Primate Labs Blog

Late last week Geekbench results from what appeared to be a yet-unreleased MacBook Pro appeared on the Geekbench Result Browser. These results generated a lot of excitement, along with a lot of speculation; people wanted to know if these results were legitimate.

I spoke with Wired’s Brian Chen earlier today and shared my thoughts regarding the legitimacy of these results:

Geekbench creator John Poole told Wired.com that Geekbench results can be faked, but he believes the Core i7 MacBook Pro benchmark is real.

“If the system information for this system has been faked, it’s a convincing fake; there aren’t any inconsistencies in the system information, the Mac OS X build number matches Apple’s numbering scheme for new hardware builds, and the processor matches people’s expectations for what will appear in the refreshed MacBook Pro,” Poole said. “In other words, I believe this result is authentic.”

I have a feeling we’ll find out sooner rather than later whether this result is real or not!

I’ve updated the Mac Benchmark chart with Geekbench results for the new MacBook Pros announced at WWDC earlier this month. I’ve included the results for these new MacBook Pros below, along with results for the previous generation of MacBooks and MacBook Pros.

Results were collected from the Geekbench Result Browser for Macs with standard processors (i.e., no processor upgrades or overclocked processors). I’ve reported the average overall score for each model and processor combination. A score of 1000 is the score a Power Mac G5 @ 1.6GHz would receive, and higher scores are better.

Results

A few years ago I bought a 15″ PowerBook with an illuminated keyboard. At the time, I didn’t think much of the keyboard:

The keyboard backlight is an interesting idea, and looks very cool, but I’m not sure how practical it is. It’s only really visible when in a pitch-black room, and I can’t remember the last time I used a laptop in a room that dark (save when I was testing the keyboard backlight).

A few days ago, I bought a 15″ MacBook Pro with an illuminated keyboard and unlike the first time around I can’t say how much I’ve missed, and how much I appreciate, having a backlit keyboard.

You see, in between the PowerBook and the MacBook Pro I had a MacBook with a regular keyboard. That keyboard was hard enough to read in dim lighting, let alone complete darkness. Now, though, I have no problem reading the keys.

If you’re considering between an illuminated and a regular keyboard, might I recommend going with the illuminated keyboard. Even if it doesn’t seem like much at first, you’ll soon come to appreciate it.

Last week when I looked at the performance of Apple’s latest MacBook Pros I didn’t have results for the high-end CTO MacBook Pro (with the 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo processor).

Now that I’ve got results for the high-end MacBook Pro I thought I’d revisit MacBook Pro performance to see how the high-end MacBook Pro compares against the last two generations of MacBook Pros. Sure, it’s the fastest laptop Apple’s ever produced, but just how much faster is it?

Setup

Like last time, I used Geekbench 2, Primate Labs’ cross-platform benchmark, to measure the processor and memory performance of the new MacBook Pros. Here’s the configuration of the test machines:

• MacBook Pro (Late 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9600 @ 2.80GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 @ 2.53GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 @ 2.40GHz
  • 4.00 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F2114)

• MacBook Pro (Early 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9500 @ 2.60GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 @ 2.40GHz
  • 4.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F33)

Geekbench 2 scores are calibrated against a baseline score of 1000 (which is the score a Power Mac G5 @ 1.6GHz would receive). Higher scores are better.

Results

Overall Performance

Integer Performance

Floating Point Performance

Memory Performance

Stream Performance

Earlier this week Apple released new MacBooks and MacBook Pros. While the biggest changes are the new enclosures and the new graphics cards, the new laptops also have a new chipset (an NVIDIA chipset instead of an Intel chipset) and faster DDR3 memory. These last two features might improve processor performance even though the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros don’t really have upgraded processors.

So, do the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros have better processor performance than the old MacBooks and MacBook Pros? Does the new memory and chipset make a difference? Let’s find out!

Setup

I used Geekbench 2, our cross-platform benchmark, to measure the processor and memory performance of the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros. Here is the configuration of the eight test machines.

• MacBook Pro (Late 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 @ 2.53GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 @ 2.40GHz
  • 4.00 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F2088)

• MacBook Pro (Early 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9500 @ 2.60GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 @ 2.40GHz
  • 4.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F33)

• MacBook (Late 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 @ 2.40GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo P7350 @ 2.00GHz
  • 2.00 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F2114)

• MacBook (Early 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 @ 2.40GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo T8100 @ 2.10GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.5 (Build 9F33)

Geekbench 2 scores are calibrated against a baseline score of 1000 (which is the score a Power Mac G5 @ 1.6GHz would receive). Higher scores are better.

Results

Overall Performance

Integer Performance

Floating Point Performance

Memory Performance

Stream Performance

Conclusions

Somewhat suprisingly, processor performance is virtually unchanged in the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros; the new NVIDIA chipset and the faster DDR3 memory haven’t managed to help increase processor performance.

