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Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

macrumors.com

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Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#31
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Having such a large difference in single-core performance, will negate the sizable difference in total core count (96 vs 16). But why? Wouldn’t total score be approximately corecount*corescore? Of course it’s not exactly that because not all cores run full speed at the same time, but how are the cores weighted that 16 cores are better than 96 cores with half the speed each?

Geekbench 5 and earlier constructed the multi-core test as essentially running N independent copies of the single-core test. This effectively pretends that every subtest is embarrassingly parallel. Geekbench 6 switched to having the multi-core test actually operate like real multi-threaded software: a fixed-size problem is broken up to be divided among available cores, with a non-zero amount of coordination between t…

But that’s a very specific thing to adjust a benchmark for, what if I want to host 50 VMs on one server for example? Then the 100 core server would be much better than the 16 core server, even though it has a lower benchmark value.

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#32

Geekbench multi falls off a cliff after ~16 cores. E.g. the Epyc 9654 with 96 cores benches lower than the Ryzen 7950X with 16 cores of the same generation.

I read this a few times and just wanted to confirm - are you saying the benchmark itself is can’t handle the higher core count?

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#33
post #18

Not true, obviously: M4 Max in the new Macbook Pros has been benchmarked to be faster [1]. Its not just a little faster than the #2; looking at ~15-20% uplifts in both single and multi compared to the previous kings. The previous production single core #1 was ~3100; Apple skipped over most of the 3000s right into the 4000s. [1] https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/8593555/

The article itself directly acknowledges this saying “of course this will be surpassed once we can benchmark the m4 max” (or something similar).

I wonder if their rules are “we only announce benchmarks we’ve done ourselves”? Coupled with “well we need some readers today and our MacBook order hasn’t arrived”

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#34
So the new Mini is faster than all existing Macs (at least on multicore Geekbench). That revelation sort of throws a monkey wrench into the grand plan of seldom buying a super-duper Mac that will perform competitively for years. Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU) and leave the Studios and Pros to rich fools eager to part with their megabucks.

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t really get tired of them releasing stuff that is better than the previous stuff?

The actual releasing of the stuff is not what I was referring when I specifically stated "the standard Apple line". We know this is better than what you released previously, otherwise, why would you be releasing it. It's just over the top marketing/PR fluff that is over the top over used to the point it is meaningless approaching insulting

> We know this is better than what you released previously, otherwise, why would you be releasing it

Because it's at a lower pricepoint and in a different form factor than the thing it's being compared to. How is this even a question?

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#36

So the new Mini is faster than all existing Macs (at least on multicore Geekbench). That revelation sort of throws a monkey wrench into the grand plan of seldom buying a super-duper Mac that will perform competitively for years. Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU) and leave the Studios and Pros to rich fools eager to part with their megabucks.

This is what it was like buying any computer before 2010. Top of the line would be mid shit a year later

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#37

So the new Mini is faster than all existing Macs (at least on multicore Geekbench). That revelation sort of throws a monkey wrench into the grand plan of seldom buying a super-duper Mac that will perform competitively for years. Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU) and leave the Studios and Pros to rich fools eager to part with their megabucks.

[deleted]

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#39

So the new Mini is faster than all existing Macs (at least on multicore Geekbench). That revelation sort of throws a monkey wrench into the grand plan of seldom buying a super-duper Mac that will perform competitively for years. Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU) and leave the Studios and Pros to rich fools eager to part with their megabucks.

I'm still running an Intel-based MacBook Pro from 2019, and it's trucking along just fine. It's not as fast as the M* chips, obviously, but it's still perfectly serviceable for software development. I'm tempted by the new Pro, but I don't consider it a necessity.

If I picked up a new Mini or MacBook today, I'm reasonably confident it, too, would last me five years or more.

Re: Mac Mini with M4 Pro is the fastest Mac ever benchmarked

#40

So the new Mini is faster than all existing Macs (at least on multicore Geekbench). That revelation sort of throws a monkey wrench into the grand plan of seldom buying a super-duper Mac that will perform competitively for years. Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU) and leave the Studios and Pros to rich fools eager to part with their megabucks.

> Better to buy the cheapest Mac possible (with a Pro CPU)

As long as it has enough RAM, that seems like a sound idea.

I actually got the M1 MacBook Air to replace an old Linux netbook that was dying (and also needed the walled garden for a project). I think that the M1 would still be enough for my daily tasks away from the desktop for quite a few years... except that I got the 8 GB version, which in hindsight was a pretty big mistake, assuming the rest of the hardware and software will have decent longevity.

Now I'm looking for remote development environments, something I could maybe run on my homelab and remote into, or maybe just running development containers on them.

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