5 ms·

I was downvoted to oblivion for suggesting that was the reason the last couple of years of intel MacBooks had botched thermal solutions. They were really indefe

by bjoli 3y ago

I was downvoted to oblivion for suggesting that was the reason the last couple of years of intel MacBooks had botched thermal solutions. They were really indefensibly bad, but then again: the jump to m1 was enormous. I have a hard time feeling I was the only one conspiratorial enough to suggest something like that.

znpy 3y ago
Knowing how much apple exploits its users a d knowing how apple fanatics are willing to buy whatever and in retrospect… it makes perfect sense. I believe you.
- 3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
  Comments from someone that speaks as if they always expect the worst of Apple, telling everyone that they expect the worst of Apple, are a dime a dozen and do nothing to add to the conversation.
- qeternity 3y ago
  Solid take, couldn't possibly be that you simply don't understand why people buy Apple. Everyone else is wrong.
alpaca128 3y ago
Three reasons that make me disagree: Firstly M1/M2 Macbooks don't have great cooling either. The Air models use basically nothing but a thin sheet of metal, maybe they'd run longer without throttling otherwise. Secondly Intel Macbooks had subpar cooling (and power delivery) much longer than the last couple of years. A video on YouTube shows more than doubled performance on a watercooled 2015 Macbook. And let's not forget that other manufacturers are sometimes even worse than Apple: Microsoft once sold a Surface Pro where the upgraded i7 version was slower than the model with i5 CPU because the cooling was so terrible! No, I don't see how that's more than a conspiracy theory. I am using an M2 Air right now and it has 2-3x better performance than my older i7 Thinkpad while being completely silent and running 3x longer on battery. Apple didn't have the need to pull any tricks.
- bjoli 3y ago
  What I am saying is that the cooling solution for the intel MacBooks was designed for chips with a lot lower TDP, meaning it made the m1 look a lot better. Maybe artificially so, since the intel MacBooks throttled more or less instantly. I am not saying the m1 wasn't amazing (I have one, I like it). I am saying that apple had subpar cooling solutions for several years before the m1. They had ample time to fix it, yet the last intel MacBook was probably the worst one.
  - alpaca128 3y ago
    I don't have the impression Apple would intentionally cut the performance like that if they can't also make you pay for an upgrade that alleviates the bottleneck. Want a reasonable RAM & storage capacity? Pay for the upgrade. Want more IO without dongles? Pay for the Pro model. Want a 120Hz screen for smoother drawing? Pay for the iPad Pro. If it was intentional I'd expect Apple to have a more expensive Pro Max Ultra tier with actually good cooling, and then a year later they can pretend they invented a new paradigm of CPU cooling that works even in the cheaper models. There's no upside for them if cooling just sucks in general, and their switch to a more energy efficient architecture is clearly motivated by this problem.
dangus 3y ago
It's a weak theory, considering how the first M1 devices used the same thermal solutions as their Intel predecessors. The M1 Air even removed the fan from the existing design that already had a fan when it was powered by Intel. The only reason the thermal solutions were indefensibly bad was because Intel's roadmap had nowhere to go but to add more watts and heat. The 2016 MacBook Pro 15" had a perfectly adequate thermal solution for its hardware. Still, in a few short years, Intel's newer processors pushed the design to its thermal limits when they should have been delivering more performance within the same heat and power constraints. Apple had to relent and make the product thicker and add more wattage for the 16" MacBook Pro (Intel). It's not like Apple massively upgraded the M1 thermal solution and took a victory lap on an artificially unfair playing field. Apple dropped their chips into the same or worse thermal designs and still outperformed Intel. On some benchmarks, the 2020 M1 MacBook Air with no fan beats the 96W 2019 Intel 16" MacBook Pro. [1] For Intel, it was downright embarrassing. We can't blame Apple for designing an inadequate thermal solution for the 2016-2019 MacBook Pro 15" when it was Intel's own product line that couldn't deliver improved performance without consuming more watts. Computers are supposed to get smaller and faster over time, not bigger and hotter. [1] https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macbook-air-with-m1-chip-beats-16-inch-macbook-pro-performance-in-benchmark-test/ https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macbook-air-with-m1-chip-beat...
- bjoli 3y ago
  That is exactly what I am saying: they must have seen that the thermal solution wasn't enough. MacBooks were throttling way too much since at least 2015. The conspiracy theory is that that used a thermal solution that was enough for the m1 on the intel chips that throttled while browsing the web.
  - dangus 3y ago
    What I’m saying is that the older models (like the 2016 MacBook Pro Touch Bar) didn’t throttle very much and were thermally acceptable. Fast forward to Intel’s newer chips in 2018-2019 and the same chassis was much more limiting to the newer processor SKUs. Here’s an article: https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/05/26/tested-thermal-throttling-and-performance-in-the-eight-core-2019-macbook-pro https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/05/26/tested-thermal-th... > Apple's 2016 MacBook Pro chassis was designed at the latest, in early 2016. We got the first glimpse of it in a photograph in May of 2016. It looks like Apple is sticking with a four-year chassis design, so it's entirely possible that this is the last year of this enclosure. > We aren't expecting a thicker machine. > We've also said this before — we think Apple got hosed by Intel, when they were gearing up for the 2016 MacBook Pro enclosure in 2015. We know that in 2015, Intel was promising delivery of 10nm process Core chips well before now. With any luck, Intel will finally deliver on its promises for a die-shrink that was expected nearly three years ago which will help alleviate the situation further. Or, maybe the next will be ARM-based — we don't know. Apple’s stop-gap 16” model would prove to be thicker, and the article correctly hinted at a future ARM system. This quote is important context because Intel had been promising lithography advancements that were delayed. In 2016 Apple designed a chassis that they wanted to keep around for the next several years, but Intel basically didn’t deliver on their stated roadmap. There was no way to update the system without pushing the thermal solution to its limits or partially redesigning the thing. As far as thermal performance on 2015 systems (pre-USB-C), those designs are so old that I don’t think replacing Intel was on Apple’s near-term radar.
Tagbert 3y ago
The Intel MacBooks had bad thermals because Intel had promised more efficient processors and Apple had designed the new cases around that. Then Intel flubbed their die shrinks for several years in a row and Apple was stuck with the hotter chips from the larger process node. Since they were already on the road to switching to Apple Silicon, it may have not been worthwhile to redesign the cases for the Intel machines to compensate.
- bjoli 3y ago
  Intel flubbed the die shrinks several years in a row, but from 2015 it was pretty obvious that whatever apple was designing for wasn't enough. There were better thermal solutions in thinner, cheaper laptops. The fan didn't even draw air over the CPU in the last intel MacBook air. I opened one and really tried to figure out if there was some 4d chess going on, but no. The fan did nothing. It just started spinning fast making noise for no reason. I even did the old incense test. Next to nothing was being pulled over the CPU heatsink. It was spectacularly bad by design. This would not have been sufficient even if intel had delivered. The pro models were better but still awful. It wasn't a matter of fitting things in. It was by design. I have apple products. I like them. But even being charitable I can't come to any other conclusion that they just didn't care to deliver a good product.

