Cost Proposition of a 2x M1 Mac Mini vs iMac Pro

[dingclancy23]

This is a dumb question. Please indulge.

I am just thinking these at the moment because this might be irrelevant by next Spring when the new processors come out.

However, there are many people who say that a Mac Mini M1 can "replace" a $5,000-$10,000 iMac Pro or Mac Pro rig for some cases. However the bottlenecks come when you have to do some very heavy CPU/GPU task and are left with some slowdowns/swapping during those peak performances.

However what if you buy three Mac Minis and have one primary, then use the two as secondary or servers. So for example you throw the encoding/compiling task on the secondary machines and have your primary running butter? You still have a Mac Mini bill of $2,700 for the three and still be compelling work rig.

Is there a workable way to get the 2 or 3 mac mini working together? Is this not one of the creative ways that Mac Minis are used?

 

[Internaut]

Any application with a processing pipeline where all three Minis end up processing at the same time (or doing the same processing in parallel on different data sets)?

 

[1240766]

This is a dumb question. Please indulge.

I am just thinking these at the moment because this might be irrelevant by next Spring when the new processors come out.

However, there are many people who say that a Mac Mini M1 can "replace" a $5,000-$10,000 iMac Pro or Mac Pro rig for some cases. However the bottlenecks come when you have to do some very heavy CPU/GPU task and are left with some slowdowns/swapping during those peak performances.

However what if you buy three Mac Minis and have one primary, then use the two as secondary or servers. So for example you throw the encoding/compiling task on the secondary machines and have your primary running butter? You still have a Mac Mini bill of $2,700 for the three and still be compelling work rig.

Is there a workable way to get the 2 or 3 mac mini working together? Is this not one of the creative ways that Mac Minis are used?

Then save money getting a few raspberry pies, 8gb, and setup a K8s cluster ?

 

[dingclancy23]

Any application with a processing pipeline where all three Minis end up processing at the same time (or doing the same processing in parallel on different data sets)?

Right. The application would probably be better off on the cloud unless there is a specific use case to need multiple mac minis. However, there might be certain use cases where you just throw an export/render job on one Mac mini so that you can use the other freely?

I guess my point is, at the moment, the Performance to cost ratio of a Mac Mini compared to the hign end Intel Macs are so disparate that it probably make sense to just have double or triple the Mac Mini and be creative with it and still get your work done somewhat comparably?

Thanks!

 

[dingclancy23]

Then save money getting a few raspberry pies, 8gb, and setup a K8s cluster ?

But Raspberry Pis cannot run Xcode or Final Cut?

I think what I am describing is a more local version of MacStadium, because at $699 to $899 (for 16gb) these are insanely good value. Perhaps if you just need one extra Mac Mini to slave work.