How big is the difference between the Old and new GPU on MacBook Pro 15’?

[bonjourx]

Just like what the title say. I’m really curious as to how big would be the difference between the Radeon Pro 560X versus the Radeon Vega? Because I have a new laptop coming tomorrow, but if the difference between the two is huge, I’m thinking of just returning what I purchased and wait for the MacBook Pro with Radeon Vega. Also, anyone knows what the price estimate will be? And lastly, anyone planning on upgrading their 2018 laptop again for the new one with the new GPU?

 

[Naimfan]

No one knows yet.

 

[John-117]

Just like what the title say. I’m really curious as to how big would be the difference between the Radeon Pro 560X versus the Radeon Vega? Because I have a new laptop coming tomorrow, but if the difference between the two is huge, I’m thinking of just returning what I purchased and wait for the MacBook Pro with Radeon Vega. Also, anyone knows what the price estimate will be? And lastly, anyone planning on upgrading their 2018 laptop again for the new one with the new GPU?

It'll be the largest jump since the 460 that was introduced in the 2016 Touchbar MacBook Pro. Without actual hardware with benchmarks and reviews it's hard to guess the exact difference, but some educated guesswork by outlets like Anandtech seem to peg it around the Vega M GH, or slightly higher than a 1050ti (mobile).

The second I saw the announcement I called Apple Support and got an extended return window added, where I can return my current 2018 MacBook Pro past the standard window. I would recommend trying the same if you're eager for the new GPUs as well.

 

[fokmik]

Just like what the title say. I’m really curious as to how big would be the difference between the Radeon Pro 560X versus the Radeon Vega? Because I have a new laptop coming tomorrow, but if the difference between the two is huge, I’m thinking of just returning what I purchased and wait for the MacBook Pro with Radeon Vega. Also, anyone knows what the price estimate will be? And lastly, anyone planning on upgrading their 2018 laptop again for the new one with the new GPU?

same 14nm..so it will be hot

 

[Ifti]

With the heat/throttling issues that the i9 had, I can already picture the threads RE the i9 MacBook with Vega......

 

[maflynn]

It'll be the largest jump since the 460 that was introduced in the 2016 Touchbar MacBook Pro.

I think like the 32GB of ram, many people will opt for this, just because. I would bet a good number will want the new GPU just because its faster, not because they need it. I know there's probably a lot of folks that absolutely need it, and I'm not even knocking those who want it. I'm just pointing out that there may be a group of buyers who won't be taking advantage of the power.

With the heat/throttling issues that the i9 had, I can already picture the threads RE the i9 MacBook with Vega......

Perhaps, but I do wonder if the delay in this model (I'm sure they wanted to roll this out sooner), was to improve thermal design.

 

[fokmik]

I think like the 32GB of ram, many people will opt for this, just because. I would bet a good number will want the new GPU just because its faster, not because they need it. I know there's probably a lot of folks that absolutely need it, and I'm not even knocking those who want it. I'm just pointing out that there may be a group of buyers who won't be taking advantage of the power.


Perhaps, but I do wonder if the delay in this model (I'm sure they wanted to roll this out sooner), was to improve thermal design.

not a chance...i think Vega wasn't ready at all in summer. But who knows...very small chances

 

[Ma2k5]

Considering it is still a 14nm 35W GPU, I wouldn't say the difference is enough for you to feel shafted. To add, it's probably as an added cost too rather than a same price replacement of the 5XX series, if it makes you feel better.

I am sure some tasks it will probably do better, but then others it's probably the same. Under load, I can't imagine how much better this dGPU could be due to the thermal limitations, definitely not 60% improvement (not even half of that).

 

[maflynn]

Considering it is still a 14nm 35W GPU, I wouldn't say the difference is enough for you to feel shafted.

Compared to PC laptops, yes. That GPU will not be as robust as say a nvidia 1080, but compared to what we mac users already have it will certainly be an improvement.

 

[Naimfan]

Any cooling improvements would have already been done - it is impossible to believe, from a cost perspective, that Apple would engineer and maintain two different chassis/board designs for the different GPUs.

The 2018 is already hamstrung by its lack of cooling, so the Vega GPU had better run more efficiently or the MBP will have to throttle severely (whether CPU, GPU, or both).

 

[bonjourx]

Yikes. So perhaps the difference would be really noticeable and huge? I just purchased the 2.6ghz 16gb ram 512gb storage and it arrived today. As I am not very knowledgeable about these stuff, I wanted to know if it’s a huge gap between the 560x and Vega. Are you guys planning on purchasing a new one? Should I just return this one and wait for the Vega? Ugh... price would be probably around extra 400?

 

[KarmaRocket]

Supposedly the new Vega chip will be equivalent to something between the GTX 1050 and 1060. While the current 560X is equivalent to something below the GTX 1050. I don't think it will be a huge jump in real world tests. Though it would be nice if I'm wrong and AMD made a killer mobile GPU. My Radeon pro 560X in my 2018 MBP i9 is quite efficient for it's TDP. Though I do wish it was more powerful.

Honestly, if you really need the graphics power, I would wait for 2019 and see if AMD can get a good mobile variant of their 7nm Vega/Navi GPUs. Seems like apple is all in on AMD GPU's, so we could see them using it in an upcoming MBP. Hopefully, they change the chassis to improve cooling as well.

I think if Apple just put in a premium GPU in their laptops, a lot people would be satisfied with the MBP. Paying a premium for a device, you would want premium components, especially the CPU and GPU.

