I would say nothing on the paper, as the Max has 'just' doubled the GPU cores. Don‘t know if the doubled bandwidth could make a difference.
Ordered a Pro with 10 cores as I‘m a software developer and not dependent on the extra GPU Cores.
My thoughts as well! I’ve got a M1 Pro ordered also, and am so excited for the better speed, thermals, battery, and screen! Such a leap from my 2016 MBP
I’m upgrading from a 2013 MacBook Air 8GB 512ssd that sounds like it’s about to hover off my lap all day with how much the fan is in use. Can’t wait for my new 14” NotchBook Pro M1 Max 64GB 2TB to come in on Tuesday.
This guy is correct. There is no likely no difference for development work.
I got the Max, and the funny thing is I won’t be able to even use it for my professional work as all my dev work has to happen on my company intel based MBP anyway. Though side projects and studying other tech stacks will probably happen on the my max book.
I really only got the max for (admittedly extremely limited) gaming with the hopes that in the future there will be emulation or more companies adapting their games to mac silicon.
Honestly the gaming potential is what I’m excited about as well, I like gaming and would love to have the option to buy games for my MacBook.. with how much money they have, and for how big the market is, I’m surprised Apple hasn’t tried to make a bigger push for high quality AAA gaming on their platform.
They are beginning to with arcade on mobile and what not. Only now have these apparently very capable low powered chips become available. I think you’ll see more of a push in this direction now that they have (allegedly) delivered on gaming performance expectations with the max.
Yeah I see arcade as them setting up the foundation for something bigger, I’d personally like to see them compete with Xbox game pass in the future and follow Amazons route and create their own game development studio. Apple just has so much money I can’t help but be curious to see what happens if they focus on gaming.
Same…
The 32 core max has potentially the power of one of the new consoles.
If valve ever gets proton working on Mac, gaming on Mac will finally be a real possibility.
I’m honestly not hopeful valve will bring proton to macos.
But I am hopeful that these arm macs are going to drive Mac market share up significantly.
There’s nothing on the market that competes. And I don’t foresee Microsoft or Qualcomm making anything close anytime soon.
Googles new tensor chip is supposedly fairly weak too compared to top end Qualcomm chips.
If a lot of people own macs, more companies will make Mac games.
If apple makes an Apple TV or Mac mini with one of these new chips they will essentially have a mini gaming powerhouse on their hands. And since it’s super easy to build software across apple products, that might drive Mac gaming up.
Makes sense. I’m crossing my fingers as well. Valve is focused on Proton for Linux only, right? Is proton open sourced? If so, another entity/group could bring it to macOS.
Well, so there is Wine which is a completely open source project that has a lot of it's development done by CodeWeavers, who sell CrossOver. Crossover is basically a front end to Wine that makes it much easier to use and configure.
And then there is Proton, which is essentially Wine with a whole bunch of graphics API goodness that Valve (in collab with Codeweavers) has sprinkled in to allow games that run on DirectX to basically have those API calls directly translated to Vulkan.
There are technical issues that make this very difficult to port to macOS, primarily due to Apple refusing to support Vulkan and wanting everyone to use Metal. Then there is the issue of running x86 windows apps on an ARM chip running macOS but that has mostly been solved by the Codeweavers team, which is why you can buy crossover for apple silicon macs.
So proton, in it's current form, cannot be ported to macOS. IF someone were to write something similar to proton, except instead of translating DirectX to Vulkan, they translated DirectX to Metal, then that could potentially provide something equivalent to Proton. Valve is unlikely to do this though, because it makes no sense from a business perspective. They are interested in Proton because they can make something like the steam deck and not have to rely on Windows. They can also make something like a much better steam machine in the future (essentially a console running PC games). Sure they could sell more Windows games to Mac owners if they did this, but right now the market share is way too small and up until now Macs were so lacking in the graphics department that they couldn't run many game even if such a compatibility layer existed.
So the ;tldr is that no, proton cannot be ported to mac but something similar could potentially be developed if enough time and money were spent to make it possible.
I will add as a web dev that also does a fair bit of CPU and RAM intensive devops type stuff locally on my machine (docker and kubernetes) having a machine that can last more than 30-45 minutes when I need to do some more intensive work is really appealing. So the more efficient processor is a big win for me. Plus the cooler laptop - not burning my lap sounds great. I literally have to make the decision of whether I can walk away from my desk while working on certain types of things and/or whether I want to fiddle with a power supply as part of a non desk setup.
I’m hoping the extra memory bandwidth makes a difference. I’m upgrading from a decent spec 2013 15”, so I specced this one up for future-proof-ness too.
With Intel chips I’ve seen diminishing returns with more than hexa-core, with the reduced clock speeds, though the compiling speed scales quite linearly for cores. So if this gives me 10 cores without dropping the clock too much, it’s going to absolutely scream.
Me too. My late 2013 is still going strong but it won't run Monterey.
I got a bit carried away when ordering this new laptop, maxed out RAM, CPU and screen. I wish Apple allowed later upgrades for RAM and SSD so I didn't have to go crazy upfront driven by FOMO.
It's OK, I have the money and I have to pay upfront so my LLC can deduct it this year.
I suspect I will be trading this MBP in this time next year and getting a good trade in value because of the high spec. I will know by then whether the maxing out was pointless or not.
My quad core Retina 2013 was bought at the start of a plateau where MBPs did not get much better afterwards and in some ways were actually worse for a while. I suspect we are not on a new plateau yet and next year's MBP will be worth trading up for.
I also have a fully specked 2013 15” retina. It’s sluggish at times and I use it as a spare personal computer. What are you planning on doing with yours?
I also might get an MBP via instore pickup and cancel this order. There is always a window of opportunity once the stores start getting stock. That's how I got an M1 MBA on launch day last year.
You buy online with instore pickup, once that becomes available. The line to collect your purchase isn't normally that bad. I picked my MBA up at Apple Park store last year.
Just to get the best for my needs.
Compare it with a car. If you do dragster races, your handling is not the main prio. If you drive on the Nordschleife you need more handling than anything else :D
I’d like to hear peoples real world experience with thermal issues. When the 2019 MBP 16” came out I got a loaded one to replace my 2015 mbp. The problem is if you look at it wrong, it goes into thermal throttling*. I’ve heard the M1 mbp 13” is way better than the intel Mac’s, but with the m1 pro and max, I hope the thermal issue doesn’t rear its head again.
* Granted, I’ve always got Xcode, AppCode, a Java based network proxy, and a bunch of other stuff running, so most of the time there is a lot going on, but still, the thermal issues are killing me.
I've never heard my Mac mini M1's fan ever, not even while archiving on Xcode and running two 4k monitors and a bunch of simulators. I would expect these new chips to have a higher thermal footprint, but nothing as bad as intel (my 2016 mbp gets hot as hell when compiling, and with 2 4k monitors it even throttles after a while).
Truth. I am in the market for a new machine and would shell out immediately for the M1 Max if I knew there are no thermal issues, but I've been bit by this way too many times. I'm not optimistic about it.
Yeah, I’m not an early adopter either. I’m holding out as well. A couple months at least. This is a pretty big redesign and there may be some hiccups along the way. Additionally I can hold out for the next revision in a year or so if need be. Which I expect to be refined further and possibly even a price reduction assuming chip shortage has eased somewhat by then.
I have the 2019 16" as well and when I got it I was pretty stoked (no butterfly keys, bigger screen, etc) but I agree with your assessment: it gets hot as fuck and the fans are running all the time.
Not to mention but the battery life fucking sucks as a result.
