(apple silicon ) Would 16gb RAM be enough for future proofing ?

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

Sup.

While ram management might be good on macOS ,and aarch improving it further ,8gb isn't actually "enough" on current M1 lineup .

Which makes me wonder ,will 16/512 base mpb m1x models be enough for future proofing,assuming i plan on keeping it for around 6years+ ?

As they are already very expensive devices -even base models will be ,be it 14 or 16"- and bcz i can't justify spending that much,i am willing to "cut" the price where I can,that is ,not upgrading stuff.

However if because I refused to upgrade the RAM,i find my super powerful laptop struggling after 3-4 years(because not enough memory to cache everything ,system taking more ram,browsing etc ) in spite of being still powefu l (c'mon M1 should intrinsically be enough for the next couple of years,how m1x couldn't ) then I'll have a slow or even bad experience ...let alone 6 years after the purchase date lol.

So perhaps would it be a brighter idea to get 32gb for future proofing ,if i don't wanna lose too much money at changing Mac too soon...on the other hand ,it's still 400€ ..which would make MBP 16 at 3100€,roughly 3600$...

Another thing to keep at mind is ,if I'm correct,the fact that resale value is much higher with bigger ram versions .not only is its value kept better,but there also is more demand

I am not rly planning to sell it in like 3 years,since I'm gonna take a QWERTY keyboard,which most people here can't even look at lol .still good to know that i could potentially sell it

 

[ascender]

What are you going to be using the laptop for?

8GB is more than enough for a lot of people and will be for many years to come. You can run lots of the most popular apps, all at the same time and not notice any slowdown.

16GB is definitely worth going-for if you're going to be running things like virtual machines, are doing photo and video editing etc. And if you're going to be keeping the machine for a while, is probably a good investment for the money.

If you definitely need 32GB RAM, you'll know that you do already, so don't need to ask. Its definitely not worth it just to "future proof" the machine.

 

[barkomatic]

16gb would probably be fine for 5 years but as ascender mentioned it depends upon what you'll use if for. I don't know where you're at in life but if you're in college or early career your financial circumstances might be such that in 4 years you'll be able to get a new mac if your needs change.

 

[Spock]

Your system will seem slower 3 to 4 years down the road no matter how much ram you install in the system as MacOS gets updated and your hardware gets older. Buy the highest amount of ram you can afford and be happy with it. I try to only think of what I will be using the computer for at this point in time and not worry about what I will be using the computer for 3 years down the road.

 

[Fishrrman]

16gb today (on m-series Macs) is "the new 8"...

Buying an 8gb m-series Mac TODAY... would be like buying a 2012 Mac Mini with 4gb.
That is to say, it might do well enough when new... but in years to come, it would no longer "be enough"...

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

What are you going to be using the laptop for?

8GB is more than enough for a lot of people and will be for many years to come. You can run lots of the most popular apps, all at the same time and not notice any slowdown.

16GB is definitely worth going-for if you're going to be running things like virtual machines, are doing photo and video editing etc. And if you're going to be keeping the machine for a while, is probably a good investment for the money.

If you definitely need 32GB RAM, you'll know that you do already, so don't need to ask. Its definitely not worth it just to "future proof" the machine.

browsing,office ,programming , photo editing .perhaps occasionnally re-encoding videos but it doesnt rly matter.possibly editing 4k hdr vidoes as well if i get a good phone,but such videos would be short ,and not raw ofc xd

8gb wont be available for mbp i can bet on that .

contemplating between 16 and 32 basically

nope thats what i meant,i currently dont need 32gb.at all.even tho chrome sucks the ram -and life- outta my computer ngl

alright so in your opinion buying it just for future proofing simply isnt worth the money ?

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

Your system will seem slower 3 to 4 years down the road no matter how much ram you install in the system as MacOS gets updated and your hardware gets older. Buy the highest amount of ram you can afford and be happy with it. I try to only think of what I will be using the computer for at this point in time and not worry about what I will be using the computer for 3 years down the road.

correct me if im wrong but hw on m1 is already very powerful ,and m1x will be even more.hence why it all seems to play on memory imho ,as the chip in itself will be good enough ,just needs to have enough bandwidth ....also i though macs could be kept longer due to apple optimising their devices and sw,as they do on iphones?

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

16gb today (on m-series Macs) is "the new 8"...

Buying an 8gb m-series Mac TODAY... would be like buying a 2012 Mac Mini with 4gb.
That is to say, it might do well enough when new... but in years to come, it would no longer "be enough"...

exactly my concern ....tho it doesnt seem to be that obvious according to other people in this thread

 

[ascender]

Over a number of years 4GB became 8GB as the standard, but look at the performance of those 8GB machines now, especially how fast the SSDs have become. I think 8GB on a M1 Mac will be more than enough for people who buy machines for general use for a long time yet. I didn't realise anybody thought 16GB today is "the new 8". If anything I thought the consensus was that the new M1-based machines show just how capable a machine with 8GB RAM is.

I've recently been using an 8GB M1 Air for a lot of things and after coming from a 16GB machine, I genuinely can't tell the difference for my varied workload. I keep loading stuff up and its snappy and responsive and just keeps going.

You can't have too much RAM, so just buy as much as you like, but I'll guess unless you need the 32GB for a heavy duty workflow, you'll never notice the difference over 16GB RAM.

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

Over a number of years 4GB became 8GB as the standard, but look at the performance of those 8GB machines now, especially how fast the SSDs have become. I think 8GB on a M1 Mac will be more than enough for people who buy machines for general use for a long time yet. I didn't realise anybody thought 16GB today is "the new 8". If anything I thought the consensus was that the new M1-based machines show just how capable a machine with 8GB RAM is.

