How many people really need M1 Pro or M1 Max

[armoured]

It's a tax write off. Look at the people they showed off as Pro users in the presentation.

People say this, "it's a tax write off", as if it means it's free. Do you really think that's how it works?

Tax write-offs mostly just reduce the taxable income by the marginal tax rate - if that's 15% for eg a privately-owned business, that's a 15% reduction as an expense. (And note I'm leaving out of this whether the computer as an expense is amortised over several years, meaning even less immediate tax reduction)

To be clear that 15% is a made-up rate but it's not like businesses are generally paying 100% tax rate on profits.

(Okay if you're an employee and someone else is paying for it, all the better - but that's not the tax write off)

 

[davidako]

I agree there seems to be a missing middle ground.

If I want a laptop with the most comfortable display and keyboard I need to pay for what might be completely excessive power.

 

[SpartaMAC]

The other side of the argument is that you won't be able to get more for your MBP the longer you sit on it, so why not "trade-up" while you can still get some money back.

I bought the new MBP 16 today online, and like you, I don't need it, but I know that every day that goes by with my current 2019 MBP, the trade-in/resale value will continue to decline while the machine takes on more daily use. Having gone through many MBP's and Air's, it's pretty clear to me - they only have some much useful life.

I was able to trade-in my 2019 MBP online earlier for $1600, so I thought it's not gonna get much better and I took the plunge. But yes, your point is completely valid.

I do not want to trade it in. Something’s I do require windows. So until there is a viable windows solution for the MacBook M1 im keeping it. Here is one example. Some of the old switches I supports require a USB to serial adapter. Win 11 ARM insider preview does not have the driver. My MBP with win 10 VM does so its a very important tool for me.

 

[millerj123]

I dunno. I'm typing this on a 2011 13" MBP. Over the years, I've maxed the RAM at 16 GB, and upped the hard drive to 750 gigs. It's starting to have issues just running my applications and multiple websites. Since you can no longer upgrade the internals, I'm stuck with what Apple offers vs my acceptable price point.

 

[jessejesse]

All I really wanted was a better keyboard than the Touch Bar intel generation, no Touch Bar, and a 1080p webcam. It's a shame I would need to fork over 2k when I really want everything in the air, plus a better webcam for work.

 

[DougiePhresh]

These new MacBook Pros are insane. If they would have just put the new screen on the regular M1, I would have been on board and put in my order. But holy overkill Batman, I'm just an attorney, there is no scenario where I would ever need a M1 Pro or M1 Max. Good on Apple for targeting the audio/visual professionals and hitting them with a roundhouse to the face. I just hope some of that tech trickles down to the other models and I can get a reasonably-spec'd MBP/Air/(bring back the regular MacBook?) in the next year or two with the new screen/port set-up.

Side note: Did anyone else notice that the presenter (Ms. Haldea) said "we are adding ports to the new MacBook Pro." But then there was an intentional change of verbiage to "And yes, MagSafe is coming back to the MacBook Pro." My memory isn't that bad... I remember five years ago when all of these ports that are being "add[ed] to the new MacBook Pro" were already there and got ripped away from us. Seems like they should have used "coming back" for that entire segment instead of trying to cover up their enormous mistake and act like ports on a laptop are a whole new frontier Apple is pushing 🙄

 

[Eidorian]

People say this, "it's a tax write off", as if it means it's free. Do you really think that's how it works?

Tax write-offs mostly just reduce the taxable income by the marginal tax rate - if that's 15% for eg a privately-owned business, that's a 15% reduction as an expense. (And note I'm leaving out of this whether the computer as an expense is amortised over several years, meaning even less immediate tax reduction)

To be clear that 15% is a made-up rate but it's not like businesses are generally paying 100% tax rate on profits.

(Okay if you're an employee and someone else is paying for it, all the better - but that's not the tax write off)

It's not free but a deduction reduces the pain of the upfront costs. (It was fun trying to guess the percentage of "personal use" shared for something you bought for your business. It's easier to calculate mileage.) You're going to make it back over the life time of the MacBook Pro via work done using said equipment.