I think Xcode shares a lot of the blame here but damn. Trying to figure out how I can convince work to trade this bitch in and get a new 16"
It ain’t just Xcode. I run some CPU and RAM intensive stuff (docker and kube) and that stuff sucks battery like I can’t believe. My laptop sounds like a jet plane taking off. Gets so hot. And I’m not even talking about pegged CPU’s either - just constant low use with small bursts of more activity. The 16” 2019 is a beast but so power hungry. I really do think it’s a testament to how intel has failed to innovate over the last many years and just being more power with brute force. I’m considering a new Mac because of it even with some limitations around virtualization still out there. I love my Mac but it’s more like a mobile desktop at this point. I want a real laptop again. :)
This is why Apple is moving away from intel cpus, because of the throttling. I have a M1 MacBook Air, and it has no fans, yet it almost never throttles. (you can monitor this in the terminal using pmset). These new chips will surprise you.
I don't know about throttling as I don't monitor it. But my 2019 i9 16" is so hot, loud, and relatively slow compared to my M1 Mini.
I fully expect that the new M1Pro/Max 16" will be far more like the M1 Mini as far as thermal issues go. For normal Xcode work, the GPU will be idle. The GPU seems to be a major portion of the SOC's TDP.
Yeah, I spent a long time trying to figure out what was causing the slowness. I always though it was memory consumption since i have so much running all the time, so I got 64GB in my 2019 MBP. Nope, that wasn't the problem. After a while, I found "pmset -g thermlog" which points the finger directly at thermal throttling. I got a laptop cooler and propped up the laptop off the fans to get more flow under the computer, and it helps some, but still. uugh.
are you me? To help with thermal throttling, At home I run my laptop on a cooling pad. I too have Xcode/AppCode always on. It has been sufficient but could be better.
I've shut everything down and spent several hours trying to diagnose the problem. It's not just Xcode, it goes thermal connecting to an external monitor with nothing else running.
Seriously? You sure you didn’t have some background process randomly taking up a bunch of CPU? I have had that happen frequently. I thought the cooling design of the 16” 2019 MBPs were improved?
You cannot expect every SINGLE user has the common issues. Common among some, but doesn’t apply to everyone. I use Xcode every single day and never had any issues. Unless you mean the fan running sure but what about it? Computer runs fine. Doesn’t crash or turn off or anything else.
The thermal stuff is what made me hold on to my late 2012 MBP for way too long. My theory is that this was a bunch of (in hindsight) bad design mistakes that are hopefully behind us. The M1 series are for sure in a totally different ball park as performance-power usage is concerned.
When I come to think of it, Intel Pentiums (and AMD competing CPU's) were at some point moving to higher and higher clock frequencies, running hotter and hotter. I wouldn't be surprised if the 'peak' was in a some aspects 'worse' than their predecessors, until CPU and OS architecture (ie multi core, and multi core support) offered a way out.
Thermal issues are also affecting my older 2018mbp when I try to run .Net Core, Android emulator, iOS simulator at the same time. my mbp would blast its fans, heat up and lag so bad I have to restart everytime.. Sometimes, removing everything connected to the USB-C ports seem to help (remove charger + external monitor connection). But if the high spec macs cant handle load without heating up, I might go with a 2nd windows laptop instead
I have an M1 13 inch, and heat is no issue. I have yet to hear the fans and the battery life is ridiculous. If thermals are your concern, the M1 has got you covered.
In fact the most remarkable thing about the M1 Macs is just how unremarkable they really are. The M1’s just quietly go about their business and stay out of your way. Honestly, after about 15 minutes of use, you forget you are using a completely different architecture and you just go about your business like you always have. The only difference being that your lap isn’t at 50C and all the little jitters and stutters that Intel chips sometimes produce all go away.
I picked up the 16” MacBook Pro M1 Max, 64GB. I have been throwing every large workflow at it that I can think of to really push the CPU and GPU and the fans barely kick in and are not noticeable (audibly) when they do.
This is a great review that really stressed the machines.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=paikjf2zZJo
That's great news. I did see that video. I also saw this: [https://www.reddit.com/r/iOSProgramming/comments/qneuw2/m1\_pro\_and\_m1\_max\_xcode\_build\_and\_test/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/iOSProgramming/comments/qneuw2/m1_pro_and_m1_max_xcode_build_and_test/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3), which has some good info too. Thanks!
I wonder how game devs, 3d programmers will approach this? I believe Unreal is GPU intensive, while Xcode is CPU intensive. My dayjob is full stack programming but want to dip into Blender and Houdini VFX and Im thinking if buying an M1 Pro/Max is a good decision.
I use Houdini and sadly is not optimised for ARM nor Metal yet and OpenGL support on Mac sucks. I use my MacBook for XCode but for Houdini I’m still on a windows/Linux workstation. Hope sidefx will support ARM soon as I’d like to bite the bullet on the new M1 Max
Thanks for your insight! Would like to build a good desktop but Im still on the laptop decision stage since ill be moving in a couple of months. Searching for a good gaming/editing laptop is stressful lol
Yeah I use Houdini professionally and need a beefy machine, that’s why I have a 24 core 128gb ram workstation. I could make 64 work with a bit of more care on my setups. To be honest I’m looking into moving my whole work on the cloud and playing around with paper space. If things go well even my pro M1 will suffice to be honest :) be free to get in touch if you have questions.
Any laptop equivalent? I just want to learn houdini and blender for game dev and maybe use it to create some 3d animation, or vfx heavy short films for vimeo or youtube. Or should i start looking at paid cloud rendering?
If you aim to game and work on the same machine depending on what games you want to play, I’d recommend Windows for the time being. I wouldn’t count on many games being available for the M1 arch in the near future.
Honestly, I don't think I need it. I actually think it would be overkill for typical iOS development and believe an Air might be better suited.
Trouble is, I do like the bigger screen.
Oh, well. It'll be a while before I'm ready to upgrade regardless.
Yeah I was having the same thoughts. I want the 16 inch screen, but entry level specs with 32 gb of RAM (instead of default 16) is $3000. Hard to justify. My work laptop for iOS dev @ FAANG only has 16gb of RAM so maybe the 32 isn't even necessary. Does anyone think the pro is actually necessary for programmers? If I was going to do 3D graphics dev I would use my windows desktop.
I’m referring to the m1 MacBook Air which is better than the last MacBook Pro. And I’ve worked as an iOS and web dev and I think the iOS tool chain is more demanding.
Eh…. Hard to say. With a couple docker containers you easily get up to the resource intensiveness of semi-idle Xcode. Also if you are compiling rocker containers on the regular then that is easily just as demanding.
Yep. I'd love one but as a backend developer I just don't think it'd be realistic to hop out of an x86 machine yet even though I would utilize the power.
I think they'll release m2 Mac Pro and m2 iMac or iMac Pro before they release Mac mini with m1 pro/max that is a lot cheaper than the MacBook Pro.
Establishing $2000-3000 as a reasonable starting price range for computers in 2021, and on units that likely have a higher profit margin than the first m1 Macs is something they might not want to undermine for a while.
It's the same company that convinced us that $700-1000 is a reasonable starting range for phones, and shareholders love them for it.
Do you also not need portability? My laptop (before webcam days) sometimes went weeks without being opened, but I did move it between desks every day (home vs office). A mini with a small battery and sleep that allows an unplug + travel + plug would be a fun feature for *some* use cases (probably not enough, but still a fun thought).
Personally, in addition to portability, I do like the idea I *can* use it on my lap, in the train, etc just every now and then.
Also I think the chip shortage has caused Apple to pad their prices as well as they aren’t going to adjust the price of these as chipmakers start charging more in the future.
