Macbook Pro 16GB RAM Limit Exploration

[nicklmg]

Buy SODIMM memory on Amazon: http://geni.us/ysABsd

 

Apple claims that they MUST limit their Macbooks to 16GB of RAM to limit concerns about battery life... Is there any legitimacy to that claim?

 

 

[ThinkWithPortals]

First

 

Cheers Nick!

[Coaxialgamer]

34 minutes ago, nicklmg said:

 

snip

by the way , the graphs are unreadable , since the data on the y axis is cut off by the screen edge ...

 

edit : never mind , seems to be a problem with my browser ... derp

[colejohnson66]

I'm sorry, but no. This video is bad. The reason is pretty simple and obvious if you actually do research instead of jumping on the Apple Hate Bandwagon.

 

Apple used Skylake processors which support two kinds of memory: LPDDR3 and DDR4. LPDDR3 uses less power per gig than DDR4, so obviously Apple would go with that. Unfortunatly, the controller for LPDDR3 only supports up to 16 GB of RAM. When Apple claims it's limited for battery life, they're not lying; putting even 20 GB of RAM would force them to use DDR4.

 

Now, I'm not defending Apple here. If you're going to market it as a "Pro" laptop, 16 GB of RAM is just wrong. Sure, the majority of people don't need more than 16 GB, but that doesn't mean EVERYONE can get by with 16 GB. Apple's obsession with thiness has clearly gotten in the way of making a "Pro" laptop.

 

Hate Apple all you want, but don't hate if you don't even know the reason behind their decisions. And before you say "Apple is greedy" or some other stupid thing, think about how stupid that makes you sound: "I hate Apple because they sell expensive stuff". So? It's not your money. If someone wants to buy a laptop with 2015 specs for $2500, why do you care? Ever seen how much a Rolex costs?

[pyrojoe34]

6 minutes ago, colejohnson66 said:

I'm sorry, but no. This video is bad. The reason is pretty simple and obvious if you actually do research instead of jumping on the Apple Hate Bandwagon.

 

Apple used Skylake processors which support two kinds of memory: LPDDR3 and DDR4. LPDDR3 uses less power per gig than DDR4, so obviously Apple would go with that. Unfortunatly, the controller for LPDDR3 only supports up to 16 GB of RAM. When Apple claims it's limited for battery life, they're not lying; putting even 20 GB of RAM would force them to use DDR4.

 

Now, I'm not defending Apple here. If you're going to market it as a "Pro" laptop, 16 GB of RAM is just wrong. Sure, the majority of people don't need more than 16 GB, but that doesn't mean EVERYONE can get by with 16 GB. Apple's obsession with thiness has clearly gotten in the way of making a "Pro" laptop.

 

Hate Apple all you want, but don't hate if you don't even know the reason behind their decisions. And before you say "Apple is greedy" or some other stupid thing, think about how stupid that makes you sound: "I hate Apple because they sell expensive stuff". So? It's not your money. If someone wants to buy a laptop with 2015 specs for $2500, why do you care? Ever seen how much a Rolex costs?

Doesn't DDR3L run at 1.35V and DDR4 run at 1.2V, how is DDR3L less power hungry?

[colejohnson66]

8 minutes ago, pyrojoe34 said:

Doesn't DDR3L run at 1.35V and DDR4 run at 1.2V, how is DDR3L less power hungry?

Voltage doesn't matter; it's the wattage that matters (however, yes, they are correlated to an extent). BUT, unless DDR4 uses half or less the wattage of DDR3L, 32 gigs of DDR4 will always use more power than 16 gigs of DDR3L. It's basic math.

[pyrojoe34]

Just now, colejohnson66 said:

Voltage doesn't matter; it's the wattage that matters. Unless DDR4 uses half or less the wattage of DDR3L, 32 gigs of DDR4 will always use more power than 16 gigs of DDR3L. It's basic math.

That's not the debate, the only real question is does 16GB of DDR3L use significantly less power than 16GB DDR4? (I honestly don't know I'd like to see the data). If the answer is no then they should have stuck with DDR4 and given users a 32GB option if they wanted it. The only reason they don't have a 32GB option is because they went with a DDR3L controller over DDR4.

 

You can't compare 32GB power use with 16GB power use when asking why they choose a certain memory type/controller, that's an entirely different debate.

[RedRound2]

Wow, this was just a horrible video. Even the Apple-hate disease affects unadulterated channels like LTT

 

First of all, they use LPDDR3 RAM, NOT DDR4 SODIMM RAM as their only option from intel was to go with skylake quad cores. This itself pretty much invalidates all your comparisons

 

Second, if they ever wanted to put anything above 16GB, they would've had to go with SODIMM DDR4 which would be much more power hungry (& space consuming, hence battery) than for a laptop this thin and light with a good battery life

 

Third, the outcome of the video was pretty obvious when I saw @Slick on the thumbnail. He's pretty ignorant when it comes to Apple and doesn't seem to know anything about their products rather always hopping in the iHate Apple bandwagon. Example, and since when can LPDDR equipped laptops can have upgradable memory. It's not like they soldered a SODIMM RAM just for the sake of it

