Anyone cross-shopping 16" m1 Pro MBP with Mac Studio Max?

[T Coma]

It's time to pull the trigger on the replacement for my indefatigable but increasingly limited 2011 iMac. I'm looking ahead and buying perhaps more than I need today in order to promote another long-term ownership of heavy consumer use, with a budding video editing hobby. I did my homework, and in lieu of a more substantial iMac, I came down to either a 16" M1 Pro MBP in standard 10/16/16/1TB form, and the standard 10/24/32/512 Studio. The price at my reseller of choice is $2449 for the MBP and $1949 for the Studio (both include a 4 year warranty, or 5 with drop/spill protection for $99).

Sure everyone has their own particular situation which is "unique," but probably still similar to others. Just curious if you've cross-shopped these two and how you decided on what you got. I've done a ridiculous amount of pros/cons to the point of "paralysis by analysis," and just ordered the MBP before this current sale ends to get something rolling. I should have it by Monday.

FWIW, I don't have any of the accessories necessary to make the Studio as functional as the MBP (camera, speakers, keyboard, touchpad, monitor) so I can't fairly compare purchase price without adding those, and at a similar quality. I think the only accessory I'd need to add to the MBP is a hub for USB A and ethernet (screen size notwithstanding).

 

[southerndoc]

Purchased a Mac Studio M1 Max/64GB/2TB from B&H. Got it the next day. VERY happy with it. It does have the whine that people have complained about, but it is barely noticeable. I have to put my ear next to it. Granted I have some minor hearing loss from working years on a helicopter. You can hear the fan when my AC isn't on. Plan to mount it under my desk so I probably won't even hear it at all.

It's super fast.

 

[tripleburst]

As an owner of of both. With the difference being my MBP is 14" and the studio has 1tb, I agree with your choice of the macbook. The M1Pro is very capable of video editing even with just 16gb. Not sure which editor you're using, but DaVinci Resolve is getting better and better with each update and more optimized for Apple Silicon. That $500 difference will not get you a monitor as good as the one on the macbook. You got evertyhing you need to get going.

 

[BeatCrazy]

I have both, and they're both the very baseline configs, i.e. $1999 and $2499 USD.

The MacBook Pro is probably the better 'value'. Although I got the Studio first, in hindsight I would have been OK with the MacBook Pro + a dock. But at the time I didn't feel like paying for a screen (MacBook Pro) that was not going to get a lot of use.

As time when on, I realized I didn't want to sit at my desk any more than absolutely required, so the 16 MacBook Pro brings me most of the functionality of the Studio, with a great screen, and is wonderful to use on the couch.

 

[Basic75]

For the MacBook I would have gotten more RAM to make it last longer. As I just showed on a different thread, I have 20GB of RAM filled just with office applications on my 64GB M1 Max, no heavy multimedia applications, no virtual machines. (And before somebody pipes up about the cached files, I know about them, those are another separate 40GB.)

 

[nhk]

It's time to pull the trigger on the replacement for my indefatigable but increasingly limited 2011 iMac. I'm looking ahead and buying perhaps more than I need today in order to promote another long-term ownership of heavy consumer use, with a budding video editing hobby. I did my homework, and in lieu of a more substantial iMac, I came down to either a 16" M1 Pro MBP in standard 10/16/16/1TB form, and the standard 10/24/32/512 Studio. The price at my reseller of choice is $2449 for the MBP and $1949 for the Studio (both include a 4 year warranty, or 5 with drop/spill protection for $99).

Sure everyone has their own particular situation which is "unique," but probably still similar to others. Just curious if you've cross-shopped these two and how you decided on what you got. I've done a ridiculous amount of pros/cons to the point of "paralysis by analysis," and just ordered the MBP before this current sale ends to get something rolling. I should have it by Monday.

FWIW, I don't have any of the accessories necessary to make the Studio as functional as the MBP (camera, speakers, keyboard, touchpad, monitor) so I can't fairly compare purchase price without adding those, and at a similar quality. I think the only accessory I'd need to add to the MBP is a hub for USB A and ethernet (screen size notwithstanding).

I replaced my trusty 2012 iMac 21 inch (i7 with 16GB) with a 16 in M1 Pro with 32 GB mated to a Studio Display. Couldn’t be happier. I believe I have the best of both worlds with this setup.