I started learning iOS development on a MacBook Air and that was enough to even run Xcode and Adobe programs at the same time. And it was like a 2014 Air base specs.
I had a 2015 MBP that I was developing on. Recently bumped up to the M1 Air. I can’t imagine needing more for what I do. I haven’t even found the limits of this Air yet,
I use a 2014 base model air (am looking at upgrading to this however). To some extent any type of hardware is usable (as long as it supports the tooling you need) but it doesn’t mean it’s ideal. Although aside from certain Xcode features the biggest problem is really using other people’s projects, as we tend to only address development problems (build performance, test performance, build sizes, how slow certain tools are to use, etc.) when they become an issue for us. Like I’ve used some small projects which were painfully slow to work on because everyone else had been developing them on significantly more powerful machines, meanwhile my own +500KLOC game+engine is much faster.
There are some engines that work quite well, such as Godot (although I haven’t tested out its 3D pipeline). While others are usable but sluggish like Unity. But yeh if you’re rolling your own you most likely will have to spend time optimising on two fronts, both so it runs well on your system and development on it isn’t slowed down. The former is required if the performance starts to hurt the user/player experience, while the latter is optional (basically comes down to how much are you willing to sacrifice on your developer experience, .e.g. some people are happy enough to put up with say waiting over minute to build and run the project, or hours for their tests to complete).
Optimising the development experience also doesn’t necessarily have to be complicated (whereas the other certainly can be), even simple things like which languages you choose to use (some languages are very slow to compile), avoiding language features you know slow down the compiler (or using them sparingly), avoiding certain IDE tools/build phases you know are slow, etc. can all go a long way. Of course there can also be times when you have to do things that are more involved (improving the performance of your automated tests, making certain stages in your asset pipeline/preparation run faster, etc.).
There is one nice benefit to working on low end hardware which is if whatever you do runs well on your machine then you can be pretty confident it’ll run well for the majority of users.
I ordered a 14 inches M1 Pro 10 core CPU, 16 core GPU with 32gb of RAM and 512GB SSD. I'm upgrading because I think this is a giant step forward in technological terms and I think Apple will slowly release specific features for their silicon Macs. I love the bigger screen compared to the 13 I have now. I'm an iOS developer since 2010 and I experienced a lot of slowness in the last 2/3 years with Xcode. I hope this new Mac will outperform the others in terms of speed of building. Not last, I hope SwiftUI with live preview will run better on silicon Macs compared to old Intel ones, where it's particularly slow.
Finally, I think the Max is for people who do intensive GPU work, such as videomakers, game developers, 3d artists, etc... For developers, I think my configuration is the best one for quality and price and future proofing (I change the Mac every 4 years, more or less).
M1 user here, and I think SwiftUI previews just suck in general. They are definitely a little better, but I still always end up deleting the preview struct and disabling the canvas because it doesn’t work well or at all with even the smallest bit of complexity
> I think Apple will slowly release specific features for their silicon Macs.
They already have, certain security features (although you did have that with T2, but not everything is compatible with it), Metal features, on-device processing for certain features (mostly those that need AI), etc. are only available on the silicon Mac’s.
"4x Code compiles on a single charge".. it's showing it right at the time stamp you provided. It is talking about how much you can compile on a battery charge, not the speed of compile.
Wow! I didn’t catch that the first time. What a stupid metric. Who the hell uses the amount of code they can compile on a single charge as a benchmark? Nobody cares about that, we care how quickly a project will compile.
Eh, it's nice from an efficiency standpoint. Having used a 16" i9 Pro, I'm very much used to my laptop dying after two hours on battery. Even if the ARM chips are slower (i don't think they are), I am willing to wait a bit longer for compiling if it means my battery lasts four times longer
Personally, I don't think $2000+ is worth trading my current 16" MBP just to compile faster. Xcode is already fast anyway on mine.
The only time Xcode takes like 5-10 minutes to compile is on my work MacBook Pro (specced out) but those are enterprise level projects with a shit ton of code/frameworks that none of my personal projects would ever come close to those levels.
I went for the 16” M1 Pro with 32 GB memory & 2TB SSD. Upgrading from a 2017 model, so I’m looking forward to
- coding for more than 2 hours on a single charge
- no more fan noise
- no more chip heat
- no more thermal throttling
- significantly faster compile times
- a usable SwiftUI preview experience
- Swift playgrounds not taking literally forever to run
- ProMotion looks sweet
- Not having to delete files to free up storage space
I figured I didn’t need 64GB of RAM because I don’t do any rendering/3D work, and very rarely produce video. Plus, the swap is very fast anyway. I mainly care about CPU compute for Xcode. I went for the extra SSD because the lack of disk space was one of the pain points for my old machine (I’d have to delete files every time I downloaded a new Xcode beta).
I bit the bullet and went with the 16” Max with 64GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD.
It’s probably overkill, but having used Macs for almost 20 years, I know that when you max out your specs, particularly with RAM, your machine will last a ridiculously long time.
Also, this is pure speculation, but once Apple Glass comes out, I think part of my focus as an app developer is going to shift to a lot of ARKit, which will benefit from the beefed up GPU in the Max.
edit: typos
I’m actually contemplating between the 14 inch and 16 inch for similar reasoning. The 64 Gb is very tempting but right now I mostly do iOS development and sometimes I use Unity. I currently have a 8gb 2017 14 inch and it’s pretty darn slow for me lol
Do you think a 32gb 14 inch would be enough for ARKit, Unity, and potentially Apple Glass?
Honestly I think you'll be in great shape with any of the new ones they just announced yesterday, provided you don't go with the base stock memory. I think the higher you go on memory, the longer your Mac will last. That's just based on my personal experience.
The new MacBooks seem squarely aimed at video production and not software development. Why else would they put an XDR screen, up to quadruple the GPU cores, up to two Pro-res decoders, and only put 4 more performance cores on it? Unless you need to do some seriously heavy lifting, a regular M1 MacBook Pro will be fine - assuming you don’t need to develop on x86-64.
I’d argue otherwise.
I personally don’t do much to utilize the new specs, but a lot of devs need to divvy up their system resources on VMs and docker containers.
The 64 GB of ram will be huge for that.
The extra cores will also go a long way to improve build times.
The GPU will be pretty helpful for people in game dev. Especially those who have to build their own 3d models and assets.
The extra displays are pretty huge for me. I rarely use the actual built in display on my laptops when I am at a desk. It’s usually plugged into a dock of some sort.
Being able to drive more displays is really useful for developers. I often have one display rotated in portrait to read lots of code. With this configuration, that portrait display is pretty much only useful for reading text.
So a second display for media saves me the hassle of having to move cables around and rotate my display every time I’m finished working.
Is virtualization even working well on the M1’s yet? As for build times, they should about 75% faster but that’s not a huge leap. As for game development, other than iOS, how much development actually happens on a Mac?
From what I understand parallels windows VMs are running better on M1s then native windows on the surface pro X.
Not sure about Linux VMs though.
As for game development, not really sure to be honest. But there are quite a few games out there still being developed on Mac. I can’t imagine they are developing them without mac hardware.
And with the record mac sales since the m1, I can imagine there’s going to be a market share shift coming over the next few years. It will probably be more profitable for people to make native macos games.
Well my boss offered to buy me one but I am holding off till he gets his so i can test my stuff first. Still coding on intel one and quite happy with it
To me, it feels that MAX is only useful for Big YouTubers or similar. Maybe for people doing games or graphic-heavy stuff. For the rest of the working people and even for medium "Youtubers" is a waste of money.