Why is this surprising? Well, with other hardware revisions Apple’s managed to make some modest gains in processor performance with chipset or memory upgrades without upgrading the processor itself. Here, though, performance is practically the same (and acutally down in some cases) with the new chipset and memory. I think NVIDIA has a ways to go (at least compared to Intel) when it comes to implementing chipsets.

Does this mean the new laptops are a bad upgrade? Hardly! While the NVIDIA chipsets might not be as good as the Intel chipsets when it comes to processor performance, they far surpass Intel when it comes to graphics performance. This increased graphics performance is a huge gain for the MacBook, and makes the MacBook a compelling machine for people looking for a smaller MacBook Pro.

Throw in the new, sturdier chassis and you’ve got a compelling upgrade for almost any Mac laptop user.

Intel’s Quad-core Mobile Chip Coming Next Month:

“We’re bringing quad-core to mobile in August,” said Sujan Kamran, regional marketing manager for client platforms at Intel in Singapore. Kamran declined to disclose specifics of the quad-core chip, which will carry Intel’s Core 2 Extreme moniker.

While the article argues that quad-core processors are more about bragging rights than any real increase in performance, I’d argue that if you’re on the road more often than not and you use applications that can take advantage of multiple cores on a regular basis (like, say, most media applications) then a quad-core laptop is going to look pretty awesome.

I know I’m excited about quad-core MacBook Pros. Are you?

Yesterday Apple released updated MacBooks and MacBook Pros both of which feature (among other things) new processors. While I don’t have Geekbench results for the new MacBooks, I wanted to compare Geekbench results for some of the new MacBook Pros against results for older MacBook Pros.

Setup

Here is the configuration of the test machines:

• MacBook Pro (Early 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T9300 @ 2.50GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Build 9C2018)

• MacBook Pro (Early 2008)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 @ 2.40GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Build 9C2018)

• MacBook Pro (Mid 2007)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T7800 @ 2.60GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Build 9C31)

• MacBook Pro (Mid 2007)

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T7700 @ 2.40GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Build 9C31)

If you’re not familiar with Geekbench 2, benchmarks are scored against a baseline, where a score of 1000 represents the performance of a Power Mac G5 @ 1.6GHz. Higher is better.

Results

Overall Performance

Integer Performance

Floating Point Performance

Memory Performance

Stream Performance

Conclusions

At first glance the results seems counter-intuitive; shouldn’t the new MacBook Pro @ 2.4GHz be faster than the old MacBook Pro @ 2.4GHz? Isn’t the Penryn better than the Merom? It turns out the answer is, “not necessarily”.

The processor in the new MacBook Pro @ 2.4GHz (T8300) has less L2 cache than processor in the old MacBook Pro @ 2.4GHz (T7700) which explains the slight drop in performance.

However, when you consider the new MacBook Pro 2.4GHz is the base model, while the old MacBook Pro 2.4GHz was the mid-range model, the small drop in performance comes with a significant reduction in price. Plus, the new Penryn processor uses less energy than the old Merom processor, which means a cooler laptop with increased battery life.

Apple quietly updated the MacBook Pro along with the MacBook earlier this month.
The MacBook update was quite substantial; the updated added, among other things, the Santa Rosa chipset to the MacBook which improved performance dramatically. The MacBook Pro update wasn’t as substantial; it added a larger hard drive and a faster processor as build-to-order options.

What I (and others) have wondered is the faster processor (an Intel Core 2 Duo T7800 at 2.6GHz) worth the price? I’ve gathered Geekbench 2 results for all three MacBook Pro processor configurations to find out.

Setup

• MacBook Pro (Mid 2007)
  • Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.60GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz or
  • Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.20GHz
  • 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
  • Mac OS X 10.5.1 (Build 9B18)

I’m reporting the baseline score, rather than the raw score, for the benchmarks (where a score of 1000 is the score a Power Mac G5 1.6GHz would receive). Higher is better.

Results

Overall Performance

Integer Performance

Floating Point Performance

Memory Performance

Stream Performance

Conclusion

On the latest MacBook Pros, processor benchmark scores (Integer Performance and Floating Point Performance) scale with processor speed; a 20% increase in speed will bring about a 20% increase in score.

Memory benchmark scores (Memory Performance and Stream Performance) are a different story. Since all of the MacBooks have the same chipset and use the same memory (which influence memory benchmark scores far more than the processor), there isn’t as much of a gain.

So, is configuring a MacBook Pro with a 2.6GHz processor instead of a 2.4GHz processor worth it? If you’re running a lot of processor-intensive tasks where even a small increase in performance is noticeable (and appreciated) then you might want to consider it. Otherwise I’d recommend adding more RAM instead. More RAM will probably help your MacBook Pro performance more than just a faster processor.