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

[MarkC426]

This is true, but also consider once bought, that's it.
Unlike the old mini where you could add extra ram later.

It can also be wise to consider 12 months time, what you may need.

 

[rui no onna]

They have implicitly - they are the Air 16 GB/1 TB and the Pro 16 GB/1 TB. I could order the Pro right now and get it Thursday, either delivered to my home or at three local stores. The Air is out of stock at the moment but the stores should have their inventories replenished tonight.

Not really. Only place you can get those is Apple Store and select retailers. They're not available at Best Buy, Costco, Amazon.com, etc. All Apple Stores are closed in California so we've got a 3-4 week wait here.

 

[MarkC426]

3-4 week wait in UK also, for base model from Apple.
However you can get base mini from Amazon uk within a couple of days.

 

[Rck1984]

This is true, but also consider once bought, that's it.
Unlike the old mini where you could add extra ram later.

It can also be wise to consider 12 months time, what you may need.

For 90% of the people, their usage isn't going to flip around at once and be all different.

I mean.. Yes, if you are getting into certain things such as video editing, then keep that in mind and perhaps "future proof" your purchase. But most of us know exactly what we're buying these devices for. Students being students, office workers being office workers and so forth.

 

[JeepGuy]

For me the difference between a 8GB and 16GB would be about 320 euro, that's about $400 U.S.
Being located in Europe and getting a discount on a base model.

$400 U.S for 8GB of RAM? I've accepted Apple tax, but that is a ridiculous amount money (a third of the entire MacBook) for something I don't need right now, but maybe, just maybe in the future.

That's a crazy price for 8gb, and I felt ripped off paying $250cdn. ??

 

[Rck1984]

That's a crazy price for 8gb, and I felt ripped off paying $250cdn. ??

Yup, it is...

I just cringe a little bit when I read/see someone doubting over their 8GB purchase, after hearing that they should have gone 16GB instead, because 8GB just isn't enough in 2021 or because their device isn't future proof. Whilst yes, RAM is still RAM, a lot has changed also with the M1 system, its better optimised, its faster and where swapping led to slowdowns and beach balls before, thanks to the fast SSD's an average user -that does not obsessively keeps an eye on his/her activity monitor- isn't going to even notice it. The Nvme might not have a lifespan of 12 years, but 10 years because of it, no big deal.

I've had a friend worrying over his 8GB, considering an expensive exchange instead of enjoying his awesome brand new MacBook.

 

[MarkC426]

But again, unified ram shouldn't be compared to standard memory modules.
This is a whole new playing field, so who knows the actual cost of the chips.

 

[TynH]

Just give it a rest.

 

[Michael Scrip]

This is a whole new playing field, so who knows the actual cost of the chips.

Whatever the cost is... it can't be anywhere near the price of Apple's upgrade pricing.

You can get the whole laptop for $1,000... and they want another $200 for a couple extra RAM chips?

I say this as not being a unified memory engineer. Maybe they do cost that much. But it does seem a little high.

 

[rui no onna]

But again, unified ram shouldn't be compared to standard memory modules.
This is a whole new playing field, so who knows the actual cost of the chips.

Unified just means CPU, GPU, storage, etc. are all sharing the same RAM.

These are commodities. A quick Google Search shows spot price of $12.50-13.40 for LPDDR4x 32Gb (4GB) and $16.30-19.40 for LPDDR4x 48Gb (6GB).

 

[alien3dx]

Yes, this is all true. I was only pointing out that you can't treat them as just additive - it's not like 8 + 8 ram /video ram were being used for the same things (or only in certain circumstances).

But yes, most of the time the ram dedicated to the video is taken out of what's available elsewhere (true for the intel systems with on-board gpu only as well, like the previous macbook airs).

I think having 16gb on board in the M1 series is far superior to 8 + 8 (for comparison only), assuming no speed penalty - previously your dGPU ram would not be available for general system purposes, and hence little benefit from that extra 8 unless you were actively using a lot of it (which might only be for games or some specific programs). If your actual video ram in use is only 1gb, that extra dedicated 8 would be mighty underused.

