I am really torn between 8GB vs. 16GB RAM

[OldMike]

Yeah, it is complicated, but the 8GB doesn't magically turn into 16GB on the new M1. Yes, the management is better, more efficient, the memory is faster and used for more things... but 8GB is still 8GB.

Here's a screenshot of my entire Activity Monitor screen. As you can see, only Safari (with several tabs, including Prime Video) and Firefox with just one or two tabs, is what is causing my 8GB machine to suffer with yellow levels of RAM compression. This is not always happening, but it happens. And when it is green, it is pretty high as well, using a big amount of Swap memory (which uses the SSD and we all know what happens if you're constantly writing gigabytes of data each day on a rather small SSD).

View attachment 1705997

In my case, honestly, I'd like to get the redesigned MacBook Air in 2022 (because this year we'll only see the MacBook Pros redesign, according to analysts), but that means being 2 years with a machine I won't be 100% satisfied with. Also, I am not sure if in 2022 I will have the income to sell this and get the new one. Also, maybe the new MacBook Air doesn't come with a 3nm M3 but rather a slightly improved M2, a minor upgrade. And being the first model after a complete redesign, there may be flaws like the 2016 MBP keyboard, or the 2016 flex cable, etc. I'd rather wait a few iterations of the new redesigned MacBook Air, and get the machine at the best moment.

If I want to wait 3 or even 4 years with this machine, I want to be happy with it. And that's why I am returning my 8GB/256GB MacBook Air and getting a 16GB/512GB MacBook Air.

I finally setup my 8GB/256GB base M1 Mini yesterday. My experience has been similar to yours. Memory pressure was yellow quite often with swap reaching 8GB+ at times. I also had some time in red memory pressure territory. At idle the machine was high green on the memory pressure graph.

For applications, I was using PyCharm IDE, Safari, Edge, Outlook and Affinity Designer. Most applications seem to be Universal binaries already. I am running two 4K LG displays, both having active applications running simultaneously, as opposed to having a single screen with one front facing application in which background applications would probably be likely candidates for memory compression.

I am also running OneDrive with two accounts, personal and enterprise. I have over 300GB on each, and OneDrive is currently an Intel application still, so that might have had some negative effect.

Even when memory pressure was in the high yellow, the Mini was still surprisingly responsive.

My plan is to only keep this Mini until the next one is released (hopefully configurable to more than 16GB RAM). I have the luxury of having other machines to use which will allow me to offload some work to them. If I was going to plan on doing everything on one machine, I would definitely need 32GB RAM, so even upgrading to 16GB would still be a bandaid approach for $200 extra in this 1st gen M1 Mini.

After watching all of the YouTube videos, and some of the posts here, I was honestly surprised at how little it took to get the memory pressure into the high yellow and red range.

If I had any intention of keeping this Mini as my primary machine for more than 6 to 12 months, it would be going back and I would be getting an upgraded model with more storage and more RAM.

After having some time with my new M1 Mini, my general recommendation would be to get the 16GB model unless you are sure that your usage is very light, or if this is only a temporary machine until the next higher specced models are announced. Between RAM used by the OS and GPU, there really is not a lot left for your applications. The unified memory architecture of the M1 should not be used as an excuse to starve it of RAM, since working off of swap deprives it of the extra memory it could have used to do the job it was intended to do.

Despite the low memory spec, the M1 Mini is still a fantastic machine and very responsive. I am looking forward to pushing the base Mini to its limits (and beyond) until its successor arrives.

 

[pldelisle]

I was honestly surprised at how little it took to get the memory pressure into the high yellow and red range.

When you are a power user and especially working with IDEs, I’d be anything but surprised.

Great comments. Thanks a lot.

 

[alien3dx]

When you are a power user and especially working with IDEs, I’d be anything but surprised.

Great comments. Thanks a lot.

average me hover around 10 to 13 GB in iMac 2017 while in windows 5.9/7 . The rest one gb for graphic card.

Imac 2017
1. PhpStorm, Xcode, Android Studio(Yes with emulator)(m1 doesn't support),Adobe Xd
Worst culprit ram : Google Chrome and PHPStorm.

Running Background
1. Apache, MySQL

Huawei
1. Microsoft Office,PhpStorm,Heidi,Google Chrome,Adobe XD

 

[pldelisle]

Huawei

In China we trust.... ?
Sorry, it was stronger than me.