by bjoli 3y ago

znpy 3y ago

Knowing how much apple exploits its users a d knowing how apple fanatics are willing to buy whatever and in retrospect… it makes perfect sense. I believe you.

3c6bYDXLMj 3y ago
Comments from someone that speaks as if they always expect the worst of Apple, telling everyone that they expect the worst of Apple, are a dime a dozen and do nothing to add to the conversation.
qeternity 3y ago
Solid take, couldn't possibly be that you simply don't understand why people buy Apple. Everyone else is wrong.

alpaca128 3y ago

Three reasons that make me disagree: Firstly M1/M2 Macbooks don't have great cooling either. The Air models use basically nothing but a thin sheet of metal, maybe they'd run longer without throttling otherwise. Secondly Intel Macbooks had subpar cooling (and power delivery) much longer than the last couple of years. A video on YouTube shows more than doubled performance on a watercooled 2015 Macbook. And let's not forget that other manufacturers are sometimes even worse than Apple: Microsoft once sold a Surface Pro where the upgraded i7 version was slower than the model with i5 CPU because the cooling was so terrible! No, I don't see how that's more than a conspiracy theory. I am using an M2 Air right now and it has 2-3x better performance than my older i7 Thinkpad while being completely silent and running 3x longer on battery. Apple didn't have the need to pull any tricks.

bjoli 3y ago
What I am saying is that the cooling solution for the intel MacBooks was designed for chips with a lot lower TDP, meaning it made the m1 look a lot better. Maybe artificially so, since the intel MacBooks throttled more or less instantly. I am not saying the m1 wasn't amazing (I have one, I like it). I am saying that apple had subpar cooling solutions for several years before the m1. They had ample time to fix it, yet the last intel MacBook was probably the worst one.
- alpaca128 3y ago
  I don't have the impression Apple would intentionally cut the performance like that if they can't also make you pay for an upgrade that alleviates the bottleneck. Want a reasonable RAM & storage capacity? Pay for the upgrade. Want more IO without dongles? Pay for the Pro model. Want a 120Hz screen for smoother drawing? Pay for the iPad Pro. If it was intentional I'd expect Apple to have a more expensive Pro Max Ultra tier with actually good cooling, and then a year later they can pretend they invented a new paradigm of CPU cooling that works even in the cheaper models. There's no upside for them if cooling just sucks in general, and their switch to a more energy efficient architecture is clearly motivated by this problem.

