Do I need the M1 Ultra for my work flow?

[Riffbear]

Hi guys I'm needing some advice on the Mac Studio.

I use Lightroom - Adobe Animate - Photoshop - FXP & Media Encoder.
Am I better off buying the M1 Ultra 128GB for use with these softwares?

Or should i just stick with my MBP 64GB?

Cheers

 

[Red_Dragon]

Buy the best you can afford.

 

[Mr.Blacky]

General rule: If you have to ask, you don't need it.

 

[LonestarOne]

Better? Of course. The question you have to answer is wherever it’s enough better to justify the extra cost.

 

[cinder]

I think the more important question is if you need mobility.

If you need mobility, then stick with the MBP. If not, then you can decide if you want to more money to get something a little more powerful.

My opinion: Mac Studio M1 Ultra isn't necessary for that at all.

 

[Pressure]

Check the newest video from ArtIsRight, which is photography oriented. The important thing is to get the amount of RAM you will need as that will have the biggest effect on performance.

 

[now i see it]

If “Rendering” is not a BIG part of what you do (either video or 3D) then the Ultra is a big waste of money.

 

[Pressure]

If “Rendering” is not a BIG part of what you do (either video or 3D) then the Ultra is a big waste of money.

Importing and exporting large batches of photos is much faster on the M1 Ultra in Lightroom.

 

[Riffbear]

Thanks everyone! After watching many reviews I'll wait for the software I use to be optimised for the M1 Ultra and get one then. Who knows maybe by the time I decide, the Mac Pro will be out for pre order.

Will just use my 64GB M1MAX MBP for now.

Cheers

 

[teohyc]

Importing and exporting large batches of photos is much faster on the M1 Ultra in Lightroom.

Sure, but is the bottleneck import, export, render times?

E.g. If Apple released M100 processor tomorrow, will it make you produce more work?

 

[Pressure]

Sure, but is the bottleneck import, export, render times?

E.g. If Apple released M100 processor tomorrow, will it make you produce more work?

Have you tried to import, generate thumbnails and export thousands of RAW photos to JPEGs in Lightroom on a slow computer. Yikes.

Anything that takes minutes to process is a bottleneck.

I remember in the good old days were you could turn on the computer, walk into the kitchen and make coffee, walk back to the computer and it would finally have finished loading the desktop.

The M1 Ultra beats out the Mac Pro 2019 with 96GB of RAM but only 12 cores by 67% in some of those tasks. Sure we will see some diminishing returns at some point but we will always be able to leverage faster computing.

 

[teohyc]

Have you tried to import, generate thumbnails and export thousands of RAW photos to JPEGs in Lightroom on a slow computer. Yikes.

Anything that takes minutes to process is a bottleneck.

I remember in the good old days were you could turn on the computer, walk into the kitchen and make coffee, walk back to the computer and it would finally have finished loading the desktop.

The M1 Ultra beats out the Mac Pro 2019 with 96GB of RAM but only 12 cores by 67% in some of those tasks. Sure we will see some diminishing returns at some point but we will always be able to leverage faster computing.

But is the editing process smooth and lag-free after that?

Because the time spent waiting to load the photos can be used to do other things.

The real question is can you edit and put out more photos? And whether the work has deadline. The bottleneck is probably time limited to taking photos.

I resisted upgrading my Mac Pro 2013 for the longest time even though newer Macs are several times more powerful. Because even if a new Mac is 100 times faster, I can’t make more YT videos as the bottleneck is my limited time to shoot videos with my camera.

E.g. My videos take 2 hours to export on the Mac Pro 2013. I upgraded to M1 Mac Mini recently only because the video editing process has lag. The overall experience is smoother, more satisfying, yes. Now videos take 5-10 mins to export, but I wasn't able to make more videos because the bottle neck is not the computer.

 

[now i see it]

A long time ago I worked for a phographer who had seven Macs in his computer room, each set up with a keyboard and mouse and had a chair in front of it.
This was back in the power Mac tower days.

I was there to scan his thousands of slides, optimize them and categorize them and build his website.

Not a day would go by where I didn’t have at least four of the computers running full time doing tasks. One would be scanning, one burning CDs, one was my workstation and another was running Apple scripts generating thousands of webpages.

That experience taught me that having SEVERAL lower powered machines is Way Way Way more efficient than having just one or two top tier workstations.

If I were to buy a Mac Studio today, without hesitation, I’d buy four Mi Max versions instead of two Ultras.

And I’d NEVER buy an Ultra. Two Maxes will kick one Ultra’s butt every time from an efficiency point of view.
One can be churning on one thing while you’re doing something else.