So mostly you'll get better use out of that 16gb system ram. [There will be some uses that really need the separate large dgpu with dedicated ram - doubt they're the market for macbook airs / low-end powerbooks.]

hehe , you need to said like this

1080p - video editing fokus okay
1080p - open video editing , after effect, ilustrator , photoshop all same time (kiok)

some add futures will (kiok) - opeb lightroom open some big ehm 2 40mb pixel (slowdown)

* m1 not pure 1080p screen layout and got retina screen , normal cheap laptop like me huawei got 1080p, My imac 2017 1080p not retina. Im not into 4k thing such as website development such as even most people dont even need 1080p browser and even safari scaling width . Conclusion pure simple workload no need 8gb but its good to have 16gb till 0 swap 0 compress

 

[Johnny907]

If you can afford it, go with 16GB. If not, make do with 8.
Easy math.

 

[Ethosik]

Yes, this is all true. I was only pointing out that you can't treat them as just additive - it's not like 8 + 8 ram /video ram were being used for the same things (or only in certain circumstances).

But yes, most of the time the ram dedicated to the video is taken out of what's available elsewhere (true for the intel systems with on-board gpu only as well, like the previous macbook airs).

I think having 16gb on board in the M1 series is far superior to 8 + 8 (for comparison only), assuming no speed penalty - previously your dGPU ram would not be available for general system purposes, and hence little benefit from that extra 8 unless you were actively using a lot of it (which might only be for games or some specific programs). If your actual video ram in use is only 1gb, that extra dedicated 8 would be mighty underused.

So mostly you'll get better use out of that 16gb system ram. [There will be some uses that really need the separate large dgpu with dedicated ram - doubt they're the market for macbook airs / low-end powerbooks.]

Except I have 2560x1440 and a 4K display connected which itself takes up GPU. Is there a way to see how much GPU memory you are using in Activity Monitor?

 

[Ethosik]

But again, unified ram shouldn't be compared to standard memory modules.
This is a whole new playing field, so who knows the actual cost of the chips.

Honestly, our discussions in this thread is the actual opposite of what you need to focus on. Like my earlier post, my iMac 8GB of system RAM and 8GB of GPU = 8+8 = 16GB of Unified RAM if I want to keep the same "setup". Since there is no separation of system RAM and GPU anymore, you need to add what your GPU was before, so in my case 16GB made sense. I can't see a way to view how much GPU was being used in Activity Monitor so I don't know if I was using 1 or 2 GB or 4GB or maybe all 8GB when video editing. So 16GB was the correct choice, even if I was only using 1GB of the 8GB GPU.

 

[armoured]

Honestly, our discussions in this thread is the actual opposite of what you need to focus on. Like my earlier post, my iMac 8GB of system RAM and 8GB of GPU = 8+8 = 16GB of Unified RAM if I want to keep the same "setup". Since there is no separation of system RAM and GPU anymore, you need to add what your GPU was before, so in my case 16GB made sense. I can't see a way to view how much GPU was being used in Activity Monitor so I don't know if I was using 1 or 2 GB or 4GB or maybe all 8GB when video editing. So 16GB was the correct choice, even if I was only using 1GB of the 8GB GPU.

Sorry, I'm repeating, but you cannot just add your previous 8+8=16. They work differently and separately. But not worth worrying about, if you got 16, you will effectively have more than before in almost all circumstances (unified will reduce usage and allow switching between the types without your involvement).

 

[armoured]

Except I have 2560x1440 and a 4K display connected which itself takes up GPU. Is there a way to see how much GPU memory you are using in Activity Monitor?

I don't know that there's an easy way to do this although look around, some like istat menus may attempt to (some question about how exact it may be in practice/different architectures).

I'd much appreciate if those with a better knowledge weighed in, but: I don't believe the screen display or size itself is the real issue, it's not all that much, even with more than one display. This is in simple day to day use and won't matter much for, say, office (although things not shown on the screen may be held in vram for example in a background window).

The way to think of it with gaming as an example: it's holding in memory and calculating and shifting multiple 'screens' (frames) at once/in very short timeframes; roughly that's the framerate - obviously 60 frames per second will want more memory. But even just shifting and displaying video (with some frames in buffer and some calcs to up/downsize) isn't all that much memory even at pretty high resolution.

