New Mac advice - M3? M2? Studio? MacBook Pro...?

[smurfyou]

I don't think Ultra is necessary unless you need the max RAM.

Honestly if budget is any issue an Apple refurbished M1 Studio is the best for price/performance. I went with an M2 Studio just for the financing but M1 would have been fine judging by my experience with the laptop.

External drives are fine for libraries or sessions. Or slap it all on the internal. It's kind of your preference. Yes everyone says the internal drive is super fast but how much that actually matters is subjective. I prefer the organization and record keeping of external drives.

[JFreak]

Ultra only adds more GPU, really. Avid figuring out how to use it for plugin processing would be a game changer, but don't hold your breath.

[EGS]

Originally Posted by JFreak

Ultra only adds more GPU, really. Avid figuring out how to use it for plugin processing would be a game changer, but don't hold your breath.

Right? Check out a company called GPU Audio.

[innerbooty]

Hmm, yeah, I was thinking of doing the financing to spread the pain out over a year. But honestly, I'm prepared to fork out what I need to, since I haven't bought a new Mac in so long. I just want to make the most strategic move, optimize my setup, and get many years out of it. Doesn't need to be the cheapest option.

Is 64GB RAM good for future proofing, when it comes to loading a bunch of VIs and Kontakt instruments? Especially knowing there will be no RAM upgrade available, I want to get that part right! I'm not doing movie scores, but I want to have room to spare with RAM.

Also, re: the M1 Studio, weren't there fan noise issues?

Originally Posted by smurfyou

I don't think Ultra is necessary unless you need the max RAM.

Honestly if budget is any issue an Apple refurbished M1 Studio is the best for price/performance. I went with an M2 Studio just for the financing but M1 would have been fine judging by my experience with the laptop.

External drives are fine for libraries or sessions. Or slap it all on the internal. It's kind of your preference. Yes everyone says the internal drive is super fast but how much that actually matters is subjective. I prefer the organization and record keeping of external drives.

[EGS]

Originally Posted by innerbooty

Hmm, yeah, I was thinking of doing the financing to spread the pain out over a year. But honestly, I'm prepared to fork out what I need to, since I haven't bought a new Mac in so long. I just want to make the most strategic move, optimize my setup, and get many years out of it. Doesn't need to be the cheapest option.

Is 64GB RAM good for future proofing, when it comes to loading a bunch of VIs and Kontakt instruments? Especially knowing there will be no RAM upgrade available, I want to get that part right! I'm not doing movie scores, but I want to have room to spare with RAM.

Also, re: the M1 Studio, weren't there fan noise issues?

64GB ram good for future proofing

[Obsidian Dragon]

Originally Posted by innerbooty

Also, re: the M1 Studio, weren't there fan noise issues?

There were initial reports of a high-pitched whine from the fans on some of the M1 Max Studios (but no fan noise reports on the M1 Ultra Studio with the more robust cooling system). This seems to have been on the initials shipment as we have not heard complaints about this since. Since Apple provides a generous return period, test your new purchase to determine if you have any fan noise issues. I got the M1 Max Studio and have not had any fan noise issues.

I have 64GB of RAM and have never run into any issues. I do use some VIs with sample libraries but maybe not as heavy as some others doing sound for picture or orchestral scores. With the current technology where data can be streamed so quickly from the Solid State Drives, many sample libraries can be streamed directly from the drives and buffered in RAM rather than needing to preload the entire sample data into RAM. Again, you'll need to test this performance for yourself with your VIs and sample libraries. Be sure to update all you VI software and sample libraries to ensure compatibility and that they work with Apple Silicon processors and newer macOS versions.

[digiot]

Originally Posted by JFreak

Ultra only adds more GPU, really. Avid figuring out how to use it for plugin processing would be a game changer, but don't hold your breath.

the Ultra doubles the CPU count over Max! Probably over kill regardless.

[dominicperry]

Ultra adds more CPU, more GPU and more max memory. Apart from that, they're exactly the same.

Dominic

oh, and more neural engines, whatever they are.

[innerbooty]

This is all really helpful. Probably still leaning towards an M2 Studio Max w/ 64GB RAM and 2TB internal. Hoping that should keep me out of trouble for a while, hoping at least 8-10 years! More? Half wondering if I should wait for the M3 Studio to come out to get a cheaper M2 at that point. But that seems kind of silly. Could end up waiting forever looking for the "perfect" time to buy

[innerbooty]

Chiming back in simply to say that other posts in the Pro Tools forum now have me questioning whether I even want to take the risk of upgrading to an M1/M2 Mac at this point. Folks describing issues with glitchy graphics, ongoing MIDI and VI issues, and continuing problems with ADC. I wonder if I'll be stepping into a nightmare with a super fast new Mac that is full of problems?? I can't afford to have that happen... Maybe I'm better off just getting a faster cheesegrater for now, staying the course until things are more stable. Or will they ever really be stable? Or are the problems I'm reading about in the Pro Tools forum just outliers? Not sure...