 

And Jon, you too seem ignorant if you actually think Apple intentionally didn't make a 32GB Option. Other than the power/space barriers, I will give an easier analogy for haters to digest on, If 32GB was indeed possible Apple could've easily tiered it in a higher end with extra premium and reap more profit, but fact check they didn't

 

PS They may have removed traditional ports, but professionals including LMG I believe uses 10Gb/s network and thunderbolt to move files around, meaning professionals investing in higher end equipment just for better performance/convenience. Talk about not catering to professionals when hypocrites don't realize Apple just released a device with much superior ports compared to anything else in the market, that too with a good number of them especially considering that the port can be daisy-chained

 

And, rather than Type-C only being relevant to professionals it is also relevant to consumers and just because of this move you guys can thank Apple 2 years later down the road for ubiquitous Type-C adoption

[tomappl]

Ok, I looked into it, maybe a wee bit deep. Here's what I found:

The MT40A1G16WBU-083E:B, a 16gig ddr4 sdram chip, often found in Notebooks these days, costs like 30$ in a 2k quantity, so cost is not an issue, Apple could sell the 32gb model for 200$ more than the 16g model an still make a acceptable margin.

Also, there is power consumption: 

Total current draw for the 2.666GHz chip: Itot = 130 + 6 + 160mA = 296mA

Operating voltage: Vnom = 1.2V nominal

That gives us a worst-case power consumption of: P = Itot * Vnom = 296 * 1.2 = 355mW (!)

Thats miliwatts! What a world we live in. But please remember, this is ddr4, so for ddr3 maybe 400 - 450mW.

For anyone interested, here's the digikey site with link to the datasheet:

http://www.digikey.at/product-detail/de/micron-technology-inc/MT40A1G16WBU-083E-B-TR/557-1681-2-ND/6135789

Unfortunatly, I didn't find a datasheet for the processor, so if anyone got information on that, please let me know.

[Alpha-Toxic]

39 minutes ago, pyrojoe34 said:

Doesn't DDR3L run at 1.35V and DDR4 run at 1.2V, how is DDR3L less power hungry?

Just wanted to point out that DDR3L and LPDDR3 are completely different things. These macs use LPDDR3

 

EDIT: Am I missing something here? All 3 cpus that I could find for the 15 inch model (I7-6700HQ, I7-6820HQ and I7-6920HQ) have  LPDDR3-1866 as the highest supported speed in the spec shet on intel's site. Apple lists 2133 in their spec. How would this work and why would they do it?

[potoooooooo]

18 minutes ago, Alpha-Toxic said:

Just wanted to point out that DDR3L and LPDDR3 are completely different things. These macs use LPDDR3

 

EDIT: Am I missing something here? All 3 cpus that I could find for the 15 inch model (I7-6700HQ, I7-6820HQ and I7-6920HQ) have  LPDDR3-1866 as the highest supported speed in the spec shet on intel's site. Apple lists 2133 in their spec. How would this work and why would they do it?

XMP, extra integrated GPU performance

 

Also, this video was horrible. Completely ignored the difference between LPDDR3 and DDR4

[PocketNerd]

53 minutes ago, colejohnson66 said:

Apple used Skylake processors which support two kinds of memory: LPDDR3 and DDR4. LPDDR3 uses less power per gig than DDR4, so obviously Apple would go with that. Unfortunatly, the controller for LPDDR3 only supports up to 16 GB of RAM. When Apple claims it's limited for battery life, they're not lying; putting even 20 GB of RAM would force them to use DDR4.

Apparently someone doesn't know about LPDDR4, making your argument moot entirely.

[zMeul]

3 minutes ago, PocketNerd said:

Apparently someone doesn't know about LPDDR4, making your argument moot entirely.

last time I checked, no one was selling LPDDR4

 

nvm, SKHynix is actually mass producing LPDDR4

 

---

 

the other thing, only KabyLake supports LPDDR4

Edited November 17, 2016 by zMeul

[RedRound2]

1 minute ago, PocketNerd said:

Apparently someone doesn't know about LPDDR4, making your argument moot entirely.

Except someone doesn't know that LPDDR4 isn't supported by Skylake chips. 

[PocketNerd]

Just now, RedRound2 said:

Except someone doesn't know that LPDDR4 isn't supported by Skylake chips. 

Touche!

[mrchow19910319]

No matter what apple does or why it does it, this is a terrible video. 

Cringy glasses and the shout out to louis...I have nothing against the man. I like what he said, and some of it are true. BUT. Since when this channel become a "pcmr" wannabe? Are we a bunch of 5 year old who just want to follow what other people say?? Everytime apple release a product, people mock it. It is not perfect, as nothing is. Just because there are companies that do not follow window's trend so everything they do are stupid??? If that's the case, the market and the consumer will not give a shit about apple. And now clearly that is not the case. 

If Mac are build like windows ,sell like windows they will fail terribly. Mac and windows pc are using different marketing technique and targeting quite different users. Just because you are driving a honda civic does it mean Mercades and Lambo, and even an audi r8 need to be destroyed??? Those product does not have a purpose??? 

