Seriously? I love my MBA - but ti's Rev A and I've yet to drink the Kool-Aid about RevB actually being 4x faster. Maybe for Games... but not for everyday stuff.
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I own a rev a. tested a rev b today...
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Seriously? I love my MBA - but ti's Rev A and I've yet to drink the Kool-Aid about RevB actually being 4x faster. Maybe for Games... but not for everyday stuff.
What I don't get is how we can have users claiming their old G4 1 Ghz can run Leopard and do ordinary tasks "just fine" with 1GB of ram while people are complaining about the snappiness of a Dual Core 1.86Ghz Machine with 2GB of faster ram, a better HD, etc.
Always been bothered by this, could somebody care to explain?
Always been bothered by this, could somebody care to explain?
So much mis-information here.
First, Rev B is faster than Rev A in 3D graphics. When we talk about the graphic acceleration today, it is all about 3D. There is really not much to optimize with 2D since it only involves copying memory.
There is also rumor that MPEG-4 decoder also uses the graphic card for hardware acceleration.
OK, let's look at Youtube and hulu.com. What encoding do they use? Youtube website is all Flash. I am not sure about Hulu, but it is not QuickTime or MPEG-4. So, with either site, the CPU is doing all the work. You will not see any difference caused by the graphic chip.
So, I have no doubt that Youtube/hulu will look any different on Rev B vs Rev A. Actually, None of the Flash content will benefit from Rev B's faster graphic chip.
First, Rev B is faster than Rev A in 3D graphics. When we talk about the graphic acceleration today, it is all about 3D. There is really not much to optimize with 2D since it only involves copying memory.
There is also rumor that MPEG-4 decoder also uses the graphic card for hardware acceleration.
OK, let's look at Youtube and hulu.com. What encoding do they use? Youtube website is all Flash. I am not sure about Hulu, but it is not QuickTime or MPEG-4. So, with either site, the CPU is doing all the work. You will not see any difference caused by the graphic chip.
So, I have no doubt that Youtube/hulu will look any different on Rev B vs Rev A. Actually, None of the Flash content will benefit from Rev B's faster graphic chip.
Why no one mentions, what makes it faster is not the 200Mhz but if it is equipped with HDD or SSD?
Rev A does good with SSD, unless it's a 3D graphic intensive operation. Rev B has 60Mhz more CPU (might possibly have better tuned CPU, don't know in detail.), bigger disk space and DDR3 RAM instead of DDR2 and possibly fixed CPU core meltdown issue. (But with Rev A, CoolBook fixes it anyway.), and has the four finger swipe. (But you can also possibly do this on Rev A)
While you can get an used Rev A SSD around $1500, Rev B SSD is plus $1000, which, isn't really that better. (Unless you are drooling to play some better games on boot camp on it or something.) But then again, some people's Rev B has display problems.
Rev A does good with SSD, unless it's a 3D graphic intensive operation. Rev B has 60Mhz more CPU (might possibly have better tuned CPU, don't know in detail.), bigger disk space and DDR3 RAM instead of DDR2 and possibly fixed CPU core meltdown issue. (But with Rev A, CoolBook fixes it anyway.), and has the four finger swipe. (But you can also possibly do this on Rev A)
While you can get an used Rev A SSD around $1500, Rev B SSD is plus $1000, which, isn't really that better. (Unless you are drooling to play some better games on boot camp on it or something.) But then again, some people's Rev B has display problems.
Well, not literally melts, but it used to shut down one of the core trying to cool itself down when kernel_task bursts itself to use entire CPU cycle. Recent update did fix the core from stopping, but that didn't fix the kernel_task from going berserk from time to time to take all CPU cycle to slow the machine down, but CoolBook just fixes for $10...
First of all, Rev B is faster at the same clock at processor related tasks (like running youtube/flash) because it has a faster system bus, faster memory, more L2 cache, a faster HD interface, uses a 45nm Penryn chip instead of a shrunken down 65nm Merom AND it has the FAR superior graphics subsystem. It does all of this while running at 17W instead of 20W like Rev. A
ON TOP OF ALL THAT, Rev A never reached it's potential since the severe heat dissipation (or lack thereof) issues caused the processor to constantly throttle down if not shut down entire cores. Rev B doesn't suffer from these same overheating problems that plagued Rev A, so while in theory it is somewhat faster, in the real world it is much much faster.
