Macbook Pro 16GB RAM Limit Exploration

[79wjd]

1 hour ago, Jack_of_all_Trades said:

 

What if its wrong about the things you need and just fills your ram with things you don't need and then has to clean up ram when you want something it didn't predict ?

It doesn't exactly take a long time to clear out ram of unnecessary data. And again, idle memory is doing me know good. 

[AxelRantila]

3 hours ago, Razor512 said:

For the RAM, I am mostly focused on photography, graphic design, and video editing.

 

There are a wide range of professional tasks that are done by people, but the only tasks that the macbook pro will be good with are ones that are light on RAM and heavy on the CPU, with little to no GPU acceleration.

 

PS, 16GB is not enough for even photoshop if you are working with many layers, and multiple smart objects (e.g., retouching a set of photos). Even with an NVMe SSD, when they start to bump into the RAM limit and start using virtual memory, performance slows significantly, as even if an SSD can write at 1.5GB/s and read at 3+GB/s, it does not help much for a memory hard task that is reading and writing to a device that is offering around 40-50GB/s and 40 nanosecond response time.

 

To comfortable do even basic photo editing (retouching photos after a photo shoot where you have a ton of 14 bit raw files to work on), 32GB is he bare minimum.

 

16GB is fine for content consumption, but not enough for content creation.

 

For the price you are paying for the macbook pro, it is sad that you have to compromise in this way, where as on other professional systems, that kind of money means that you do not have to compromise.

From my experience with game dev, programming and basic video editing, you can make it work with 16 gigs but in the future I would like to have a system with at least 32 gigs.

 

And still trying to understand why anyone criticizing Apple is calling for a crusade against them

[Castdeath97]

4 hours ago, AxelRantila said:

From my experience with game dev, programming and basic video editing, you can make it work with 16 gigs but in the future I would like to have a system with at least 32 gigs.

 

And still trying to understand why anyone criticizing Apple is calling for a crusade against them

Well I guess with most of the posters in this thread problem isn't with "criticising apple", it's about using misinformation to do so(deliberately or not), that's why some people are calling it a crusade. 

[RedRound2]

@LinusTech@nicklmg

 

How in the world do you fuck up again? Do you actually think LPDDR3 is same as DDR3 SODIMM? According to the WAN show, Jon said the power consumption on these two different standards are the same when the reality is it isn't. Here's a quote from Wikipedia on the differences between DDR & LPDDR

Quote

The original low-power DDR (sometimes, in hindsight, called LPDDR1) is a slightly modified form of DDR SDRAM, with several changes to reduce overall power consumption.
Most significant, the supply voltage is reduced from 2.5 to 1.8 V. Additional savings come from temperature-compensated refresh (DRAM requires refresh less often at low temperatures), partial arrayself refresh, and a "deep power down" mode which sacrifices all memory contents. Additionally, chips are smaller, using less board space than their non-mobile equivalents. 

 

 

1

So yes, when you consider the very dynamic use of RAM in day to day life even a small amount of extra power consumption used by a different kind of RAM will have an impact on the battery and far from supposedly 5% extra usage you put up. This is a bigger problem since the new MacBooks seem to have battery issues. And btw, please correct jon that while Apple gives estimate of 10 hours on the MBP other companies like Dell and Microsoft advertises as 16 hours battery life when in reality it's close to like 1/3rd of it (which @LinusTech knew but chose not to say it)

 

Second, why do you like the razer blade, when you could easily go with a little more bulky laptops which have like a GTX 1080 in it. If people don't mind bulky setups then they're better off with a desktop which could be much more powerful. People do like portability, no matter how you put it. Why is there a sudden interest in small form factor PC, although it wouldn't make any difference rather harm airflow or break compatibility? Same things going on here

 

Third, do many people even need 32GB RAM? A very very few people. If anyone's even doing professional work, their main system would be a desktop with 32 or 64GB RAM and this would act as a secondary. The main point you seem to ignore (or forget is that) this is a professional laptop when you look in the realm of laptops and not desktops. 

