
Testing the 12-inch MacBook's Performance with Windows 10 - ingve
http://www.alexvking.com/12_inch_macbook_and_windows_10.html
======
kasabali
> Here's the real kicker: it's fast. It's smooth. It renders at 60FPS unless
> you have a lot going on. It's unequivocally better than performance on OS X,
> further leading me to believe that Apple really needs to overhaul how
> animations are done. Even when I turn Transparency off in OS X, Mission
> Control isn't completely smooth. Here, even after some Aero Glass
> transparency has been added in, everything is smooth. It's remarkable, and
> it makes me believe in the 12-inch MacBook more than ever before.

So much this. I really admire how performance of Windows desktop is optimized.
I can't compare it with OS X, but when compared to modern Linux DE's (Plasma,
Gnome Shell, Cinnamon etc.), Windows desktop still has all the same modern
bells and whistles (hw acceleration, effects etc.) yet it blows them out of
water when it cames to both smoothness and resource consumption.

I say I admire the effort on optimization, because things weren't that good
even on Windows 7. I remember constantly having slight stuttering here and
there on Windows 7 but Windows 8+ is completely smooth on the very same
machine (which is now getting close to its 6th year), and this anectode shows
that they must have taken the optimization seriously.

P.S: I'm not complaining on Linux DE's, they just have different priorities,
and they're good deals considering their price.

~~~
Aleman360
And guess what... We're using the same tools available to third party app
developers, in an effort to ensure the dev platform is rock solid. The Start
menu is just a universal XAML app. We don't have to do any special
optimization on top of what the framework offers.

Disclaimer: Microsoft employee working on the Windows 10 Start menu.

~~~
AnkhMorporkian
You guys have knocked it out of the park with the start menu. It's wonderful.
Besides occasionally having to kill explorer because it becomes non-responsive
it's been an absolute pleasure to use. I really like that you guys have
downgraded the size a bit since earlier builds; really sleek and useful now.

~~~
robotresearcher
> Besides occasionally having to kill explorer because it becomes non-
> responsive it's been an absolute pleasure to use.

Sigh.

~~~
sathyabhat
You're talking about pre-release software.

~~~
farawayea
Cool story. Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 have similar problems. Windows 7 becomes
slow with huge uptime. Windows 8.1 has countless bugs.

------
edandersen
Macs really are some of the best Windows laptops you can buy - and now with
full UEFI support Windows boots as fast as OS X.

~~~
FreakyT
Completely disagree -- the Apple trackpad drivers on windows are awful, and on
a laptop, most of your time will probably be spent using a trackpad.
Trackpad++, which the author of the article mentions, can help, but it's a
horrible program for the following reasons:

1\. The developer requires that you put windows into "test mode" (creating a
non-removable desktop watermark) to install it at all, apparently to get
around code signing restrictions

2\. The developer requires that you install the _completely useless_ "Power
Plan Assistant" program in addition to Trackpad++

3\. The software itself is terribly buggy, causing random 100% CPU usage
spikes

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Apple's windows trackpad drivers are indeed not that great, but I haven't seen
a windows laptop yet that can provide a better trackpad experience in spite of
the bad drivers.

~~~
izacus
Oh pretty much all of them have better trackpad experience than Apple drivers
on Windows provide. Under OS X the trackpad is stellar, but on Windows the
drivers are just awful.

~~~
FreakyT
You're completely correct, and it's unfortunate that you're being downvoted.
I'm guessing this is due to idiots who have never used Windows on a Mac laptop
and think they know more than they do.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
As a universal, parent's claim is patently false. I have an Lenovo X1 Carbon
that is a testament to how crappy a trackpad can get. I have had a few PC
laptops in the last 5 years (HP, Lenovo) but have never found one with an
adequate trackpad. So, if could you please tell me which laptop I should try?
This is quite easy to test.

I've heard good things about the new XPS trackpad, but haven't been able to
try one in the wild yet.

~~~
FreakyT
Your issue is that you're misunderstanding the parent comment's claim. Izacus
didn't claim that Windows laptop trackpads weren't bad -- the only claim made
was that Apple trackpad drivers were _worse_. I've used a few friends' windows
laptops, and while their trackpads certainly weren't _good_ or perhaps even
_adequate_ (to borrow your term), they were without a doubt better than the
Apple-laptop-running-windows combination, which I would classify as far below
"adequate".

