This is a bit misleading -- the performance difference between 1.6.1 and 1.7 ranges from 2x to >1000x depending on the circumstances (size of documents, durability, whether the client waits on network reply, etc.) This also doesn't account for 10-100x performance improvements on the batch insert algorithm made prior to 1.7.
I suspect that RethinkDB 1.7 would be comparable to Mongo on insert performance workload described in this stack overflow thread.
It was not deliberately misleading - it's simply the top result when doing a google search on rethinkdb and mongo performance. It's a shame that decent, general case database benchmarks are so hard to find.
Sorry, I meant to say that the benchmark in the release announcement is misleading (since it doesn't address all relevant issues), not the link in your comment.
We're working on getting authoritative benchmarks out, but unfortunately good benchmarks are extremely time consuming (much like any science experiment).
I suspect that RethinkDB 1.7 would be comparable to Mongo on insert performance workload described in this stack overflow thread.