The MacBook Pro Review (13 & 15-inch): 2011 Brings Sandy Bridge
by Anand Lal Shimpi, Brian Klug & Vivek Gowri on March 10, 2011 4:17 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
- Mac
- Apple
- Intel
- MacBook Pro
- Sandy Bridge
Mostly No QuickSync
One of the most significant features of Intel's Sandy Bridge CPU is Quick Sync, the hardware assisted video transcode engine. In our review we found it to be better than any of the currently available GPU based transcoding methods and far better than just running the transcode operation on your CPU. While Quick Sync's performance/quality in the pro space is unproven, there's simply no better way of taking your existing video content and transcoding it for use on mobile devices like an iPhone or an iPad.
Given how well Quick Sync is suited for moving content between i-devices it's surprising that Apple doesn't tout it as a feature of the new 2011 MacBook Pros. Not only is Quick Sync not featured by Apple, it's not supported by any Apple application other than FaceTime.
That means iMovie and QuickTime rely on CPU based video encoding and not Quick Sync.
Apple has traditionally been very conservative with adopting new hardware features in software (ahem, TRIM). I'm worried that we may not see Quick Sync in iMovie until the 2012 version, however once the rest of the Mac lineup moves to Sandy Bridge maybe the incentive to introduce it sooner will be there.
Apple does claim support for Quick Sync in FaceTime however CPU utilization is still very high when using FaceTime HD:
Depending on available upstream bandwidth I saw between 50 and 100% CPU utilization of a single core while running FaceTime. According to Apple, FaceTime HD wasn't possible on a dual-core machine without the SNB video encoder. As to why we're seeing such high CPU utilization even with hardware accelerated encode and decode, your guess is as good as mine.
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Bewareofthewolves - Thursday, March 24, 2011 - link
Hello all, I just wanted a bit of advice. I am planning on buying one of the new Macbook Pro's, and wondered which one would best suit my needs. I am mainly making the purchase to use Logic Pro, which i will use extensively, i will also be using the internet regularly, should i go for a high end 13'' or the 15'' model. Advice would be appreciated, thankyou.abhic - Sunday, March 27, 2011 - link
Hey Guys,I had to decide what to upgrade to this year and I kept on going back and forth between the 13" & the 15" MBP. You guys single-handedly made up my mind! Kudos on an insanely well researched post.
I ended up noting down a few points on how I analyzed the choices as well - http://vritti.net/2011/03/2011-15-macbook-pro-i7-2...
Keep up the great work.
Mezoxin - Thursday, March 31, 2011 - link
Does switching between SNB HD3000 and the discrete graphics work in windows 7 ?tno - Wednesday, May 4, 2011 - link
Nope. As they stated, in Win 7 it's dGPU only.Steve Katz - Tuesday, April 12, 2011 - link
Anand states that the Thunderbolt port is not even visible under Device Manager.Does this mean that the 2011 MBPs cannot use an external monitor under Windows 7? Or did the author mean that the Thunderbolt port is limited to mini-DisplayPort functionality under Windows 7?
Lack of support for external monitors under Windows 7 would be a deal breaker for me.
BTW: I had to create a new log on to post this comment. Anyone care to explain why it's "apparently spam?"
linked.account - Saturday, May 7, 2011 - link
Well I think the subject of my question was enough to explain my question :D!linked.account - Saturday, May 7, 2011 - link
And what about Airport Express 802.11n ?JCrichton - Monday, May 9, 2011 - link
Would you happen to have a comparison or stats for the DGPU difference for the 6490M?cagecurrent - Friday, May 13, 2011 - link
Got my first Mac ever yesterday: a Macbook Pro 13" with the slower CPU. As I had a X25-M G2 160 GB SSD lying around I had planned from the start to install it. It was super-smooth, and everything works perfect.Love Mac/OSX, really sold on it... probably getting a second Mac before the end of the summer.
Per, Sweden
@cagecurrent
angad - Wednesday, June 8, 2011 - link
I was kind of hoping for a better look at Windows 7 (and specifically gaming) performance on the 15-inch Pro, given that the 13-inch's anemic GPU should have been enough of a 'don't bother'.I want a Macbook but I want to game. I'm ok with 4-odd hours of battery life under Windows and I might get used to the funky fn+backspace to delete but I really don't want a rude shock when it comes to gaming.
Can anybody tell me whether the base 15-inch model will handle games under Win7 without killing itself?