frontpage Posted by Dr.Wajahat • 6d ago
May 6, 2025 8:28 PM
Item 1 of 1
frontpage Posted by Dr.Wajahat • 6d ago
May 6, 2025 8:28 PM
Apple MacBook Pro Laptop: 14.2", M4 Pro Chip, 24GB RAM, 512GB SSD (2024)
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When I'm forced to replace this one, I'll almost certainly get another Max.
The argument on using a device for 9 years is a solid one. Unfortunately if my applications continue to take advantage of additional cores while almost ignoring bandwidth and only kind using my gpu would it still make sense?
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The argument on using a device for 9 years is a solid one. Unfortunately if my applications continue to take advantage of additional cores while almost ignoring bandwidth and only kind using my gpu would it still make sense?
The "bigger GPU" does help with games (I do a fair bit of this, from time to time), and probably helps with photo and movie editing (I do a fair bit of this too, from time to time), but not much else.
The "keep it for 9 years" thing for me helps me reduce waste. I like buying nice stuff, but I hate creating waste. Being able to keep a notebook for 9 years and use it the whole time without feeling like I'm sacrificing something is a good feeling (for me).
is 16 extra gb ram and M4 over M3 worth $850 additional? how is this deal?
The "bigger GPU" does help with games (I do a fair bit of this, from time to time), and probably helps with photo and movie editing (I do a fair bit of this too, from time to time), but not much else.
The "keep it for 9 years" thing for me helps me reduce waste. I like buying nice stuff, but I hate creating waste. Being able to keep a notebook for 9 years and use it the whole time without feeling like I'm sacrificing something is a good feeling (for me).
3d modeling the sky is really the limit. Still mostly cpu without much memory bandwidth getting utilized.
As far as slicers go. Even with 48GB's of ram I still need to be careful on how I slice things. Otherwise it's hello memory swap. Orca slicer does use the gpu but the other major ones it's all cpu. Bambu isn't actually Mac friendly so I'm forced to use other programs to fix models.
3 years ago I did make a mistake of getting only 16GB's with my M1 Pro. I'm trying not to make that mistake again. That said, my M1 Pro isn't going to waste. It will be donated and still used.
Games that I run on the Mac are relatively low end, e.g. Factorio, Civ, Terraria, Stardew, so definitely not stressing the GPU. The only one that is any heavy 3d load at all that I play on the Mac is 7 Days to Die. I usually run my heavy games (and VR) on my amd7800x3d/nv3090 setup.
I never regret having too much memory, *except* when I'm on battery, because RAM does pull some power all the time. (It's one of the reasons why iPhones are fairly limited in RAM, i.e. to save battery.)
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is 16 extra gb ram and M4 over M3 worth $850 additional? how is this deal?
But an M3 with 32GB RAM should be plenty for most people. Even an M3 with 16GB RAM should be plenty for typical usage.
My rules of thumb are (i) that you get at least as much flash storage as you will need, because needing more later will suck, (ii) that you get more RAM than you need now because the OS and the apps just get fatter with time (and if you don't have enough RAM, that fat spills over into the flash at a much lower speed, called "swap" or "memory paging"), (iii) that extra GPU never hurts but unless you're doing things that specifically rely on the GPU (like 3d games e.g. first person shooters), the GPU doesn't matter as much, and (iv) more/faster CPU cores always helps (again, because the OS and the apps just get fatter with time).
With a Dell (etc.), the hardware is so shoddily built that it's only going to last a couple of years anyhow, so you buy what you need now and maybe a little extra. As a bonus, most Windows PCs are fairly upgradeable. But if you're buying a Mac, there's basically no way to upgrade, so you buy what you're going to need for as long as you intend to keep it.
I've been building and buying both Apple and PC hardware now for 40+ years, not that that means much.
Games that I run on the Mac are relatively low end, e.g. Factorio, Civ, Terraria, Stardew, so definitely not stressing the GPU. The only one that is any heavy 3d load at all that I play on the Mac is 7 Days to Die. I usually run my heavy games (and VR) on my amd7800x3d/nv3090 setup.
Interesting. I do use my M1 for running Bambu, but I haven't benchmarked it either. I never thought about it being GPU intensive. My M1 is only 32GB (my x86 machines, both notebooks and desktops, are all 64GB or 128GB).
I never regret having too much memory, *except* when I'm on battery, because RAM does pull some power all the time. (It's one of the reasons why iPhones are fairly limited in RAM, i.e. to save battery.)
I usually try to at-least double RAM with each notebook upgrade. My next one will be 64GB or more. Although I have yet to hit a wall with 32GB (probably thanks to high speed flash hiding the swap cost). I will at times be running 2 or 3 VMs (Linux servers) when doing development testing for production modeling of web sites etc.
Bambu studio doesn't care at all about your gpu. It's Orca that supports the GPU. Adobe makes poor use of the GPU's in general. Adobe "should" take advantage of it but their software optimization isn't their strong point. They'll make little use of that extra memory bandwidth.
Games will use it. It's just at the very bottom of my list of things. I have a steam dock, a ps5 and a vr headset. A windows desktop with a dedicated gpu that.. runs of out of video memory on games.. go figure.
Talking with you has helped me decide that for me the difference between the max and pro will be non existent expect for the hit to my wallet. Resolve would take advantage of it but I don't add special features to my videos so it isn't going be used at all by me.