 

Spoiler

I am not here to discuss whether apple should/should not put 32GB of ram in its machine. It is this kind of video that LTT produce sometimes buzz me. And seeing other people said that this is not a very accurate video, I know that I am not alone. The quality of the video they make is somehow going down. All those videos about "hey I just modded a pc and spend 9000 dollars on it " , I mean I do not know how many people who are like me who never liked it. Even I have those kind of money I would not use it on a pc. It is kind of absurd, who does that??? And who does that then keep showing to others over and over and over again ? Do we have to be either "I am using a mac since steve jobs wisdom tooth got out , and I am better than  everyone, you guys have no taste cos you have no idea what piece of art this machine is" OR "Macs are fucking trash! What kind of fucking retard/isheep will buy apple's product?? omg it just bothers me so much! Look at apple, what they do now??? " Do we have to be these kind of people?? I think in my opinion, they are both equally boring, and have nothing better to do with their life. 

 

[captain_to_fire]

19 minutes ago, mrchow19910319 said:

Cringy glasses and the shout out to louis...I have nothing against the man.

Am I the only one who thinks Louis Rossmann is kind of a jerk? I don't know if anyone from LTT can review the MacBook Pro objectively aside from the criticisms I concur like the lack of type A USB, SD card reader, and MagSafe.

[Qwweb]

JDEC states that LPDDR4 delivers 50% more performance and 40% better efficiency than LPDDR3 and potential for data density is 16 times that of LPDDR3. Skylake M does support DDR4 on certain processors. Both of the processors below are the ones used in the macbook pro, and they both support DDR4 according to Intel.

http://ark.intel.com/products/91156/Intel-Core-i5-6360U-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_10-GHz

http://ark.intel.com/products/91169/Intel-Core-i7-6660U-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_40-GHz

[mrchow19910319]

Just now, hey_yo_ said:

Am I the only one who thinks Louis Rossmann is kind of a jerk? I don't know if anyone from LTT can review the MacBook Pro objectively aside from the criticisms I concur like the lack of type A USB, SD card reader, and MagSafe.

He is a stubborn. If you watched his vids (one of them) you will know that he grew up really hard. And that kind of experiences stick with one. Unfortunately he could not outlive himself so that stubborn part is now part of him. He is also deadly honest and he is a reliable person. I am pretty sure that he can fight for what he believe, at all cost. And that is good, but sometimes pretty dangerous.  Like I said above, a lot of the media has this "urge" to criticize apple. It must make them feel better about themselves or something....I do not know why, and I find it boring./ 

[LeapFrogMasterRace]

1 minute ago, hey_yo_ said:

Am I the only one who thinks Louis Rossmann is kind of a jerk? I don't know if anyone from LTT can review the MacBook Pro objectively aside from the criticisms I concur like the lack of type A USB, SD card reader, and MagSafe.

He is a total prick IMO. I get this from the videos where he talks badly about his rude customers and does half-assed or rushed repairs on them. I think it was a macbook repair forgot which one specifically but I found it suuper unprofessional, if you are going to work in a position like that please respect all customers or kindly go out of business. 

 

Also 10/10 LMG would get misinformed again. You guys are on a roll!

[captain_to_fire]

4 minutes ago, LeapFrogMasterRace said:

He is a total prick IMO. I get this from the videos where he talks badly about his rude customers and does half-assed or rushed repairs on them. I think it was a macbook repair forgot which one specifically but I found it suuper unprofessional, if you are going to work in a position like that please respect all customers or kindly go out of business. 

 

Also 10/10 LMG would get misinformed again. You guys are on a roll!

LMG should hire a person who is well acquainted with both Mac and PC. They better NOT hire that jerk Louis Rossmann or anyone like him.

[blaze756]

30 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

LMG should hire a person who is well acquainted with both Mac and PC. They better NOT hire that jerk Louis Rossmann or anyone like him.

Some times I wish I could easily contact them just to correct them on certain things, especially when it comes to their Apple coverage.

[captain_to_fire]

7 minutes ago, blaze756 said:

Some times I wish I could easily contact them just to correct them on certain things, especially when it comes to their Apple coverage.

Well, ignorance is bliss for a lot of tech reviews.

[ATFink]

3 hours ago, PocketNerd said:

Apparently someone doesn't know about LPDDR4, making your argument moot entirely.

The current Macbook Pros use Skylake Processors. Skylake doesn't support LPDDR4. When Apple uses Kabylake your point will be valid if they don't change the RAM situation.

[corrado33]

While I was unaware of this memory situation until I read this thread, the first few results that popped up when googling the macbook pro memory issue stated exactly what I read above. 

 

So yes, it seems like LTT is simply hating on Apple because the "research" was not hard to do. 5 second google search anyone? 

 

I mean, LTT has awesome internet, so maybe a 2 second google search?

 

I may not support the direction Apple is going right now, but putting out such an ill informed video from a channel with whom I usually put my trust is... sad.