M1 MacBook Pro energy consumption versus desktop Macs

March 19th, 2021 by rob-ART morgan, mad scientist

How much energy is consumed by the M1 MacBook Pro compared to desktop Macs?

GRAPH LEGEND

2010 Mac Pro = 12-core CPU, RX 5700 XT GPU
2013 Mac Pro = 8-core CPU, FirePro Dual D700 GPUs
2017 iMac Pro = 8-core CPU, Pro Vega 64 GPU
2019 Mac Pro = 12-core CPU, Pro Vega II Duo GPU
2020 M1 rMBP = 13-inch MacBook Pro, 8-Core CPU, 8-Core GPU

We used the ENERGY tab in Activity Monitor. All the Macs ran macOS Big Sur except the 2010 Mac which ran macOS Catalina.

DaVinci Resolve 17 - Temporal Playback
Playback 8K RED project using Temporal Noise Reduction. (LOWER energy = BETTER)

DaVinci Resolve 17 - Deliver
Deliver 8K RED project to ProRes 4444 XQ. (LOWER energy = BETTER)

DaVinci Resolve 17 - Triple Noise Reduction
Playback the Candle 1080p project using Triple Noise Reduction (3NR). (LOWER energy = BETTER)

Warhammer II - Benchmark
Ran Skaven benchmark at 1920x1080 High. (LOWER energy = BETTER)

WHAT DID WE LEARN?

Using the ENERGY tab in Activity Monitor, we recorded the highest score while running each test. As expected, the M1 MacBook Pro used less energy than the Mac Pros in all four tests.

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OTHER GOOD SOURCES
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copyright 2021 Rob Art Morgan
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