dangus 3y ago

It's a weak theory, considering how the first M1 devices used the same thermal solutions as their Intel predecessors. The M1 Air even removed the fan from the existing design that already had a fan when it was powered by Intel. The only reason the thermal solutions were indefensibly bad was because Intel's roadmap had nowhere to go but to add more watts and heat. The 2016 MacBook Pro 15" had a perfectly adequate thermal solution for its hardware. Still, in a few short years, Intel's newer processors pushed the design to its thermal limits when they should have been delivering more performance within the same heat and power constraints. Apple had to relent and make the product thicker and add more wattage for the 16" MacBook Pro (Intel). It's not like Apple massively upgraded the M1 thermal solution and took a victory lap on an artificially unfair playing field. Apple dropped their chips into the same or worse thermal designs and still outperformed Intel. On some benchmarks, the 2020 M1 MacBook Air with no fan beats the 96W 2019 Intel 16" MacBook Pro. [1] For Intel, it was downright embarrassing. We can't blame Apple for designing an inadequate thermal solution for the 2016-2019 MacBook Pro 15" when it was Intel's own product line that couldn't deliver improved performance without consuming more watts. Computers are supposed to get smaller and faster over time, not bigger and hotter. [1] https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macbook-air-with-m1-chip-beats-16-inch-macbook-pro-performance-in-benchmark-test/ https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macbook-air-with-m1-chip-beat...

bjoli 3y ago
That is exactly what I am saying: they must have seen that the thermal solution wasn't enough. MacBooks were throttling way too much since at least 2015. The conspiracy theory is that that used a thermal solution that was enough for the m1 on the intel chips that throttled while browsing the web.
- dangus 3y ago
  What I’m saying is that the older models (like the 2016 MacBook Pro Touch Bar) didn’t throttle very much and were thermally acceptable. Fast forward to Intel’s newer chips in 2018-2019 and the same chassis was much more limiting to the newer processor SKUs. Here’s an article: https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/05/26/tested-thermal-throttling-and-performance-in-the-eight-core-2019-macbook-pro https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/05/26/tested-thermal-th... > Apple's 2016 MacBook Pro chassis was designed at the latest, in early 2016. We got the first glimpse of it in a photograph in May of 2016. It looks like Apple is sticking with a four-year chassis design, so it's entirely possible that this is the last year of this enclosure. > We aren't expecting a thicker machine. > We've also said this before — we think Apple got hosed by Intel, when they were gearing up for the 2016 MacBook Pro enclosure in 2015. We know that in 2015, Intel was promising delivery of 10nm process Core chips well before now. With any luck, Intel will finally deliver on its promises for a die-shrink that was expected nearly three years ago which will help alleviate the situation further. Or, maybe the next will be ARM-based — we don't know. Apple’s stop-gap 16” model would prove to be thicker, and the article correctly hinted at a future ARM system. This quote is important context because Intel had been promising lithography advancements that were delayed. In 2016 Apple designed a chassis that they wanted to keep around for the next several years, but Intel basically didn’t deliver on their stated roadmap. There was no way to update the system without pushing the thermal solution to its limits or partially redesigning the thing. As far as thermal performance on 2015 systems (pre-USB-C), those designs are so old that I don’t think replacing Intel was on Apple’s near-term radar.

Tagbert 3y ago

The Intel MacBooks had bad thermals because Intel had promised more efficient processors and Apple had designed the new cases around that. Then Intel flubbed their die shrinks for several years in a row and Apple was stuck with the hotter chips from the larger process node. Since they were already on the road to switching to Apple Silicon, it may have not been worthwhile to redesign the cases for the Intel machines to compensate.

bjoli 3y ago
Intel flubbed the die shrinks several years in a row, but from 2015 it was pretty obvious that whatever apple was designing for wasn't enough. There were better thermal solutions in thinner, cheaper laptops. The fan didn't even draw air over the CPU in the last intel MacBook air. I opened one and really tried to figure out if there was some 4d chess going on, but no. The fan did nothing. It just started spinning fast making noise for no reason. I even did the old incense test. Next to nothing was being pulled over the CPU heatsink. It was spectacularly bad by design. This would not have been sufficient even if intel had delivered. The pro models were better but still awful. It wasn't a matter of fitting things in. It was by design. I have apple products. I like them. But even being charitable I can't come to any other conclusion that they just didn't care to deliver a good product.