AC 12: Can a laptop still work in place of a 8 core machine?

[Chazz]

Decisions, desisions. I'm debating between an MacBook Pro 2.6ghz 17" and a new Mac Pro 8 core.

Maybe some of the beta testers can speak to this: Is the speed improvement in AC 12 on an 8 core beast really 4x better than on a laptop with just a single 2 core processor? I really love the portability of my current MacBook Pro but I spend a heck of a lot of time waiting for Atlantis and Archicad. Any input appreciated.

[Chris Phillips]

OK, you are just trying to make me jealous! Yes it is worth it!

Chris Phillips

[Rick Thompson]

I haven't loaded it on my laptop, so can't answer that directly, but comparing 11 to 12 on a 2.8 Quad core there is a nice speed bump, but I work on small file size plns. Personally, I wish I had had some inclination AC would have been multi capable when I bought the Quad the first of this year and I would have gone "all the way". So, I can't imagines wanting to use anything less than you can get your hands on. The biggest difference in speed was going from my old 2 core 2.0 to the newer quad. The difference was bigger there than from 11 to 12.. for me. A pln opening went from 30 sec to 20 sec with 11 to 12. It went from something like 1.5 min to 30 sec from the old 2.0 - 2 core to the faster 2.8 quad.

[Rick Thompson]

ps.. the new dimensioning ablities alone is worth the upgrade:)

[Chazz]

Chris wrote:
OK, you are just trying to make me jealous! Yes it is worth it!Chris Phillips

But the cost is not really the issue. You can get a decent 8 core desktop for the same $ as a well appointed MBP. The tradeoff for me is speed Vs the loss in portability. I move around a lot (and love to be able to bike with my files). My question is what IS that tradeoff? 1.5X? 2X? 4X?

At the World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) this month, Apple anounced the next version of the OS, Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard which will focus on multiprocessor support. Implicit in this decision is the fact that processors are not getting much faster and the key to speed improvements in future is parallelism.

Parallelism appears to be the name of the game going forward and it makes me wonder if doing architecture is just not something that one will do on a laptop in the near future (it certainly was not in the distant past).

[Eduardo Rolon]

Runs fine on a Macbook Pro 15", no regrets. Though I am buying a 8core next month.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Chazz wrote:
Decisions, desisions. I'm debating between an MacBook Pro 2.6ghz 17" and a new Mac Pro 8 core.

Maybe some of the beta testers can speak to this: Is the speed improvement in AC 12 on an 8 core beast really 4x better than on a laptop with just a single 2 core processor? I really love the portability of my current MacBook Pro but I spend a heck of a lot of time waiting for Atlantis and Archicad. Any input appreciated.

As Rick mentions, the speed improvement depends on the size of your files. It feels zippier with any file, but we're talking seconds with smaller files vs perhaps minutes on huge commercial projects. You'll not notice much change in performance once you are in a view, but will notice that sections, elevations and 3D open much faster than before.

If you use Artlantis and other multithreaded apps, then all the more reason for as many cores as possible. Using Artlantis, even in preview mode, all cores will run 'hot' and you'll really notice the improvement that each additional core/processor gives.

I switched to the Mac Pro 8 core this spring, but still have a single core XP laptop. Feels very slow in comparison!

Since you prefer portable, the rumors are that the Macbook Pro will have a new 4 core intel chip this fall...ditto iMac... but who knows... If you get a dual core Macbook Pro now... there will surely be a resale market for it when the quad cores arrive...

Karl

[Chazz]

Karl wrote:
Since you prefer portable, the rumors are that the Macbook Pro will have a new 4 core intel chip this fall...ditto iMac... but who knows... If you get a dual core Macbook Pro now... there will surely be a resale market for it when the quad cores arrive...

See, this is want I want to hear. Thanks Karl (I'm a follower of mac rumors but had not heard this one). The truth is I'd buy a MBP with a 1 hour battery life if it had a multicore brain. I never work without the thing plugged in.

My files are typically huge so speed is really an issue, hence the octi-core lust. But no one at my company uses a desktop. We are all mobile, all the time and the peer pressure is considerable.

[Dwight]

Chazz wrote:
the peer pressure is considerable.

Get the speed: Be the rock they all flit around.

[Thomas Holm]

Chazz,

i've been testing AC12 on my late 2006 15" MBP all the time. It feels much faster than AC11, but my projects are typically small. I feel more pain in ArtlantisRender, where 4x more cores would be really useful.

I guess with large files, you'll want the speed more. If you're prepared to wait, Intel's upcoming Nehalem will give you 8 or more cores in a laptop. But that's next year, or more