I remember that model. One of the problems with mechanical keyboards is a lot of Chinese players have moved into the market and I have no idea if they're junk or decent but they've put a few other companies out of business. I like the Max Blackbird but I can no longer get it.
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Waiting for the 2020 MBP
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I remember that model. One of the problems with mechanical keyboards is a lot of Chinese players have moved into the market and I have no idea if they're junk or decent but they've put a few other companies out of business. I like the Max Blackbird but I can no longer get it.
I hadn't realized that the XPS 15 uses 45 watt processors... I knew that a very closely related Precision model did (there's a lightweight Precision 15" (the 5540) that is much like the XPS, except with Quadro graphics instead of GeForce). I agree that the higher end configurations of the XPS 15 are close relatives of the 15" MBP (and probably not counted in Statista's workstation survey).
Note that the GeForces in the XPS 15, and the Quadros in its Precision relative, aren't any faster than the GPUs in the MBP - especially the Vega options. Those low-end mobile Quadros are pretty much low-end mobile GeForces (perhaps binned) with a more stable driver. The only workstations I've ever seen using the higher-end mobile Quadros (which are related to big mobile GeForces, although they may have a genuine extra feature or two) are huge 17" models.
I've never seen a workstation or high-end business notebook (e.g. XPS 15 or competitors - a machine related to slimline mobile workstations, but with a consumer graphics card) vendor try to slip a high-power GPU into anything less than 8 lbs or so. Some gaming laptops do, but they either have to undervolt the GPU, use turbojet fans or accept case-melting heat..
I'd say that the MacBook Pro is in between the XPS 15 and the Precision 5540. Yes, it uses a "consumer" GPU, but the Apple driver is closer to a low-end Quadro driver in stability than it is to a gaming driver - and those little mobile Quadros are rebadged GeForces. What's actually going to be closest is NVidia's new "creative pro" driver, once it's been around a while and is fully stable.
I wonder how many 45 watt, discrete GPU, non-gaming laptops are sold (outside of Apple and workstations)? There are obviously some, and I can't see where Statista might track them. They'd make a difference in 45 watt processor demand, of course.
Note that the GeForces in the XPS 15, and the Quadros in its Precision relative, aren't any faster than the GPUs in the MBP - especially the Vega options. Those low-end mobile Quadros are pretty much low-end mobile GeForces (perhaps binned) with a more stable driver. The only workstations I've ever seen using the higher-end mobile Quadros (which are related to big mobile GeForces, although they may have a genuine extra feature or two) are huge 17" models.
I've never seen a workstation or high-end business notebook (e.g. XPS 15 or competitors - a machine related to slimline mobile workstations, but with a consumer graphics card) vendor try to slip a high-power GPU into anything less than 8 lbs or so. Some gaming laptops do, but they either have to undervolt the GPU, use turbojet fans or accept case-melting heat..
I'd say that the MacBook Pro is in between the XPS 15 and the Precision 5540. Yes, it uses a "consumer" GPU, but the Apple driver is closer to a low-end Quadro driver in stability than it is to a gaming driver - and those little mobile Quadros are rebadged GeForces. What's actually going to be closest is NVidia's new "creative pro" driver, once it's been around a while and is fully stable.
I wonder how many 45 watt, discrete GPU, non-gaming laptops are sold (outside of Apple and workstations)? There are obviously some, and I can't see where Statista might track them. They'd make a difference in 45 watt processor demand, of course.
I meant Icelake CPU's. I'm just wondering if all the noise about it is going to be justified in terms of the average use case of these computers, or if it will be a solid bump, but nothing earth shattering.
I'm 95% on board with buying the 16" whenever it drops and it seems like its going to have another 14+++++++ Intel chip. I'm just curious about the performance differential when the 7nm chips finally hit in 2021 or whenever. Intel is saying its a 18% IPC improvement over Skylake, which is pretty big. I guess I'm just wondering if I'm going to be upset that I didn't hold out for another year. I'm not usually one to be obsessed with the latest and greatest specs on a computer like this, but there are times where the jump in performance is large enough to justify waiting.
The 18% IPC increase will come with a much lower clockspeed. It's likely that this difference in clockspeed will easily offset the IPC increase. So CPU performance is going to be around the same with better efficiency on 10nm. The new integrated GPU however is a big jump from current offerings with more than 1 TFLOPS of performance.
The Precision 7730 which I'm looking at offers the Nvidia Quadro P5200 w/16GB GDDR5 and I think that the variant that they use will use upwards of 110-110 Watts of power. I don't think that a MacBook Pro is going to run 100-110 Watts on the GPU without melting.
The Lenovo P73 (due later this year) offers the NVIDIA® Quadro RTX™ 5000 which has a power rating of up to 250 Watts. The P73 comes with a 230 Watt power supply so you're obviously not going to run sustained workloads there.
