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by lern_too_spel 2026 days ago
Which is why I provided a link to show it. Whenever I see IntelliJ IDEs on Macs, they seem so sluggish, and the benchmarks in that link show that Java2D is several times slower on MacOS on the same hardware.

iOS is even worse, taking vastly superior hardware and still managing to perform worse on standard productivity tasks.

1 comments

The post doesn’t substantiate the claim: “The software adds a 30% performance penalty on top”. It shows performance on an extremely narrow test which clearly doesn’t represent general performance.

As to your claim about iOS. There is literally nothing to substantiate it.

You are simply lying and hoping nobody checks.

> The post doesn’t substantiate the claim: “The software adds a 30% performance penalty on top”.

From the link I posted: "Ubuntu 19.10 meanwhile had a 29.5% advantage over Apple macOS..."

Ubuntu 20.04 is faster still on that set of benchmarks, and ClearLinux has a 10% performance increase on top of that.

>It shows performance on an extremely narrow test.

No, it includes a very broad range of tests. I just highlighted one of them, on which MacOS performs particularly poorly and which affects software a lot of us use.

> As to your claims about iOS. There is literally nothing to substantiate it.

I gave you three links to substantiate it. It also matches my own experience.

Those results rely on Java and OpenGL.

These technologies are long deprecated on Apple platforms.

It’s completely unrepresentative. But sure, if you rely primarily on Java or OpenGL for your workloads, I agree that a Mac isn’t the right choice for you.

It’s a lie to say “The software adds a 30% performance penalty on top” based on these results. It doesn’t.

If you have something credible to link to about iOS performance being slower, I’m interested, but I’m not going waste time watching YouTube videos that nobody else is going to bother with.

If it’s that bad, you’ll be able to find some credible analysis in writing. I’m guessing you can’t.

> These technologies are long deprecated on Apple platforms.

This doesn't matter to the user, who is still using apps like IntelliJ IDEs. To the end user, this is a problem with MacOS, which does not allow GPU vendors to update their OpenGL drivers. Meanwhile, Ubuntu has far superior OpenGL performance and superior Vulkan performance on the same hardware.

> It’s a lie to say “The software adds a 30% performance penalty on top” based on these results.

You keep saying that, but you haven't explained why. MacOS is also twice as slow on git operations according to the benchmarks. Java2D and git are software that people use that are multiple times slower (not merely 30%) on the same hardware.

> I’m not going to watch YouTube videos.

Then I'll post text summarizing them. Android on midtier previous generation phones launches apps to interactivity faster than iOS running on latest generation hardware, and this has been the case for about ten years now. There are hundreds of videos on YouTube substantiating that.

Edit to respond to below comment due to rate limiting:

> YouTube videos, however many, are not a credible source of operating system performance claims. You can find YouTube videos supporting flat earth theories or that Obama is a lizard alien.

The YouTube videos doen't say that Android is faster. They show that Android is faster. You seem to not understand the difference between people claiming things are true and people showing things are true.

It's the same with the 30%. I showed a suite of benchmarks where MacOS is 30% slower on average. It was many times slower on a few specific benchmarks I called out.

> If you are a heavy Java or OpenGL user, don’t by a Mac.

I'm glad we can agree on that. You forgot heavy git users.

Edit 2:

> It creates a dishonest impression of the thread.

How does replying with edits create a dishonest impression of the thread when I very clearly indicate which comment I am replying to? If you would like to respond normally, there is a very easy way to enable that. Simply upvote my comments to disable the rate limiting.

If you are a heavy Java or OpenGL user, don’t buy a Mac.

If you are running a git server farm, don’t use macs. If you are a developer using Git, you’ll be just fine.

These just aren’t representative of most people’s experience.

It’s a lie to say the software is 30% slower.

It’s even a lie to say it’s 30% slower for an IntelliJ user.

It’s only 30% slower on a narrow benchmark.

YouTube videos, however many, are not a credible source of operating system performance claims. You can find YouTube videos supporting flat earth theories or that Obama is a lizard alien.

If you can’t find any article anywhere substantiating your claim, I think we can conclude that it’s not supported by evidence.

If it was that bad, a reputable site like ars, or anandtech would have shown it.

> It’s a lie to say the software is 30% slower.

I gave you a source. The sluggishness is something I notice when I use MacOS.

> If it was that bad, a reputable site like ars, or anandtech would have shown it.

It is that bad. Hundreds of YouTubers have shown it, and you can do it yourself to confirm. I have friends who have iPhones. The launch times are noticeably slower.

I'll even give you my speculation for why this is the case in order of impact:

1. Android's zygote based process initialization.

2. Developers optimizing for the $50 Android phones in the long tail.

3. GC instead of ARC.

Please stop replying with edits.

It creates a dishonest impression of the thread.