, they actually responded! Well I think it‘s certain that they will utilize it, if it doesnt work out of the box. Probably they dont even have their hands on an actual device :D
I wish It was possible to already order the AB separately to just get one and try it out and if it doesnt do much just to return it.. guess it‘s gonna stay exciting for a bit.
Click to expand...
You can. See here -> https://www.apple.com/search/Afterburner?src=alp
 
Yeah they’re not selling the AB or any graphics modules separately yet.

Hopefully soon .
 
bxs said:
Gosh.... you are correct. Accept my apology. I would assume it will be available in future as a bone fide accessory.
Click to expand...
Yea it will be but probably right now they’re waiting till they’re over the initial bottleneck of orders.
 
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