The news no one at Apple wants to hear? The new entry level MacBook might be slower than the old one. According to Primate Labs Blog, that might be true. The low power Penryn, was more or less forced on Apple by Intel but does offer significant benefits in terms of power consumption and heat dispacement.
The real culprit, according to the blog (and common sense) is the lowering of the level 2 cache on the entry level Penryn processors from 4mb to 3mb. While the higher end processor also got 1Mb of level 2 cache lopped off, the processor speed makes up the difference.:
Despite having a slightly faster processor, the smaller L2 cache of the Penryn processors means the base MacBook (Early 2008) is slower than the base MacBook (Late 2007). If you’re considering buying a base MacBook, you might want to shop around and see if you can snag an old one rather than a new one.
Of course, the high-end MacBook (Early 2008) is faster than the high-end MacBook (Late 2007); it seems the increase in processor frequency is enough to overcome the smaller L2 cache in this case.
Overall the new MacBooks, like the new MacBook Pros, don’t feel like an incredibly compelling upgrade. Sure, the MacBook Pro has a multi-touch trackpad, but the MacBooks don’t and sure, the new Penryn processors are cooler and use less power, but at an apparent hit in performance.
If you do want to buy an "old" one, Amazon has them for a limited time and they are marked down considerably ($919!).
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trust apple to do an update
trust apple to do an update but then go backwards in terms of the performance!
everybody was so happy when the update came through! but nobody noticed...
dont you think it is a bit stupid that intel should 'force' apple into updating to penryn?! anyhow, im still happy i got my lovely blackbook in december!
let me get this straight...
let me get this straight... as far as i can see only the white (2,0/2,1ghz) model decreased in speed?
Exactly, so ole boy missed
Exactly, so ole boy missed out on the 2.4GHz. which i dont think he knows yet. also im pretty sure the hard drive is bigger.
People are taking these
People are taking these benchmarks far too seriously. Some of the advances in the CPUs, like SSE4, no doubt are not reflected at all. While the benchmarks claim to use other SSE/Altivex type operations, I think they're not accurately reflected either.
These computers are so fast that for the vast majority of things we do, slight variations in the benchmarks don't matter at all. And the things that some do care about aren't well reflected. These benchmarks don't reflect disk system performance, GPU performance for games, or video compression abilities.
For a great example of how off things are, look through their archives and compare the old G3 iMacs with the earlier G4's. The advantages of the G4 are NOT reflected. I recall some video compression tasks that would take much of a week on a G3 being done in a couple of hours or less on a G4.
Various benchmarks are occasionally useful, but the numbers must be interpreted taking into account just what they measure and what a user intends to do.
The folks getting excited over battery life figures also need to understand that mileage will vary. If one is doing light surfing, word processing etc and keeps the brightness as low as possible, runtime will be dramatically longer than when one is viewing or compressing HD video,doing disk-intensive operations, and runs the brightness up.
Tip - using NoScript or Flashblock in Firefox will prevent annoying flash ads from increasing the CPU workload. Some take more resources than one would expect, especially on older laptops.
exactly, the only people
exactly, the only people that can really benift from these things are people who use graphic art,studio, or even animation. i personally dont care about a track pad, aluminum casing or .2 more GHz, sure its nice but def. not worth waiting month after month for an update and putting of my purchase. The new processor, yea its cool, but do you really need that to get on the internet and check your email?
sad thing is, thats what
sad thing is, thats what most people use a comp for. Although i am curious to see if they will release a new model for the mb in june. its a 1st gen. so i cant say i would buy it
Might the MacBooks be faster
Might the MacBooks be faster than the MacBook Pros?
Comparing PrimateLabs' results for the MacBook Pro (Penryn, T8300, 2.4 GHz), as reported on
http://www.primatelabs.ca/blog/2008/02/macbook-pro-performance-february-2008/,
with their results for the MacBook (Penryn, T8300, 2.4 GHz), as reported on
http://www.primatelabs.ca/blog/2008/03/macbook-performance-march-2008/,
it becomes apparent that the MacBook performs better in all tested categories than the MacBook Pro.
Any explanation for this?
3 month updates
The switch from PPC to Intel is beginning to kick in for the Mac now. Gone are the days of bi-yearly updates. Apple must now update their machines as frequently as Windows PCs.
I hope we start to see quarterly updates.