Apple News
Benchmark scores for 2015 MacBook Air lineup and 13-inch MacBook Pro show minor upgrades
Now, courtesy of Primate Labs’ John Poole, a series of new benchmark tests have been published that outline some of the performance upgrades that the new models have been provided. As revealed in the reports, the scores are surely better than the predecessor units, but those improvements might be minor enough that upgrading this year might be something to hold off on, especially if you picked up a new MacBook Air just last year.
As revealed in the 32-bit single-core test, both the stock Intel Core i5 chip clocked at 1.6GHz and the upgraded 2.2GHz Intel Core i7 performed reasonably enough, showing slight improvements over the Intel Haswell chips used in the 2014 models. That’s an improvement of about 6 percent. However, when put through the 64-bit multi-core benchmark, the tests showed that the i7 chip increased by a total of 14% from last year’s model.
Based on the report put together by Poole, he suggests that for anyone looking to buy a MacBook Air, go for the multi-core processor. Poole says the 20% faster single-core and 25 percent faster multi-core performance when compared to the i5 processor is worth the 15% uptick in price:
“If you’re thinking of buying the new MacBook Air I would strongly recommend the i7 processor. It has 20% faster single-core performance and 25% faster multi-core performance for only a 15% increase in price.“
MacBook Pro
Single-core performance increases between 3% to 7% from Haswell to Broadwell, depending on the model. Multi-core performance has increased 3% to 6%. The increases in performance are roughly in line with the MacBook Pro’s price differences.
“I have no recommendations regarding the processor for the new MacBook Pro. The performance differences and the price differences between the processors are roughly equivalent.“
So are you going to buy one of the refreshed Macs ?
[via MacRumors; Primate Labs]