MP 7,1 Mac Pro 2019 vs Macbook Pro 16" (performance)

[mBlomkvist]

Hey everyone,

So I've ordered a Mac Pro to start doing all my remote editing/animating work from. I edit using proxy 422's in premiere and my animations are general 2d motion graphics. Sometimes I throw on some red giant plug in's but never anything too intensive.

I'm coming from a 16" macbook pro. Specifically the 2.3GHz 8‑core Intel Core i9 option on apple's website.

The mac pro I ordered is the base model with a larger ssd and Pro Vega II video card added.

From my research I assumed I was making the right call in that this was a good starting point for Adobe's software and the work I do. While I'm not adding more cores... I've heard the premiere and ae don't really love multi cores and they're horribly opitmized. So you want to lean towards a lower core count and faster per core. And I assumed the Xeon W would be faster than the i9 because well... I just sort of assumed that a 3.5 GHz would be faster than a 2.3. Also while, 32 GB of ram isn't a ton, it's twice as much as the previous 16 GB of slower RAM in the laptop.

But now, after looking at geekbench results... I don't know if I made the right call here. The video card is obviously miles better but the processor seems to be equal if not somewhat less impressive than the i9.

What's going on? I didn't expect the Mac Pro to be a powerhouse. I got what I could afford and opted to go with a machine that I could upgrade. But everything is telling me I will see zero difference.

Thank you for any information. Obviously I will know for sure when this thing shows up... but I'm trying just grasp how the Mac Pro ships with a slower cpu than the Macbook pro.

 

[Meads]

I have a 16" MBP (the i7, though) and a Hackintosh with an i9 9900K.
In comparison to those machines my MacPro (16 Core) is less than impressive to say the least. I mean, it holds up fine, but especially in single core scenarios it's on par or worse than the i7 and doesn't hold a candle to the i9. I knew that beforehand though, so I was not shocked.
Xeons are all about number of cores. In environments were core count is king the Mac Pro shines. When it's more about single core juice the Mac Pro clearly falls behind recent i9 offerings, no question.

 

[mBlomkvist]

I have a 16" MBP (the i7, though) and a Hackintosh with an i9 9900K.
In comparison to those machines my MacPro (16 Core) is less than impressive to say the least. I mean, it holds up fine, but especially in single core scenarios it's on par or worse than the i7 and doesn't hold a candle to the i9. I knew that beforehand though, so I was not shocked.
Xeons are all about number of cores. In environments were core count is king the Mac Pro shines. When it's more about single core juice the Mac Pro clearly falls behind recent i9 offerings, no question.

Well now I feel like I total idiot buying the new mac pro. I mean it isn't all bad news. I'd feel like more of an idiot if it was the same parts but in an imac.

I heard somewhere that the 2019 Mac Pro is rumored to have more CPU options coming? That the Xeon's that it ships with are actually sort of old and that there are new ones coming? Have you heard about this at all?

I guess I'm also thankful that the geekbench's are even with the computer I'm coming from and not slower.

 

[Meads]

Put it through its paces within your return window and send it back if you don't like it.
While it's not a performance monster (at least for my use cases), it's good enough and it has been nothing but stable for me so far. Plus the PCIe expansion capabilities and the amount of TB3 (with the 5700x installed) are what made me keep that fella.
If, when and how it is going to be upgraded is anyone's guess. Personally I wouldn't hold my breath though.

 

[eflx]

The difference in single core performance on the i9 in real world usage, and the Xeon is negligible. You will not notice any real difference if you are running the 12 or 16 core in the Mac Pro; and the Mac Pro overall is much more powerful and capable. The 8 core has a higher base clock, but a bit lower turbo boost. Either way, it's still very powerful. Just make sure you fill 6 RAM slots or you're missing out on some CPU performance not running all ram channels to regain a bit of lost ground there versus the i9 ... but honestly, it's very marginal differences you'll see in synthetic benchmarks "only"

The i9 is snappy, but the comparison doesn't hold any ground outside of "50 points" on a synthetic benchmark like GeekBench.

Don't feel stupid - the Mac Pro is way more powerful overall

 

[Meads]

The difference in single core performance on the i9 in real world usage, and the Xeon is negligible.

The i9 is snappy, but the comparison doesn't hold any ground outside of "50 points" on a synthetic benchmark like GeekBench.