 

[alien3dx]

In China we trust.... ?
Sorry, it was stronger than me.

no stock m1 laptop that time. ??? even official release till today ?. I usually buy at the shop not online

** most other brand laptop is low because of covid and even second hand laptop sell quick. In my country school open close open close and everybody really headache

 

[pldelisle]

no stock m1 laptop that time. ??? even official release till today ?. I usually buy at the shop not online

I would have waited incredibly long instead of buying anything from this company.

 

[alien3dx]

I would have waited incredibly long instead of buying anything from this company.

the laptop is okay , 2 year warranty and 0 oddness build in software. Try other brand full of junk/crap install software.

I can't wait because need to meet customer and my macbook 2011 cannot accept 100mb pdf and i need to present and my imac 2017 broke power supply.

 

[quantyx]

I ordered a 256/8 silver MBA in early December, which arrived on the 21st. But on that same day I noticed a local shop was doing a Christmas sale and had 256/16 SG MBA in stock for basically the same price as the base model (just 40 Euros extra). I bought this one immediately and returned the one I ordered. Even though it’s not in the color I wanted, I couldn’t be happier. I never got to try an 8Gb M1 with my workflow, but I can tell you that 16Gb is giving me peace of mind. I’m sure this MBA will stay in the family for a long time.

If Apple is giving MBA users the option to upgrade to 16Gb, doesn’t this mean that we will be able feel its benefits? If not so much now, maybe in 2-3 years, when the OS, software will require it?

 

[armoured]

The current M1 Air/Pro and Mac minis are aimed at the average consumer, ...

It's not like that extra RAM comes free of cost, its still $200 U.S. (or at least 230 euro in Europe). For those moments your computer does need some more RAM, swap will take care of it without noticeable hits on performance. The whole package including the SSD is so fast nowadays, without obsessively looking at the activity monitor, an average user won't even notice it.

In general:

8GB - Office work, video conferencing, entertainment, daily web browsing, casual video/photo/music editing.
16GB - Video/photo/music editing enthusiasts, virtualisation users (parallels/docker and such).
32GB and more - Professionals.

I overall agree with your point but just would put a different emphasis:

1) Cost: $200 isn't all that much - for lots of people I know, that is perhaps two dinners out at a nice restaurant, or a tiny portion of a vacation. Sure, for those for whom cost constraints are serious and they know they don't need it - save the money. But it's not crazy for an individual to decide that for a computer you use for several hours a day, it's not a large amount and may come in handy; even more so if you plan to keep it longer term and particularly if it's for work.

2) I'm in your second group and know it. I also notice that in forums such as this, users have more than a passing interest in computers and what they can do with them and are mostly not "casual" users; forum participants is a self-selected group that tends to heavy users - so if your 90% rule is correct, it doesn't mean it applies here.

Most of my acquaintances/friends/family who I'd put in your first group have almost no interest in computers and would barely know how much ram they have or even ask the question - and the vast majority of them don't need to buy a new apple silicon mac at all (until their old computer breaks or gets too old). When they do decide to change their computer and ask, 100% I will tell them they don't need more than 8; but that may not apply to users here.

 

[alien3dx]

I overall agree with your point but just would put a different emphasis:

1) Cost: $200 isn't all that much - for lots of people I know, that is perhaps two dinners out at a nice restaurant, or a tiny portion of a vacation. Sure, for those for whom cost constraints are serious and they know they don't need it - save the money. But it's not crazy for an individual to decide that for a computer you use for several hours a day, it's not a large amount and may come in handy; even more so if you plan to keep it longer term and particularly if it's for work.

2) I'm in your second group and know it. I also notice that in forums such as this, users have more than a passing interest in computers and what they can do with them and are mostly not "casual" users; forum participants is a self-selected group that tends to heavy users - so if your 90% rule is correct, it doesn't mean it applies here.

Most of my acquaintances/friends/family who I'd put in your first group have almost no interest in computers and would barely know how much ram they have or even ask the question - and the vast majority of them don't need to buy a new apple silicon mac at all (until their old computer breaks or gets too old). When they do decide to change their computer and ask, 100% I will tell them they don't need more than 8; but that may not apply to users here.