 

And again you didn't address the issue where you don't seem to mind the lack of 32GB in other mainstream laptops like the Razer Blade where you gave a glowing review too (basically a macbook clone with GPU). Sure you could argue that it's not marketed to professionals rather gamers but that's a very moot argument especially considering that professionals know what specs they need and it doesn't matter what a device is marketed to as long as it has the required specs which the razer blade has

 

And fourth, don't go judging things before you try it. There's a reason why people buy Macs for their professional work and you can't just dismiss that. So please, instead of bitching about Apple blindly and give a negative review about the MBP on how it doesn't have any ports or how thin it is or etc give it a long-term trial replacing your razer blade (I assume you dont game on it) and ask taran or someone to give Final Cut Pro a try

[TLSOnlyPls]

I'd like to share an article that discusses the problem in detail.

https://macdaddy.io/macbook-pro-limited-16gb-ram/

 

It also mentions LinusTechTips directly:

Quote

LinusTechTips attempted to do an analysis on the extra power that would be required to support more RAM, but unfortunately it has the fatal flaw in that they only compare DDR4 (16GB) to DDR4 (32GB), making their results mistaken. Which is surprising, usually it’s a top quality information source.

To be honest, I was similarly surprised when I saw "Desktop RAM" below the charts. It is obvious that Desktop RAM cannot represent Laptop RAM power usage. The fact that Desktop RAMs are even used shows how sloppy this video is. And you dared to label it "Truth".

 

With regard to Linus' sentiment:

Quote

the fundamental disagreement we have with Apple's obsession with thin at the cost of better usability and performance. Our conclusion - they did it for space savings

 

The problem the DDR4 power drain cannot be solved with a bigger battery and thicker body without compromising the overall design. To quote the article, the current LPDDR3 RAM on avg drains 1.8 W. DDR4 drains 2 to 5 W more. How much more battery is needed to accommodate that? For a battery life of 10 hours according to the spec, that's 20 Wh to 50 Wh. How large is the battery of Macbook Pro? According to the spec, 49.2 Wh. I don't think 32 GB RAM justifies almost doubling the battery. In fact, according to Business Insider's review, the spec is already overstating. Actual battery life is around 8 hours.

 

The article went on to some examples of actual 32GB RAM laptops that are not gaming laptops. All the examples suffer from battery life problem, and have to compromise one way or the other to accommodate.

 

To quote the conclusion:

Quote

Apple have never taken big compromises in their engineering, and to switch to DDR4 memory now just to support 32GB would be relatively absurd given the disadvantages which are outlined in this article. They would be more likely to replace the Intel CPU with their in-house manufactured ARM CPU in order to support LPDDR4.

 

[gonvres]

I do think its a fair point that no criticism was aimed at Razor or the Dell XPS13 for its lack of 32gb options. They certainly didn't warrant additional videos lambasting them for the reduced memory. Especially since Linus uses one...

[othertomperson]

I just want to point out as well that the community here is not exactly known for its fondness for Apple. If they are saying that you are being unfair to Apple of all people, you fucked up.

[Nyehrifier]

Thankfully for Apple, lots of Windows laptop manufacturers still hasn't caught up with Apple in terms of offering increadible optimised experience in a thin and light package. However, I know a few professionals already jumping into Windows with the Razer Blade series, Dell XPS and even the Surface Book even if it means using software that feels unoptimised (Looking at you Adobe) 

[Mr.Meerkat]

14 hours ago, Razor512 said:

they did not spec it to a pro level

Ermmmm...a quad core i7 and a polaris 11 is actually quite a decent configured machine...yes I know the MBP13 doesn't even have a quadcore I7 but to be fair, they are still quite powerful  

[Razor512]

1 minute ago, Mr.Meerkat said:

Ermmmm...a quad core i7 and a polaris 11 is actually quite a decent configured machine...yes I know the MBP13 doesn't even have a quadcore I7 but to be fair, they are still quite powerful  

Yep, the the CPU is good for a laptop, but the issue is that due to the various other limitations, it becomes harder to take advantage of it because most of the common tasks that will take advantage of it, will also need either a higher end GPU, or much more RAM.

[Mr.Meerkat]

1 minute ago, Razor512 said:

higher end GPU, or much more RAM.

More ram:  https://macdaddy.io/macbook-pro-limited-16gb-ram/

So is it really worth to have 32GB of ram while doubling the size of the battery?

 

GPU: Ermmm...I guess?  

