7 ms·

Two glaring issues: 1. The MacBook only has 8GB of ram whereas the Ryzen has 16GB 2. Comparing x86 linux vs arm linux on a MacBook (which is still early days)

Two glaring issues: 1. The MacBook only has 8GB of ram whereas the Ryzen has 16GB 2. Comparing x86 linux vs arm linux on a MacBook (which is still early days) rather than the most stable and mature OS for both

factorialboy 4y ago
> 1. The MacBook only has 8GB of ram whereas the Ryzen has 16GB But are they priced similarly? > 2. Comparing x86 linux vs arm linux on a MacBook (which is still early days) rather than the most stable and mature OS for both Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument.
- cruano 4y ago
  > But are they priced similarly? Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately > Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument I guess "for each" would be better ? But OPs point still stands, if you put me on a race car you are not breaking any records no matter how good the car is
  - foepys 4y ago
    It's very meaningful when you want the best bang for the buck.
    - 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
      It’s still pretty silly because the price is the easiest thing to compare. Just show the prices of 2 systems as closely specced as possible and list power, thermal envelop blah blah. As it is, this doesn’t change my mind about if I’m making the right trade offs by getting the M2
  - threeseed 4y ago
    Apple sells a M2 MacBook Pro which has better performance. So it's not a meaningless question at all.
  - lelanthran 4y ago
    >> But are they priced similarly? > Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately What does that have to do with the question "Does this X-dollar laptop outperform that X-dollar laptop?"
    - gjsman-1000 4y ago
      Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. Does the Ryzen system come with a full aluminum enclosure? Does it come with a screen with P3 color, 400 nits peak brightness, and HDR support? What is the battery size on both machines, and how long do each last? How thin is it? How light it it? How fast does it charge? How much does this affect you daily? If it was only about CPU performance, I could grab the cheapest Clevo with a Core i9 and it would beat every other manufacturer in the “bang-buck” spec as you are defining it, but it would be an awful experience.
      - jacooper 4y ago
        > Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. Yes, people might be searching for the best performance, and cost comparison here is fair. > If it was only about CPU performance, I could grab the cheapest Clevo with a Core i9 and it would beat every other manufacturer in the “bang-buck” spec as you are defining it, but it would be an awful experience. Evey user has his/her requirements and things he/she is okay to comprmise on.
      - lelanthran 4y ago
        > Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. But they aren't doing that!* They're specifically comparing performance between two similarly-priced laptops[1]. That's what "benchmark" means. If this was a review between the two laptops I'd agree with you, but it isn't a review, it's a benchmark suite. > Does the Ryzen system come with a full aluminum enclosure? > Does it come with a screen with P3 color, 400 nits peak brightness, and HDR support? > What is the battery size on both machines, and how long do each last? > How thin is it? How light it it? How fast does it charge? How much does this affect you daily? All of these are valid questions, just not for a benchmark. The benchmark is one set of inputs a potential purchaser would take into account, with the other inputs being all those things you mentioned. [1] I assume that they're similarly priced - I skipped the introduction and went straight to the benchmarks.
  - gsnedders 4y ago
    > Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately AFAIK the 6850U also isn't sold separately.
- jbverschoor 4y ago
  Build quality Higher res display Better mousepad etc. etc. etc. so you also can't really compare prices like that
- scoopertrooper 4y ago
  > Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument. Linux has supported AMD CPUs for decades and AMD has engineers creating kernel patches to ensure their CPUs work correctly on Linux. Linux support for Apple chips is in its infancy and what little support it does have has been provided by a ragtag team of volunteers that have reversed engineered the M-series chips. It's reasonable to assume that the AMD chip might be at a slight advantage on Linux.
  - sillystuff 4y ago
    Linux has supported ARM CPUs for decades too. Linux has run on ARM since 2002. Apple OSX was first released for ARM in 2020. Apple iOS on ARM wasn't released until 2007. Though I doubt that any of this is relevant for a CPU only benchmark. I'd bet the effect of compiler support overwhelms any other effects.
- nash 4y ago
  In answer to your first question... https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx/thinkpad-x13-gen-3-(13-inch-amd)/len101t0021 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx/th... vs https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air So 1800 for the Lenovo vs 1200 for the Mac. This is a meaningless comparison.
  - JAlexoid 4y ago
    You've posted this a few times. But now the devices are actually available and X13 starts at $1097... That's $103 less than cheapest MacBook. What a difference 5 days makes, right?
  - nicolaslem 4y ago
    For those not familiar with Lenovo's pricing, basically the sticker prices are insane but routinely get ~50% discounts after the products have been available for a few weeks. Those are brand new models that do not yet get steep discounts. It makes comparing them on prices almost impossible.
- _aavaa_ 4y ago
  > But are they priced similarly? Final laptop price isn't that important when this is a CPU comparison, "Apple M2 vs. AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U" > Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument. What I meant is that they don't use the OS which is most stable and most mature on each platform independently (i.e. some flavour of linux, or even windows, for the Ryzen and macOS for the M2). Either choice will introduce OS differences, but I believe that using the most optimized OS is the better choice as it allows each CPU to show off its best performance.
  - JAlexoid 4y ago
    Depends on what you measure. Hypothetically - a diesel BMW m3 may cost the same as a Camaro with a V8 engine, but what's the point of talking what engines they have... if you are purchasing these items for other reasons.
    - _aavaa_ 4y ago
      I agree, but this is a CPU benchmark. They don't benchmark the screen, or the ram speed, or the battery life, or anything else in the laptops. All they compare is the CPU
threeseed 4y ago
3. MacBook Air does not have a fan versus the Lenovo ThinkPad X13 Gen3 which does. Based on experience with the M1 Air at least one of those benchmarks Primeseive would be severely throttling. This whole article seems pretty stupid to me given they really should be benchmarking the M2 MacBook Pro against the Lenovo.
gbil 4y ago
at work I got a m1 pro with 16GB of RAM just because they offered the 14" managed device with 16GB only, while they offered 32GB on the 16" devices. When I complained about this, the response was "but is 16GB unified memory" as if I was disputing the performance of the RAM and how it is handled within the M1 chip while my issue was filling the 16GB. I'm happy that at least in HN people seem to be more aware on RAM sizing
- Damogran6 4y ago
  More ram = more performance if there's a cost in going across a bridge to keep the pipeline full. 16gb of _unified_ RAM that can be accessed by the CPU and GPU without a performance hit in going to the motherboard is a factor in some workloads. Whether you agree or not, it's an effective test comparing two architectures. So the question is: are you spec benchmarking, or are you interested in the performance of the workload, because it's the actual work that matters, not how the bits are stored under the keyboard.
  - gbil 4y ago
    I'm interested on not swapping which is a simple matter of RAM size, regardless if that is unified or not - which I believe I touched in my post
