Do you have any insight as to how much this RAM costs? It’s obviously incredibly fast.
They’re not just gluing some $50 sticks from Amazon to their SoC...
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8GB RAM is a disappointment?
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They’re not just gluing some $50 sticks from Amazon to their SoC...
You sound like the woman who was interviewed on the streets of Moscow, the day after Communism fell, complaining that the people in the stores sold goods for more than they paid for them.
The food you eat, the clothes you wear, the car you drive — they all have markups. The cost of a Tesla is not just the cost of aluminum and lithium used to build it. Get over it.
So all this said, if you’re buying your teenage son one of these machines and getting the pro suite for him with Logic Pro and final cut but he’s NEVER used them but is excited to HAVE them and he’s a coding freak kind of kid who is on a robotics team instead of a football team....
8G 256SSD
16 gig 256SSD
or do you go 16/512?
I fully intend most of his use to be playful and creative in nature and also feel that by the time he gets really into these programs he’s going to want a better machine anyway.
8G 256SSD
16 gig 256SSD
or do you go 16/512?
I fully intend most of his use to be playful and creative in nature and also feel that by the time he gets really into these programs he’s going to want a better machine anyway.
Thousands upon thousands of laptop owners will disagree with you. Like I said in my post, I have worked directly with computer manufacturers and also in numerous computer sales shops and I know from first hand experience dealing with customers who wanted to return a 4GB or 8GB laptop within the year of purchase because they thought it was good enough for their needs then something unexpected happened and they needed a laptop with a larger ram capacity.
And yes I know exactly the reason why computer manufacturers sell laptops with low fixed ram sizes because they know customers get it wrong and have to purchase the next best expensive model meaning the company makes more money.
Let's see how it performs before we judge it.
It's worth noting that for many people who are interested in those machines, that they're likely going to be fine with 8GB as they're simply not going to push them enough.
Although having said that - if you're doing anything more than light productivity & content creation (photo editing in Photos, video editing in iMovie, playing Apple Arcade games, watching online video - I'd get 16GB to future proof it.
It's worth noting that for many people who are interested in those machines, that they're likely going to be fine with 8GB as they're simply not going to push them enough.
Although having said that - if you're doing anything more than light productivity & content creation (photo editing in Photos, video editing in iMovie, playing Apple Arcade games, watching online video - I'd get 16GB to future proof it.
I have a 2017" rMBP with 2 Thunderbolt ports. My machine is the base 2.3GHz Dual Core i5 with 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD. I currently have Photoshop, Preview, Mail, Messages, Safari (four tabs) Music, RDP, WhatsApp and FB messenger open. Switching apps is responsive, as is opening a new tab in Safari and rendering a web page. I think nowadays with the speed of flash storage, paging to disk, whilst not as fast as physical RAM is still plenty fast enough.
Your mileage may vary of course and I'm not saying 8GB is enough for everyone in my experience and use case, 8GB is enough.
Your mileage may vary of course and I'm not saying 8GB is enough for everyone in my experience and use case, 8GB is enough.
This benchmark method is quite stupid.
He clearly states that he was doing the benchmarks while Chrome was running with several tabs open.
Of course he was doing that to keep memory loaded. But doing CPU performance tests while Chrome is running in the background is bonkers.
Chrome is causing constant CPU load that falsifies the benchmark results.
Besides of this: I never said that you can‘t have any benefits from having more RAM (under special conditions). But you won‘t notice it with „normal use“. 8GB are perfectly fine for regular users.
even if you swapped to the 3.3g ssd on the m1 macs it would be almost impossible to notice the difference. in this case , and many many others.
That’s nice. But it isn’t a strawman because it is exactly the argument you were using. Apple is under no obligation to give customers memory at cost just because you think it would be nice. As a profit-making company, they’re entitled to charge whatever the market will bear.
You're certainly welcome to disagree.
Over the thirty+ years I've been in the industry, the many folks I've worked with who had an unexpected change in needs driving the new computer purchase were addressing limitations other than RAM.
In mine. I have 16GB in my 2009 private iMac and more in all other computers.
It brings headroom and longevity, apart from various specific use cases.
The prices Apple charges for getting RAM and storage to levels that gives some margin for future use is getting a lot of ridicule. Deservedly.