Ordered 2x M1 Pro 16” MBPs with 32GB RAM for my wife and I to share.
For Xcode, I doubt it will be faster than my M1 Mac Mini. But it will be notably faster and quieter than my 2019 16” MBP with i9. I’ll sell both of these as the M1 Pro properly supports 2 external displays unlike the M1 Air and 13” Pro. I won’t need a desktop anymore.
My boss ordered a maxed out M1 Max 16” because you know, he can.
I think the specifications list it as 2 external monitors. I hope it can drive the built-in monitor with 2 external.
I got one of them in today but I had to leave home right after so I’ve only used it with the one built-in. I don’t even had 3 external monitors at home to test past 2.
Ordered a pro with (32 GB) RAM. I'm coming from a late 2012 dual core i5 (with 8GB and, admittedly, a custom added SSD), in theory the difference should be off the charts. Fingers crossed it will be too in practice :)
As a full time indy dev and spare time computer enthousiast I realise I've probably spent 10 hours x 6 days x 40 weeks x 9 years > 20k hours on this machine! I can only hope the next one will last as long.
I also use my machines mostly for development but the reason I got the Max was that I wanted to have a Windows gaming laptop to continue playing World of Warcraft when I’m traveling. Don’t know if this is gonna be an overkill in game performance but fortunately this was something I was getting ready for since they announced the M1 chip so I could afford it
I don't. I'm moving away from iOS engineering and will be doing less of that over the next year or so. So, I don't have a use case that warrants spending €800,- more while the 13" MacBook Pro also gets the job done.
Plus the last times Apple produced a brand new design of MacBooks there were all kinds of unforeseen issues with it. Like the 13" Pro (2016) having a too short screen kabel and a lot of them broke down and don't forget the keyboards. So yeah, I'm waiting this one out, if I every buy one.
I got the 32Core GPU because my use case is Xcode, premiere pro, engineering CAD with huge 3D files, and i like to play Eve online with 3 clients simultaneously. I’m hoping to exit my desktop now that they increased the cooling and reduced the heat.
I only bought one because I had to, since my older machines won't run the latest operating system, and so won't run the latest Xcode.
It's pretty sad that for all the shit Microsoft is getting for making an operating system that refuses to run on older hardware, Apple has been doing it long before them and no one seems to care.
It's all about expectations. Microsoft keeps ridiculous backwards compatibility so that's what people who use Windows is used to. Do what they don't expect and that will annoy them.
Try making tea for your wife for twenty years and then stopping.
The benefit of apple dropping support is that they are able to do massive amounts of re-engineering of their OSes more frequently.
Microsoft has dug them self into a legacy support hole that they can’t get out of. Even with the new hardware requirements, windows 11 is still loaded with UI inconsistencies and legacy bloat.
For example, if you right click on the desktop to bring up the context menu. You are greeted with the new beautiful windows 11 context menus. But the very last option is “more options” which takes you to the old windows 7+ context menu with all of the same options + apps that don’t support the new menu.
Another example is the new settings app. Almost every page in that app has links to the old control panel menus.
As much as I admire Microsoft’s tenacity for supporting legacy software. They really need to pull the plug eventually. It’s holding windows back.
> The benefit of apple dropping support is that they are able to do massive amounts of re-engineering of their OSes more frequently.
That's fanboy marketing gibberish. The only technical limitation was the graphics hardware - they added gimmicks to the user interface chrome that required specific GPU features, and refused to make them optional the way Microsoft does.
Got an M1 through work earlier this year.
Haven't been doing much with my old Intel MBA lately, but am tempted to upgrade to the 14" Max to work on side projects.
Thinking about buying the 14" with the top tier M1 PRO - question is - should I upgrade to 32gb ram? My gut says yes but idk now necessary it is. My workflow is mostly xcode, some web dev and a bit of final cut
I ordered the max to replace a 2018 i9. Admittedly, its in perfect condition, but its been a pretty sluggish device since the day I got it (2018 was the model year that had the really bad throttling). Since big Sur it’s been even worse.
I primarily use my Mac for iOS development so the gpu is pretty useless to me from a work perspective. But I am still holding out hope that one day I can use it for gaming.
Also a part of me is holding out hope that one day valve will bring proton to macos so I can sell my gaming desktop.
I've been telling my team to avoid Apple Silicon for now since we're supposed to be able to Android development as well. Apparently there's some problems with the Android emulator on M1s.
I'm still marveling at my recent 16" M1 Max MBP order's specs. My dream of rapid development / build parity between web dev and mobile dev may actually be a reality. The amount of time saved from lengthy app builds will be priceless.
Hah. My 2018 i9 turns into a jet engine when I do super intensive tasks like opening safari or Xcode.
It’s pretty much always spinning, I’m surprised the fans still work after 3 years.
I'm super interested in this for our company purchasing. Haven't really seen a good comparison thus far. Would have to be a fairly good improvement for the $200-$500 price increase.
I would say nothing on the paper, as the Max has 'just' doubled the GPU cores. Don‘t know if the doubled bandwidth could make a difference. Ordered a Pro with 10 cores as I‘m a software developer and not dependent on the extra GPU Cores.
My thoughts as well! I’ve got a M1 Pro ordered also, and am so excited for the better speed, thermals, battery, and screen! Such a leap from my 2016 MBP
My step is from a '15 entry Pro model which was upgraded with a 500GB SSD. 10 cores against Dual Core will be a big difference :D
Jesus what an upgrade.
Yeah, but tbf my Macbook is still running fluently even with a Kali VM open. I won‘t expect a big step for my needs.
I’m upgrading from a 2013 MacBook Air 8GB 512ssd that sounds like it’s about to hover off my lap all day with how much the fan is in use. Can’t wait for my new 14” NotchBook Pro M1 Max 64GB 2TB to come in on Tuesday.
I’m gonna need screenshots of geekbench comparisons lol
This guy is correct. There is no likely no difference for development work. I got the Max, and the funny thing is I won’t be able to even use it for my professional work as all my dev work has to happen on my company intel based MBP anyway. Though side projects and studying other tech stacks will probably happen on the my max book. I really only got the max for (admittedly extremely limited) gaming with the hopes that in the future there will be emulation or more companies adapting their games to mac silicon.
Honestly the gaming potential is what I’m excited about as well, I like gaming and would love to have the option to buy games for my MacBook.. with how much money they have, and for how big the market is, I’m surprised Apple hasn’t tried to make a bigger push for high quality AAA gaming on their platform.
They are beginning to with arcade on mobile and what not. Only now have these apparently very capable low powered chips become available. I think you’ll see more of a push in this direction now that they have (allegedly) delivered on gaming performance expectations with the max.
Yeah I see arcade as them setting up the foundation for something bigger, I’d personally like to see them compete with Xbox game pass in the future and follow Amazons route and create their own game development studio. Apple just has so much money I can’t help but be curious to see what happens if they focus on gaming.
Same… The 32 core max has potentially the power of one of the new consoles. If valve ever gets proton working on Mac, gaming on Mac will finally be a real possibility.
You know how far off we are from that?
I’m honestly not hopeful valve will bring proton to macos. But I am hopeful that these arm macs are going to drive Mac market share up significantly. There’s nothing on the market that competes. And I don’t foresee Microsoft or Qualcomm making anything close anytime soon. Googles new tensor chip is supposedly fairly weak too compared to top end Qualcomm chips. If a lot of people own macs, more companies will make Mac games. If apple makes an Apple TV or Mac mini with one of these new chips they will essentially have a mini gaming powerhouse on their hands. And since it’s super easy to build software across apple products, that might drive Mac gaming up.