200 usd a lot , a month food here for family. For usa and europe may seem not much. For working people like me dont mind as long work done.Average 8 gb is just pure enough and some dont even mind platter disk.

There was a story is software. A person wait usually 12 hour to do batch processing. One day a vendor recreate and batch only 10 minute. The usual person wait wait as usual but seem shock how improve the system compare to old system.Conclusion , not all people geek enough to know all gizmo thing like ssd ram and so on.

 

[OldMike]

In general:

8GB - Office work, video conferencing, entertainment, daily web browsing, casual video/photo/music editing.
16GB - Video/photo/music editing enthusiasts, virtualisation users (parallels/docker and such).
32GB and more - Professionals.

Lastly, stop obsessing over memory graphs and just enjoy your new MacBook.

When I saw this, it reminded me of a review of the 8GB M1 MBP I read recently:

Its final test was a live presentation to Austin’s CapMac user group using Zoom and mimo Live, which have yet to be updated to Universal, along with Apple’s (Universal) Keynote. Everything worked flawlessly for nearly 75 minutes. In fact, I remarked several times that I was impressed by how nicely everything worked with only 8GB of RAM and Rosetta 2.

Then I saw a brief alert about running out of memory and the Mac crashed. Since M1 models aren’t upgradeable, I returned it

That was from this Mac Observer post:

Dr. Mac's Experience with an Apple Silicon (M1) Mac

Dr. Mac bought a MacBook Pro M1 with only 8GB RAM because he didn't want to wait a month for one with 16GB... Was eight (GB) enough?

www.macobserver.com

 

[pshufd]

200 usd a lot , a month food here for family. For usa and europe may seem not much. For working people like me dont mind as long work done.Average 8 gb is just pure enough and some dont even mind platter disk.

There was a story is software. A person wait usually 12 hour to do batch processing. One day a vendor recreate and batch only 10 minute. The usual person wait wait as usual but seem shock how improve the system compare to old system.Conclusion , not all people geek enough to know all gizmo thing like ssd ram and so on.

Back in the 1970s, we had an IBM 360 at Uni. So you punched up your cards, took the stack to the card reader, and then waited for your printed output. And it could be the next day even though your job only took a fraction of a second of CPU time. I found out that they had a PDP-11 that was used for some student classes - the PDP-11 was an interactive time-sharing system. The PDP-11 had an RJE interface to the IBM 360. So you could type your program into the PDP-11 and submit your job to the IBM and then get the results back.

What's more, there were dial-in modems on the PDP-11. So, you didn't need to carry around a stack of cards, and you could do your work from your dorm or home and get much faster turnaround time. The RJE wasn't advertised - I just looked around on the system and ran into it.

 

[pshufd]

When I saw this, it reminded me of a review of the 8GB M1 MBP I read recently:



That was from this Mac Observer post:

Dr. Mac's Experience with an Apple Silicon (M1) Mac

Dr. Mac bought a MacBook Pro M1 with only 8GB RAM because he didn't want to wait a month for one with 16GB... Was eight (GB) enough?

www.macobserver.com

Yeah, catastrophic failure at the margins. Something you don't want happening.

People sometimes have their ISP go out during the trading day with grumbles over it. My typical response is that they should have backup internet and a backup computer that's battery powered. That's pretty easy to do these days with the cellular plan on your phone and a laptop.

Some people, of course, live near a Starbucks, Panera Bread or Dunkin; so they just go to a local cafe when there's an ISP or power issue. That works too.

 

[armoured]

200 usd a lot , a month food here for family. For usa and europe may seem not much. For working people like me dont mind as long work done.Average 8 gb is just pure enough and some dont even mind platter disk.

I agree, it of course depends on budget. But then, depends also what the machine does and whether they need a new machine or a mac or a desktop computer at all.

Let's look at the 'casual user' list of tasks: "Office work, video conferencing, entertainment, daily web browsing, casual video/photo/music editing." With possible exception here of office work, none of these tasks require a laptop/desktop computer at all (low-end ipad will do these pretty well, plenty do a lot of this on smartphones); for most office work, a hand-me-down under-specced Ubuntu laptop or desktop with free libreoffice will do fine.

Now people have preferences and some want to run Macs; that's great, they can decide what to spend money on and what they can afford. But for a lot of users spending $1000+ on a new laptop, the extra $200 is not that much more (I mean, apple sells a lot of $800+ or even more pricey phones, too).

