Apple unveils M1, its first system-on-a-chip for portable Mac computers • Hacker News Board

Post by tomaskafka » Tue, Nov 17, 2020, 7:39 PM UTC

kossTKR wrote: post #774

tomaskafka wrote: post #771

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am curious - my 2017 12" MB is an absolutely awesome machine (fast enough for casual use and light development while absolutely quiet and lightweight), but 30+ degree summer day is enough for it to get so close to it's thermal envelope that it throttles down to cca 1 GHz during normal (browser) use soon. So, the sustained performance might make quite a difference for pro use.

It shouldn't really throttle to 1ghz - it's because Apple puts low quality paste in it, and sometimes because of dust. My Macbook from 2014, is still excellent but it started throttling to 1ghz with video encoding. After going to a repair shop and telling them about the problem they put high quality thermal paste in it for about 100 usd and the problem disappeared. Now i get 100% CPU no matter what i throw at it, pre…

Thanks for your experience, but the passively cooled 12" Macbook is really a different thing. Basically, it isn't a 2.5 GHz CPU that throttles, but a 1.1 GHz CPU which can boost itself for a very short time, and the it runs into thermal limit and returns to a 1.1 GHz sustained performance.

And on hot day, that boost might last 30 seconds and then that's it.