~~~
seanmcdirmid
I have an X1 to test side by side with an rMBP running windows, and the X1 is
categorically worse. Heck, I've tried many PC laptops (we have access to many
at work) and haven't found anything that was as usable as an rMBP.

So, just name one laptop whose trackpad is better than an rMBP, I'll go try it
side by side.

------
marvel_boy
"Until thorough benchmarking is completed by me or someone else, I think the
best way to put it is this: Task View often runs at 60FPS, while Mission
Control never runs at 60FPS"

So, it seems that in this case a beta version of Windows works best than MacOS

~~~
danieltillett
Based on how buggy Yosemite is this should really be rephrased as a beta
version of Windows runs better than a beta version of MacOS.

~~~
coldtea
How buggy was it, really? I've heard several painful stories, but nothing
concrete, except some changes Apple made to the DNS infrastructure.

The same kind of stories I've heard for every release since 10.4, about how
the new one is so buggy, etc. Then, the next release comes and people wax
nostalgically about how stable the previous one was.

~~~
dman
Yosemite was bad enough that I do not accept Apple updates until a few months
have passed and I know what the fallout will be based on complaints on
websites. List of broken things

a) Battery life on my macbook pro plummeted after the upgrade.

b) I get visual artifacts (black lines on screen and some flashing) when OSX
auto switches between the intel gpu and the nvidia gpu.

c) Cannot get nfs transfers to work with acceptable speeds (they seem to top
out at 2 MBPs)

d) Broke drag and drop in Qt because of some changes to the string supplied to
the drop event.

e) Bottom of my macbook pro gets unacceptably warm. I dont recall it being
this bad before the update.

~~~
coldtea
a) same battery life as ever on mine. Even better actually.

b) Seen some occasional flashes. Not sure why it happens, but I think it's
related to the color temperature mananging "Flux" app (they seem to stop when
I don't use it).

c) Sure not some network problem? I've had succesful NFS transfers, but
usually small files, so never bothered to check.

d) Shouldn't Qt fix it? If it didn't broke drag and drop in native apps, then
Qt emulated it based on some assumptions that weren't guaranteed.

e) Never had this happen, even when using Compressor on all cores. Top left
might get a little warm at those times.

------
nogridbag
I was on a Youtube binge last night watching Windows 10 videos. It looks
really impressive. Automatically switching between tablet and desktop mode
when you dock appears to actually work - perhaps it is possible to make a UI
that works for both use cases!

The Cortana feature is slick and I'm tempted to cancel my Amazon Echo order
and get a Surface (which has a free Windows 10 upgrade).

I was never a fan of the OSX Dock. When switching between apps, I always
misclick and startup a new program accidentally. I prefer the traditional
windows dock. Two features I would surely miss if I switch back to Windows
would be in-app window switching (cmd ~) and the placement of of the cmd key
on the Mac keyboard versus the awkward stretching of my pinky finger to reach
the control key on Windows.

~~~
pmelendez
> "possible to make a UI that works for both use cases!"

That was what Windows 8/8.1 tried to do, but apparently people didn't like at
all ( never understood that, to me is a fine OS)