Both of those statements are plain and simple not true.
I work in audio on fairly large projects. My sessions don't benefit greatly from core count but more from clock speed.
I did thorough testing when I got my Mac Pro, because I really wanted to see if my 10K bought an upgrade or a downgrade compared to my Hackintosh.
And as it stands, bouncing mixes is almost 60% slower on the Mac Pro compared to my i9 9900 Hackintosh. That is not exactly negligible. And it is as real life as it gets. It's what I do every day.

So stop posting nonsense regurgitating some opinion you might have read somewhere without having done any testing yourself to back up your claims.

Nobody said the Mac Pro wasn't powerful. I gave a differentiated statement when the Mac Pro can flex and when it really can't. And that's based on experience, not on some bogus opinion.
Sorry, but I've had it with people that post misinformation only to be part of a discussion. It's not helping anyone.

 

[th0masp]

Common wisdom appears to be that Adobe does not scale well, uses little GPU acceleration and that some plugins for Adobe software can put further restrictions on system resource usage.

The upside of that Mac Pro is likely only going to be that you can keep upgrading it long after Apple stops caring and that it will not easily throttle like a laptop under load.

Meads' hacktintosh sounds like the superior solution to me.

 

[Meads]

Common wisdom appears to be that Adobe does not scale well, uses little GPU acceleration and that some plugins for Adobe software can put further restrictions on system resource usage.

The upside of that Mac Pro is likely only going to be that you can keep upgrading it long after Apple stops caring and that it will not easily throttle like a laptop under load.

Meads' hacktintosh sounds like the superior solution to me.

I agree.
That Hackintosh has now been degraded to being a Windows gaming PC. Kind of hurts seeing it go to waste and kinda doesn't.

 

[tanoanian]

I have both. The 16" macbook pro is nice on the go but as a desktop replacement it's not good. For one thing it's a leafblower when you hook it up to external monitors and try to do anything that taxes the system. The mac pro is one hell of a refined machine and the best computer I've ever owned.

 

[eflx]

And as it stands, bouncing mixes is almost 60% slower on the Mac Pro compared to my i9 9900 Hackintosh. That is not exactly negligible. And it is as real life as it gets. It's what I do every day.

60% slower? Prove it. I seriously doubt anyone who runs around with advice while running a "Hackintosh". You may see some very specific cases where the higher turbo-boost of the i9 and base clock does indeed help single-threading, but the single-threaded performance between the 12 core and 16 core is nowhere near 60% unless there's some VERY specific usage case.

The Mac Pro is an audio-editing and mixing workhorse in general. There's not a 60% improvement in clock speed, nor memory bandwidth running the i9.

 

[mBlomkvist]

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I have both. The 16" macbook pro is nice on the go but as a desktop replacement it's not good. For one thing it's a leafblower when you hook it up to external monitors and try to do anything that taxes the system. The mac pro is one hell of a refined machine and the best computer I've ever owned.

This is literally why I got rid of the 16". I couldn't stand the fans and I wanted to be able to run dual 4k" while closed.

I think the main thing, while adobe doesn't really lean on gpu, the graphics card is going from a 28000 geekbench to a 94000. When I jump into red giant on projects I'll crush it. Also I shouldn't have a problem with the dual 4k.

I should be fine. When I was working in studios I was on maxed out trashcans and I believe my build is still better than those.

 

[codehead1]

I work in audio on fairly large projects. My sessions don't benefit greatly from core count but more from clock speed.

Curious what you're doing, in particular. I've just had time to do a little recording and working with existing projects, since moving to the 7,1 (from 4,1 hardware upgraded to 5,1 firmware, High Sierra). For my most power-hungry plugins, at least, the cores seem to be a huge win. But yes, I can understand that for some things single core speed is supreme.

 

[Adult80HD]

I have the same MBP you have except mine is maxed out with 64GB of RAM. I can assure you that the GeekBench scores don't mean a lot in the real world. Adobe definitely is lagging in terms of scaling with CPU cores and leveraging the GPU, but they are *finally* starting to make some moves in that area in recent releases of most of the apps.

The single-core performance is pretty much on par in most applications with the i9 in the 16" MBP and unlike that machine, it won't thermally throttle with load. As others have pointed out, fill 6 channels with RAM as you will see a boost on many tasks doing so, and not a minor boost either. I recall someone here benchmarking some functions in Adobe Lightroom and seeing about a 40% performance jump.