But some programs will move things to the GPU memory and do calculations directly on that board. And yes, obviously if you have a larger screen/multiple screens and multiple frames/high framerates needed with bazillions of calcs, then it does enter into the memory use, but not just from displaying stuff. With games actually the video cards are running various calcs, transformations, etc, and holding/tracking objects in memory and moving them around there, like rotating shapes with light bouncing off, shading, etc - think an explosion in a game throwing off hundreds of thousands of bits of shrapnel with their own shapes and trajectories.

So it depends on what programs you're using and how much they use the gfx - program specific. It might be intuitive to think that everything video and photography related will but not all actually use the gpu that much (they don't have all those discrete objects), depends on calcs, and some people are doing non-video stuff that is designed to make use of the gpu's specialised processing abilities (bitcoin mining being an example). For photography it can be specific to individual filters. 3D rendering of virtual worlds and stuff like that (like a game) - different story.

If you do a lot of gaming, probably will matter (but how much?). Everything else - you'd need to test in real world use and/or check specs and recommendations of the program. My understanding is that video processing/rendering might make use of extra vram but perhaps not as much as you might think.

Anyway this is as I understand it and hope it helps, but happy to be corrected too.

 

[opeter]

If you can afford it, go with 16GB. If not, make do with 8.
Easy math.

Well, yeah. But I personally wouldn't buy a computer in 2021 with only 8 GB RAM.

And for 1200 dollars? Sorry, for that money I expect to have min. 16 GB of RAM. Simple math.

 

[alien3dx]

Well, yeah. But I personally wouldn't buy a computer in 2021 with 8 GB RAM. Simple math.

It depend on usage and availbility. Now testing MacBook m1 installation software and da da da.

Sometimes is not just about ram but other too.

 

[Sydde]

How does the display system work? The GPU is just a multicore parallel processor for manipulating and generating display data (or doing other highly parallelizable calculations). The display output is a separate unit. Does it scan an area in common memory?

 

[pshufd]

I don't know that there's an easy way to do this although look around, some like istat menus may attempt to (some question about how exact it may be in practice/different architectures).

I'd much appreciate if those with a better knowledge weighed in, but: I don't believe the screen display or size itself is the real issue, it's not all that much, even with more than one display. This is in simple day to day use and won't matter much for, say, office (although things not shown on the screen may be held in vram for example in a background window).

The way to think of it with gaming as an example: it's holding in memory and calculating and shifting multiple 'screens' (frames) at once/in very short timeframes; roughly that's the framerate - obviously 60 frames per second will want more memory. But even just shifting and displaying video (with some frames in buffer and some calcs to up/downsize) isn't all that much memory even at pretty high resolution.

But some programs will move things to the GPU memory and do calculations directly on that board. And yes, obviously if you have a larger screen/multiple screens and multiple frames/high framerates needed with bazillions of calcs, then it does enter into the memory use, but not just from displaying stuff. With games actually the video cards are running various calcs, transformations, etc, and holding/tracking objects in memory and moving them around there, like rotating shapes with light bouncing off, shading, etc - think an explosion in a game throwing off hundreds of thousands of bits of shrapnel with their own shapes and trajectories.

So it depends on what programs you're using and how much they use the gfx - program specific. It might be intuitive to think that everything video and photography related will but not all actually use the gpu that much (they don't have all those discrete objects), depends on calcs, and some people are doing non-video stuff that is designed to make use of the gpu's specialised processing abilities (bitcoin mining being an example). For photography it can be specific to individual filters. 3D rendering of virtual worlds and stuff like that (like a game) - different story.

If you do a lot of gaming, probably will matter (but how much?). Everything else - you'd need to test in real world use and/or check specs and recommendations of the program. My understanding is that video processing/rendering might make use of extra vram but perhaps not as much as you might think.

Anyway this is as I understand it and hope it helps, but happy to be corrected too.

One thing that I've noticed with discrete cards that Apple uses is that onboard RAM seems to increase with more monitor support. So 8 GB of discrete video RAM can support 3x4k or 4x4k.

 

[theSeb]

What range is a significant number of PageOuts?