~~~
nkozyra
People didn't like it because it wasn't adaptive to the present use. The
tablet and desktop views were the same regardless, which made for some poor
UX. Square peg, round hole.

~~~
pmelendez
> People didn't like it because it wasn't adaptive to the present use. The
> tablet and desktop views were the same regardless, which made for some poor
> UX. Square peg, round hole.

I think the whole thing is very subjective. I have a way better UX with
Windows 8/8.1 that I had with Win7 and with OSX.

The change resistance effect should not be dismissed too, people tend to be
scared when a change is dramatic.

------
Tinyyy
I think the title should be renamed: Testing Windows 10’s performance with the
12-inch MacBook.

------
anonymfus
>Little design touches have really improved the way things look, such as the
switch to circular account pictures on the login screen

This is the thing I and many other Windows users hate with passion, see rants
like this:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/windowsphone/comments/35zsgk/excuse...](https://www.reddit.com/r/windowsphone/comments/35zsgk/excuse_me_sir_do_you_have_a_moment_to_talk_about/)

[https://windowsphone.uservoice.com/forums/101801-feature-
sug...](https://windowsphone.uservoice.com/forums/101801-feature-
suggestions/suggestions/7001141-keep-square-avatar-in-windows-10-rather-than-
round)

[https://windows.uservoice.com/forums/265757-windows-
feature-...](https://windows.uservoice.com/forums/265757-windows-feature-
suggestions/suggestions/7186294-reconsider-round-login-picture)

[https://windows.uservoice.com/forums/265757-windows-
feature-...](https://windows.uservoice.com/forums/265757-windows-feature-
suggestions/suggestions/7009306-remove-rounded-ui-elements-in-new-
windows-10-9926)

~~~
Artemis2
It's actually a UX improvement: a lead designer at Microsoft talked about how
"people aren't squares" in a recent blog post [1]. I'm not sure it looks that
great, but once you know the logic behind it it's a lot more interesting.

[1]:
[http://blogs.windows.com/bloggingwindows/2015/04/29/windows-...](http://blogs.windows.com/bloggingwindows/2015/04/29/windows-10-design-
getting-the-balance-right/)

~~~
whoopdedo
My rebuttal is that an account ID picture is not necessarily a portrait
photograph. Oh, sure, social data miners like Facebook want you to only use a
photo of yourself for a profile picture. But many people -- such as on Twitter
-- don't.

Profile pictures I've used are a photo of my computer, a still from a movie,
an animated GIF of a flying pig (alas no one I know of supports animated
profile pictures), and yes even a photo of myself every once in a while.

That said, complaining about the shape of the profile picture is pure
bikeshedding. Big deal. How much time on your computer do you spend staring at
your own picture? (Please don't answer that.) Although if given the choice I'd
prefer rectangular. My computer screen is a rectangle. The area reserved to
display the picture is a rectangle. Does a click in the invisible rectangle
register as part of the picture? And most of all, it's easier to crop a photo
to appear circular when displayed in a rectangle than it is to show a
rectangle inside a circle. So the "safe" default should be a rectangle.

------
gcb0
it's a crippled device for windows.

windows 8 with touch enabled devices is another level. even if you only ever
use touch so little. with touch and pen it's another level yet.

I've used Linux laptop with touch screen hacked in since 2006. had tons of
tweaks. and win 8 still bowed me away. it is even integrated with a remote
desktop (RDP) client on ios and android. when i connect to my HTPC in the
living room (only place i have a reason to have windows installed) the touch
input from the tablet just shine. i can use the remote device as if i was
holding a surface 3 or something. there's no hacks and extra menus on the
client to do anything. just touch solves all the needs you have to use the box

------
roma1n
While we're talking about windows, any advice on how to make it developer
friendly outside of .net? (Say for people whose main tools are bash, vi and a
compiler)

~~~
jszymborski
Step one: Install Cmdr
[http://gooseberrycreative.com/cmder/](http://gooseberrycreative.com/cmder/)

Step two: If on !Win10, use the chocolatey nu-get package manager
([https://chocolatey.org/](https://chocolatey.org/)), but if on Win10, I
_think_ the native package manager will be a drop-in, tho I'm not sure.

That is literally _all_ you have to do to get 90% of what I do on a linux
terminal into a windows console.

~~~
RomanPushkin
Be careful with Chocolatey, it will install the software without unchecking
those nastly tools: search bars, etc. To be honest, it makes Chocolatey
absolutely unuseful.

~~~
jsalit
Source for this? I use Chocolatey on Win7 and haven't had anything unwanted
installed. No Ask Toolbar (from multiple JRE and JDK installs), etc.

