14” M2 Pro 16gb vs 14” M1 Max 64GB

[erkanasu]

Hi guys, I was able to get a 14” M2 Pro 16gb 1TB for $2k and also a 14” M1 Max 64GB 2TB for $2.5k.

My workflow - product manager and executive - tons of tabs, office, slack, music, and star craft 2 lol.

I got the pro because I work outside a lot and use the app vivid to get more screen brightness.

Battery life is important.

Which machine do you think I’ll be more happy with?

 

[killawat]

You'll run outta ram, swapping to disk more often with the 16gb model before you run out of CPU on the M1 Max. More storage too? I'd stick with the M1.

 

[erkanasu]

thanks,

How much worse will battery life be on the max?

I think that’s the last consideration here

 

[ignatius345]

I was able to get a 14” M2 Pro 16gb 1TB for $2k and also a 14” M1 Max 64GB 2TB for $2.5k

I feel like double RAM and double SSD space is going to count for more than the bump in chip spec?

 

[ilikewhey]

thanks,

How much worse will battery life be on the max?

I think that’s the last consideration here

glad that you were able to get that deal from b&h!

so for context:
i have the same m1 max 64gb 2tb 14inch as you, except i paid around 4k for it when it was first released 🤣

and also a work issued m2 pro 32gb m2 14inch(previously they issued me a base m2 before i start complaining about ram)

i know a m2 pro is not a direct comparison to a m1 max, but it should be close,

battery wise:
the m2 pro has a longer battery, lets say if i get around 10 hours on the m1 max, same usage wise the m2 pro would get maybe 14. if same workload applied to a m2 max, i would say maybe 12 hours.

the usage on both would be around 40 tabs on chrome, blender running on and off, and some other bs apps like MS office, whatsapp, disc, adobe suites. this makes sense since m2 has more efficiency cores than m1.

i'm perfectly happy with 10 hours consider none of my previous intel mac could come close to it. but if you come from a m1 or m2 macbook air then ok you might notice the shorter battery life.

performance wise:
its like comparing light speed vs faster than light speed, the apple silicon is so fast it will smash any every day productivity software you throw at, minus maybe AI training and complex computational work that you need a RTX 4090 or Quadro. the m2 is perhaps 10-14% faster than the m1 max in single core, but multicore the max is still faster. so you gotta ask yourself if you really want to pay thousands of dollars to get that 10-14% performance in single core.

in your given situation between a m2 pro with 16gb, or a m1 max with 64gb? it depends on your workflow and what you trying to do, memory swap is not as seamless as these diehard apple fanboys describes. even though apple uses fast SSD in their macs, you will still notice the performance drop when the infamous beachball pops up and apps and programs start glitching up.

side note:
i also replicated my workflow on my gaming rig with 64gb of ram for a week when my mac was in the shop, and one interesting thing i noticed is mac os gobbles up ram alot more than windows, i was maybe averaging 30gb of ram while my mac took up 50gb, macos definitely will put your ram to use if you have it.

edit: just saw your workflow "product manager and executive - tons of tabs, office, slack, music, and star craft 2 lol."

thats very similar to mine, i'm a operation lead, i have around 60 tabs open(10 personal), slack, office, teams, zoom. you absolutely need alot of ram, 16gb of ram is not going to cut it. you can certainly try but you will most likely run into memory swap, and that will shorten your battery since its taxing the cpu to move stuff around.

 

[erkanasu]

Thanks so much guys

Incredibly helpful

 

[erkanasu]

glad that you were able to get that deal from b&h!

so for context:
i have the same m1 max 64gb 2tb 14inch as you, except i paid around 4k for it when it was first released 🤣

and also a work issued m2 pro 32gb m2 14inch(previously they issued me a base m2 before i start complaining about ram)

i know a m2 pro is not a direct comparison to a m1 max, but it should be close,

battery wise:
the m2 pro has a longer battery, lets say if i get around 10 hours on the m1 max, same usage wise the m2 pro would get maybe 14. if same workload applied to a m2 max, i would say maybe 12 hours.

the usage on both would be around 40 tabs on chrome, blender running on and off, and some other bs apps like MS office, whatsapp, disc, adobe suites. this makes sense since m2 has more efficiency cores than m1.

i'm perfectly happy with 10 hours consider none of my previous intel mac could come close to it. but if you come from a m1 or m2 macbook air then ok you might notice the shorter battery life.

performance wise:
its like comparing light speed vs faster than light speed, the apple silicon is so fast it will smash any every day productivity software you throw at, minus maybe AI training and complex computational work that you need a RTX 4090 or Quadro. the m2 is perhaps 10-14% faster than the m1 max in single core, but multicore the max is still faster. so you gotta ask yourself if you really want to pay thousands of dollars to get that 10-14% performance in single core.