I think that one of the Asus models allows you to use dual power bricks to make use of the somewhat insane graphics cards out there. The P73 and 7730 are the leading contenders for my next laptop. Some might call it a portable desktop.
I want Icelake too, but not for performance, the current 14+++++ is tweaked so much to the edges that they are space heaters.
Yes, there are 17" laptop workstations around (and sometimes over) 8 lbs that support bigger Quadros. They use (as pshufd said) oversize, and in some cases even multiple power bricks (pretty much all the time - their battery life is measured in minutes if you're using them as designed - the battery is almost there as a UPS in case the power cord pulls out). They are designed for much more reliability (at much greater expense) than similarly large gaming machines.
Apple's not going to build something like that (even the old 17" wasn't - it was half the weight of the predecessors of those behemoths - they were around 12 lbs when the 17" MBP was around).
Apple is going for the slimline workstation market (Dell P5540, Lenovo P1, HP Zbook Studio), and the closely related upper-end 15" business laptop market (XPS 15" and friends), not even the heaviest end of the 15" workstation market, let alone the 17" workstation market.
Apple's not going to build something like that (even the old 17" wasn't - it was half the weight of the predecessors of those behemoths - they were around 12 lbs when the 17" MBP was around).
Apple is going for the slimline workstation market (Dell P5540, Lenovo P1, HP Zbook Studio), and the closely related upper-end 15" business laptop market (XPS 15" and friends), not even the heaviest end of the 15" workstation market, let alone the 17" workstation market.
The Dell Precision 7730 is listed at 7.3 pounds. The Lenovo P73 is listed at 7.5 pounds. My 2008 17 inch MacBook Pro weighed in at 8 pounds but the listed average weight is 6.8 pounds. The 2008 17 inch MacBook Pro is listed as 1 inch thick. The P73 is 25 mm (just under an inch), while the 7730 is 1.18 inches. So the modern mobile workstations aren't that far away from the early 2008 MacBook Pro 17.
We don't even know that 7nm is real. Intel promised huge performance gains with 10nm but it's years late and may never reach certain market segments.
The theoretical boost from a shift to 7nm would be big. Keep in mind Intel has only publicly committed to releasing a 7nm GPU in 2021, so even if 7nm materializes on-time, it's still probably 3 years out.
It depends on just what the 7nm chips are like - according to Brian Krzanich last year, Intel had targeted an ambitious 2.7x transistor density for 10nm over their 14nm design. This seems to be what they couldn't make work, and what they will now be releasing as '10nm' is Kaby Lake refresh built on a 10-12nm process (i.e. no transistor density increase at all). It sounds like any improvement will come from cooler temperatures allowing them to up clock speeds, so in this regard it will actually be a lot like Kaby Lake over Skylake. As far as 7nm goes, I don't think we can even speculate. Will they risk trying the big density increase again to leapfrog the competition, or once bitten twice cautious?
Appreciate the info, actually makes me feel better about buying the 16" with whatever it comes with as it's clear it won't be as big a jump as I thought when they eventually change to Icelake (or whatever the 45w 10/7nm stuff will be called).
Are we assuming that the 16" will use a mobile Comet Lake setup? And do we know if its going to have hardware mitigation of the Intel security flaws?
Are we assuming that the 16" will use a mobile Comet Lake setup? And do we know if its going to have hardware mitigation of the Intel security flaws?
Those listed weights on 17" workstations are very low... They do a bunch of things to keep the listed weight down (I don't know which tricks are employed in each particular machine).
Optical drive/multipurpose bay is filled with a blank tray (options include optical, HDD, SSD(s), card reader, battery - no one machine has all of those options available).
Weighed with a single SSD stick and no HDD (those 17" machines can have up to 4 drives)
Smallest possible battery if there's a choice
Intel integrated graphics if that's an option (discrete graphics are generally on a daughterboard)
Single RAM DIMM unless the machine requires two to run. Two if they must, never four
Most of those things don't matter by more than an ounce or two - the optical bay blank could be three or four, and a battery choice could be half a pound - but they add up. In most realistic configurations, the big workstations are over 8 lbs.
Of course, the big weight cheat is that they don't include the power adapter in the weight. Most of those monsters have a ~ 2 lb adapter (with the cords), and you need it all the time - they have very short battery lives.
All laptops have gotten lighter in the past few years - their predecessors (when the MBP 17" was still made) were well over 10 lbs, approaching 12 lb. Including the power adapters for both machines, they were at least very close to twice the weight of the MBP 17".
Optical drive/multipurpose bay is filled with a blank tray (options include optical, HDD, SSD(s), card reader, battery - no one machine has all of those options available).
Weighed with a single SSD stick and no HDD (those 17" machines can have up to 4 drives)
Smallest possible battery if there's a choice
Intel integrated graphics if that's an option (discrete graphics are generally on a daughterboard)
Single RAM DIMM unless the machine requires two to run. Two if they must, never four
Most of those things don't matter by more than an ounce or two - the optical bay blank could be three or four, and a battery choice could be half a pound - but they add up. In most realistic configurations, the big workstations are over 8 lbs.
