The M5 MacBook Pro excels in performance tests, demonstrating significant gains over previous generations, especially in single-core and multi-threaded CPU tasks, GPU rendering, and AI workloads, while maintaining impressive battery life despite criticisms regarding its identical exterior design, lack of Wi-Fi 7, and expensive storage upgrades.
M5 MacBook Pro Introduction and Initial Impressions #
- Apple released the new MacBook Pro with the M5 processor without a major event.
- The M5 chip is touted to have the fastest single performance core on any processor.
- The overall design and weight of the new MacBook Pro are identical to the previous generation.
Unboxing Experience #
- Includes a sleeve and a 2-meter USB-C to MagSafe cable.
- Comes with a 70W charging brick by default; a 96W charger is an optional $20 upgrade.
- No Apple stickers included, unlike previous products.
External Features and Design (Identical to Previous Gen) #
- Ports: MagSafe, dual Thunderbolt 4, 3.5mm audio jack, SD card reader, additional Thunderbolt 4 (Type-C), HDMI port.
- Physical components: Keyboard, speakers, and webcam are the same as the M4 generation.
- Display: 14.2-inch ProMotion high refresh rate XDR display with 1600 nits peak HDR brightness, 1000 nits sustained full-screen, and 1000 nits SDR brightness.
- Webcam: Appears to be the same 12-megapixel camera.
- Speakers: Sound similar, with a slight perceived improvement, potentially due to being new.
- Minor Physical Changes: The mute button label and function key design are slightly different.
Wi-Fi Connectivity #
- Still uses Wi-Fi 6E, achieving over a gigabit per second both ways.
- Criticized for not including Wi-Fi 7, which is becoming standard on high-end devices, including new iPhones.
M5 Chip Performance Claims and Specifications #
- The M5 chip, despite having the same number of performance and efficiency cores as the M4 (four performance, six efficiency), and the same 10 GPU cores, promises significant improvements.
- Claims up to 15% faster multi-threaded performance.
- Claims up to 30% better baseline GPU performance (no ray tracing/AI).
- Claims up to 45% better performance in ray-traced applications.
- Claims "multiple times faster" AI performance due to dedicated hardware.
Base Model Configuration and Storage Options #
- Reviewer tested the absolute base model.
- The max SSD option increased to 4TB (from 2TB), but Apple's storage upgrade pricing is very high ($1200 for 3.5TB more storage).
UGREEN DH2300 NAS (Sponsored Segment) #
- An affordable alternative for storage compared to Apple's expensive upgrades.
- Supports up to 60TB raw storage with two hard drives.
- Offers personal cloud functionality without monthly subscriptions.
- Easy setup process, including NFC tapping for mobile configuration.
- Can back up iPhones, Android phones, and M5 MacBooks with Apple Time Machine.
- Features a permission system for family sharing.
- Achieves wired transfer speeds up to 125 MB/s.
- Supports remote connection and management.
- Can back up to another UGREEN NAS or cloud automatically.
- 20% discount available (code DH2300OFF).
- Has an 8-core processor, capable of running a Plex server.
Performance Benchmarking (M5 vs. M4/M4 Max) #
- Cinebench 2024 (Single-threaded): M5 scored 200 points, nearly double an M1, and significantly higher than high-end Intel/AMD desktop CPUs.
- M5 shows a nearly 16% increase over M4 (173 points to 200 points).
- Cinebench 2024 (Multi-threaded): M5 showed almost a 17% increase (from approximately 1000 to 1200 points) over M4.
- Blender (Monster Render - CPU): Good uplift, though not quite 15%.
- Blender (Monster Render - GPU): Over a 35% performance increase.
- Puget Bench (Photoshop): Approximately 10% faster.
- Puget Bench (Adobe Premiere Pro): Over a 30% increase.
- DaVinci Resolve: 25% generation-over-generation increase.
- Gaming (Shadow of the Tomb Raider): Nearly 90% performance uplift from base M4 to base M5.
- Gaming (Cyberpunk): 42% uplift.
- 3DMark Solar Bay Extreme (Ray-traced synthetic): Over 50% faster.
- Passmark Performance Test (Single-threaded CPU): M5 scored 6000, significantly higher than top Intel/AMD consumer chips (e.g., 14900K at 4700, 285K at 5100).
Power Efficiency and Battery Life #
- M5 draws slightly more power than M4 in single-core tests (2.2 Wh vs. 2.165 Wh) but completes tasks faster, complicating direct efficiency comparison.
- Apple rates both M4 and M5 for the same 24 hours of battery life.
- Endurance test (lower brightness, video optimization, 1080p Plex streaming) showed identical battery life for both M4 and M5, around 17 hours.
- Battery life under stressful situations needs further testing.
AI Performance #
- Tested with the 8 billion parameter Quen 3 VL model in LM Studio (4-bit mode, 16GB RAM).
- M5 achieved 27 tokens/second output, compared to M4's 21 tokens/second.
- Represents around a 25% speed increase for LLM workloads.
Conclusion and Overall Assessment #
- The M5 processor is monumentally fast, fulfilling Apple's claims of being the fastest performance core in many applications.
- Anticipates M5 Pro and M5 Max versions, and M5 in a Mac Mini.
- Maintains excellent power efficiency and industry-leading battery life.
- Considered the "best laptop of the year" due to its performance, efficiency, and battery life.
- Challenges Windows laptops, suggesting Parallels for Windows-specific software like SolidWorks.
- Criticisms remain around expensive RAM and storage upgrades.
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