I ended up getting a refurbished MacBook Air for myself since I don't have a business reason for self employment (I could claim the Air too though but that's annoying.) and I think it would be a waste to ask my primary employer for one either.

 

[mrz_V1]

if you dont know why you need it, then you arent the customer for this..

 

[calstanford]

You should get one of these new machines if you're a video editor or full time dev. For anything else I really don't see it. M1 performance and 16GB RAM is plenty for Photoshop, plenty for your everyday web/office etc tasks and plenty enough for most (not all) dev work.

 

[mysticmanix]

I don't need the power, I just want the bigger screen, so I ordered a base 16 inch. Had the previous 16 inch but it got stupid hot doing simple stuff, so I sold it. And I bought the base M1 air just to see if the cooling was really that much better, and it truly is. I expect the new 16 inch one to be a bit worse due to higher power consumption and having fans, but not so much that my palms sweat when typing.

 

[ha1o2surfer]

I almost purchased the new 14 but the battery life took far too much of a hit.. The current 14 has 17 hours of web use (I get 14-15 easy) and the current M1 pro base gets 11. that's super disappointing.

 

[HQNYC]

I'm currently using my m1 MBP and my son is using my 2020 i7 MBP to code. He has complained so many times that it gets too hot to type while on the table so I hooked him up with a keyboard. I don't think I should have to do that for 2.5k USD. (2020 i7 2.3ghz, 16gb ram, 1TB SSD plus tax)

He'll get my m1 when my M1 Max (32 GPU) arrives in 2 weeks. Intel Macs will continue to drop in value so it's a good time to trade it in.

 

[Shreducator]

Not me I consume content, not make it.

 

[BootLoxes]

I am struggling to decide if I should get it or not. In terms of hobbies I like to do 3D things with Zbrush, Blender, Substance Painter, and Marmoset Toolbag 4. I have a desktop already that can do it but I have been considering moving everything over to the Mac. I need to see how the support for those 4 programs go before I am convinced.

Blender is getting Metal rendering as announced a few days ago and Zbrush already confirmed it will eventually support apple silicon. That just leaves Substance and Marmoset. For Marmoset I am sure I could find another renderer thats native for Mac or just ditch it for the Blender one once Metal comes out, but I really like substance painter and hope the steam version (the only way to get the non subscription one) is updated for apple silicon. I love that texturing program and really do not want to have to switch over to something else. If these get proper support, I will for sure get the MAX 64gb.

I have an M1 air 8gb for on the go and I dont really do anything too advanced outside my house, but I want a bigger screen. I like to do split screen and on some apps, split screen will take up 3/4th of the screen where on the 16" it takes half which is big for me.

The other thing is that I am making the switch into Network Engineering and I might be in a situation where I start running gns3 simulations and learning linux via parallels vm which are very ram heavy. Having that extra ram would really help with my education.

I love editing video on my M1. I mostly use davinci resolve because its free and the mac version has the hardware acceleration in the free version while on my desktop I would have to pay for the pro davinci to get that feature. I always shoot in 1080p because I don't like big files so on the M1 it edits smoothly. Outside of render times I dont think I would see a difference except for the bigger and better quality screen.

So it is a tough choice. My current air and desktop get everything I need to done, but I would love the idea of one device that can do it all no matter where I am with good battery life. I also was hoping for a mini pro to get announced to get this power in a smaller package.

I guess for now I will wait and see how the development of my 3D software support progresses and then upgrade to the M2 Max Macbook Pro 16" 64gb. That would be enough for my 3D needs and my future career.

 

[Jorbanead]

I’m the target demo for this product. I edit video, produce music, and design UI. My current setup can’t handle my Logic sessions, and my video exports take too long. Overlays and color correction are issues too, and my system lags with multiple video streams. When I’m designing UI, my system gets laggy and slow when I have hundreds of layers in Figma with a preview open on a second monitor.

I am a creative professional and I have been waiting for these chips ever since the AS announcement. M1 was great, but the GPU couldn’t keep up with my Vega card, and I need more I/O and ram options. The M1 Max is the chip of my dreams honestly.

 

[rnizlek]

People say this, "it's a tax write off", as if it means it's free. Do you really think that's how it works?