[david b death]

I've been using apple since the 603e era. Since 2003 i've administered multiple apple based computer labs and servers in the art department of a college. I excel at all things apple. I also 3D model, digitally paint, occasionally edit video, etc.

 

Apple doesn't have a pro line anymore. Their Mac Pro towers are unreliable as in the people i know personally who have them all have had to have them repaired. The MBPs don't have important ports like ethernet. Im not going to network render over wifi. Constantly rendering on a MBP seams to shortens its life span.

 

So even though the video wasn't 100% accurate. It doesn't change the fact that thinner at the cost of performance doesn't appeal to me and many others.

 

If you've ever digitally painted more ram equals more layers and more pixels.

[XenosTech]

21 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

Unused RAM is worthless RAM. 

Has to be the dumbest thing I've ever read on any forum in my entire life

[Thaldor]

People nit picking on argument while the videos conclusion is even without that argument correct. Apples initial argument for limiting memory to max. 16GB because battery life is total BS.

 

The RAM voltage doesn't really tell the whole story either. While it plays a major role in the total power consumption the real main character in the play is the constant power consumption. While LPDDR3 uses around 70-90% less power than DDR3 (depends on loads and do we constantly read and write or just detent data), DDR4 uses quite closely as much power as LPDDR3 while LPDDR4 will use less power than DDR4 and LPDDR3. So, Apple probably saves around 5-10% of power consumption by using LPDDR3 instead of DDR4, but in contrast that is around 0.01-0.5% in total power consumption of the system, amount that probably no one really notices in real use.

 

Size of the chips. Probably not that either. Size of the LPDDR3 and DDR4 chips isn't that significant and even if it was Apple is using a lot of room inside of the MBP for the batteries and changing from LPDDR3 to DDR4 would probably take max. 100mAh worth of room from the inside in the worst case.

 

Price. That's a really good quess. In findchips.com LPDDR3 chips go for ~40-60$/piece while DDR4 chips cost ~10-30$/piece. So, a quite a good place to bumb the price artificially.

 

My quess for the LPDDR3 memories: Pure retention. We don't probably see a lot of changes and upgrades in DRAMs for few years so why to stick into a machine, that will sell no matter how shitty or not it is, the best possible DRAM. While you can stick older DRAM in it and when you upgrade it after few years you can bring it with the newer DRAM and market "We even upgraded the choices of memories you can get!" and some people will go crazy over how great the upgrade is and how no one has ever thought about it earlier. Or you can go totally lazy and just silently add the better RAM in and market how fast the machine feels while you haven't done almost nothing to the OS but you have upgraded the memory.

[79wjd]

3 hours ago, XenosTech said:

Has to be the dumbest thing I've ever read on any forum in my entire life

Oh I'm sorry, does your computer somehow magically run faster by having all your ram empty? Of course it doesn't. Theres no point in leaving ram idle, you may as well fill it with things it things you might need.

[XenosTech]

2 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

Oh I'm sorry, does your computer somehow magically run faster by having all your ram empty? Of course it doesn't. Theres no point in leaving ram idle, you may as well fill it with things it things you might need.

It doesn't need to run faster... Having the extra ram means when I need it it's there, especially if I transition from gaming to doing work it helps a lot. You sir clearly don't under how your computer should work or how ram is utilized if you're saying empty ram is worthless ram.

[RedRound2]

12 hours ago, Thaldor said:

The RAM voltage doesn't really tell the whole story either. While it plays a major role in the total power consumption the real main character in the play is the constant power consumption. While LPDDR3 uses around 70-90% less power than DDR3 (depends on loads and do we constantly read and write or just detent data), DDR4 uses quite closely as much power as LPDDR3 while LPDDR4 will use less power than DDR4 and LPDDR3. So, Apple probably saves around 5-10% of power consumption by using LPDDR3 instead of DDR4, but in contrast that is around 0.01-0.5% in total power consumption of the system, amount that probably no one really notices in real use.