The advantages of the multiple cores and great memory bandwidth show up more as you load up the MP and give it a lot of tasks to work on; whereas the MBP will start to slow on tasks and the fans will spin up, the MP will just keep chugging along. I do think the better value in the MP is the 12 or 16-core versions; had you asked for advice before buying I would have strongly suggested one of those options.

Any applications you use that can leverage the GPU will see a big boost, and there is the fact that you can expand the MP by adding PCIe cards. It is much more future-proof then the MBP and you will get a much longer life out of it.

 

[mBlomkvist]

I have the same MBP you have except mine is maxed out with 64GB of RAM. I can assure you that the GeekBench scores don't mean a lot in the real world. Adobe definitely is lagging in terms of scaling with CPU cores and leveraging the GPU, but they are *finally* starting to make some moves in that area in recent releases of most of the apps.

The single-core performance is pretty much on par in most applications with the i9 in the 16" MBP and unlike that machine, it won't thermally throttle with load. As others have pointed out, fill 6 channels with RAM as you will see a boost on many tasks doing so, and not a minor boost either. I recall someone here benchmarking some functions in Adobe Lightroom and seeing about a 40% performance jump.

The advantages of the multiple cores and great memory bandwidth show up more as you load up the MP and give it a lot of tasks to work on; whereas the MBP will start to slow on tasks and the fans will spin up, the MP will just keep chugging along. I do think the better value in the MP is the 12 or 16-core versions; had you asked for advice before buying I would have strongly suggested one of those options.

Any applications you use that can leverage the GPU will see a big boost, and there is the fact that you can expand the MP by adding PCIe cards. It is much more future-proof then the MBP and you will get a much longer life out of it.

Thank you! Yeah I think I've sort of regretted not getting the higher core count but I'm sure prices will come down as time goes on.

Also just ordered 6x 16gb sticks of RAM so hopefully that gives me a boost from the 32.

Tomorrow is the day!

 

[yurc]

On longer usage, MBP always hit thermal envelope. While it still keep performance, but sometimes it start hot and annoyance fans noise kick in. Wouldn’t happened on desktop (Mac Pro) which is still silent.

 

[jvlfilms]

I don't think a MacBook Pro could ever compare to editing on a fully fledged desktop. Heat dissipation, fan noise, and overall performance will be better on a full CPU and GPU. But then you lose one of the key features of the MBP: editing anywhere you'd like, which isn't possible on a desktop machine. I think you'll be completely satisfied with your new MP 7,1

I have the last 15" MBP and this thing gets so hot under full load even with Turbo Boost disabled.

When my work resumes, I am excited to test out editing fully on my Mac Pro 5,1 (2009) now that I've done all these upgrades.

 

[maflynn]

[MOD NOTE]
Some posts were removed as things were getting a bit heated. Please stay on topic and be respectful

 

[DFP1989]

I have both. The 16" macbook pro is nice on the go but as a desktop replacement it's not good. For one thing it's a leafblower when you hook it up to external monitors and try to do anything that taxes the system. The mac pro is one hell of a refined machine and the best computer I've ever owned.

This is the main reason I can’t use my loaded 16-inch MBP as my main machine, it’s so unpleasantly loud when working hard.

I’m very excited to receive my 16-core with the W5700X and 96GB RAM in the next week or so!

 

[diego9]

This is the main reason I can’t use my loaded 16-inch MBP as my main machine, it’s so unpleasantly loud when working hard.

I had the same problem with my 2019 MBP 16". I maxed out the graphics when ordering it, and it is somewhat capable, but the fans become audible when I simply browse the web with the Pro Display XDR connected to it.

Now what? External GPU to the rescue! I got the 5700 XT graphics card for under $400, a Sonnet Breakaway Box 650 for $300, and now I can play 3D games silently on the Pro Display XDR connected to the MBP via eGPU. I don't do video editing so I don't know how it would behave in that situation, but with a game like Sonic Racing from Apple Arcade, the MBP doesn't even break a sweat. And that's at full native 6K resolution. I can play for as long as I want while the MBP's fans remain inaudible. The graphics card itself has 3 large fans which run quietly while playing Sonic Racing, and stop completely for tasks like web browsing and watching a video in fullscreen.

My understanding is that an eGPU can be used by DaVinci Resolve and all the other programs which make use of the MPX modules.

