Austin Mann is a photographer who regularly puts Apple gear through its paces, often in remote and beautiful locales.
Austin got his hands on one of the brand new, 2.9 GHz, 32GB, 4TB MacBook Pros. From his review:
I’m deep in the mountains and wasn’t able to run many side-by-side speed tests, but I did manage to set up one test and the results were surprising.
The test was simple: convert a 4K Mavic Pro video file to 1080p H.265 (HEVC) using QuickTime Player (File > Export As > 1080p > Check “Use HEVC”).
I have three different MacBook Pros, all on macOS 10.13.6, all running QuickTime 10.4, all with the original file on the internal drive and exporting to the internal drive. Here are the results:
- My daily MBP until I discovered these results: 2.3 GHz i7 MacBook Pro (15″, Late 2013, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD) = 1980 seconds (33 minutes)
- Top-of-line 2016 MBP: 2.9 GHz i7 MacBook Pro (15″, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD) = 99 seconds
- This top-of-line 2018 MBP: 2.9 GHz i9 MacBook Pro (15″, 32 GB RAM, 4 TB SSD) = 24 seconds
Those are some impressive results. Obviously, you’ll have to pay for the privilege, but if you are considering a purchase, this is a nice data point.
There’s lots more in Austin’s review. Take a look.
Blimey. There must be more money in landscape photography than I previously thought. Good luck to him.
He certainly makes a compelling case in regard to the performance of the new system. But then, if I’d spent over £6k on a laptop, I’d expect it.
The opening video is nice although the bird sounds ought to fade as the drone clears the treetops…
As for the machine, I guess if one needs a portable studio its worth spending more on a MacBook Pro than an iMac Pro and miniaturization has always come at a cost.
I don’t think he bought it, I think it was given to him for the purposes of creating this review. That said, he also teaches photography through a paid course, so who knows what is income level really is.