 

[lcubed]

One can be churning on one thing while you’re doing something else.

modern osX machines are perfectly happy to multitask!
i usually got multiple spaces up with each churning along doing a different task

 

[Riffbear]

And I’d NEVER buy an Ultra. Two Maxes will kick one Ultra’s butt every time from an efficiency point of view.
One can be churning on one thing while you’re doing something else.

Now that makes allot of sense!!

 

[Pressure]

But is the editing process smooth and lag-free after that?

Because the time spent waiting to load the photos can be used to do other things.

The real question is can you edit and put out more photos? And whether the work has deadline. The bottleneck is probably time limited to taking photos.

I resisted upgrading my Mac Pro 2013 for the longest time even though newer Macs are several times more powerful. Because even if a new Mac is 100 times faster, I can’t make more YT videos as the bottleneck is my limited time to shoot videos with my camera.

E.g. My videos take 2 hours to export on the Mac Pro 2013. I upgraded to M1 Mac Mini recently only because the video editing process has lag. The overall experience is smoother, more satisfying, yes. Now videos take 5-10 mins to export, but I wasn't able to make more videos because the bottle neck is not the computer.

Ok, what if you discover an error after you have spent 2 hours exporting a video for YouTube?

You correct it in 10 minutes and then your machine is locked for another 2 hours. If you were part of a production house that would be totally unacceptable.

It worked for you because you don't seem to have a deadline or clients expecting a finished product within a set timeframe and the next job waiting to be completed.

Generally Adobe has poorly multithreaded optimisations for most of their filters, like capping out at 6 cores for specific workloads but then single threaded performance becomes equally important.

If I do product shoots the "hero shots" will usually be made of anywhere from 20 to 50 RAW images that need to be focus stacked and that takes a lot of computational power (and RAM).

A long time ago I worked for a phographer who had seven Macs in his computer room, each set up with a keyboard and mouse and had a chair in front of it.
This was back in the power Mac tower days.

I was there to scan his thousands of slides, optimize them and categorize them and build his website.

Not a day would go by where I didn’t have at least four of the computers running full time doing tasks. One would be scanning, one burning CDs, one was my workstation and another was running Apple scripts generating thousands of webpages.

That experience taught me that having SEVERAL lower powered machines is Way Way Way more efficient than having just one or two top tier workstations.

If I were to buy a Mac Studio today, without hesitation, I’d buy four Mi Max versions instead of two Ultras.

And I’d NEVER buy an Ultra. Two Maxes will kick one Ultra’s butt every time from an efficiency point of view.
One can be churning on one thing while you’re doing something else.

From a production point of view the cost difference from $8k to $16k isn't much. If it enabled you to finish tasks faster they would go that route. He also needed to pay you for your time, which would cost a lot more yearly. If he could cut your salary by 40% by going with slightly more expensive machines he totally would.

If he needed that many machines he probably also had enough work to gain from faster processing and finishing the tasks quicker.

Everything else in the production were more expensive, from camera bodies, lenses, lightning, studio, tripods, dollies etc.

 

[teohyc]

Ok, what if you discover an error after you have spent 2 hours exporting a video for YouTube?

You correct it in 10 minutes and then your machine is locked for another 2 hours. If you were part of a production house that would be totally unacceptable.

It worked for you because you don't seem to have a deadline or clients expecting a finished product within a set timeframe and the next job waiting to be completed.

Generally Adobe has poorly multithreaded optimisations for most of their filters, like capping out at 6 cores for specific workloads but then single threaded performance becomes equally important.

If I do product shoots the "hero shots" will usually be made of anywhere from 20 to 50 RAW images that need to be focus stacked and that takes a lot of computational power (and RAM).


From a production point of view the cost difference from $8k to $16k isn't much. If it enabled you to finish tasks faster they would go that route. He also needed to pay you for your time, which would cost a lot more yearly. If he could cut your salary by 40% by going with slightly more expensive machines he totally would.

If he needed that many machines he probably also had enough work to gain from faster processing and finishing the tasks quicker.

Everything else in the production were more expensive, from camera bodies, lenses, lightning, studio, tripods, dollies etc.

Which is why I mentioned deadline.

The answer to whether you need a more powerful computer is really simply, can it help you create more work.

Does it sound like the OP is working in a production house where if the work doesn't come out the cold sweat or palpitations starts?

There are so many people on the forum who like to recommend products as if money is not an issue.

 

[Pressure]

Which is why I mentioned deadline.

The answer to whether you need a more powerful computer is really simply, can it help you create more work.

Does it sound like the OP is working in a production house where if the work doesn't come out the cold sweat or palpitations starts?

There are so many people on the forum who like to recommend products as if money is not an issue.

He didn't mention or state as such so we don't know. He already owns a computer that cost as much as the M1 Ultra, so there is that. Have a nice day