    - Damogran6 4y ago
      Only if your datasets, in aggregate, extend beyond what can be compressed into 16Gb...an what's the performance of the device you're swapping to? There's a GREAT BIG DIFFERENCE between an RLL 80 Gb drive and What you're swapping to on the motherboard today... (In fact, you could consider the on-die RAM to be a really big Cache and the Flash storage to be REALLY REALLY big Non volatile addressable RAM.)
gnu8 4y ago
The difference in RAM size should not matter as long as both systems have their memory channels filled out and the workload fits in memory.
- _aavaa_ 4y ago
  > as long as both systems have their memory channels filled out and the workload fits in memory. Those are big ifs. We don't know how much of those 8GBs were used, and how much swapping the OS was forced to do. But either way, it's a silly thing to have different.
  - gnu8 4y ago
    I am sure Michael Larabel knows what he is doing, given how long he has been benchmarking. I think both devices have soldered memory though, so the amount of installed RAM isn’t flexible.
Damogran6 4y ago
The macbook ram is on the same package as the processor...there's an additional latency cost for the Ryzen...I don't think it invalidates the tests if they're not tied to memory latency for swapping in and out of RAM. You'll get no argument from me on the OS...that's an interesting test decision.
- astrange 4y ago
  The unified RAM helps with memory bandwidth, but doesn't actually help with latency at all. It also makes the GPU architecture very different in ways that makes performance hard to compare.
trasz 4y ago
Not to mention the usual problems with Phoronix benchmarks: it doesn't say how many benchmark runs were done, where are the error bars, was the software actually compiled properly etc. Phoronix folks don't understand what they are measuring; they also don't really care - I remember one of their benchmarks measured the execution time of a command that was erroring out. Phoronix Test Suite isn't a benchmark, it's a marketing tool.
- paulmd 4y ago
  I remember a recent "gaming on linux" article from them where they were computing "summary" geomeans including benchmarks across different resolutions... from the same game. So you might have: * SOTTR 1080p * SOTTR 1440p * SOTTR 4K * F1 1080p ... And this wasn't like they had a 1080p geomean and then a 1440p geomean and a 4K geomean... they just had one geomean with a bunch of different resolutions thrown into it, including duplicates of the same game at different resolutions. And sometimes different combinations of resolutions for different games (they might skip 4K for a particular game, etc). That's pleb-tier benchmarking, pick a random redditor and they know not to make that kind of mistake, it's obviously and facially incorrect. It just goes to show the power of community goodwill... UserBenchmark's actual sub-scores are reasonably accurate, but because the owner is a massive fucking twat they're persona-non-grata in the internet community (I'm sure I'm going to be regaled with NO THEIR BENCHMARKS ARE TRASH AND HE CHANGES THINGS TO MAKE INTEL but nope, the subscores are accurate, topline "summary" score weights are what he fucks with). Michael Larabel is a very nice guy and frankly doesn't seem to understand the first thing about benchmarking, or score weighting, or mathematics, and constantly puts out trash-tier results with obvious defects, and he's revered in the community, basically a saint. I know, nobody else is really benchmarking Linux and he's what we've got, if you don't like it then be the change, etcc. But, his results are given incredibly disproportionate weight to the quality there, he's no anandtech. And sadly anandtech is no anandtech anymore.
  - sudosysgen 4y ago
    It's not... Games are benchmarked at different resolutions for the same game because that shifts the CPU/GPU burden. It's a great thing to do and many benchmarks do it too, and yes in the same average. If you don't include a game at those resolutions for no good reason that's one thing, but varying the resolution in the same mean is a good idea.