Of course, the big weight cheat is that they don't include the power adapter in the weight. Most of those monsters have a ~ 2 lb adapter (with the cords), and you need it all the time - they have very short battery lives.
All laptops have gotten lighter in the past few years - their predecessors (when the MBP 17" was still made) were well over 10 lbs, approaching 12 lb. Including the power adapters for both machines, they were at least very close to twice the weight of the MBP 17".
I don't know of any systems with an optical drive. What I usually do is get a power brick for home and office so I don't have to carry one back and forth. I currently carry a 2014 15 and a 2015 15 in my backpack. I used to carry two 8 pound laptops around every day. So the weight doesn't bother me.
I have one word for you guys: XEON
The 16" will have the Xeon E-2276M or the Xeon E-2286M. They are 45 watt parts, and the new Dell Precision 7540 has them. With up to 128GB of ram (like the 7540). And able to drive multiple Pro Display XDR's.
This will be a serious mobile companion to the Mac Pro. THAT is the market these will chase.
The 16" will have the Xeon E-2276M or the Xeon E-2286M. They are 45 watt parts, and the new Dell Precision 7540 has them. With up to 128GB of ram (like the 7540). And able to drive multiple Pro Display XDR's.
This will be a serious mobile companion to the Mac Pro. THAT is the market these will chase.
Thanks. I didn't know about the new 40 series so I looked up the 7740 and priced out what I'd like - about $3,800.
I do think that Apple should go here but they'd need a thicker chassis if they really want to compete with the likes of the 7740.
I don't need ECC. BTW, I'd go with an AMD card on the possibility of running Mojave.
Having a spare power brick is certainly a good option for those big systems.
I'd actually like to see Apple's take on something like that, but the best we can hope for is something in between the current MBP and that kind of all-out power.
You're right - Dell and Lenovo finally eliminated the optical/multipurpose bay and replaced it with the spot for the smart card reader (probably saving some weight and volume in the process). HP still has the bay in the Zbook 17. I don't think most people had used it for an optical drive in years - it was generally an extra 2.5" HDD? Since a few people did fit an optical drive, it had to be an odd shape.
I'd actually like to see Apple's take on something like that, but the best we can hope for is something in between the current MBP and that kind of all-out power.
You're right - Dell and Lenovo finally eliminated the optical/multipurpose bay and replaced it with the spot for the smart card reader (probably saving some weight and volume in the process). HP still has the bay in the Zbook 17. I don't think most people had used it for an optical drive in years - it was generally an extra 2.5" HDD? Since a few people did fit an optical drive, it had to be an odd shape.
I had considered getting a Mac Mini and a portable display. It would certainly fit into my backpack.
I don't see Apple making a laptop that requires 240 Watts.
So.. how long must we wait for a 16 inch non touchbar mbp with new scissor keyboard?
The one rumor we have of a launch date says September. But these are all just rumors. Nobody really knows until Apple says something official; there's no guarantee that a 16″ MBP will even be released.
Will a redesigned MBP have a touch bar or not? I can see a case for both. On the one hand, Apple really doesn't like admitting a mistake and going back to a previous design. Especially if they're going back to a scissor mechanism keyboard already, there would be two glaring admissions of error on the physical exterior of the device and I don't know if Apple is prepared to do that. The headlines would write themselves.
But on the other hand, there isn't much of a case for keeping the touch bar. It doesn't add a whole lot to the user experience. I really only use it to adjust the brightness/volume and to press the virtual Esc key. It's very much a solution in search of a problem, and that makes it seem really gimmicky. It's been the focus of a lot of marketing, but Apple hasn't made a compelling case for it. Nobody's buying this machine because it has a touch bar.
Apple has to fix the keyboard though. It's possible they will release a redesigned MacBook Pro that they have to put on a repair program the day it launches. Either because they don't have a suitable replacement in time, or because they're stubbornly charging forward with putting more band-aids on the butterfly keyboard. That possibility worries me, but it would be incredibly foolish of them to do that. There's a rumor that they've got a scissor mechanism design on the way that's nearly as thin as a butterfly keyboard. And with six redesigned MacBooks coming (that we know for sure, since Apple registered model numbers with the EEC), it looks like we're in for an imminent refresh of, like, all the MacBooks, and my hope is that we're going to see a rapid introduction of that keyboard across the lineup.
Indeed, $3999 starting price. Although it will be 8-core 32 gigs memory and 1 TB SSD storage, 4K high refresh rate screen with a top of the line although AMD gpu.
The ergonomics of a virtual keyboards are ****. The technology to make them have been there for a long long time but they are not used, not because its expensive but because it would be painful and actually less user friendly (can't feel where the keys are). No matter how good the haptical feedback is.