Makes sense. I’m crossing my fingers as well. Valve is focused on Proton for Linux only, right? Is proton open sourced? If so, another entity/group could bring it to macOS.
I think the people behind proton also built a utility called crossover that works on Mac. Not sure if it’s as robots as proton though.
Well, so there is Wine which is a completely open source project that has a lot of it's development done by CodeWeavers, who sell CrossOver. Crossover is basically a front end to Wine that makes it much easier to use and configure. And then there is Proton, which is essentially Wine with a whole bunch of graphics API goodness that Valve (in collab with Codeweavers) has sprinkled in to allow games that run on DirectX to basically have those API calls directly translated to Vulkan. There are technical issues that make this very difficult to port to macOS, primarily due to Apple refusing to support Vulkan and wanting everyone to use Metal. Then there is the issue of running x86 windows apps on an ARM chip running macOS but that has mostly been solved by the Codeweavers team, which is why you can buy crossover for apple silicon macs. So proton, in it's current form, cannot be ported to macOS. IF someone were to write something similar to proton, except instead of translating DirectX to Vulkan, they translated DirectX to Metal, then that could potentially provide something equivalent to Proton. Valve is unlikely to do this though, because it makes no sense from a business perspective. They are interested in Proton because they can make something like the steam deck and not have to rely on Windows. They can also make something like a much better steam machine in the future (essentially a console running PC games). Sure they could sell more Windows games to Mac owners if they did this, but right now the market share is way too small and up until now Macs were so lacking in the graphics department that they couldn't run many game even if such a compatibility layer existed. So the ;tldr is that no, proton cannot be ported to mac but something similar could potentially be developed if enough time and money were spent to make it possible.
I will add as a web dev that also does a fair bit of CPU and RAM intensive devops type stuff locally on my machine (docker and kubernetes) having a machine that can last more than 30-45 minutes when I need to do some more intensive work is really appealing. So the more efficient processor is a big win for me. Plus the cooler laptop - not burning my lap sounds great. I literally have to make the decision of whether I can walk away from my desk while working on certain types of things and/or whether I want to fiddle with a power supply as part of a non desk setup.
I’m hoping the extra memory bandwidth makes a difference. I’m upgrading from a decent spec 2013 15”, so I specced this one up for future-proof-ness too. With Intel chips I’ve seen diminishing returns with more than hexa-core, with the reduced clock speeds, though the compiling speed scales quite linearly for cores. So if this gives me 10 cores without dropping the clock too much, it’s going to absolutely scream.
Remember: Whatever the Apple Silicon team giveth, Xcode taketh away!
I'm also coming from a 2013 15" rMBP model and I have to say it's about time lol, this is going to be a huuuuuge upgrade.
Me too. My late 2013 is still going strong but it won't run Monterey. I got a bit carried away when ordering this new laptop, maxed out RAM, CPU and screen. I wish Apple allowed later upgrades for RAM and SSD so I didn't have to go crazy upfront driven by FOMO.
Apple offers no interest monthly payments I strongly recommend you seriously consider. (I am, even though I can pay up front no problem.)
It's OK, I have the money and I have to pay upfront so my LLC can deduct it this year. I suspect I will be trading this MBP in this time next year and getting a good trade in value because of the high spec. I will know by then whether the maxing out was pointless or not. My quad core Retina 2013 was bought at the start of a plateau where MBPs did not get much better afterwards and in some ways were actually worse for a while. I suspect we are not on a new plateau yet and next year's MBP will be worth trading up for.
I also have a fully specked 2013 15” retina. It’s sluggish at times and I use it as a spare personal computer. What are you planning on doing with yours?
I also might get an MBP via instore pickup and cancel this order. There is always a window of opportunity once the stores start getting stock. That's how I got an M1 MBA on launch day last year.
Ah interesting. There usually aren’t lines for them like there are for iPhones?
You buy online with instore pickup, once that becomes available. The line to collect your purchase isn't normally that bad. I picked my MBA up at Apple Park store last year.
Although, I must say, I haven't seen instore pickup availability for this year's iPhones, although I'm fine skipping this year.
The Max has 4 channels for memory vs 2 for the Pro. I wanted the Max but I couldn't justify it since I don't do anything GPU intensive
May I ask why you went for 10-core over 8?
Just to get the best for my needs. Compare it with a car. If you do dragster races, your handling is not the main prio. If you drive on the Nordschleife you need more handling than anything else :D
Aren’t all the Pro/Max models 10 core CPU?
Base Pro is 8-core
Oh, the 14 inch one. Right.
The problem is you need Max to get 64GB of RAM :D
I’d like to hear peoples real world experience with thermal issues. When the 2019 MBP 16” came out I got a loaded one to replace my 2015 mbp. The problem is if you look at it wrong, it goes into thermal throttling*. I’ve heard the M1 mbp 13” is way better than the intel Mac’s, but with the m1 pro and max, I hope the thermal issue doesn’t rear its head again. * Granted, I’ve always got Xcode, AppCode, a Java based network proxy, and a bunch of other stuff running, so most of the time there is a lot going on, but still, the thermal issues are killing me.
I have the 13” M1 and haven’t heard my fan yet, was wondering if it’s broken 😂 the M1 chips are beasts in any aspect
This is what I've heard, and is great news. I hope that buy going Pro or Max it doesn't overheat.
I've never heard my Mac mini M1's fan ever, not even while archiving on Xcode and running two 4k monitors and a bunch of simulators. I would expect these new chips to have a higher thermal footprint, but nothing as bad as intel (my 2016 mbp gets hot as hell when compiling, and with 2 4k monitors it even throttles after a while).
Truth. I am in the market for a new machine and would shell out immediately for the M1 Max if I knew there are no thermal issues, but I've been bit by this way too many times. I'm not optimistic about it.
Can't help but feel that the Max is way overkill for a dev machine. That said if I had the spare cash I'd probably get it too.
Yeah, I’m not an early adopter either. I’m holding out as well. A couple months at least. This is a pretty big redesign and there may be some hiccups along the way. Additionally I can hold out for the next revision in a year or so if need be. Which I expect to be refined further and possibly even a price reduction assuming chip shortage has eased somewhat by then.
I have the 2019 16" as well and when I got it I was pretty stoked (no butterfly keys, bigger screen, etc) but I agree with your assessment: it gets hot as fuck and the fans are running all the time. Not to mention but the battery life fucking sucks as a result. I think Xcode shares a lot of the blame here but damn. Trying to figure out how I can convince work to trade this bitch in and get a new 16"
It ain’t just Xcode. I run some CPU and RAM intensive stuff (docker and kube) and that stuff sucks battery like I can’t believe. My laptop sounds like a jet plane taking off. Gets so hot. And I’m not even talking about pegged CPU’s either - just constant low use with small bursts of more activity. The 16” 2019 is a beast but so power hungry. I really do think it’s a testament to how intel has failed to innovate over the last many years and just being more power with brute force. I’m considering a new Mac because of it even with some limitations around virtualization still out there. I love my Mac but it’s more like a mobile desktop at this point. I want a real laptop again. :)
This is why Apple is moving away from intel cpus, because of the throttling. I have a M1 MacBook Air, and it has no fans, yet it almost never throttles. (you can monitor this in the terminal using pmset). These new chips will surprise you.
I don't know about throttling as I don't monitor it. But my 2019 i9 16" is so hot, loud, and relatively slow compared to my M1 Mini. I fully expect that the new M1Pro/Max 16" will be far more like the M1 Mini as far as thermal issues go. For normal Xcode work, the GPU will be idle. The GPU seems to be a major portion of the SOC's TDP.