 

2

The power consumption metric you brought up is wrong. LPDDR has special features like deep sleep, etc that normal memories don't have, reducing the power consumption by a lot while in dynamic usage scenarios which wouldn't be the case with normal SODIMM memory. Plus RAM does consume a significant amount of energy when you actually consider how much a power a battery can actually hold (it's laughably small when you actually realize this)

Quote

Size of the chips. Probably not that either. Size of the LPDDR3 and DDR4 chips isn't that significant and even if it was Apple is using a lot of room inside of the MBP for the batteries and changing from LPDDR3 to DDR4 would probably take max. 100mAh worth of room from the inside in the worst case.

 

Price. That's a really good quess. In findchips.com LPDDR3 chips go for ~40-60$/piece while DDR4 chips cost ~10-30$/piece. So, a quite a good place to bumb the price artificially.

 

 

It is significant. A DDR4 SODIMM module is pretty much as long as your index finger and as wide as two fingers put together while LPDDR module is close to the size of a tip of the finger. When it comes to silicon chips more surface area = more power (excluding PCB)

Quote

Price. That's a really good quess. In findchips.com LPDDR3 chips go for ~40-60$/piece while DDR4 chips cost ~10-30$/piece. So, a quite a good place to bumb the price artificially.

 

 

How would they benefit if they bumped the price artificially? It's not like they're getting better profit as they also have to spend more for the LP RAMs

[79wjd]

11 hours ago, XenosTech said:

It doesn't need to run faster... Having the extra ram means when I need it it's there, especially if I transition from gaming to doing work it helps a lot. You sir clearly don't under how your computer should work or how ram is utilized if you're saying empty ram is worthless ram.

Yes, and having the extra ran sit idle or sit with data you might need will both leave you with ram for when you need it. But there is still no benefit to leaving ram empty. You clearly don't understand that there are already programs and operating systems that fill extra ram/VRAM rather than just letting it sit idle because it's a waste of resources to just let memory sit idle.

[TLSOnlyPls]

16 hours ago, Thaldor said:

The RAM voltage doesn't really tell the whole story either. While it plays a major role in the total power consumption the real main character in the play is the constant power consumption. While LPDDR3 uses around 70-90% less power than DDR3 (depends on loads and do we constantly read and write or just detent data), DDR4 uses quite closely as much power as LPDDR3 while LPDDR4 will use less power than DDR4 and LPDDR3. So, Apple probably saves around 5-10% of power consumption by using LPDDR3 instead of DDR4, but in contrast that is around 0.01-0.5% in total power consumption of the system, amount that probably no one really notices in real use.

 

2016 MBP runs a 49.2 Wh battery, specced at 10-hour battery life, restricting its power consumption to 4.92 W on average. 0.5% of 4.92 W is about 0.025 W. If you can make RAM which uses that little power, I think Apple would be really interested.

[XenosTech]

1 hour ago, djdwosk97 said:

Yes, and having the extra ran sit idle or sit with data you might need will both leave you with ram for when you need it. But there is still no benefit to leaving ram empty. You clearly don't understand that there are already programs and operating systems that fill extra ram/VRAM rather than just letting it sit idle because it's a waste of resources to just let memory sit idle.

Operating systems don't fill the ram with data, they just use as much as it needs to out of the total physical ram provided and what isn't used is in standby til I the user open more programs/do tasks (such as CONTENT CREATION) that require the use of more ram the operating system with then use more of the physical ram. What's the point of buying something that's targeted at power users that's under speced for said user and makes their work flow more frustrating than it already is. That's why people who have workstations on the windows side what systems that have in 64 gb of ram, they don't have it because it makes their computer faster they have it because it makes working in the applications way smoother than it does now on mac's. If the targeted audience is now shifting to windows because it is making their productivity better then apple fucked up and there isn't anything you can say that can prove otherwise.

[79wjd]

5 hours ago, XenosTech said:

Operating systems don't fill the ram with data, they just use as much as it needs to out of the total physical ram provided and what isn't used is in standby til I the user open more programs/do tasks (such as CONTENT CREATION) that require the use of more ram the operating system with then use more of the physical ram. What's the point of buying something that's targeted at power users that's under speced for said user and makes their work flow more frustrating than it already is. That's why people who have workstations on the windows side what systems that have in 64 gb of ram, they don't have it because it makes their computer faster they have it because it makes working in the applications way smoother than it does now on mac's. If the targeted audience is now shifting to windows because it is making their productivity better then apple fucked up and there isn't anything you can say that can prove otherwise.