in your given situation between a m2 pro with 16gb, or a m1 max with 64gb? it depends on your workflow and what you trying to do, memory swap is not as seamless as these diehard apple fanboys describes. even though apple uses fast SSD in their macs, you will still notice the performance drop when the infamous beachball pops up and apps and programs start glitching up.

side note:
i also replicated my workflow on my gaming rig with 64gb of ram for a week when my mac was in the shop, and one interesting thing i noticed is mac os gobbles up ram alot more than windows, i was maybe averaging 30gb of ram while my mac took up 50gb, macos definitely will put your ram to use if you have it.

edit: just saw your workflow "product manager and executive - tons of tabs, office, slack, music, and star craft 2 lol."

thats very similar to mine, i'm a operation lead, i have around 60 tabs open(10 personal), slack, office, teams, zoom. you absolutely need alot of ram, 16gb of ram is not going to cut it. you can certainly try but you will most likely run into memory swap, and that will shorten your battery since its taxing the cpu to move stuff around.

So you think 40% loss in battery life is worth the ram performance improvements?

 

[erkanasu]

glad that you were able to get that deal from b&h!

so for context:
i have the same m1 max 64gb 2tb 14inch as you, except i paid around 4k for it when it was first released 🤣

and also a work issued m2 pro 32gb m2 14inch(previously they issued me a base m2 before i start complaining about ram)

i know a m2 pro is not a direct comparison to a m1 max, but it should be close,

battery wise:
the m2 pro has a longer battery, lets say if i get around 10 hours on the m1 max, same usage wise the m2 pro would get maybe 14. if same workload applied to a m2 max, i would say maybe 12 hours.

the usage on both would be around 40 tabs on chrome, blender running on and off, and some other bs apps like MS office, whatsapp, disc, adobe suites. this makes sense since m2 has more efficiency cores than m1.

i'm perfectly happy with 10 hours consider none of my previous intel mac could come close to it. but if you come from a m1 or m2 macbook air then ok you might notice the shorter battery life.

performance wise:
its like comparing light speed vs faster than light speed, the apple silicon is so fast it will smash any every day productivity software you throw at, minus maybe AI training and complex computational work that you need a RTX 4090 or Quadro. the m2 is perhaps 10-14% faster than the m1 max in single core, but multicore the max is still faster. so you gotta ask yourself if you really want to pay thousands of dollars to get that 10-14% performance in single core.

in your given situation between a m2 pro with 16gb, or a m1 max with 64gb? it depends on your workflow and what you trying to do, memory swap is not as seamless as these diehard apple fanboys describes. even though apple uses fast SSD in their macs, you will still notice the performance drop when the infamous beachball pops up and apps and programs start glitching up.

side note:
i also replicated my workflow on my gaming rig with 64gb of ram for a week when my mac was in the shop, and one interesting thing i noticed is mac os gobbles up ram alot more than windows, i was maybe averaging 30gb of ram while my mac took up 50gb, macos definitely will put your ram to use if you have it.

edit: just saw your workflow "product manager and executive - tons of tabs, office, slack, music, and star craft 2 lol."

thats very similar to mine, i'm a operation lead, i have around 60 tabs open(10 personal), slack, office, teams, zoom. you absolutely need alot of ram, 16gb of ram is not going to cut it. you can certainly try but you will most likely run into memory swap, and that will shorten your battery since its taxing the cpu to move stuff around.

Also, does zipping around the os feel faster with m2 pro or same as M1 Max ?

 

[ilikewhey]

So you think 40% loss in battery life is worth the ram performance improvements?

apology if i give you the impression is about 40%, i just realized my simple illustration on the math by using 10 hours as a base creates a false narrative when percentage is applied.

let me rephrase myself, and again this is my anecdotal, i feel the m2 pro has about 2-3 hours longer battery than the m1 max in a worse case scenario that is with gpu being tasked and everything, however if you are doing mundane task, the hour difference isn't so drastic. i would say about 1-2 hours difference.


edit:
remember you are comparing the most battery efficient processor in the m2 pro/max lineup to the least efficient processor in the m1 pro/max lineup.

the m1 max in my experience can easily last 10+ hours, at the end of the work day i still have about 20-30 % left on the m1 max. for me, i wouldn't trade 2 hours of battery life and go from 64gb to 16gb, that will absolutely destroy my workflow.

 

[ilikewhey]

Also, does zipping around the os feel faster with m2 pro or same as M1 Max ?

lol no, its about the same, you be hard pressed to see that 10% difference with mundane tasks, it is however a tad faster in blender work for me. like i said before the m1 is already plenty fast.