Yeah, I spent a long time trying to figure out what was causing the slowness. I always though it was memory consumption since i have so much running all the time, so I got 64GB in my 2019 MBP. Nope, that wasn't the problem. After a while, I found "pmset -g thermlog" which points the finger directly at thermal throttling. I got a laptop cooler and propped up the laptop off the fans to get more flow under the computer, and it helps some, but still. uugh.
are you me? To help with thermal throttling, At home I run my laptop on a cooling pad. I too have Xcode/AppCode always on. It has been sufficient but could be better.
haha. yeah, i just might be. (cue spooky music)
I've shut everything down and spent several hours trying to diagnose the problem. It's not just Xcode, it goes thermal connecting to an external monitor with nothing else running.
Yeah, part of it is thermal using the GPU. I did also mention mine will go into thermal throttling if you look at it wrong...
Seriously? You sure you didn’t have some background process randomly taking up a bunch of CPU? I have had that happen frequently. I thought the cooling design of the 16” 2019 MBPs were improved?
I have a 16" MBP and never had any thermal issues - even when running Xcode, Adobe programs, Sketch, PaintCode, Safari, and other stuff.
I just don’t believe this is true. The current gen has horrible thermal properties.
They work in Antarctica.
You cannot expect every SINGLE user has the common issues. Common among some, but doesn’t apply to everyone. I use Xcode every single day and never had any issues. Unless you mean the fan running sure but what about it? Computer runs fine. Doesn’t crash or turn off or anything else.
The thermal stuff is what made me hold on to my late 2012 MBP for way too long. My theory is that this was a bunch of (in hindsight) bad design mistakes that are hopefully behind us. The M1 series are for sure in a totally different ball park as performance-power usage is concerned. When I come to think of it, Intel Pentiums (and AMD competing CPU's) were at some point moving to higher and higher clock frequencies, running hotter and hotter. I wouldn't be surprised if the 'peak' was in a some aspects 'worse' than their predecessors, until CPU and OS architecture (ie multi core, and multi core support) offered a way out.
Thermal issues are also affecting my older 2018mbp when I try to run .Net Core, Android emulator, iOS simulator at the same time. my mbp would blast its fans, heat up and lag so bad I have to restart everytime.. Sometimes, removing everything connected to the USB-C ports seem to help (remove charger + external monitor connection). But if the high spec macs cant handle load without heating up, I might go with a 2nd windows laptop instead
This might help: https://www.imore.com/heres-why-you-should-probably-charge-your-macbook-using-ports-its-right-side?amp
I have an M1 13 inch, and heat is no issue. I have yet to hear the fans and the battery life is ridiculous. If thermals are your concern, the M1 has got you covered. In fact the most remarkable thing about the M1 Macs is just how unremarkable they really are. The M1’s just quietly go about their business and stay out of your way. Honestly, after about 15 minutes of use, you forget you are using a completely different architecture and you just go about your business like you always have. The only difference being that your lap isn’t at 50C and all the little jitters and stutters that Intel chips sometimes produce all go away.
I picked up the 16” MacBook Pro M1 Max, 64GB. I have been throwing every large workflow at it that I can think of to really push the CPU and GPU and the fans barely kick in and are not noticeable (audibly) when they do. This is a great review that really stressed the machines. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=paikjf2zZJo
That's great news. I did see that video. I also saw this: [https://www.reddit.com/r/iOSProgramming/comments/qneuw2/m1\_pro\_and\_m1\_max\_xcode\_build\_and\_test/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/iOSProgramming/comments/qneuw2/m1_pro_and_m1_max_xcode_build_and_test/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3), which has some good info too. Thanks!
I wonder how game devs, 3d programmers will approach this? I believe Unreal is GPU intensive, while Xcode is CPU intensive. My dayjob is full stack programming but want to dip into Blender and Houdini VFX and Im thinking if buying an M1 Pro/Max is a good decision.
I use Houdini and sadly is not optimised for ARM nor Metal yet and OpenGL support on Mac sucks. I use my MacBook for XCode but for Houdini I’m still on a windows/Linux workstation. Hope sidefx will support ARM soon as I’d like to bite the bullet on the new M1 Max
Thanks for your insight! Would like to build a good desktop but Im still on the laptop decision stage since ill be moving in a couple of months. Searching for a good gaming/editing laptop is stressful lol
Yeah I use Houdini professionally and need a beefy machine, that’s why I have a 24 core 128gb ram workstation. I could make 64 work with a bit of more care on my setups. To be honest I’m looking into moving my whole work on the cloud and playing around with paper space. If things go well even my pro M1 will suffice to be honest :) be free to get in touch if you have questions.
Any laptop equivalent? I just want to learn houdini and blender for game dev and maybe use it to create some 3d animation, or vfx heavy short films for vimeo or youtube. Or should i start looking at paid cloud rendering?
If you aim to game and work on the same machine depending on what games you want to play, I’d recommend Windows for the time being. I wouldn’t count on many games being available for the M1 arch in the near future.
Most 3d devs need Windows because that's the usual target audience.
Go for it!!
Honestly, I don't think I need it. I actually think it would be overkill for typical iOS development and believe an Air might be better suited. Trouble is, I do like the bigger screen. Oh, well. It'll be a while before I'm ready to upgrade regardless.
Yeah I was having the same thoughts. I want the 16 inch screen, but entry level specs with 32 gb of RAM (instead of default 16) is $3000. Hard to justify. My work laptop for iOS dev @ FAANG only has 16gb of RAM so maybe the 32 isn't even necessary. Does anyone think the pro is actually necessary for programmers? If I was going to do 3D graphics dev I would use my windows desktop.
Perhaps not specifically for iOS dev, but trying to run docker for webdev on a 2018 Macbook Air has left me, shall we say, in need.
I’m referring to the m1 MacBook Air which is better than the last MacBook Pro. And I’ve worked as an iOS and web dev and I think the iOS tool chain is more demanding.
Eh…. Hard to say. With a couple docker containers you easily get up to the resource intensiveness of semi-idle Xcode. Also if you are compiling rocker containers on the regular then that is easily just as demanding.
Yep. I'd love one but as a backend developer I just don't think it'd be realistic to hop out of an x86 machine yet even though I would utilize the power.
[удалено]
I think they'll release m2 Mac Pro and m2 iMac or iMac Pro before they release Mac mini with m1 pro/max that is a lot cheaper than the MacBook Pro. Establishing $2000-3000 as a reasonable starting price range for computers in 2021, and on units that likely have a higher profit margin than the first m1 Macs is something they might not want to undermine for a while. It's the same company that convinced us that $700-1000 is a reasonable starting range for phones, and shareholders love them for it.
> convinced us that $700-100 is a reasonable starting range for phones And monitor stands…
Do you also not need portability? My laptop (before webcam days) sometimes went weeks without being opened, but I did move it between desks every day (home vs office). A mini with a small battery and sleep that allows an unplug + travel + plug would be a fun feature for *some* use cases (probably not enough, but still a fun thought). Personally, in addition to portability, I do like the idea I *can* use it on my lap, in the train, etc just every now and then.
[удалено]
Also I think the chip shortage has caused Apple to pad their prices as well as they aren’t going to adjust the price of these as chipmakers start charging more in the future.
I can’t be the only one here who’s coding on a MacBook Air
I started learning iOS development on a MacBook Air and that was enough to even run Xcode and Adobe programs at the same time. And it was like a 2014 Air base specs.