Never once did I claim that there shouldn't have been a 32gb model. Nor did I claim that 16gb is enough. I was commenting on someone who made a claim about how different operating systems allocate memory differently. And that id rather the OS allocate that memory to something i might need rather than letting it sit idle. 

[Shahnewaz]

8 hours ago, XenosTech said:

Operating systems don't fill the ram with data, they just use as much as it needs to out of the total physical ram provided and what isn't used is in standby til I the user open more programs/do tasks (such as CONTENT CREATION) that require the use of more ram the operating system with then use more of the physical ram. What's the point of buying something that's targeted at power users that's under speced for said user and makes their work flow more frustrating than it already is. That's why people who have workstations on the windows side what systems that have in 64 gb of ram, they don't have it because it makes their computer faster they have it because it makes working in the applications way smoother than it does now on mac's. If the targeted audience is now shifting to windows because it is making their productivity better then apple fucked up and there isn't anything you can say that can prove otherwise.

That is still used RAM. Sorry, but your logic is flawed.

 

If there is any portion of RAM that never gets used up, that is wasted RAM.

On the other hand, your idle/standby RAM should also be used to cache as much stuff up as possible, while also clearing it when space is required. Idle RAM is just as useless as wasted RAM, or no RAM.

 

There is no use in having 32 gigs of RAM when you never peaked over 16GB, or 31GB for the matter. That extra 16GB or 1GB won't make your system any more stable or run faster. It will only consume more power by pointlessly running on standby all the time.

[Marinatall_Ironside]

On 11/19/2016 at 8:48 AM, david b death said:

Apple doesn't have a pro line anymore. Their Mac Pro towers are unreliable as in the people i know personally who have them all have had to have them repaired. The MBPs don't have important ports like ethernet. Im not going to network render over wifi. Constantly rendering on a MBP seams to shortens its life span.

 

So even though the video wasn't 100% accurate. It doesn't change the fact that thinner at the cost of performance doesn't appeal to me and many others.

 

If you've ever digitally painted more ram equals more layers and more pixels.

True that. But remember software design has changed significantly over the years. Adobe programs began to get the synchronized updates to software design for both Windows and Mac OS's (Macintosh/OS X/macOS/any OS Apple) since 1997. It has made it to the point where it doesn't matter what operating system the person is using anymore. What matters now is the person themselves on three important aspects: familiarity with the keyboard of their preferred OS and required applications (two things), and creativity.

 

I run all of my Adobe, Autodesk programs, Blender, and all of my game development applications on a Windows computer that's over-spec'd close to all hell when compared to the average computer, and I can assure you I can do the same things on a macOS-based system, because as I've said before, it's me and me only that matters. A tool is a tool. Real designers use whatever they have at hand and make the absolute most of it. 

 

The matter of the fact why I don't use an iMac or MacBook Pro, or a Mac Pro is the horrendously limited upgrade-ability and underpowered hardware for the price you're paying, and that's been proven time and time again. You can make the move to pirate OS X and slam it onto a customized PC, something Linus and Luke did before, but that's a matter I will not discuss here at all.

 

Also you can make the argument that the extra price comes from warranty and software. Yeah aside from software and great customer support and warranty, don't sell me a Apple desktop computer until it can match a similar Windows computer for the applications used.

 

Here's the one thing though, I will only use a Apple desktop computer if my future workplace absolutely requires me to do so for whatever reason they can try and justify. Bite the bullet, and just get the shit done and be over with it by the end of the day.

 

What's the one thing Windows computers and Apple computers have in common?

[AxelRantila]

On 2016-11-19 at 9:41 AM, Castdeath97 said:

Well I guess with most of the posters in this thread problem isn't with "criticising apple", it's about using misinformation to do so(deliberately or not), that's why some people are calling it a crusade. 

That I can understand. But when someone states something incorrectly (whether intentional our not), isn't there better ways of correcting them instead of calling it a crusade. I'm not saying that LMG is innocent, but calling it a crusade isn't very constructive.

[PandaPanda]

Apple's marketing worked. Everyone defending the idea of downgrading what was once a portable creation powerhouse to being a mediocre everyday use device at the same price point is an example of this. Apple's reason? They priced a picture book $300 and everyone defending the clearly crippled MBP probably bought the book.