factorialboy 4y ago

> 1. The MacBook only has 8GB of ram whereas the Ryzen has 16GB But are they priced similarly? > 2. Comparing x86 linux vs arm linux on a MacBook (which is still early days) rather than the most stable and mature OS for both Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument.

cruano 4y ago
> But are they priced similarly? Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately > Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument I guess "for each" would be better ? But OPs point still stands, if you put me on a race car you are not breaking any records no matter how good the car is
- foepys 4y ago
  It's very meaningful when you want the best bang for the buck.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
    It’s still pretty silly because the price is the easiest thing to compare. Just show the prices of 2 systems as closely specced as possible and list power, thermal envelop blah blah. As it is, this doesn’t change my mind about if I’m making the right trade offs by getting the M2
- threeseed 4y ago
  Apple sells a M2 MacBook Pro which has better performance. So it's not a meaningless question at all.
- lelanthran 4y ago
  >> But are they priced similarly? > Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately What does that have to do with the question "Does this X-dollar laptop outperform that X-dollar laptop?"
  - gjsman-1000 4y ago
    Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. Does the Ryzen system come with a full aluminum enclosure? Does it come with a screen with P3 color, 400 nits peak brightness, and HDR support? What is the battery size on both machines, and how long do each last? How thin is it? How light it it? How fast does it charge? How much does this affect you daily? If it was only about CPU performance, I could grab the cheapest Clevo with a Core i9 and it would beat every other manufacturer in the “bang-buck” spec as you are defining it, but it would be an awful experience.
    - jacooper 4y ago
      > Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. Yes, people might be searching for the best performance, and cost comparison here is fair. > If it was only about CPU performance, I could grab the cheapest Clevo with a Core i9 and it would beat every other manufacturer in the “bang-buck” spec as you are defining it, but it would be an awful experience. Evey user has his/her requirements and things he/she is okay to comprmise on.
    - lelanthran 4y ago
      > Simply, that you can’t compare laptops solely on a cost basis easily. But they aren't doing that!* They're specifically comparing performance between two similarly-priced laptops[1]. That's what "benchmark" means. If this was a review between the two laptops I'd agree with you, but it isn't a review, it's a benchmark suite. > Does the Ryzen system come with a full aluminum enclosure? > Does it come with a screen with P3 color, 400 nits peak brightness, and HDR support? > What is the battery size on both machines, and how long do each last? > How thin is it? How light it it? How fast does it charge? How much does this affect you daily? All of these are valid questions, just not for a benchmark. The benchmark is one set of inputs a potential purchaser would take into account, with the other inputs being all those things you mentioned. [1] I assume that they're similarly priced - I skipped the introduction and went straight to the benchmarks.
- gsnedders 4y ago
  > Meaningless question when they don't sell the M2 chip separately AFAIK the 6850U also isn't sold separately.
jbverschoor 4y ago
Build quality Higher res display Better mousepad etc. etc. etc. so you also can't really compare prices like that
scoopertrooper 4y ago
> Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument. Linux has supported AMD CPUs for decades and AMD has engineers creating kernel patches to ensure their CPUs work correctly on Linux. Linux support for Apple chips is in its infancy and what little support it does have has been provided by a ragtag team of volunteers that have reversed engineered the M-series chips. It's reasonable to assume that the AMD chip might be at a slight advantage on Linux.
- sillystuff 4y ago
  Linux has supported ARM CPUs for decades too. Linux has run on ARM since 2002. Apple OSX was first released for ARM in 2020. Apple iOS on ARM wasn't released until 2007. Though I doubt that any of this is relevant for a CPU only benchmark. I'd bet the effect of compiler support overwhelms any other effects.
nash 4y ago
In answer to your first question... https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx/thinkpad-x13-gen-3-(13-inch-amd)/len101t0021 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx/th... vs https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air So 1800 for the Lenovo vs 1200 for the Mac. This is a meaningless comparison.
- JAlexoid 4y ago
  You've posted this a few times. But now the devices are actually available and X13 starts at $1097... That's $103 less than cheapest MacBook. What a difference 5 days makes, right?
- nicolaslem 4y ago
  For those not familiar with Lenovo's pricing, basically the sticker prices are insane but routinely get ~50% discounts after the products have been available for a few weeks. Those are brand new models that do not yet get steep discounts. It makes comparing them on prices almost impossible.
_aavaa_ 4y ago
> But are they priced similarly? Final laptop price isn't that important when this is a CPU comparison, "Apple M2 vs. AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U" > Hmm .. Doesn't "for both" negate the argument. What I meant is that they don't use the OS which is most stable and most mature on each platform independently (i.e. some flavour of linux, or even windows, for the Ryzen and macOS for the M2). Either choice will introduce OS differences, but I believe that using the most optimized OS is the better choice as it allows each CPU to show off its best performance.
- JAlexoid 4y ago
  Depends on what you measure. Hypothetically - a diesel BMW m3 may cost the same as a Camaro with a V8 engine, but what's the point of talking what engines they have... if you are purchasing these items for other reasons.
  - _aavaa_ 4y ago
    I agree, but this is a CPU benchmark. They don't benchmark the screen, or the ram speed, or the battery life, or anything else in the laptops. All they compare is the CPU

threeseed 4y ago

3. MacBook Air does not have a fan versus the Lenovo ThinkPad X13 Gen3 which does. Based on experience with the M1 Air at least one of those benchmarks Primeseive would be severely throttling. This whole article seems pretty stupid to me given they really should be benchmarking the M2 MacBook Pro against the Lenovo.

gbil 4y ago

at work I got a m1 pro with 16GB of RAM just because they offered the 14" managed device with 16GB only, while they offered 32GB on the 16" devices. When I complained about this, the response was "but is 16GB unified memory" as if I was disputing the performance of the RAM and how it is handled within the M1 chip while my issue was filling the 16GB. I'm happy that at least in HN people seem to be more aware on RAM sizing