------
xyby
How about Linux on the new MacBook? It's a nice machine and my old lenovo
looks a bit "unhipsterish" when I work in a cafe. Also it's heavier. But I
live in Linux, so I would have to be sure it works.

~~~
scholia
You could look at a Yoga 3 with a Core-M processor: similar to the new MacBook
but with more ports, touch screen, tablet functinality and less than half the
price [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lenovo-Yoga-11-6-Inch-Notebook-
Silve...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lenovo-Yoga-11-6-Inch-Notebook-
Silver/dp/B00TGZX0MA/)

There is a performance hit because it has a an M-5Y10 instead of an M-5Y71.

Depends how much you want to pay to look "hipsterish". I would pay more to
look non-hipsterish ;-)

~~~
Narishma
Depending on the cooling system of the laptop and what kinds of applications
you use, a 5Y71 can be slower than a 5Y10.

More details: [http://www.anandtech.com/show/9117/analyzing-intel-core-m-
pe...](http://www.anandtech.com/show/9117/analyzing-intel-core-m-performance)

------
plg
Has anyone tested linux on the 12-inch macbook yet? How straightforward is it
(or isn't it) to install?

~~~
noondip
I haven't been successful. The latest Debian and Ubuntu images don't have a
recent enough kernel to support the trackpad, keyboard or even NVMe SSD, it
seems.

------
neovive
Windows 8.1 runs quite smoothly on my 2 year old Mac Mini via Bootcamp.
However, I do have problems runs Steam games from Windows due to the lack of a
dedicated DirectX video card. I use the setup mostly for testing and for
playing Project Spark. Does anyone know if the dedicated video card on the
latest Macbook Pro supports DirectX games?

Also, I think he meant to say "Cmd+Shift+4" as the OS X screenshot shortcut or
"Cmd+Shift+Ctrl+4" to copy screenshot to the clipboard.

~~~
Alex_V_King
It's a little thing, but Cmd+Shift+3 is actually the shortcut to send a
screenshot of the entire screen to the desktop. Cmd+Shift+4 is great for
selecting a region.

------
frenchie14
> Without a PrintScreen key, I had to download some software to let me take a
> timed screenshot. One thing I miss from OS X is the Cmd+Shift+3 shortcut.

I believe the shortcut you're looking for is Cmd+Shift+S. Courtesy of OneNote,
it's the equivalent of Cmd+Shift+4 on Mac OS.

~~~
rhodysurf
Or you could just press start and open the snipping tool

------
RomanPushkin
Im running Windows on MacBook for 4+ years. I have Bootcamp installed, and I
switch between OS X and Windows 8.

I use Windows for .Net development only. When it comes to programming Ruby, or
just to surfing the web, I prefer Mac OS X. The UI/UX for Windows really sucks
comparing to OS X. No gestures support, you'll need to use mouse instead of
TrackPad.

You can tune your Windows (use third-party tools like trackpad++, write some
autohotkey scripts), but you won't get this feeling that you're at home.

(FYI: I'm ~4 year Mac user and I've been using Windows/Linux since 1994).

------
junto
I'm now tempted to buy a Macbook Pro so I can install Windows 10!

~~~
Avalaxy
Why not just an Asus Zenbook then? Really good hardware, and comes with
Windows and a keyboard that has a Windows button.

~~~
yoklov
Eh, macs have a Cmd key which is basically the same thing. The real question
is whether or not it has a physical right mouse button. Right-click+drag is
basically impossible (without a separate mouse) on apple hardware, which is
sort of its biggest drawback in my eyes.

~~~
jszymborski
it does have a physical right. Happy owner of an Asus Zenbook for 3 years now

------
driverdan
I find it funny that Windows 10 runs well on a MacBook yet it's terrible on my
gaming desktop. Color profiles refuse to work, there's no way to prevent auto
updates, auto updates completely reinstall the whole OS which can take 30+ min
and reboots the computer without asking, video drivers break on every update,
games are far less stable than with 8.1. To top all that off it seems to be
stuck in some kind of update loop where it reinstalls the OS every night.

~~~
dangrossman
You signed up for that. It's a beta. It warns you about the forced auto-
updates on the page to download the ISO.

------
ChuckMcM
Interesting read. And one takeaway is that someone is missing out on a huge
opportunity with the trackpad driver :-) But the really interesting thing is
the software vs hardware design challenge at Apple. From a revenue standpoint
MacOS is really a small business at Apple, but its Microsoft's "iPhone" (aka
one of their main revenue drivers), so it isn't surprising that Microsoft is
investing more than Apple in that space.