 

[leman]

Supposedly the new Vega chip will be equivalent to something between the GTX 1050 and 1060. While the current 560X is equivalent to something below the GTX 1050. I don't think it will be a huge jump in real world tests. Though it would be nice if I'm wrong and AMD made a killer mobile GPU. My Radeon pro 560X in my 2018 MBP i9 is quite efficient for it's TDP. Though I do wish it was more powerful.

It depends on what you do. For gaming for example, the difference will be absolutely staggering. For machine learning, even more so (since Vega has more than twice the amount of FP16 ALUs). If you are using your dGPU for photo and video processing, not so much, since these tasks don't scale too well to begin with. But GPU-accelerated rendering? 50% increase is not unlikely.
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I am sure some tasks it will probably do better, but then others it's probably the same. Under load, I can't imagine how much better this dGPU could be due to the thermal limitations, definitely not 60% improvement (not even half of that).

I really think you will be in for a surprise. Just the move from GDDR5 to HBM2 will be huge. The current Polaris 555/560 are bandwidth-limited in most tasks and show big boosts in performance when the memory is overlocked. HMB2 will completely remove that limitation. Vega is already much more efficient than Polaris (just check the performance of the Ryzen APU parts), and — since HBM2 barely uses any energy, more of the thermal headroom can be allocated to the GPU. Combine all that and improvements in the ballpark of 50% compared to Polaris, at the same 35W TDP, are fairly realistic.

But of course, this is all just a conjecture. We have to wait and see, and then we will know.

 

[KarmaRocket]

It depends on what you do. For gaming for example, the difference will be absolutely staggering. For machine learning, even more so (since Vega has more than twice the amount of FP16 ALUs). If you are using your dGPU for photo and video processing, not so much, since these tasks don't scale too well to begin with. But GPU-accelerated rendering? 50% increase is not unlikely.
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I really think you will be in for a surprise. Just the move from GDDR5 to HBM2 will be huge. The current Polaris 555/560 are bandwidth-limited in most tasks and show big boosts in performance when the memory is overlocked. HMB2 will completely remove that limitation. Vega is already much more efficient than Polaris (just check the performance of the Ryzen APU parts), and — since HBM2 barely uses any energy, more of the thermal headroom can be allocated to the GPU. Combine all that and improvements in the ballpark of 50% compared to Polaris, at the same 35W TDP, are fairly realistic.

But of course, this is all just a conjecture. We have to wait and see, and then we will know.

I think they will be better for gaming. But who games on a Mac? I prefer gaming on a Windows machine. Hell, even Linux now is better for gaming with help from Steam. Hopefully, by putting in better dGPU's in their machines we'll see more developers port games over to Mac, but we still have the issue of Apple deprecating OpenGL and forcing developers to use Metal. Hopefully Apple will come to their senses and support Vulkan or at least let developers use Molten to access Metal API's.

What I want is a machine that is great for game development and 3D software. Vega is a step in the right direction. Hopefully AMD can come up with a 7nm variant for mobile devices in 2019. That should be really interesting. Kind of excited about what AMD is doing now. Windows has a lot of power in terms of CPU/GPU (and better prices) but my workflow is really optimized on a Mac.

 

[leman]

I think they will be better for gaming. But who games on a Mac?

Folks who only have one laptop 🙂 I am certainly not buying a separate gaming machine, that would be ridiculous. But I will gladly pay $200 more if it gives me a more capable Mac for gaming.

Hell, even Linux now is better for gaming with help from Steam

I am sure that there are more Mac games on steam then there are Linux ones...

but we still have the issue of Apple deprecating OpenGL and forcing developers to use Metal.Hopefully Apple will come to their senses and support Vulkan or at least let developers use Molten to access Metal API's.

I am using Metal for Mac and Vulcan for Windows/Linux. Vulcan is a total mess. Metal is so much better to work with. Developers are more then welcome to use MoltenVK, its open source... not that it will matter much since most will use an engine anyway.

 

[KarmaRocket]

Folks who only have one laptop 🙂 I am certainly not buying a separate gaming machine, that would be ridiculous. But I will gladly pay $200 more if it gives me a more capable Mac for gaming.



I am sure that there are more Mac games on steam then there are Linux ones...



I am using Metal for Mac and Vulcan for Windows/Linux. Vulcan is a total mess. Metal is so much better to work with. Developers are more then welcome to use MoltenVK, its open source... not that it will matter much since most will use an engine anyway.

You're right, Vulkan is a bit of a mess, but it's getting better. And most people don't want to carry two machines. Certainly a factor for me as I'm getting older 🙂

There may be more Mac games, but Linux is getting Windows exclusive AAA titles through the help of Valve. You can run some games natively on Linux without much of a performance hit. They are translating DirectX 11/12 calls to Vulkan which is pretty impressive. If Apple supported Vulkan (or Molten) Mac's could get the same thing as well.

Engines won't help with 3D software developers. For instance, Blender uses OpenGL, and are thinking of using Vulkan in future development. Some companies like Unreal, Unity, Autodesk (Maya) etc can afford to support Metal, but smaller companies and open source software don't have the resources. This is years down the line. So who knows what will happen. But Apple's walled garden approach may not be the best solution, especially for open source. Something they supported openly a few years ago.

 

[Falhófnir]

Apple are claiming up to 60% faster than the 560X, so a good chunk certainly...