Just playing a few simple youtube videos after 10 mins+ illustrates this very well (especially the overheating/speed throttling of Rev A).
ON TOP OF ALL THAT, Rev A never reached it's potential since the severe heat dissipation (or lack thereof) issues caused the processor to constantly throttle down if not shut down entire cores. Rev B doesn't suffer from these same overheating problems that plagued Rev A, so while in theory it is somewhat faster, in the real world it is much much faster.
Just playing a few simple youtube videos after 10 mins+ illustrates this very well (especially the overheating/speed throttling of Rev A).
I am a Rev A owner (1.8/ssd) who loves the laptop but who has also experienced most of the problems. I have had core shutdowns etc, had the motherboard replaced, blah blah.. it is working better now than ever, but I consider it a little sick.
I tested the Rev B in the store. I threw everything I could at it. I mean, I was running, imovie, idvd, movie on itunes, multiple youtubes, etc etc. It did not seem to care. I dont know about the heat, but i dont really care... Stuttering and core shutdowns is all i care about.
i will buy a new one... for sure... pluse 128GB will be just right
I tested the Rev B in the store. I threw everything I could at it. I mean, I was running, imovie, idvd, movie on itunes, multiple youtubes, etc etc. It did not seem to care. I dont know about the heat, but i dont really care... Stuttering and core shutdowns is all i care about.
i will buy a new one... for sure... pluse 128GB will be just right
Congrats, I am waiting for mine to arrive myself. I think you will be really happy with it. Contrary to how some people feel, I really feel like they changed almost everything that bothered me about it with this revision.
Yes it does suffer. Maybe rev B is not overheating like A-revision was but I wasn't able to maximize cpu speed when I tested my friend new 1.86GHz/128SSD model. I had multiple HD-videos running, couple terminal windows with > yes/dev/null and I also played youtube in background. So I can safely say that were more than enough stress used. Activity monitor told that both cores where in full use.
I used MSR Tools to diagnoze cpu speed and speed was jumping from 0.8GHz to 1.59GHz. I didn't see 1.86GHz at all and most of time during my test (which took 30-40minutes) speed was 1.2GHz. Just like A-revision models.
Maybe my friend has faulty unit but I don't personally believe in miracles. Rev-b also has problems.
Sorry, but I think this is ridiculous. It's not even close to a normal use case. Nobody in real life needs to watch multiple videos, etc; they just want to watch one at a time without overheating.
This is like running your car down hill for 10 miles riding the brakes and then complaining that the brake pad cooling system was ill designed. You design for what you need, not for the absurd. Especially if the real design goal is small and light.
Frankly, I doubt my Pro could do that without it's fans blazing who knows about the cores, but I don't care because I don't do that. For what I do it's always quiet and never stutters. And that's enough for me.
People had real issues with Rev A not being a functional real computer. That's a real concern. This is not.
I have to disagree with you. You did undertand that that's not how I normally use my macs? I just wanted to test does the cpu perform like Apple is selling these machines. If my friend pays extra for 1.86GHz model he should get some benefits. If cpu is working just under 1.6GHz why there even is 1.86GHz model available?
But hey, it's just my opinion.
Do you actually know how the 1.6GHz CPU performs under the same test?
If it throttles down the same MHz, then it'd run at 1.34GHz, which still makes a 1.86GHz running at 1.6GHz the faster choice, no?
Yeah, I understand that's not how you use your mac; but that's why I also thought it was not a reasonable test case.
But I also understand that your opinion is as valid as mine!
Ultimately, I am trying to sort out how the thing behaves under "normal" conditions. It does get hard when many of the posted tests are under such extreme loads. I understand the concept of stressing a system to get a test scenario but I think this might be too much stress to be a useful data point.
Maybe I should just apply the "$1800 use case" test: Buy one myself again and see how it works under my "normal" conditions.
I consider encoding video as a "normal" use:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/611606/
and I too was not able to get it to go to 1.85Ghz which is what I thought I was paying for.
I have an older MBP 15.4" C2D running at 2.16GHz. When encoding dvd's to H.264 with HandBrake both cores are running at maximum 2.16GHz according to MSR Tools. Also my iMac at work seems to be taking all available power.