~~~
eropple
_> and one takeaway is that someone is missing out on a huge opportunity with
the trackpad driver_

GDI+ is the culprit here more than any one company's driver. Windows won't
have an as-nice-as-OS-X experience with touchpads until GDI+ is either
overhauled or dead and buried. Which makes me sad, because there are really
nice things going on with Windows right now, but the _feel_ of using it is
janky and weird to me.

------
akhilcacharya
I've been using a '14 Macbook Pro Retina for the last five months - its been a
great machine, but I do notice a bit of lag in some cases.

For the longest time I just attributed it to software - I'm hopeful that the
next version of OSX is able to optimize for HDPI displays.

------
logicallee
how is the gpu - anyone test it with anything that uses it moderately/heavily?
how is it at driving external displays? (How many did you use, and what
resolution)? Is scrolling, hd video, etc smooth?

I ask because out of the specs the gpu seems integrated and quite low-power
(for the resolution it runs at.)

~~~
Alex_V_King
Hi, I typically run my MacBook connected to a 1200p monitor, and it behaves
great. I've run all sorts of video content on the computer, up to 4K, and it
plays it fine. Scrolling is smooth, though occasionally it'll hiccup here or
there. Generally, I'm quite impressed with the performance. My review on the
website goes into some more detail about day to day usage, if you're curious.

~~~
logicallee
thanks! what kind of content/load would it hiccup on?

~~~
Alex_V_King
I've had some bad experiences scrolling through super high-resolution scanned
PDF documents. Those cause beachballing for several seconds in between each
page. However, this seems to be a known issue in Preview, and it happens on
other, more powerful Macs. I haven't tried with a more optimized PDF reader.

Otherwise, if you have a very busy webpage with a lot going on, (and ads
going), scrolling might not be entirely smooth.

------
simonebrunozzi
What about the OS license? Did he buy it separately?

~~~
AlexeyBrin
If you have a Windows 7/8/8.1 license it will be free to upgrade to Windows
10. If you don't have any of the above, than yes, you will need to buy a
license.

I suppose the author bought a Windows 8 (the articles claims that he did a
clean Windows 10 install starting from Windows 8) license at some time in the
past, since a Mac doesn't come with a Windows license.

------
listic
Is there any information on the international availability of the new MacBook?
It's been over a month since the US release, and Apple continues to ignore the
existence of other countries.

------
stilleto
Obviously the guys at microsoft with a lot more experience in software
development will create a superior product. This shouldn't be a surprise as OS
X is merely a mod of components derived from linux.

~~~
nbevans
Why is this down voted to oblivion? It is the hard truth, albeit he meant to
say Unix not Linux. OSX is merely an "okay" OS. The points in the article
about Mission Control being slow and laggy are completely true in my
experience (2014 MBPr 16GB 512GB). Windows is architecturally a better OS than
OSX.

~~~
acdha
It's just trolling. Describing OS X as a Unix derivative is roughly as
accurate as describing Windows 10 as DOS-based.

If he wanted to have a nuanced conversation about OS architecture, he could
talk about something specific rather than huge generalizations with terms
which make it clear he doesn't know enough of the details to be qualified to
make such broad statements.

Similarly, talking about one benchmark on one device for a feature which many
people don't even use is not a good foundation for comparing the merits of
entire operating systems. That's like saying you should buy a particular car
because it has awesome door handles, as if there are no other possible factors
which you need to consider.

~~~
geographomics
But OS X literally is a Unix derivative. Its precursor NeXTSTEP was built on
top of the Mach kernel and BSD.

In comparison, Windows 10 has its roots in the Windows NT lineage (starting
with NT 3.1, and including Windows XP), which is separate from the DOS-derived
Windows line that ended with Windows ME.

(That said, I agree that he was just trolling.)

~~~
acdha
I don't disagree that it's a Unix – Apple even got it certified in years past
– but it's not that simple:

Mach is not a Unix kernel and the Mach interfaces percolate up to the higher
levels for many tasks which aren't covered by the POSIX layers.