 

[Michael Scrip]

But for a lot of users spending $1000+ on a new laptop, the extra $200 is not that much more (I mean, apple sells a lot of $800+ or even more pricey phones, too).

Exactly.

If somehow they're able to generate $1,000 for a new laptop... it shouldn't be too difficult to generate $1,200...

The good news is... they're more likely to keep using that same laptop for 4 or 5 years... so the extra cost is a little more reasonable.

Look... I hate that Apple charges so much for upgrades... but that's Apple.

 

[armoured]

If somehow they're able to generate $1,000 for a new laptop... it shouldn't be too difficult to generate $1,200...

The good news is... they're more likely to keep using that same laptop for 4 or 5 years... so the extra cost is a little more reasonable.

Yep - again people have different budgets, no differences of opinion there. But I know a fair lot of people that eat out (or used to before covid) several nights a week - or upgrade their phones once every year.

I also think apple charges too much for the bump up - but in this case my bigger complaint, from my personal perspective, is that the 16gb is actually not so easy to find - can't get one where I am in less than a month or so.

(Looked at differently the 8gb is a screaming bargain, just that it's honestly not spec'ed right for my uses).

 

[Spudlicious]

Or even an M1 mac.
These are the 'base' models after all, and newer macs will only be beefier.

True, but it always is true. When we're able to buy a model the next iteration, beefier, shinier, better, is well advanced down the road to market. On the day I ordered my M1 I was 73 (but still ruggedly attractive!) and although I expect at least another 30 years of enjoying technology I just don't want to wait.

 

[cakeloverpro]

I wonder how many of us are using the M1 macs as a desktop till they come out with a pro version. I plan on selling mine the instant i get a pro. I paid $1700 for a 16gb 1TB MBA, that has been perm as a docked mac mini clone. This $1700 beats out a $3200 i bought a year or so ago.

Now that IntelliJ & Emacs are native M1. I started to notice 20% reduction in overhead, so did others. I thought it was the m1, and while true to an extent ( GPU & CPU and other share memory thus no buffer for copying ) THere was a huge change in swift 5.1.. really huge... they cut memory useage below OBJC runtime. Parts of swift has moved from layer above objc.. to running things near the kernel level ( Thanks WWDC for that video )

I have been working in rust lately, I am now seeing if Swift is the better server side. Even on Linux.

M1 Macs + Swift 5.1 changes + Kernel changes is what made big sur a leap, not a small evoloution.

 

[Dammit Cubs]

After watching all of the YouTube videos, and some of the posts here, I was honestly surprised at how little it took to get the memory pressure into the high yellow and red range.

I was able to get the yellow and red-pressure when I was running high intensive scripts and this did shock me that none of these you tubers were able to get it but I'm not surprised. Apparently everything on Youtube thinks they are a Videographer.

I agree with a lot of your points. great comments.

 

[pshufd]

Just ordered the 16/1 Air. It will arrive in several hours. I could have picked it up at my preferred store on Wednesday but it appears that another store in the area has them today so they're going to drive one over from there around lunchtime. So it looks like all of the stores around me get inventory almost every day for the Airs. If you are awake when it hits their online store, then you order one and it subtracts from inventory. And this applies to inventory that they are getting two days after the current date.

There are no 16/1 Pros available in the 12 closest stores so either they are making fewer of them or there's more demand for the Pros. All of the stores in my area got these in inventory a few days ago so these do show up but it seems that they get in a lot more Airs than Pros.

If there were a Pro 16/1 available and no Air 16/1 available, then I would have ordered the Pro. This system is not for me; another household member asked for a small laptop so I asked a bunch of questions. I assumed that I'd just get the 8/256 but it turns out that 16/512 would have been the best choice (with the possibility of an external drive); but 1 TB will mean no external needed. It will also be shared with another family member.

I'm still waffling a bit on myself. I'd love a Pro 16/1 and a Mini. But I absolutely don't need either because I have so much old hardware that still works well. I'm rather impressed with how many of these things Apple is selling in my area. From other reports I've seen, this is the case in many other areas as well. I would be somewhat interested to see what Windows PC sales are like - that is is Apple's success with the M1 systems eating into Windows share?

It also means that Apple made the exact, correct decisions in selling these M1s first. The market reception appears to be phenomenal.

