If my consideration between 24-core GPU and 32-core is about gaming, is there no point spending the extra for the 32?

[HQNYC]

Don't worry, OP.

Game developers will develop for ARM soon. Google has it's ARM tensor chip, which they will definitely try to bring to their chrome books.

Microsoft has been developing a custom ARM chip since December 2020. They're also working on Windows ARM.

Alibaba just released a 5nm custom ARM server chip 2 days ago.

The industry is gravitating to ARM chips. If game companies are not aware of this fact, then they are incredibly dumb. iOS games make the bulk of Apple's service revenue.

I meant AAA game studios will develop for M series Macs soon. I will use my M1 Max (32 GPU) for work mostly, but will definitely purchase AAA games to play on breaks.

Apple Made More Money on Games Than Xbox, Sony, Nintendo and Activision Combined in 2019 - IGN

Apple is reportedly on top when it comes to video game revenue, despite not developing consoles or major AAA games of its own.

www.ign.com

 

[Valentineviolin]

My understanding is that Parallels, that is now optimised for Apple silicon, runs like an absolute dream, so I'd like to think they'll play games very nicely. I will see and report back. Counting the days for my new Mac to arrive...

I'm similar - I don't care if Macs are officially regarded as "gaming machines" or not lol. I've had many wonderful hours playing my Sims games on Bootcamp on my old 2012 iMac. I'm going to stick with Macs because I just love Mac products and will find a way to continue gaming on them even if it's not conventional to do so.

 

[WinterEmerald]

The real question is what is holding you off to not get 32 core gpu ? If the money is the issue, you should not get M1 max at all.

There's a significant difference between me spending a lot of money on a single computer that my livelihood depends on/that I will be using for everything else computing-wise, and buying multiple Macs and a gaming PC at the same time.

 

[xraydoc]

I'm similar - I don't care if Macs are officially regarded as "gaming machines" or not lol. I've had many wonderful hours playing my Sims games on Bootcamp on my old 2012 iMac. I'm going to stick with Macs because I just love Mac products and will find a way to continue gaming on them even if it's not conventional to do so.

Trouble is, there's no more BootCamp on ARM-based Macs and Parallels needs to run Windows for ARM, which means that any x86 game (which is virtually all of them) you try to run will run on an emulated (not virtual) x86 chip. That means SLOW performance for a game. No matter how fast the Mac is, the x86 game is going to suffer severely. Think back to the days of VirtualPC for the PowerPC Macs (if you're old enough). It was 'fast-enough' for desktop apps but in no way was a viable gaming platform.

You simply cannot run x86 games on an ARM Mac with performance comparable to even the cheapest gaming PC.

 

[goobot]

It sucks ms doesn’t want to release their arm version of windows for boot camp

 

[UBS28]

I meant AAA game studios will develop for M series Macs soon. I will use my M1 Max (32 GPU) for work mostly, but will definitely purchase AAA games to play on breaks.

Apple Made More Money on Games Than Xbox, Sony, Nintendo and Activision Combined in 2019 - IGN

Apple is reportedly on top when it comes to video game revenue, despite not developing consoles or major AAA games of its own.

www.ign.com

That is the problem of the gaming industry. Predatory mobile games make more money than AAA games. So why bother investing so much money making AAA games?

It is basically Microsoft and Sony who are keeping the AAA industry alive at this point most likely. Else most developers would have switched to focus on mobile games where much more money is to be earned.

Apple is in a really good position at the moment.

 

[Adarna]

There's a point. you save moeny and apple makes less

 

[the8thark]

Really umming and ahhing on this one

Gaming is all about the games. Choose the platform that has the most games you want to play.

You do not need a monster Mac to negotiate games. Even something like a 1080p docked Switch is great because it has lots of games.

With gaming, starting with the hardware is in my opinion thinking about it all backwards.

First choose the platform that has the games you want to play.

Be it a console - Nintendo / Playstation / Microsoft / retro console
Or a PC / Mac.

Then choose the hardware that can access your platform of choice.
Accessibility of games trumps hardware power. No point having beastly hardware that can not access the platform all the games you want to play are on.

 

[Mayo86]

Trouble is, there's no more BootCamp on ARM-based Macs and Parallels needs to run Windows for ARM, which means that any x86 game (which is virtually all of them) you try to run will run on an emulated (not virtual) x86 chip. That means SLOW performance for a game. No matter how fast the Mac is, the x86 game is going to suffer severely. Think back to the days of VirtualPC for the PowerPC Macs (if you're old enough). It was 'fast-enough' for desktop apps but in no way was a viable gaming platform.

You simply cannot run x86 games on an ARM Mac with performance comparable to even the cheapest gaming PC.

I completely disagree with what you are saying through and through. As someone who has run x86 games on Windows ARM through Parallels, it runs pretty damn amazing on the M1. Compatibility is not 100%, maybe 70-75%, but what does run, runs amazingly.

 

[Valentineviolin]

I completely disagree with what you are saying through and through. As someone who has run x86 games on Windows ARM through Parallels, it runs pretty damn amazing on the M1. Compatibility is not 100%, maybe 70-75%, but what does run, runs amazingly.