Tax write-offs mostly just reduce the taxable income by the marginal tax rate - if that's 15% for eg a privately-owned business, that's a 15% reduction as an expense. (And note I'm leaving out of this whether the computer as an expense is amortised over several years, meaning even less immediate tax reduction)

To be clear that 15% is a made-up rate but it's not like businesses are generally paying 100% tax rate on profits.

(Okay if you're an employee and someone else is paying for it, all the better - but that's not the tax write off)

15%? Try 25% Federal + 11% self employment tax (employee plus employer portions of social security and Medicare) + 5-8% state tax in many cases. Most people are seeing more like a 40% reduction in expense. Not nearly 100% but it takes a lot of the sting off the purchase (and it is not like the alternative is not buying a computer).

 

[KPOM]

First let me say I’ve been in IT/Telcom over 35 years. The processors Apple announced today are truly amazing. BUT… BUT… lets face it. How many people really need that much power in a laptop? Im an IT Pro and my Itel 2020 MacBook Pro and M1 Macbook air are sufficient. Really, think about it, what, aside from creative pros who needs that much power. Im disappointed a 14” MacBook Pro (M1) for the masses was not introduced today. Awesome technology for a very small percentage of users.

A 14-16” Air has long been on People’s wish lists here, but it doesn’t seem to be on Apple’s radar.

 

[rnizlek]

I’m the target demo for this product. I edit video, produce music, and design UI. My current setup can’t handle my Logic sessions, and my video exports take too long. Overlays and color correction are issues too, and my system lags with multiple video streams. When I’m designing UI, my system gets laggy and slow when I have hundreds of layers in Figma with a preview open on a second monitor.

I am a creative professional and I have been waiting for these chips ever since the AS announcement. M1 was great, but the GPU couldn’t keep up with my Vega card, and I need more I/O and ram options. The M1 Max is the chip of my dreams honestly.

I’m curious - do you need the mobility of a laptop doing that work? I’d think a desktop would be well suited to that sort of workload.

 

[alien3dx]

First let me say I’ve been in IT/Telcom over 35 years. The processors Apple announced today are truly amazing. BUT… BUT… lets face it. How many people really need that much power in a laptop? Im an IT Pro and my Itel 2020 MacBook Pro and M1 Macbook air are sufficient. Really, think about it, what, aside from creative pros who needs that much power. Im disappointed a 14” MacBook Pro (M1) for the masses was not introduced today. Awesome technology for a very small percentage of users.

not much .. Not all people want to render 8k 4k video while the market pretty low. Even the market apple user also low.

 

[KPOM]

There are other reasons to get the M1 Pro or M1 Max. If you need more than 16 GB of RAM. Or if you need more than 2 TB SSD. Or if you need more than 1 external display. Or maybe you really want a 120 Hz display. It isn't just about the number of cores.

The internal display should be great, if the iPad Pro is any indication. Plus a 1080p webcam, better built-in speakers and microphone. The MacBook Pro has long had other advantages.

 

[ian87w]

I definitely won't need the raw power of the M1 Pro/Max, but I need 16GB of RAM. Apple doesn't offer BTO option in my country, so until now, we only have M1 Macs with 8GB of RAM. If I want to get 16GB of RAM, I will have to get this new Macbook Pro, even if I don't need the power. Apple just love forcing people to pay more than what we actually need.

 

[kelvin.lau]

Not enough power. I need a Mac Pro Max with 200% the performance of the M1 Max

 

[Jorbanead]

I’m curious - do you need the mobility of a laptop doing that work? I’d think a desktop would be well suited to that sort of workload.

I don’t and I don’t want the MacBook Pro. I’m assuming this chip will also go into desktop macs as well - which is what I’m waiting for. But the chip is exactly what I’m looking for so now it’s just a waiting game.

 

[chumps]

I really wonder what the AS Mac Pro's will look like. The current Xeon's can be configured for up to 1.5 TB of memory. Is it even possible to stuff that much memory in a SoC?

 

[Mr. Dee]

I want one, but I am not going to buy it. For what I do, posting Macrumors comments and watching YouTube videos will be the same as my M1. Does anyone know if they will be in stores to play with this week?