What are your thoughts on this? I myself don't see much slow down compare to the M1 on the tasks those machines are supposed to run.
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A Photographer Take on the Base M2 Macbook
- Thread starter Larabee119
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There's definitely something fishy going on, whether intentional or unintentional...
-the 256GB model is actually doing it faster than the 512
-Lightroom is only using 4.7GB RAM, when mine can use 19GB (I have 24gb model)
I'd guess there's something special about Nikon RAW that isn't very memory intensive.
I use Sony files, Max Tech also uses Sony files. And Sony is currently the dominant camera brand.
The test system only has 8GB onboard. So naturally, Lightroom will use less RAM on that machine than it does on your machine. You've got more, so it will use more.
How's your experience with the 24GB M2 MBA in terms of performance vs your old machine?
Is it noticable in Lightroom and other apps?
My 16GB/1TB M1 Macbook Air gets bogged down when I have lots of apps and browser tabs (hundreds) open. I'm thinking of upgrading, but the primary reason is to get 24GB of RAM to alleviate the pressure and also some slightly better performance.
Thanks!
yes, but the thing is, his 8gb MBPs are crunching out those images the same speed as mine
in fact his 16GB MacMini is running almost 2x as fast as my own test at 1.2 images per second, where as im getting 0.7 images per second.
I suspect Max Tech is using uncompressed RAW files, since Sony didn’t have lossless compressed until recently. Where as the OP video is running compressed RAW files which would be about half the size, and that can make a large difference. The larger uncompressed files would be more memory intensive but less performance intensive, where as the smaller compressed files would be just the opposite, playing straight into an 8gb M2 machine’s advantage.
my previous MBP was 2018 quad core 13”, so almost same chassis but much faster (I have the MBP not air). I sold it before I bought the M2 so no first hand comparison but theoretically it’s like at least 3x as fast.
I don’t tend to open lots of apps or tabs though, the most I open is like 5 and I use Safari on my Macs most of the time.
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I’d contest that Sony is the dominant camera brand. Mirrorless it’s almost certainly the case, but overall? Certainly not within professional realm yet at least.
Also, obviously the size of the files is the relevant thing, I don’t think there are differences in how the raw files are handled catagorised by manufacturer, other than the actual size of them. So I don’t think there is something special about Nikon files.
This guy is an actual professional photographer though, unlike max tech, and I’m unsure about yourself - and he does use real workflows.
It's really quite simple and this applies to literally any computer.
No digital artist or photographer (unless you are an entry level artists using a less demanding app or do photo editing once or twice a month at most) should consider 8GB RAM in any computer. I have a 16GB M1-Pro and even my modest Photoshop work puts memory pressure in yellow. Panoramic stitching with adjustment layers in PS can get laggy on only 16GB RAM; I can't imagine how bad of an experience that would be on 8GB.
No one who deals with big files, or is regularly exporting a lot of files from their apps, should consider only using a tiny 256GB internal drive; put your project files on an external drive so you can keep around 100Gb free for swap and scratch disk.
If you can't afford 16GB RAM right now, wait until you can, or just accept that you will sometimes experience lag or the beachball.
No digital artist or photographer (unless you are an entry level artists using a less demanding app or do photo editing once or twice a month at most) should consider 8GB RAM in any computer. I have a 16GB M1-Pro and even my modest Photoshop work puts memory pressure in yellow. Panoramic stitching with adjustment layers in PS can get laggy on only 16GB RAM; I can't imagine how bad of an experience that would be on 8GB.
No one who deals with big files, or is regularly exporting a lot of files from their apps, should consider only using a tiny 256GB internal drive; put your project files on an external drive so you can keep around 100Gb free for swap and scratch disk.
If you can't afford 16GB RAM right now, wait until you can, or just accept that you will sometimes experience lag or the beachball.
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Just as an aside: Canon pretty much dominates the market.
Sony is the dominant for full frame mirrorless, which is what really matters in this case. Doesn't matter how many Rebels and M5s Canon sells, those aren't even used to shoot RAW.
Doesn't matter what you think, the fact is there's significant differences in memory usage and how fast he's exporting.
You don't need to be a professional photographer to export a bunch of photos in Lightroom to see how long it takes, but yes I am.
He tested it with a brand new machine, untouched, nvme is filled with only the test files. I’ve seen similar results on my test M2 too. Both 256gb and 512gb is really close to each other.
I am using Canon compressed lossless raw on Lightroom classic with hardware acceleration fully enabled. Not sure if Max has this feature enabled on the 8GB model?
Lightroom will eat as much RAM as it’s allowed to, so if you buy a 8GB model and test it out, you will see the memory usage in the realm of 4 to 5GB. Really. It’s not that bad if the bottleneck is not in the storage. Most of his workflow stress the cpu and gpu a lot, leaving the nvme mostly untouched. Therefore, the results between those 2 models are the same.
And about dominant camera, here is the camera market share 2006 to 2021
What a load of nonsense. Almost the entire pro market is still based on dslr. Most of those will continue on to mirrorless in X years time using their chosen vendor. That’s Canon or Nikon my friend.
Just Because Sony dominates the Mirrorless consumer market means almost nothing in testing a pro level workflow at this time.
There are plenty of pro photographers that use Sony, but they’re nowhere near top of the pile in this market at the moment.
I don’t ‘think’ anything. A raw file of X mb is what it is. The company who’s camera creates the file is of no consequence when using a general purpose editing suit like LR or C1.
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I know. Certainly professionally this is not going to challenged particularly soon.