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Huh... The title of their press release seems to me somewhat clickbait-y... Why not 'iMac got a hardware refresh; now with 2x performance'? When I read this, I

Huh... The title of their press release seems to me somewhat clickbait-y... Why not 'iMac got a hardware refresh; now with 2x performance'? When I read this, I thought, 'oh wow, Apple really outdid itself with their SW optimisations'. Overall, I'm kinda disappointed that the 21' and 27' macs get different CPU gens. Why? Why not just have the latest gen in both of them? Is it price, or is it more about artificial performance impediment?

bluedino 8y ago
have you never seen an apple press release? Every product is 2x as fast as the old one, based on a cherry picked benchmark
- coldtea 8y ago
  have you never seen apple reviews by third parties? Their performance and battery estimates nearly always pan out, if they aren't a little pessimistic.
- ekianjo 8y ago
  It is surprising they stop at 2x every single time. You would think Apple gets better at getting better because they are so elite...
  - xvector 8y ago
    Wow, I've never heard someone complain about 2x generation-over-generation improvements before.
- neuronic 8y ago
  I distinctly remember benchmarking by third parties for the iPhone 8. There wasn't even anything close out at the time.
- xuki 8y ago
  In this case it's not just marketing speech: the new top end CPU is i9-9900k, it's ALMOST 2x faster than the previous top end CPU (i7-7700k) for multi-core benchmark. https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2548 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2548 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/1779 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/1779
  - 0xffff2 8y ago
    Of course it's almost 2x faster; it has 2x the cores. Meanwhile the single-core score is almost the same for both. I've never seen anyone try to put together a good breakdown on how various common workflows stack up, but I would bet that most benefit very little from the extra 4 cores.
klodolph 8y ago
To me, it makes no sense that only the latest CPU generation should be used in new hardware. It’s not like the latest generation is a big improvement, not since the 2000s or so, and older CPUs are cheaper to manufacture (because problems in the manufacturing process have been fixed)
- opencl 8y ago
  Intel has been using the same manufacturing process for the past 5 generations of CPUs, the problems in that process were fixed a long time ago.
coldtea 8y ago
>Why not 'iMac got a hardware refresh; now with 2x performance'? When I read this, I thought, 'oh wow, Apple really outdid itself with their SW optimisations'. To me it is obvious it's about HW. These are new iMac release notes, not new macOS announcement.
- BossingAround 8y ago
  > These are new iMac release notes, not new macOS announcement. How do you know that though?
  - coldtea 8y ago
    First, new OS releases are in WWDC in June. Not on random days. Second, OS optimizations of the kind that yield such a big speedup would have applied to the whole Mac range, it makes no sense how they'd be only applicable to iMacs which run more or less the same hardware. Third, the very first words of the PR is: "Cupertino, California — Apple today updated its iMac line with up to 8-core Intel 9th-generation processors for the first time and powerful Vega graphics options, delivering dramatic increases in both compute and graphics performance. "
  - simonh 8y ago
    Because it mentions the specific hardware line in the title and doesn't mention the OS at all. If it was a software boost, it's hard to see why it would only apply to the iMac line specifically and not say MacBook Pros or Mac Minis as well.
zachruss92 8y ago
I'm pretty sure it's a cooling issue. An 8-core CPU running at 5GHz generates a lot of heat - it's likely they can't dissipate it fast enough and encounter thermal throttling issues with higher end chips. I would _assume_ the 9th gen chips are more power efficient than the 8th gen, however, so who knows...
k2enemy 8y ago
My guess is that many edu and corp customers buy hundreds at a time for computer labs, low demand office jobs, etc. The purchaser isn't the one that has to suffer from obsolete CPUs and slow spinning drives. The purchaser just wants to stay within budget.
brigade 8y ago
Blame intel maybe? 9th gen only has the 95W SKUs fleshed out; at 65W TDP the 8th gen parts still have SKUs with higher clocks. (as in there is an i5-9400 to replace i5-8400, but no refresh of the i5-8500, i5-8600, or i7-8700, which are all faster than the i5-9400.)

bluedino 8y ago

have you never seen an apple press release? Every product is 2x as fast as the old one, based on a cherry picked benchmark

coldtea 8y ago
have you never seen apple reviews by third parties? Their performance and battery estimates nearly always pan out, if they aren't a little pessimistic.
ekianjo 8y ago
It is surprising they stop at 2x every single time. You would think Apple gets better at getting better because they are so elite...
- xvector 8y ago
  Wow, I've never heard someone complain about 2x generation-over-generation improvements before.
neuronic 8y ago
I distinctly remember benchmarking by third parties for the iPhone 8. There wasn't even anything close out at the time.
xuki 8y ago
In this case it's not just marketing speech: the new top end CPU is i9-9900k, it's ALMOST 2x faster than the previous top end CPU (i7-7700k) for multi-core benchmark. https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2548 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/2548 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/1779 https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/1779
- 0xffff2 8y ago
  Of course it's almost 2x faster; it has 2x the cores. Meanwhile the single-core score is almost the same for both. I've never seen anyone try to put together a good breakdown on how various common workflows stack up, but I would bet that most benefit very little from the extra 4 cores.

klodolph 8y ago

To me, it makes no sense that only the latest CPU generation should be used in new hardware. It’s not like the latest generation is a big improvement, not since the 2000s or so, and older CPUs are cheaper to manufacture (because problems in the manufacturing process have been fixed)

opencl 8y ago
Intel has been using the same manufacturing process for the past 5 generations of CPUs, the problems in that process were fixed a long time ago.

coldtea 8y ago

>Why not 'iMac got a hardware refresh; now with 2x performance'? When I read this, I thought, 'oh wow, Apple really outdid itself with their SW optimisations'. To me it is obvious it's about HW. These are new iMac release notes, not new macOS announcement.

BossingAround 8y ago
> These are new iMac release notes, not new macOS announcement. How do you know that though?
- coldtea 8y ago
  First, new OS releases are in WWDC in June. Not on random days. Second, OS optimizations of the kind that yield such a big speedup would have applied to the whole Mac range, it makes no sense how they'd be only applicable to iMacs which run more or less the same hardware. Third, the very first words of the PR is: "Cupertino, California — Apple today updated its iMac line with up to 8-core Intel 9th-generation processors for the first time and powerful Vega graphics options, delivering dramatic increases in both compute and graphics performance. "
- simonh 8y ago
  Because it mentions the specific hardware line in the title and doesn't mention the OS at all. If it was a software boost, it's hard to see why it would only apply to the iMac line specifically and not say MacBook Pros or Mac Minis as well.

zachruss92 8y ago

I'm pretty sure it's a cooling issue. An 8-core CPU running at 5GHz generates a lot of heat - it's likely they can't dissipate it fast enough and encounter thermal throttling issues with higher end chips. I would _assume_ the 9th gen chips are more power efficient than the 8th gen, however, so who knows...

k2enemy 8y ago

My guess is that many edu and corp customers buy hundreds at a time for computer labs, low demand office jobs, etc. The purchaser isn't the one that has to suffer from obsolete CPUs and slow spinning drives. The purchaser just wants to stay within budget.

brigade 8y ago

Blame intel maybe? 9th gen only has the 95W SKUs fleshed out; at 65W TDP the 8th gen parts still have SKUs with higher clocks. (as in there is an i5-9400 to replace i5-8400, but no refresh of the i5-8500, i5-8600, or i7-8700, which are all faster than the i5-9400.)