Shipping systems with bare minimum configurations is a bit disappointing from a brand with "premium" aspirations. Charging silly money for upgrades adds insult to injury.
I am actively using the memory according to iStats. I use about 12 with a VM running. I use a multi-monitor setup as well.
the problem is your one of the very few. the target for this line up is not power users. wait for the higher end config's. bare minimum configs are plenty for many many folks.
Well I am technically using the memory on these systems too. macOS and Windows 10 will use more memory the more you have. Doesn't mean if my system is using 50GB of 128 GB that I need 50GB+. It just won't use up as much on 16GB of RAM. Unused RAM is wasted RAM, which is why the more RAM you have, the more the OS and apps will use.
It's not. Go back to my original post, which I gather you merely skimmed before replying, observe the context in which I brought up the memory upgrade markup, which was reframing the 8GB "discount" as an illusion created by a price gap that doesn't reflect a cost gap. Dispute the conclusion I was making with that observation if you want. Mischaracterizing my observation as "this guy doesn't know what margin is" leaves the argument the observation was used to support unanswered. If you disagree, I can't help that. Either my argument was too muddy or you're reading too many posts at once, and then leaping to defend your misreading by telling me what I said.
You're partially right, but for example: a lot of people like to multitask, and have multiple things going on at once, and that's where the RAM limitations show.
Also, just because 8GB is "good enough" now, doesn't mean that it will be good enough in the future.
I'm skeptical of this claim, but I'll eat my words if I have to once these Macs reach their buyers.
I HIGHLY doubt that the MacMini will out perform his 5700XT will outperform his the M1 GPU by an order of magnitude. The 8 core i7 is likely stronger than the M1 too, according to leaked benchmarks. Outside of causing where hardware acceleration will give the M1 an edge, his iMac is still more powerful. Apple did not replace the iMac to M1 for a reason.
A lot of people here are judging the entry 8GB for running multiple VMs and analyzing huge sets of data. These are entry devices for consumer level. Most people get by a browser, an office suite, and a media player. 4GB can do that, I know I have a 2014 Mac Mini.
Also many people are claiming you need 16GB to open 30 tabs or so, I am not proud of it but I currently have a number of tabs you didn't think Safari was programmed to reach at 8GB. Guess what? I have another browsers sometimes open with more tabs in them. My macbook runs smooth.
Also many people are claiming you need 16GB to open 30 tabs or so, I am not proud of it but I currently have a number of tabs you didn't think Safari was programmed to reach at 8GB. Guess what? I have another browsers sometimes open with more tabs in them. My macbook runs smooth.
Wow there are a lot of ridiculous comments in this thread. Apple's memory architecture has essentially nothing to do with how much memory a particular user needs. There is no magic silver bullet in the M1 or any other ARM architecture that means it needs less memory for user workflows (outside very specific ones that normal user software simply doesn't run in to).
The RAM they are using isn't some magic RAM either - it's standardised RAM chips. Yes, they have shortened some communication pathways by sticking it on the same package, but ultimately that's a design choice more than anything else - there's little technical reason why they couldn't allow for upgradeable packaged RAM here (even if doing so meant a small performance downtick - and make no mistake, it would be small).
In 2020 8GB is barely enough to keep a performant machine running MacOS for anything but the most basic users who are running a single task at once. That's surprisingly few people these days. Clearly nobody has been watching just how resource-heavy the modern web has become - the whole "oh i'm just running a web browser" thing is nonsense - web browsers are incredibly resource heavy, as are all the modern JavaScript-based apps via electron and the like. A very large number of users will be running at least one of these - Skype, Facebook Messenger etc.
Let's not also forget the increasingly large set of background tasks that occur - search indexing, photo indexing, caching, metrics publishing, unattended updates etc. You only have to look at the trends, which are higher resolution graphics, more client-side processing on web properties etc to realise that 8GB with no upgrade path puts limitations on the machine even for basic users.
And it's not just that - these machines should be allowed to have a life beyond their original owner or their original purpose. For all the 'eco friendliness' Apple tries to convey, limiting their machines in this way is one of the most environmentally damaging things they can do. The used market for macs turned into a hellhole after 2013, and it's still common to see 2012 maxed out fat unibodies sold in preference to limited Retina MBPs.
