Sure, gentleman's bet.Wanna bet?I’m fairly sure M2 will support more displays.
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Do you really need more than base M1?
- Thread starter Bodhitree
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M2 supporting the additional displays is critical for me as M1 Pro is a massive overbuy for me.
M1 is a good starting point. But a buy in price of nearly 2k for a laptop to support just 2 external displays is a bit insane.
M1 is a good starting point. But a buy in price of nearly 2k for a laptop to support just 2 external displays is a bit insane.
I’ve got the MBA with 16GB. I’m waiting on a Max Studio. But in the meantime I though I’d stress test my XQD cards and MBA to see what happened. I just shot about 60s of 10 bit 8K H.265 (Nikon Z9). Imported flawlessly and made some simple edits in FCP. I had view on better performance and there was no dropped frames or any issue with performance. Ok nothing too fancy that I would likely need the studio for, but as a base level consumer machine, that’s crazy. I don’t remember Apple ever having a base machine this capable of doing ‘pro’ things before.
You can add an airplay display to an apple tv. Works great, I was amazed. I have M1 MBP hooked external, internal and airplay, all separate displays - cool
I talk about it a little much on here but my MacBook Air base model has been one of the best new Macs that I have had in a while, it does everything that I throw it.
I suspect that the reason why the M1 laptops don't support two external displays is that they start with only 8GB RAM and there simply isn't enough for system RAM and VRAM without making the computers laggy. The MBPs start at 16 so there is more to go around. And Apple wants that to be a feature which might drive people to upgrade to the base 14". I wonder if it's possible for the M2 to support an additional monitor if you add the extra RAM or if that requires a structural change to the SoC.
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Yeah, I typically run with a dual external monitor setup plus the laptop screen, so this was a bit of a limiting factor for me as well. The 16GB limit for DRAM is also not great, but then again, I bought the 8GB version (very soon after release, so BTO was almost 30 days out), and I am pleased and surprised at how much it can get done and have open at any one time. I have only once gotten an out of memory message and so think that was a Big Sur bug as much as anything. The M1 and soon to be M2 really can meet most everyone’s needs, as long as they’re honest with themselves.M1 has enough performance for me, but doesn’t have the monitor support I need
And here I thought you were just old and curmudgeonly Spock, and not new and hip Spock!?
I think it's fair to say that, people who need more than M1 know for a fact that they need more. But anyone who is unsure about it, absolutely does not need more than M1.
Tech forums always have a crowd that love to buy the best computers, but I agree with you. 99% of the Mac users can survive on an M1 Mac, and only a few % would actually benefit from getting more than the base model of the chip. Even 16GB RAM is overkill for the vast majority of the users. The only upgrade I think people should consider is the storage. While you can always connect an external SSD, it’s just more convenient to have more internal storage. Anyway, my two cents.
M1 is good for most users, but not power users like me as I do software development. I just find the 16 GB of RAM a bit too limiting and the memory pressure eventually goes above 50% and get into the yellow. Dual display support with HDMI and Thunderbolt is not as reliable compared to the M1 Pro/Max/Ultra. This is never a problem with 32 GB and I have a lot of apps open.
I highly doubt Apple will raise the limit to 32 GB and add proper dual monitor support to M2 as it will cannibalize their higher end computers aimed at pros. Most consumers in their eyes only only need 8/16 GB and run only one monitor or one monitor plus a laptop screen. In their eyes, Apple views multiple screens as a pro feature and I don't think they will add dual monitor support to M2. They will most likely upgrade the cores and keep the same limitations as the M1. Still, for most users, 16 GB is enough for most use cases and 32 GB is overkill for the average consumer.
I highly doubt Apple will raise the limit to 32 GB and add proper dual monitor support to M2 as it will cannibalize their higher end computers aimed at pros. Most consumers in their eyes only only need 8/16 GB and run only one monitor or one monitor plus a laptop screen. In their eyes, Apple views multiple screens as a pro feature and I don't think they will add dual monitor support to M2. They will most likely upgrade the cores and keep the same limitations as the M1. Still, for most users, 16 GB is enough for most use cases and 32 GB is overkill for the average consumer.
nope....nothing to do with the M1 chip as the Mac mini can drive two 4k screens (HDMI and TB-4)
I wonder if it is to do with the display adaptor and the difference between the one in the Air and the Mini?