I also looked at the Accessories page carefully to get an idea as to what I might need. I was disappointed that their USB-C to multi port only supports 4k at 30 hz. I think that's a very old product. I also noticed the extension cable for the power brick - I have a bunch of those in a spare parts bin so I don't need one of those. The others can use the NAS if they need to get big files in or out of the thing and it will use WiFi for connectivity. If someone needs Accessories, I can just get them at the local Apple Store. Accessories are always important for Apple Gear. I do not have a huge amount of USB-C stuff but I have enough to manage in the short-term.

 

[pldelisle]

I also think apple charges too much for the bump up

Keep in mind that the upgrade here is simply chip binning. Every M1 right now comes from TSMC fab is 16 GB with two memory banks. Some of those two banks work, and for some only one works. The 200$ cost come from there and is a lot more legitimate than the abysmal RAM upgrade price of iMac which are socketed DIMM.

 

[alien3dx]

Just ordered the 16/1 Air. It will arrive in several hours. I could have picked it up at my preferred store on Wednesday but it appears that another store in the area has them today so they're going to drive one over from there around lunchtime. So it looks like all of the stores around me get inventory almost every day for the Airs. If you are awake when it hits their online store, then you order one and it subtracts from inventory. And this applies to inventory that they are getting two days after the current date.

There are no 16/1 Pros available in the 12 closest stores so either they are making fewer of them or there's more demand for the Pros. All of the stores in my area got these in inventory a few days ago so these do show up but it seems that they get in a lot more Airs than Pros.

If there were a Pro 16/1 available and no Air 16/1 available, then I would have ordered the Pro. This system is not for me; another household member asked for a small laptop so I asked a bunch of questions. I assumed that I'd just get the 8/256 but it turns out that 16/512 would have been the best choice (with the possibility of an external drive); but 1 TB will mean no external needed. It will also be shared with another family member.

I'm still waffling a bit on myself. I'd love a Pro 16/1 and a Mini. But I absolutely don't need either because I have so much old hardware that still works well. I'm rather impressed with how many of these things Apple is selling in my area. From other reports I've seen, this is the case in many other areas as well. I would be somewhat interested to see what Windows PC sales are like - that is is Apple's success with the M1 systems eating into Windows share?

It also means that Apple made the exact, correct decisions in selling these M1s first. The market reception appears to be phenomenal.

I also looked at the Accessories page carefully to get an idea as to what I might need. I was disappointed that their USB-C to multi port only supports 4k at 30 hz. I think that's a very old product. I also noticed the extension cable for the power brick - I have a bunch of those in a spare parts bin so I don't need one of those. The others can use the NAS if they need to get big files in or out of the thing and it will use WiFi for connectivity. If someone needs Accessories, I can just get them at the local Apple Store. Accessories are always important for Apple Gear. I do not have a huge amount of USB-C stuff but I have enough to manage in the short-term.

just now and play with it. Keyboard seem more shorter and ram usage seem okay. Anyway still 0 stock
** they only show demo set m1 air and pro

 

[pldelisle]

, I am now seeing if Swift is the better server side. Even on Linux.

Technology choice is always depending of what you are doing. Don’t limit yourself to technology hype. Chose the right one that fits what you need and the client requirements.

 

[pshufd]

just now and play with it. Keyboard seem more shorter and ram usage seem okay. Anyway still 0 stock
** they only show demo set m1 air and pro

Supply will eventually catch up with demand.

I really hope that software companies are watching and thinking that they really need to do a macOS port.

 

[Rck1984]

When I saw this, it reminded me of a review of the 8GB M1 MBP I read recently:



That was from this Mac Observer post:

Dr. Mac's Experience with an Apple Silicon (M1) Mac

Dr. Mac bought a MacBook Pro M1 with only 8GB RAM because he didn't want to wait a month for one with 16GB... Was eight (GB) enough?

www.macobserver.com

Been using a 8/256 for about a week now. Web browsing including 4k videos on YouTube, Teams videoconferencing, O365 applications, Jump Desktop to connect to work environment, Spotify, Mail and some Pixelmator Pro to edit some photos. Memory pressure constantly in green, its breezing through anything.

An occasional crash can always happen, even on a 16GB. Especially now that there is still a lot of non optimised applications around that are translated by Rosetta. I wouldn't send it back, because it crashed on me once..