 

[erkanasu]

apology if i give you the impression is about 40%, i just realized my simple illustration on the math by using 10 hours as a base creates a false narrative when percentage is applied.

let me rephrase myself, and again this is my anecdotal, i feel the m2 pro has about 2-3 hours longer battery than the m1 max in a worse case scenario that is with gpu being tasked and everything, however if you are doing mundane task, the hour difference isn't so drastic. i would say about 1-2 hours difference.


edit:
remember you are comparing the most battery efficient processor in the m2 pro/max lineup to the least efficient processor in the m1 pro/max lineup.

the m1 max in my experience can easily last 10+ hours, at the end of the work day i still have about 20-30 % left on the m1 max. for me, i wouldn't trade 2 hours of battery life and go from 64gb to 16gb, that will absolutely destroy my workflow.

thanks brother

 

[okkibs]

I'd take that M1 any day - though keep in mind display response times are worse on the M1 model. This isn't often talked about, but the M1 display panel is rather slow, and so it cannot actually make use of the 120Hz ProMotion feature. It is by no means an essential feature and you might never notice the difference in the first place. And you will not get the gaming framerates either, if you can get a constant 60fps that would already be very decent for a Macbook.

But on the off-chance that 120Hz is essential for you, you should take the M2 model. The M1 model has a lot of ghosting/smearing with quick movements. Nothing you'd notice when watching movies or doing office work though.

Once you increase display brightness to XDR levels, expect very bad battery life. You should bring a powerbank, a medium sized one will allow nearly one full charge on the 14", meaning you'll double the 3-6 hours on XDR mode to 6-12. I have one of these Macs with Vivid and it decreases the battery life significantly.

And the M2 model won't help you with battery life there, the display uses just as much power there.

 

[erkanasu]

I'd take that M1 any day - though keep in mind display response times are worse on the M1 model. This isn't often talked about, but the M1 display panel is rather slow, and so it cannot actually make use of the 120Hz ProMotion feature. It is by no means an essential feature and you might never notice the difference in the first place. And you will not get the gaming framerates either, if you can get a constant 60fps that would already be very decent for a Macbook.

But on the off-chance that 120Hz is essential for you, you should take the M2 model. The M1 model has a lot of ghosting/smearing with quick movements. Nothing you'd notice when watching movies or doing office work though.

Once you increase display brightness to XDR levels, expect very bad battery life. You should bring a powerbank, a medium sized one will allow nearly one full charge on the 14", meaning you'll double the 3-6 hours on XDR mode to 6-12. I have one of these Macs with Vivid and it decreases the battery life significantly.

And the M2 model won't help you with battery life there, the display uses just as much power there.

Interesting! I have not heard this before re display being worse

Thanks for detailed response man

 

[erkanasu]

so crazy enough, I got the M1 Max 14", and compared to the M1 Pro 14" I was playing with recently, and my m1 Max 16", this particilar screen seems to bother my eyes.

nothing really 'wrong' with it, but something about it feels harsh, almost like a flicker that's not immediately, obvious but is happening, causing eye strain. I'm tempted to mail it back to BH, but I'm afraid they might reject it since their return policy sucks. Any advice or thoughts?

 

[getheo]

display response times are worse on the M1 model. This isn't often talked about, but the M1 display panel is rather slow, and so it cannot actually make use of the 120Hz ProMotion feature.

But on the off-chance that 120Hz is essential for you, you should take the M2 model. The M1 model has a lot of ghosting/smearing with quick movements.

Could you please elaborate more about this issue? Do you have any articles about this?

 

[okkibs]

Any advice or thoughts?

There is nothing about the display's specs that should be so different from one model to another that this particular device causes eye strain. Either all 14" should cause eye strain for you, or none. But that doesn't mean that there isn't some difference I don't know about. Obviously return it, you can just tell them that the PWM flickering bothers you. All 14" are known to have PWM flickering that can be intolerable for some people that are sensitive to that. And I would not order again from anywhere that doesn't allow for a hassle-free return.

Could you please elaborate more about this issue? Do you have any articles about this?

You can just google it, or even the forum search will show a couple threads: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/16-macbook-pro-ghosting-smearing.2212842/ This is for the 16", but if I recall correctly the M1 14" is even worse than the M1 16". Don't know how it is for the M2 models, but the panels are somewhat improved.

 

[erkanasu]

There is nothing about the display's specs that should be so different from one model to another that this particular device causes eye strain. Either all 14" should cause eye strain for you, or none. But that doesn't mean that there isn't some difference I don't know about. Obviously return it, you can just tell them that the PWM flickering bothers you. All 14" are known to have PWM flickering that can be intolerable for some people that are sensitive to that. And I would not order again from anywhere that doesn't allow for a hassle-free return.


You can just google it, or even the forum search will show a couple threads: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/16-macbook-pro-ghosting-smearing.2212842/ This is for the 16", but if I recall correctly the M1 14" is even worse than the M1 16". Don't know how it is for the M2 models, but the panels are somewhat improved.

thanks bro,

B&H just sent me the RMA - looks like I got lucky and hopefully no hassle once they get machine.

 

[erkanasu]

just got open box M1 Pro at Best Buy (1TB/16GB) for $1600. no issue with the screen! I'm happy and ready to move on and enjoy this device