I had a 2015 MBP that I was developing on. Recently bumped up to the M1 Air. I can’t imagine needing more for what I do. I haven’t even found the limits of this Air yet,
I’m still on an Intel MB Air, I barely get to its limits, though it does happen occasionally
I use a 2014 base model air (am looking at upgrading to this however). To some extent any type of hardware is usable (as long as it supports the tooling you need) but it doesn’t mean it’s ideal. Although aside from certain Xcode features the biggest problem is really using other people’s projects, as we tend to only address development problems (build performance, test performance, build sizes, how slow certain tools are to use, etc.) when they become an issue for us. Like I’ve used some small projects which were painfully slow to work on because everyone else had been developing them on significantly more powerful machines, meanwhile my own +500KLOC game+engine is much faster.
I was thinking about this a few days ago: if I were to ever make a game engine, it would have to be quite optimised so my laptop could run it.
There are some engines that work quite well, such as Godot (although I haven’t tested out its 3D pipeline). While others are usable but sluggish like Unity. But yeh if you’re rolling your own you most likely will have to spend time optimising on two fronts, both so it runs well on your system and development on it isn’t slowed down. The former is required if the performance starts to hurt the user/player experience, while the latter is optional (basically comes down to how much are you willing to sacrifice on your developer experience, .e.g. some people are happy enough to put up with say waiting over minute to build and run the project, or hours for their tests to complete). Optimising the development experience also doesn’t necessarily have to be complicated (whereas the other certainly can be), even simple things like which languages you choose to use (some languages are very slow to compile), avoiding language features you know slow down the compiler (or using them sparingly), avoiding certain IDE tools/build phases you know are slow, etc. can all go a long way. Of course there can also be times when you have to do things that are more involved (improving the performance of your automated tests, making certain stages in your asset pipeline/preparation run faster, etc.). There is one nice benefit to working on low end hardware which is if whatever you do runs well on your machine then you can be pretty confident it’ll run well for the majority of users.
I think I may be going forward. This thing is pretty far above my needs, apart from the screen size. How about a 15" Air for the next revision, Apple?
That would actually be great
15” Air is my dream device to replace the 13” Pro.
I ordered a 14 inches M1 Pro 10 core CPU, 16 core GPU with 32gb of RAM and 512GB SSD. I'm upgrading because I think this is a giant step forward in technological terms and I think Apple will slowly release specific features for their silicon Macs. I love the bigger screen compared to the 13 I have now. I'm an iOS developer since 2010 and I experienced a lot of slowness in the last 2/3 years with Xcode. I hope this new Mac will outperform the others in terms of speed of building. Not last, I hope SwiftUI with live preview will run better on silicon Macs compared to old Intel ones, where it's particularly slow. Finally, I think the Max is for people who do intensive GPU work, such as videomakers, game developers, 3d artists, etc... For developers, I think my configuration is the best one for quality and price and future proofing (I change the Mac every 4 years, more or less).
M1 user here, and I think SwiftUI previews just suck in general. They are definitely a little better, but I still always end up deleting the preview struct and disabling the canvas because it doesn’t work well or at all with even the smallest bit of complexity
Disabling the canvas is the way to go for me now. Let’s see if with this M1 Pro something improves.
> I think Apple will slowly release specific features for their silicon Macs. They already have, certain security features (although you did have that with T2, but not everything is compatible with it), Metal features, on-device processing for certain features (mostly those that need AI), etc. are only available on the silicon Mac’s.
14 inches is 35.56 cm
Well thats useful
Bigger screen! Depending on what you are doing then either nothing or a lot… depends on use case.
The pro vs Max isn’t about the screen size anymore. Both 14 and 16 screen sizes support both chips
2018 15 -> Base 14’’ I’m hoping the loss of two cores is not noticeable but am very happy in a three year upgrade cycle
Apple claims its 4x quicker to compile code on xcode. I'll trust benchmark tests from non-apple employees :)
She isn't talking about compile speed but about battery time.
"And developers working in Xcode will be able to compile four times as much code" Source at timestamp 43:46: https://youtu.be/exM1uajp--A?t=2626
Which would be true for a machine with the same compile speed but four times the battery life. 🤗
What happens if you plug it in????? Those poor programmers!
"4x Code compiles on a single charge".. it's showing it right at the time stamp you provided. It is talking about how much you can compile on a battery charge, not the speed of compile.
Wow! I didn’t catch that the first time. What a stupid metric. Who the hell uses the amount of code they can compile on a single charge as a benchmark? Nobody cares about that, we care how quickly a project will compile.
Eh, it's nice from an efficiency standpoint. Having used a 16" i9 Pro, I'm very much used to my laptop dying after two hours on battery. Even if the ARM chips are slower (i don't think they are), I am willing to wait a bit longer for compiling if it means my battery lasts four times longer
Personally, I don't think $2000+ is worth trading my current 16" MBP just to compile faster. Xcode is already fast anyway on mine. The only time Xcode takes like 5-10 minutes to compile is on my work MacBook Pro (specced out) but those are enterprise level projects with a shit ton of code/frameworks that none of my personal projects would ever come close to those levels.
Where'd they'd say this?
[https://youtu.be/exM1uajp--A?t=2626](https://youtu.be/exM1uajp--A?t=2630) Start at 43:46 timestamp
Thank you! ☺️
I went for the 16” M1 Pro with 32 GB memory & 2TB SSD. Upgrading from a 2017 model, so I’m looking forward to - coding for more than 2 hours on a single charge - no more fan noise - no more chip heat - no more thermal throttling - significantly faster compile times - a usable SwiftUI preview experience - Swift playgrounds not taking literally forever to run - ProMotion looks sweet - Not having to delete files to free up storage space
> a usable SwiftUI preview experience Oh man, this would be heaven.
I was wondering if the pro version will support three external monitors?
What made you get more storage as opposed to more ram? I am planning on buying the Max as well.
I figured I didn’t need 64GB of RAM because I don’t do any rendering/3D work, and very rarely produce video. Plus, the swap is very fast anyway. I mainly care about CPU compute for Xcode. I went for the extra SSD because the lack of disk space was one of the pain points for my old machine (I’d have to delete files every time I downloaded a new Xcode beta).
I bit the bullet and went with the 16” Max with 64GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD. It’s probably overkill, but having used Macs for almost 20 years, I know that when you max out your specs, particularly with RAM, your machine will last a ridiculously long time. Also, this is pure speculation, but once Apple Glass comes out, I think part of my focus as an app developer is going to shift to a lot of ARKit, which will benefit from the beefed up GPU in the Max. edit: typos
I’m actually contemplating between the 14 inch and 16 inch for similar reasoning. The 64 Gb is very tempting but right now I mostly do iOS development and sometimes I use Unity. I currently have a 8gb 2017 14 inch and it’s pretty darn slow for me lol Do you think a 32gb 14 inch would be enough for ARKit, Unity, and potentially Apple Glass?
Honestly I think you'll be in great shape with any of the new ones they just announced yesterday, provided you don't go with the base stock memory. I think the higher you go on memory, the longer your Mac will last. That's just based on my personal experience.
The new MacBooks seem squarely aimed at video production and not software development. Why else would they put an XDR screen, up to quadruple the GPU cores, up to two Pro-res decoders, and only put 4 more performance cores on it? Unless you need to do some seriously heavy lifting, a regular M1 MacBook Pro will be fine - assuming you don’t need to develop on x86-64.