The RAM they are using isn't some magic RAM either - it's standardised RAM chips. Yes, they have shortened some communication pathways by sticking it on the same package, but ultimately that's a design choice more than anything else - there's little technical reason why they couldn't allow for upgradeable packaged RAM here (even if doing so meant a small performance downtick - and make no mistake, it would be small).
In 2020 8GB is barely enough to keep a performant machine running MacOS for anything but the most basic users who are running a single task at once. That's surprisingly few people these days. Clearly nobody has been watching just how resource-heavy the modern web has become - the whole "oh i'm just running a web browser" thing is nonsense - web browsers are incredibly resource heavy, as are all the modern JavaScript-based apps via electron and the like. A very large number of users will be running at least one of these - Skype, Facebook Messenger etc.
Let's not also forget the increasingly large set of background tasks that occur - search indexing, photo indexing, caching, metrics publishing, unattended updates etc. You only have to look at the trends, which are higher resolution graphics, more client-side processing on web properties etc to realise that 8GB with no upgrade path puts limitations on the machine even for basic users.
And it's not just that - these machines should be allowed to have a life beyond their original owner or their original purpose. For all the 'eco friendliness' Apple tries to convey, limiting their machines in this way is one of the most environmentally damaging things they can do. The used market for macs turned into a hellhole after 2013, and it's still common to see 2012 maxed out fat unibodies sold in preference to limited Retina MBPs.
Here is Grubs take on the ram:
The way I read it, they took the iPhone/iPad thinking into designing these Mac chips. Of course OSX is a different beast.
iOS can compress data in RAM very well and that is the reason why they still run well on 2gb ram and 4gb ram devices even today.
If you can compress data in RAM and have the compute power to fetch it, uncompress it since the chip is so fast, you will need less RAM.
The design also reduces duplicate data on the ram which means you will need less of it.
RAM is RAM is RAM. Everyone will need more of it, but I would not be surprised of 16gb ram in M1 is =~ 32gb on intel.
I think 8gb to 16gb is plenty enough for the average user using M1.
Of course the PRO people that need 64gb ram, wait for your turn next year.
The way I read it, they took the iPhone/iPad thinking into designing these Mac chips. Of course OSX is a different beast.
iOS can compress data in RAM very well and that is the reason why they still run well on 2gb ram and 4gb ram devices even today.
If you can compress data in RAM and have the compute power to fetch it, uncompress it since the chip is so fast, you will need less RAM.
The design also reduces duplicate data on the ram which means you will need less of it.
RAM is RAM is RAM. Everyone will need more of it, but I would not be surprised of 16gb ram in M1 is =~ 32gb on intel.
I think 8gb to 16gb is plenty enough for the average user using M1.
Of course the PRO people that need 64gb ram, wait for your turn next year.
There's an old joke that goes along the lines of:
"How much RAM do you need?"
"Twice as much as you have!"
Which, others in this forum have put into perspective for me at least: these are Apple's low-end chips, all of which replace models that had 8-16GB of RAM available anyway, so it's no biggie for now. If you need more, then wait for the next round of M chips.
"How much RAM do you need?"
"Twice as much as you have!"
Which, others in this forum have put into perspective for me at least: these are Apple's low-end chips, all of which replace models that had 8-16GB of RAM available anyway, so it's no biggie for now. If you need more, then wait for the next round of M chips.
Lol what???
Currently on a late-2015 5k iMac with 8GB of RAM, I have 3 Safari windows with a combined 16 tabs, 1 Chrome window with 7 tabs, 3 pages documents, listening to the podcast app, with an iMessage convo open, with FCP running in the background. The idea that your average Joe can't browse the web on 8GB of RAM is ridiculous
The Macbook Air is the best selling laptop this year and most people got the 8gb ram model. They expect those machines to last them 5 years. They will probably be complaining more about their SSDs filling up rather than the RAM. As an "average user", I always find myself managing my disk space more than my "RAM space" because it is not like a maxed out ram will stop me from working.
There are many many many creations in this world that were created on 8gb ram and less.
I think we will be surprised by the M1 with 8GB of low latency ram and a fast SSD - probably going to be able to edit 4K easily on the fly - it will just be a matter of waiting longer for the export (than say a fan equipped MBP or something with better discrete GPUs). The one area Memory is a must is for gaming at certain resolutions - but in this case, you can play at lower rez (prob max 900P on an 8GB M1) and lower framerate.