This is one of those how long is a piece of string type questions, but for personal computing I would consider anything above 2 GBs worth to be significant.

So using some rough quick maths that would be equivalent to 524288 pages.

 

[armoured]

One thing that I've noticed with discrete cards that Apple uses is that onboard RAM seems to increase with more monitor support. So 8 GB of discrete video RAM can support 3x4k or 4x4k.

Yes, and I didn't mean to suggest this isn't true, video ram usage (whether iGPU or dGPU) increases with size and number of monitors - and with on-board ram being used for video, it's going to reduce the amount of onboard ram available for system and applications.

Perhaps less relevant in the current M1s as basically only two monitor support (or one more in the mini? too lazy to look it up).

My point again is that it's not 1:1 replacement with dGPU ram - for many uses, the 8gb of discrete memory will be unutilised a lot of the time unless using specific programs and tasks. And that 'just' driving monitors is not the big driver of GPU memory usage - it's programs that are doing a lot more in the GPU's dedicated ram than just putting up screen data (like some games), even accounting for eg some video buffering. (Of course, add a lot of very large monitors and it starts to add up)

On the M1, that 'extra' 8gb of system ram (compared to an 8-8 on-board/dGPU ram system) will be available to system and to all apps (or for GPU-specific tasks) as needed - much better most of the time.

(And I'm making no claims about how much memory someone might need for some M2 machine with twelve monitors or something. Deal with that when we get to it)

 

[AAPLGeek]

For me the difference between a 8GB and 16GB would be about 320 euro, that's about $400 U.S.
Being located in Europe and getting a discount on a base model.

$400 U.S for 8GB of RAM? I've accepted Apple tax, but that is a ridiculous amount money (a third of the entire MacBook) for something I don't need right now, but maybe, just maybe in the future.

I still believe a lot of people are overestimating their need for RAM, and wasting money because of FOMO and "advice" on forums like these. I've been both 'suspect' and 'victim' of it in the past as well..

$400 for 8GB RAM is absolutely insane. Pretty sure BTO Macs are an entirely different class of revenue stream for Apple.

 

[theSeb]

Not sure where Rc1984 is shopping but 320 euro does seem very steep. It is £200 in the UK, which is still far too much for 8 GBs of RAM. Dell would charge me £100 for such an upgrade on an XPS 13", which is still too much but bearable. The thing is though, Apple could never be accused of being the economical choice, so we can moan, or take our money elsewhere. On the Intel Macs Apple wants to charge me £400 to upgrade from 16 to 32. So that is still £200 per 8 GBs. Therefore nothing has changed in their pricing policy, so none of this should be a surprise.

 

[pshufd]

Yes, and I didn't mean to suggest this isn't true, video ram usage (whether iGPU or dGPU) increases with size and number of monitors - and with on-board ram being used for video, it's going to reduce the amount of onboard ram available for system and applications.

Perhaps less relevant in the current M1s as basically only two monitor support (or one more in the mini? too lazy to look it up).

My point again is that it's not 1:1 replacement with dGPU ram - for many uses, the 8gb of discrete memory will be unutilised a lot of the time unless using specific programs and tasks. And that 'just' driving monitors is not the big driver of GPU memory usage - it's programs that are doing a lot more in the GPU's dedicated ram than just putting up screen data (like some games), even accounting for eg some video buffering. (Of course, add a lot of very large monitors and it starts to add up)

On the M1, that 'extra' 8gb of system ram (compared to an 8-8 on-board/dGPU ram system) will be available to system and to all apps (or for GPU-specific tasks) as needed - much better most of the time.

(And I'm making no claims about how much memory someone might need for some M2 machine with twelve monitors or something. Deal with that when we get to it)

I have a 4 GB GTX 1050 Ti and the normal RAM usage on the video card is 40-60% with 3x4k and two programs that use the GPU regularly. It was actually difficult picking a GPU to support 3x4k as GPU specs are a bit on the vague side as to what they can support but it's pretty obvious that you're not going to run 3x4k when there are only 2 video outs. I suspect that I got something that's pretty close to the minimum card. Getting a more expensive card is no guarantee of support either.

In general, there's no downside to more RAM.