The bigger difference, though, is higher up. While you certainly can compile
POSIX code on OS X, most of the applications which people run use Cocoa and
that owes far more to the NextStep side of its lineage than the Unix bits.

The better comparison might have been Win32 rather than DOS, where most of the
interfaces were designed by the Win95 developers even though they were also
implemented on top of the NT kernel. I've often wondered how much better
things would have been in the late 90s/early 200s if David Cutler's team had
been able to get the Win95 team to follow their generally much better
instincts rather than the other way around. If nothing else, they wouldn't
have needed to spend a decade duct-taping security onto a single-user design.

~~~
nbevans
This post backs up the statement you hated so much though. That OSX is just a
mod of various components plus an old era Unix kernel at the core. You
literally validated the point.

OSX is a strange OS to use. It looks and feels good at first glance but when
you have used it for a year, one really longs to return to a pure Windows
environment. OSX has weird bugs like the beachball cursor which is something
that simply shouldn't happen in a modern OS. The last Windows to have a global
lock like that was 9x.

~~~
acdha
> That OSX is just a mod of various components plus an old era Unix kernel at
> the core. You literally validated the point.

Mach is not an “old era Unix kernel” and OS X is not exactly a vanilla Mach:

[http://osxbook.com/book/bonus/ancient/whatismacosx/arch_xnu....](http://osxbook.com/book/bonus/ancient/whatismacosx/arch_xnu.html)

It has a BSD subsystem but plenty of other different things, like a completely
custom device driver model (IOKit).

Secondly, you just called everything above the level of the kernel a mod, when
that's where most of the code and almost all of the significant differences
live. Is Android also “just a mod” on top of Linux?

> OSX has weird bugs like the beachball cursor which is something that simply
> shouldn't happen in a modern OS. The last Windows to have a global lock like
> that was 9x.

Windows 10 and most X window managers have the same thing for the same reason:
you see the busy cursor when an application stops responding to events within
some defined timeout. It's not due to the Win95/Mac OS Classic-like “global
lock” you're thinking about but rather access to an unresponsive shared
resource. I most commonly see it due to either doing blocking network I/O in
the main thread (e.g. Outlook) or making the mistake of assuming that the
filesystem won't block which affects just about every app with a network home
directory or flaky drive, but it's also common with things like web browsers
using a large cache directory where the startup blocks for awhile while the
file system churns through millions of files.

~~~
nbevans
The beachball on OSX frequently causes the whole UI shell to freeze solid.
This literally never happens on Windows. Also all IO on Windows is
asynchronous. It doesn't support synchronous IO.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
> The beachball on OSX frequently causes the whole UI shell to freeze solid.

The beachball is a very infrequent occurrence on OS X, and if it does happen,
it usually doesn't freeze the whole shell. If you're seeing it a lot, this is
often an indicator of faulty hardware. That being said...

> This literally never happens on Windows.

Not true, the exact same thing can and does happen on Windows, with similar
rarity.

> Also all IO on Windows is asynchronous. It doesn't support synchronous IO.

I'm not super-familiar with Windows IO, but at the very least it has blocking,
synchronous C stdlib file I/O, and blocking, synchronous WinSock network I/O.
Also, anything asynchronous can be trivially be made synchronous, whether it
is a good idea or not.

~~~
nbevans
Sigh. You can't blame hardware when it's an as-new MBPr. Every Mac lover seems
to blame it on something else when it is just a crappy OS that is the root
cause.

On Windows it is extremely rare - maybe once a year, but you'd have to be a
power user for sure. On Mac, it is usually a weekly occurrence. Hell, I had it
happen last night in fact just by trying to mount a DMG file (a freshly
downloaded TeamViewer DMG if you must know). It decided to go to the beach
instead. After a full reboot it finally let me mount it. It really is a joke
of an OS.

If you're not familiar with Windows IO then why try to cobble together a
response? It is true that the Windows kernel does not support anything but
asynchronous IO. It simply does not support it. Yes, user-mode land implements
synchronous wrappers as a convenience for lazy developers or to aid in porting
software from other lesser platforms.

