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  #1  
Old 09-02-2021, 05:39 PM
tomhartman tomhartman is offline
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Default Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

By, "handle" of course, I mean large sessions. Or medium anyway. Say 50-60 tracks?

I have Carbon so not worried about tracking, but have been on iMacs forever and was thinking maybe my next Mac should be laptop....although it would have to be able to run my widescreen Samsung monitor, I don't know if they do....no nothing about laptops.

I do use lots of VI's but unlike some I don't try to run 20 at once, I render them so that I'm never using more than a handful at a time.

Thanks for any advice!

Tom
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Old 09-02-2021, 06:37 PM
Sardi Sardi is offline
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Default Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Yes. Easily.

Your iMac is essentially a laptop internally.

What you need to be concerned with is thermal issues with certain Mac laptops. Not an issue with the new M1 based machines, but of course, most software is currently running in emulation as they’re still Intel native.

You shouldn’t have any issue running your ext. screen off a laptop.

iMac, Mac Mini, MacBook Pro… all are capable of what you want to do.


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  #3  
Old 09-02-2021, 07:41 PM
tomhartman tomhartman is offline
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Yeah I see that now....unfortunately though the limitation of 16G Ram is a deal breaker....
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Old 09-02-2021, 08:15 PM
Sardi Sardi is offline
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

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Originally Posted by tomhartman View Post
Yeah I see that now....unfortunately though the limitation of 16G Ram is a deal breaker....

That only pertains to the M1 models. Intel variants can have up to 32GB or 64GB depending on if you’re looking at 13” or 16” models.

Also, the next gen of Apple Silicon laptops are rumoured to either be announced or released this month, probably at the same time or just after the iPhone 13 release. If you’re in no rush, might be wise to hold off and see what gets announced.

Do you require a lot of RAM for sample library playback with your VIs?


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Old 09-02-2021, 08:26 PM
tomhartman tomhartman is offline
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Oh I didn't know new ones were that imminent ....great to hear.

Yes I need the memory for VIs, and actually I "get by" pretty well with just 32g in my iMac, mostly because I as I mentioned I only use several at a time and then Commit and move on to the next batch. Very seldom do I have a huge arrangement in VIs playing back.

So good to know, thanks much!

Tom
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Old 09-03-2021, 12:06 AM
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Go to iPowerResale and get a slightly used MacBook Pro. I recently bought a mid 2018 15" MacBook Pro with a 6-core i9 and 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. It eats Protools for breakfast.
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Old 09-03-2021, 01:30 AM
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

I have used Mac laptops running PT since 2002 or so, you only need to know what you are doing and what kind of workload you expect it to handle. Even this new unsupported M1 laptop can do +100 tracks easily, but because it is memory constrained it is not going to be great experience if your workflow requires "a thousand" virtual instruments instantiated.
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Old 09-03-2021, 02:04 AM
dominicperry dominicperry is online now
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Quote:
Originally Posted by tomhartman View Post
By, "handle" of course, I mean large sessions. Or medium anyway. Say 50-60 tracks?

I have Carbon so not worried about tracking, but have been on iMacs forever and was thinking maybe my next Mac should be laptop....although it would have to be able to run my widescreen Samsung monitor, I don't know if they do....no nothing about laptops.

I do use lots of VI's but unlike some I don't try to run 20 at once, I render them so that I'm never using more than a handful at a time.

Thanks for any advice!

Tom
If you can, you should definitely wait for the new M1 Laptops. They will be announced in the next month or so, but you will pretty much have to order on the day they are announced - the queue will be long, partly due to chip / supply chain shortages, and partly because so many people have been hanging on with old Intel boxes, waiting for the 'proper' full sized M1 laptops to come out.
You should also be sure that you don't need any of the things which are not yet M1 native in PT - which includes things like HDX card enclosures and perhaps some control surfaces. Also video doesn't work well, or at all, for some.

Be careful about the current Intel MBP's - despite some positive reports on this thread, lots of people (including me) find that it's impossible to stop the fans ramping up - lots of things make that happen, but external screens, multiple screens, and heavy sessions (especially at low latency) are all problematic.
As I've pointed out before, there's a 5000+ post thread on MacRumors about '16 inch MBP is a hot mess with external monitor'.

It's for this reason that I ended up with a Mac Pro, even though I wanted something portable - I tried an 16" i9 MBP and an M1 MBA - and I will be in the queue for a new 16" M1 MBP, provided it will run my wide screen and has at least 64GB RAM.

Dominic
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Old 09-03-2021, 02:06 AM
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

Next batch of Apple Silicon most likely have 32GB max, 16GB standard. I would be happy to be wrong, but we are all only playing the guessing game.
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Old 09-03-2021, 02:13 AM
dominicperry dominicperry is online now
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Default Re: Is There A Mac Laptop that Can Handle PT?

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Originally Posted by JFreak View Post
Next batch of Apple Silicon most likely have 32GB max, 16GB standard. I would be happy to be wrong, but we are all only playing the guessing game.
OK, I bet you 10 Finnish Euros that it starts at 8GB!

I'm certainly hoping that they find a way to get SoC with 64GB - plenty of demand for it, and the whole architecture needs to be different for the big RAM numbers - 768GB will not be SoC, but they will need to find a way of pushing the bigger iMac Pro type boxes to more than 32GB.
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