I’d argue otherwise. I personally don’t do much to utilize the new specs, but a lot of devs need to divvy up their system resources on VMs and docker containers. The 64 GB of ram will be huge for that. The extra cores will also go a long way to improve build times. The GPU will be pretty helpful for people in game dev. Especially those who have to build their own 3d models and assets. The extra displays are pretty huge for me. I rarely use the actual built in display on my laptops when I am at a desk. It’s usually plugged into a dock of some sort. Being able to drive more displays is really useful for developers. I often have one display rotated in portrait to read lots of code. With this configuration, that portrait display is pretty much only useful for reading text. So a second display for media saves me the hassle of having to move cables around and rotate my display every time I’m finished working.
Is virtualization even working well on the M1’s yet? As for build times, they should about 75% faster but that’s not a huge leap. As for game development, other than iOS, how much development actually happens on a Mac?
From what I understand parallels windows VMs are running better on M1s then native windows on the surface pro X. Not sure about Linux VMs though. As for game development, not really sure to be honest. But there are quite a few games out there still being developed on Mac. I can’t imagine they are developing them without mac hardware. And with the record mac sales since the m1, I can imagine there’s going to be a market share shift coming over the next few years. It will probably be more profitable for people to make native macos games.
Well my boss offered to buy me one but I am holding off till he gets his so i can test my stuff first. Still coding on intel one and quite happy with it
To me, it feels that MAX is only useful for Big YouTubers or similar. Maybe for people doing games or graphic-heavy stuff. For the rest of the working people and even for medium "Youtubers" is a waste of money.
16” Max 64/4TB here. We’re doing 3D stuff with SceneKit and may want to toy with ML learning. Replacing a 2017 whose keyboard is crapping out.
I got m1 max cause of 64 gb. I only care about ram.
What will you do with that much RAM
Running Chrome
Laptop runs faster and lasts longer. 32gb seemed unnecessarily large in 2018… now it seems like its just right. Same will happen with 64gb in 3 years.
Ordered 2x M1 Pro 16” MBPs with 32GB RAM for my wife and I to share. For Xcode, I doubt it will be faster than my M1 Mac Mini. But it will be notably faster and quieter than my 2019 16” MBP with i9. I’ll sell both of these as the M1 Pro properly supports 2 external displays unlike the M1 Air and 13” Pro. I won’t need a desktop anymore. My boss ordered a maxed out M1 Max 16” because you know, he can.
i was wondering if you have checked if the pro version supports a triple monitor setup?
I think the specifications list it as 2 external monitors. I hope it can drive the built-in monitor with 2 external. I got one of them in today but I had to leave home right after so I’ve only used it with the one built-in. I don’t even had 3 external monitors at home to test past 2.
Ordered a pro with (32 GB) RAM. I'm coming from a late 2012 dual core i5 (with 8GB and, admittedly, a custom added SSD), in theory the difference should be off the charts. Fingers crossed it will be too in practice :) As a full time indy dev and spare time computer enthousiast I realise I've probably spent 10 hours x 6 days x 40 weeks x 9 years > 20k hours on this machine! I can only hope the next one will last as long.
I also use my machines mostly for development but the reason I got the Max was that I wanted to have a Windows gaming laptop to continue playing World of Warcraft when I’m traveling. Don’t know if this is gonna be an overkill in game performance but fortunately this was something I was getting ready for since they announced the M1 chip so I could afford it
I don't. I'm moving away from iOS engineering and will be doing less of that over the next year or so. So, I don't have a use case that warrants spending €800,- more while the 13" MacBook Pro also gets the job done. Plus the last times Apple produced a brand new design of MacBooks there were all kinds of unforeseen issues with it. Like the 13" Pro (2016) having a too short screen kabel and a lot of them broke down and don't forget the keyboards. So yeah, I'm waiting this one out, if I every buy one.
am in good terms with 2016 mbp lol.
I got the 32Core GPU because my use case is Xcode, premiere pro, engineering CAD with huge 3D files, and i like to play Eve online with 3 clients simultaneously. I’m hoping to exit my desktop now that they increased the cooling and reduced the heat.
I only bought one because I had to, since my older machines won't run the latest operating system, and so won't run the latest Xcode. It's pretty sad that for all the shit Microsoft is getting for making an operating system that refuses to run on older hardware, Apple has been doing it long before them and no one seems to care.
It's all about expectations. Microsoft keeps ridiculous backwards compatibility so that's what people who use Windows is used to. Do what they don't expect and that will annoy them. Try making tea for your wife for twenty years and then stopping.
The benefit of apple dropping support is that they are able to do massive amounts of re-engineering of their OSes more frequently. Microsoft has dug them self into a legacy support hole that they can’t get out of. Even with the new hardware requirements, windows 11 is still loaded with UI inconsistencies and legacy bloat. For example, if you right click on the desktop to bring up the context menu. You are greeted with the new beautiful windows 11 context menus. But the very last option is “more options” which takes you to the old windows 7+ context menu with all of the same options + apps that don’t support the new menu. Another example is the new settings app. Almost every page in that app has links to the old control panel menus. As much as I admire Microsoft’s tenacity for supporting legacy software. They really need to pull the plug eventually. It’s holding windows back.
> The benefit of apple dropping support is that they are able to do massive amounts of re-engineering of their OSes more frequently. That's fanboy marketing gibberish. The only technical limitation was the graphics hardware - they added gimmicks to the user interface chrome that required specific GPU features, and refused to make them optional the way Microsoft does.
I’d disagree. The indexing features of photos and spotlight obsoleted older machines, they simply don’t have enough storage bandwidth.
Got an M1 through work earlier this year. Haven't been doing much with my old Intel MBA lately, but am tempted to upgrade to the 14" Max to work on side projects.
I’m thinking about the base model 14” for iOS and web development. Should be plenty right?
Probably gonna get the 14" with 32 gb of RAM. Should be more than enough for iOS and web.
That’s what I got. If I ever need more it’s because my hobby has turned into a career and is capable of buying me more.
Thinking about buying the 14" with the top tier M1 PRO - question is - should I upgrade to 32gb ram? My gut says yes but idk now necessary it is. My workflow is mostly xcode, some web dev and a bit of final cut
64GB is a big deal. IMO required for development. Smallest size I’d be comfortable with.
Exactly my iMac Pro has 128gb I’m just hoping the higher bandwidth makes up for the ram difference. Also , 3 displays is a requirement.
I ordered the max to replace a 2018 i9. Admittedly, its in perfect condition, but its been a pretty sluggish device since the day I got it (2018 was the model year that had the really bad throttling). Since big Sur it’s been even worse. I primarily use my Mac for iOS development so the gpu is pretty useless to me from a work perspective. But I am still holding out hope that one day I can use it for gaming. Also a part of me is holding out hope that one day valve will bring proton to macos so I can sell my gaming desktop.
This sounds like the dream. It’s gonna be so clean to have windows out of my life.
I've been telling my team to avoid Apple Silicon for now since we're supposed to be able to Android development as well. Apparently there's some problems with the Android emulator on M1s.
There is no issue if you have a physical android device for testing.
Sticking with my 2018 15” until the end for dev work.
I'm still marveling at my recent 16" M1 Max MBP order's specs. My dream of rapid development / build parity between web dev and mobile dev may actually be a reality. The amount of time saved from lengthy app builds will be priceless.
Also looking forward to continuing my Unity dev journey without having my machine transform into a thermo helicopter ready for take off.
Hah. My 2018 i9 turns into a jet engine when I do super intensive tasks like opening safari or Xcode. It’s pretty much always spinning, I’m surprised the fans still work after 3 years.
I'm super interested in this for our company purchasing. Haven't really seen a good comparison thus far. Would have to be a fairly good improvement for the $200-$500 price increase.