I've recently been using an 8GB M1 Air for a lot of things and after coming from a 16GB machine, I genuinely can't tell the difference for my varied workload. I keep loading stuff up and its snappy and responsive and just keeps going.

You can't have too much RAM, so just buy as much as you like, but I'll guess unless you need the 32GB for a heavy duty workflow, you'll never notice the difference over 16GB RAM.

Youre replying to fishrrman mostly?

Yep I agree that 8gb is very capable,and honestly the swap does the job for many ,but like many apps and programs that don't require super duper fast true ram

Intersting,may i know what does your workflow consist in ?

As I said ,i can never have too much money either lol,which is why im comtemplating and asking people ,since its already a big investment ,id rather avoid spending some 400 euros more,if that is sth feasible

 

[teknikal90]

exactly my concern ....tho it doesnt seem to be that obvious according to other people in this thread

because, obviously, how the heck would anyone know? Noone outside of apple has the roadmap going past a few years, let alone 6 years.
This is a completely new platform.

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

because, obviously, how the heck would anyone know? Noone outside of apple has the roadmap going past a few years, let alone 6 years.
This is a completely new platform.

my question wasnt about apple silicon specifically,but on ram and requirements in general,as in "should 16gb of ram be enough for several years,given the upgrade is rather costly?"

 

[coachingguy]

Having been a Macrumors member for a long time and read many similar posts… The easy answer is “No”. But, the answer that would follow is more helpful, and has already been mentioned….
Buy the best machine you can afford now. If you’re waiting for the perfect speced machine… you’ll never buy…

I have a late 2018 MBP 15, 32 gig, 1TB SSD i9… work just gave me a M1 8 gig, 256 ssd MBA… it’s simply faster…at everything I do, including a lot of photo editing. My 15 was the last gen before switching to the 16 (I got an amazing deal on it). Did I think the M1 MBA was going to be faster? I did not.

As a whole, both machines perform at a high level and will continue to for years to come…

Do with this information as you will

be safe

Coachingguy

 

[ApfelKuchen]

16gb today (on m-series Macs) is "the new 8"...

Buying an 8gb m-series Mac TODAY... would be like buying a 2012 Mac Mini with 4gb.
That is to say, it might do well enough when new... but in years to come, it would no longer "be enough"...

There's one key difference between a 2012 mini and any of the current Macs. Flash storage. So if, in the future, RAM requirements grow (and since all we have to go by is the past, and some of us remember the days of the MS DOS 640 KB RAM maximum...), the swap won't be resident on a spinning HDD, but in nice, zippy Flash.

Future proofing is a fool's errand. We can't know the future. All it really comes down to is over-building. And in computers, the only part that you can specify now that won't be substantially outmoded in six years or so is storage - RAM and HD. You're buying a house with bigger closets and attic because you know eventually you'll fill them. But today's CPU and GPU are not going to be even close to state-of-the-art in six years. There may be faster Wi-Fi and Bluetooth protocols, faster/more capable I/O ports... Who cares if the closets are big if the house has a coal furnace and gas lighting?

I go to tech museums like the Henry Ford in Dearborn, Michigan and marvel at machinery built in the 19th and first half of the 20th Century. The stuff is built so robustly it's amazing. Built to last forever. The thing is, forever was too long. The stuff wore out technologically far sooner than it wore out physically.

The story of the past 15 years of PC computing hasn't been the growth of RAM requirements. RAM feeds the CPU, and other than the shift from 32 bit to 64 bit processors, we're not asking much more of CPUs today than we did back then. A spreadsheet is still a spreadsheet, a word processor is still a word processor. What has changed dramatically is what we expect from our GPUs and other specialty processors (neural networks, image signal processors, etc.) that weren't even part of the typical PCs architecture back then - that's where all the 3D, VR, AR, AI, etc. is happening.

Sometime in the not too distant future, Macs will come equipped with True Depth sensors and Lidar, like iPhones. We'll be moving windows around the display by waving our hands, twiddling our fingers in the air, or having our eye movements tracked. Or not. Who really knows? Chances are, though, whatever new capabilities come along won't be supported by whatever comes loaded onto today's Macs, because those new capabilities will require new subsystems. Not more RAM, not a bigger HD.

Buy what you can reasonably expect to use over the next 4 years. If you're, lucky it'll still be enough for your needs in 6 years. To put it in terms a college student might understand, "Don't buy your grad school textbooks when you're entering freshman year."

 

[saudor]

I never understood future proofing. I see so many people say they want to buy the 3090, i9 9900k, 8TB iPhone pro plus max and other top tier stuff for future proofing and the same people buy the 4090, 10900k, 16TB iPhone epic max plus pro etc the very next year anyways

That being said 16 is enough for most people. If you need 32, you already know it.

 

[Freeangel1]

I'm waiting and won't buy anything with APPLE silicon unless I can get 32GB ram

Where these APPLE Silicon chips are falling short is in the built in GPU graphics.

This is why I want to see if 10 GPU cores are safe instead of 7 or 8.

You cant use an external GPU breakout box like Intel Macs so you're SCREWED.

 

[Shirasaki]

I think 16GB is more than enough for a lot of use cases including light virtualization or some "crazy" casual programming, gaming etc that does not just run on an A9 processor. "Future-proof" does have its own water and should be taken into account unless you are super rich and can afford to buy a brand new Mac every year without thinking. Buy it nice or Buy it twice. Always buy something that has a bit of headroom rather than not buying enough and suffering in the process, wasting time that you will never take back just because wanting to save a bit of money right now.