GPT-5.6 Luna vs. GPT-6 Astra: Is a $1.20 Model Good Enough for Code Review? • Hacker News Board

Re: GPT-5.6 Luna vs. GPT-6 Astra: Is a $1.20 Model Good Enough for Code Review?

#131

Post by micw » Tue, Sep 15, 2026, 4:46 AM UTC

rationalist wrote: post #96

jacobgold wrote: post #8

IMHO, Codex with Astra/Sol and Claude with Fable/Opus are all any professional programmer should be using in Sep 2026, if they can afford it. These models are still terrible compared to what we'd actually wish for, but they're the best available. If you can get away with using the $200/mo subscriptions, it's really not even a money thing for most professionals. Almost all of my work is now plan, generate, review, pla…

Unfortunately ChatGPT just stopped allowing people to upgrade to the $200/mo subscription. I started my first paid subscription ($100/mo) last week, and now I want to upgrade and I can't :-(

Also not available in their business offer. So I have now a $20 business plus a $200 "personal" plan in my account.

Re: GPT-5.6 Luna vs. GPT-6 Astra: Is a $1.20 Model Good Enough for Code Review?

#132

Post by micw » Tue, Sep 15, 2026, 4:50 AM UTC

jacobgold wrote: post #41

baxtr wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you elaborate on your exact setup? Where do you run these models?

Since you asked, the answer is that I built and use an agent multiplexer called Clor https://clor.com I have a $200/mo Claude subscription and a $200/mo Codex subscription, and I'm signed in to both. The Docker containers keep each session isolated, so dev servers, browser testing, etc. can work without conflicts. It includes `/ask-claude` and `/ask-codex` skills that I use very frequently to have the Claude or Codex…

How do you access Claude from the multiplexer? AFAIK Anthrophic allows the use with their official tools only.

I have created wrappers for Codex (https://github.com/micw/codex-wrapper-advanced) and claude (https://github.com/micw/claude-wrapper-advanced) that uses their SDK (Codex) and the CLI (Claude) internally to align with the subscription ToS and still have a common API ;-) This way I can use both in any harness and can easily switch between both.

Re: GPT-5.6 Luna vs. GPT-6 Astra: Is a $1.20 Model Good Enough for Code Review?

#133

Post by chis » Tue, Sep 15, 2026, 5:16 AM UTC

extr wrote: post #47

triyambakam wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What have you noticed about Astra? I haven't used Claude models lately so I can't compare but it seems fine compared to 5.6 Sol

- It doesn't write great code. - Occasionally has strange tics around asking for permission for obvious next-steps, implied actions, etc. - It's very expensive, both in terms of tokens and % usage on subscription plans. - Relatedly, effort level is unintuitive. Sometimes it seems like higher effort levels are actually cheaper due to not under-thinking and needing to correct work. But other times they are overkill and…

I gave up on fable 5 after I asked it to critique my PR and it spit out a page of complete nonsense technical jargon. Like, to the point that I had to review the feedback with other models and try to parse what it was saying and ultimately it wasn't even right. Compare to Astra and Sol where I can almost forget there's a model and just speak/read naturally.

I think I should give 5.1 another chance but I am just so triggered by the way it talks after spending so long battling fable 5.

Also I'm starting to wonder if the latest round of models have finally saturated for my personal coding needs. I mean obviously not for taste and judgement, but those barely seem to improve with model generations. For just spitting out a 1000-line feature I've vaguely scoped out, Astra feels basically as good as I need.