By the way, the 5700 XT graphics card has a PassMark score 17% higher than the W5700 (which has one USB-c port). Apple's variation of the 5700, the W5700X with its 4 TB3 ports, is not listed on the PassMark website, so I don't know what its PassMark score is.

 

[jvlfilms]

Good to hear! I bought the RX 580 for my cMP with the option of using it external for my MBP.

I think in most gaming situations it certainly helps on performance but I’ve heard mixed things about video editing. While it does allow the CPUs to get hotter with minimal fan noise, the GPU itself needs time to travel back and forth from the system to process renders. So with an eGPU it may actually take longer to render the final file.

 

[diego9]

Good to hear! I bought the RX 580 for my cMP with the option of using it external for my MBP.

I think in most gaming situations it certainly helps on performance but I’ve heard mixed things about video editing. While it does allow the CPUs to get hotter with minimal fan noise, the GPU itself needs time to travel back and forth from the system to process renders. So with an eGPU it may actually take longer to render the final file.

Ok, so I downloaded DaVinci Resolve and ran some comparison tests between my MBP's built-in discrete GPU (dGPU) and my eGPU. The encoding times are basically the same. I think the reason is that modern GPUs have compute units for 3D, but the video encoding is not done on those. Video encoding is performed by specialized circuitry in the graphics card, and it's the same circuitry for a variety of models.

Of course, speed is only one of the factors, the other one being noise. If you do pure video encoding with an eGPU on an MBP, it will be quiet. HOWEVER, if you throw filters at it (de-interlacing, sharpening, etc.) then those filters are perfomed on your CPU, not the eGPU, and then it's possible that the fans are going to spin up. I tried adding filters to my video project in DaVinci but I couldn't find any filters, so I didn't do the test. I'm used to working with video conversion in HandBrake, which is a video conversion (not editing) tool, and I know where to find the filters in it, but not in DaVinci which is the tool more commonly used by video editors.

 

[th0masp]

Ok, so I downloaded DaVinci Resolve and ran some comparison tests between my MBP's built-in discrete GPU (dGPU) and my eGPU. The encoding times are basically the same. I think the reason is that modern GPUs have compute units for 3D, but the video encoding is not done on those. Video encoding is performed by specialized circuitry in the graphics card, and it's the same circuitry for a variety of models.

It might also be that your eGPU is not utilized to its full extend. From what I have read about the subject there's a performance difference between hooking it up to drive the displays and just having it hang off the system. Also if you haven't done so already - make sure to set the preferences in Resolve to use the GPU you want and test with Metal vs OpenCL.

 

[fritzzzzzz]

Apart from adding more sticks, at least 6 sticks for all Xeon cpus inside of Mac Pro. try to add duo GPUs (2 MPX), the preference of open CL and Metal will be way better than single MPX (no matter what combination you have (580 + W5700x or any other MPX) . Also, Mac Pro runs ECC memory so it is good for you. For HDD wise, upgrade to 1TB at minimum cause it runs RAID 0 if you only have 256 so it won't be getting any benefits. personally I like to spend extra money to Apple for HDD storage cause of T2 so it will be better for me.

 

[spideyrsf]

Comparing i9 with Xeon is not the right thing to do. I work with 2D/3D motion graphic and archviz, in studio we have a win pc with i9 8 core and my old mac pro 5.1 with 12 core. As said before mostly problems are related to adobe software, if you are using after effects, photoshop... you will think i9 is far faster and better than xeon, but when you need multiple cores, render animation for hours, cpu render on cinema 4d etc... xeon machines are beasts

 

[OkiRun]

Comparing i9 with Xeon is not the right thing to do. I work with 2D/3D motion graphic and archviz, in studio we have a win pc with i9 8 core and my old mac pro 5.1 with 12 core. As said before mostly problems are related to adobe software, if you are using after effects, photoshop... you will think i9 is far faster and better than xeon, but when you need multiple cores, render animation for hours, cpu render on cinema 4d etc... xeon machines are beasts

Having both PCs and Macs makes a production company more flexible, strategic, and economic. Both types of computers have strengths and weaknesses. I mentioned in another thread; professional musicians often have numerous instruments (e.g. keyboards, guitars, etc.) and not just one for all purposes. Same is the case for a production company. How a company could get by with only one type of computer is beyond me.