That's still a total of two screens for the Mini and 13" laptops right?
Yeah it doesn't trust me. 1080p30fps isn't that best experience, I do use however an iPad Pro 12" in Sidecar and the experience is much better
I do use dual 4K60@ when docked so yeah the M1 Pro is a must for me. Alongside the iPad Pro as a 3rd external display to put the 'personal apps'
this is a really good thread....I keep looking at the studio and comparing it to my 16Gig M1 Mini and going meh (for my use cases as a low power user). I have just bought a 16Gig M1 Air for travel.....the mini I actually quite portable and I could take it into the office but it kinda doesn't work on the train!
I might look at the studio in 6 months when it hits refurb, then 20% off for VAT......might enjoy the extra ports, CPUand 32Gig RAM then!
I might look at the studio in 6 months when it hits refurb, then 20% off for VAT......might enjoy the extra ports, CPUand 32Gig RAM then!
same, I'd have one right now if the Air could support my two thunderbolt DisplaysM1 has enough performance for me, but doesn’t have the monitor support I need
I believe it is because the display controller in the (OG) M1 can only drive two displays natively at one time.
So:
MacBook Air: 1 external display + the (1) internal display
Mac Mini: 2 (external) displays (because it lacks an internal display)
24" iMac: 1 external display + the (1) internal display
The M1 Pro with its double width GPU has double the display controllers and can thus drive two external displays along with the internal display while the M1 Max can drive four.
Bringing it back to the topic at hand, I feel the multi-display issue perfectly illustrates the main limitations of the M1 for "regular" / "casual" users as well as Pros/Power Users. That is, that the M1 is a one size fits all solution, and while its very good, if you need even one of the things it doesn't do (or doesn't do well) it can become sub-optimal.
For example, need more than one external display? Too bad (or deal with DisplayLink lag.) Need more than 8GB of ram? Pay up. Need more than 16GB? Too bad. Need more ports? Hope you like hubs and can find one/multiple that meet your needs. More IO bandwidth? Sorry no can do. And so on and so fourth.
In a lot of ways even the M1 Pro/Max/Ultra inherit a similar problem due to the modular way in which the design is scaled. On the one hand it's simple but you can't just buy more of what you need, you have to get more of everything. For example, you may not want or need more GPU cores than even the base M1 offers but if you want a wider CPU (more cores) you're going to have to buy them.
Nonetheless... Apple Silicon is great and the transition is going way better than I could've ever expected (I was pretty worried/unsure when they first announced the switch)
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I think we will see multiple display support going forward, M1 probably used the iPhone display controller they had at the time, with obvious limitations. It is not ok to only support a single external display if even competitors with weaker GPUs are much better here. Of course, there is always the problem of RAM bandwidth, multiple displays will certainly eat into it and having significantly higher bandwidth on Pro/Max certainly helps.
Ports and stuf will be limited by design, as will be RAM.
I too am hopeful that Apple recognizes that a single external display is just not ok on a premium laptop (or desktop in the case of the iMac)
That said I don't think it's an issue of memory bandwidth. Intel/AMD integrated GPUs have had less bandwidth than the OG M1 and ran multiple displays fine enough. While a faster GPU/more memory bandwidth certainly help keep everything running smoothly when driving multiple displays hard, the OG M1's GPU should be... more than fast enough to drive three screens w/o lag.
People will accept "fine enough" from Intel, but they will not accept the same from Apple, even on the entry-level Air. Apple knows this and wants to avoid dumbname-gate drama.
Oh, it is definitely more than fast enough for that, but it's also what @darngooddesign says. It's a different level of expectation. If your GPU performance suddenly plummets because your external display connections are eating a portion of your valuable RAM bandwidth, people might get annoyed.
Luckily, I am not sure this is going to be a practical problem, especially once Apple moves to LPDDR5. Looking at DisplayPort specs, a 4K@60fps needs around 2GB/s, which should be perfectly doable. While something like DP2.0 would need 10GB/s, which is much more painful.