Damogran6 4y ago
More ram = more performance if there's a cost in going across a bridge to keep the pipeline full. 16gb of _unified_ RAM that can be accessed by the CPU and GPU without a performance hit in going to the motherboard is a factor in some workloads. Whether you agree or not, it's an effective test comparing two architectures. So the question is: are you spec benchmarking, or are you interested in the performance of the workload, because it's the actual work that matters, not how the bits are stored under the keyboard.
- gbil 4y ago
  I'm interested on not swapping which is a simple matter of RAM size, regardless if that is unified or not - which I believe I touched in my post
  - Damogran6 4y ago
    Only if your datasets, in aggregate, extend beyond what can be compressed into 16Gb...an what's the performance of the device you're swapping to? There's a GREAT BIG DIFFERENCE between an RLL 80 Gb drive and What you're swapping to on the motherboard today... (In fact, you could consider the on-die RAM to be a really big Cache and the Flash storage to be REALLY REALLY big Non volatile addressable RAM.)

gnu8 4y ago

The difference in RAM size should not matter as long as both systems have their memory channels filled out and the workload fits in memory.

_aavaa_ 4y ago
> as long as both systems have their memory channels filled out and the workload fits in memory. Those are big ifs. We don't know how much of those 8GBs were used, and how much swapping the OS was forced to do. But either way, it's a silly thing to have different.
- gnu8 4y ago
  I am sure Michael Larabel knows what he is doing, given how long he has been benchmarking. I think both devices have soldered memory though, so the amount of installed RAM isn’t flexible.

Damogran6 4y ago

The macbook ram is on the same package as the processor...there's an additional latency cost for the Ryzen...I don't think it invalidates the tests if they're not tied to memory latency for swapping in and out of RAM. You'll get no argument from me on the OS...that's an interesting test decision.

astrange 4y ago
The unified RAM helps with memory bandwidth, but doesn't actually help with latency at all. It also makes the GPU architecture very different in ways that makes performance hard to compare.

trasz 4y ago

Not to mention the usual problems with Phoronix benchmarks: it doesn't say how many benchmark runs were done, where are the error bars, was the software actually compiled properly etc. Phoronix folks don't understand what they are measuring; they also don't really care - I remember one of their benchmarks measured the execution time of a command that was erroring out. Phoronix Test Suite isn't a benchmark, it's a marketing tool.

paulmd 4y ago
I remember a recent "gaming on linux" article from them where they were computing "summary" geomeans including benchmarks across different resolutions... from the same game. So you might have: * SOTTR 1080p * SOTTR 1440p * SOTTR 4K * F1 1080p ... And this wasn't like they had a 1080p geomean and then a 1440p geomean and a 4K geomean... they just had one geomean with a bunch of different resolutions thrown into it, including duplicates of the same game at different resolutions. And sometimes different combinations of resolutions for different games (they might skip 4K for a particular game, etc). That's pleb-tier benchmarking, pick a random redditor and they know not to make that kind of mistake, it's obviously and facially incorrect. It just goes to show the power of community goodwill... UserBenchmark's actual sub-scores are reasonably accurate, but because the owner is a massive fucking twat they're persona-non-grata in the internet community (I'm sure I'm going to be regaled with NO THEIR BENCHMARKS ARE TRASH AND HE CHANGES THINGS TO MAKE INTEL but nope, the subscores are accurate, topline "summary" score weights are what he fucks with). Michael Larabel is a very nice guy and frankly doesn't seem to understand the first thing about benchmarking, or score weighting, or mathematics, and constantly puts out trash-tier results with obvious defects, and he's revered in the community, basically a saint. I know, nobody else is really benchmarking Linux and he's what we've got, if you don't like it then be the change, etcc. But, his results are given incredibly disproportionate weight to the quality there, he's no anandtech. And sadly anandtech is no anandtech anymore.
- sudosysgen 4y ago
  It's not... Games are benchmarked at different resolutions for the same game because that shifts the CPU/GPU burden. It's a great thing to do and many benchmarks do it too, and yes in the same average. If you don't include a game at those resolutions for no good reason that's one thing, but varying the resolution in the same mean is a good idea.