Yes that's what my research has told me too. I have also seen Sims 2 working beautifully on an M1 via Parallels on quite a few YouTube videos so I know it's both possible and workable.

 

[smirking]

I went with the 32 and am looking forward to it.

I made the same calculation. I normally buy only the base processor, but the differential between the base package and the maxed package was modest enough that it just made sense to go for it.

I'm not even doing this for gaming. I'm doing it primarily for photography.

 

[Wando64]

The real question is what is holding you off to not get 32 core gpu ? If the money is the issue, you should not get M1 max at all.

Sorry but this is a ridiculous argument.
Why should you get something you will never make any use of?

Also, are you suggesting only extremely well off people need high processing power on their computer equipment?
Should people on a budget just change job?

 

[Adarna]

I do not play modern games but I'd consider looking at the cost of a Mac you want to configure for gaming vs a PC that is built for that purpose.

Apple may have the best hardware out there but you're after the gaming library.

 

[Piplodocus]

I've bought one, mostly for music production, but equally it'll be my main do-it-all machine and I was figuring on getting some games on it. It should be a beast for that too (and no, I'm not gonna buy a windows gaming laptop instead for my music production).

I went 32 core. Do I need them? Probably not. But consider what a 32 GB / 4TB* one of these costs, and my intention to be using it for many years to come. Even if later it's being reduced to more menial tasks as maybe I'll get a desktop next time I do need a newer machine. So the extra cores kinda seemed a relatively small uplift percentage-wise to the cost. It might be a waste of money and I may be pushing my maxed out budget to its absolute limit, but I'd feel a fool if down the line I'm kicking myself I should have spent the extra (+£300 on the 16-core, but only £100 more than the 24-core), and I'm not gonna by a new machine any time soon based on the cost of either graphics option so am stuck with it.

I always stretch as far as I can on stuff to get the best I can afford, then I can never be too disappointed and I make it last as long as possible (same with all my music gear/mountain bike/etc). There's no way I could afford the 8 TB storage, and the 64GB RAM was +£400, so more expensive than the difference between 16 and 32 core graphics.

Will I regret it? Not as much as I could end up regretting going too low and being stuck with it. My iPad Pro has 1 TB storage. That was a definitely a waste of money when I checked the spare capacity a few weeks back. But it doesn't annoy me on a daily basis as I completely forget about it. If it was too small though it would drive me nuts. Also to be fair, I had some hopes for mobile music production on it and it's bloody useless for what I want, else maybe I'd be making a lot better usage of it. Maybe I should have got less storage for that and now I could afford the 64GB RAM!

Who knows, by the time this is spent Mac gaming *may* be massive. Or not. But I'll be running everything I can on max settings for many years either way.

 

[smirking]

I always stretch as far as I can on stuff to get the best I can afford, then I can never be too disappointed and I make it last as long as possible

I went with the 32 Max as well, but normally I buy the base package because the gap between the fully upgraded package and the base package ends up being relatively small in comparison to new machines 4 years down the line when I start considering an upgrade again. We're paying a high premium for what ends up being a modest bump in performance in hindsight.

That's how I normally feel. It was different this time. The gap between the M1 Pro and the M1 Max was substantial and the cost to performance ratio for the upgrade seemed favorable.

 

[l0stl0rd]

I've bought one, mostly for music production, but equally it'll be my main do-it-all machine and I was figuring on getting some games on it. It should be a beast for that too (and no, I'm not gonna buy a windows gaming laptop instead for my music production).

I went 32 core. Do I need them? Probably not. But consider what a 32 GB / 4TB* one of these costs, and my intention to be using it for many years to come. Even if later it's being reduced to more menial tasks as maybe I'll get a desktop next time I do need a newer machine. So the extra cores kinda seemed a relatively small uplift percentage-wise to the cost. It might be a waste of money and I may be pushing my maxed out budget to its absolute limit, but I'd feel a fool if down the line I'm kicking myself I should have spent the extra (+£300 on the 16-core, but only £100 more than the 24-core), and I'm not gonna by a new machine any time soon based on the cost of either graphics option so am stuck with it.

I always stretch as far as I can on stuff to get the best I can afford, then I can never be too disappointed and I make it last as long as possible (same with all my music gear/mountain bike/etc). There's no way I could afford the 8 TB storage, and the 64GB RAM was +£400, so more expensive than the difference between 16 and 32 core graphics.

Will I regret it? Not as much as I could end up regretting going too low and being stuck with it. My iPad Pro has 1 TB storage. That was a definitely a waste of money when I checked the spare capacity a few weeks back. But it doesn't annoy me on a daily basis as I completely forget about it. If it was too small though it would drive me nuts. Also to be fair, I had some hopes for mobile music production on it and it's bloody useless for what I want, else maybe I'd be making a lot better usage of it. Maybe I should have got less storage for that and now I could afford the 64GB RAM!

Who knows, by the time this is spent Mac gaming *may* be massive. Or not. But I'll be running everything I can on max settings for many years either way.

Similar, but went the less storage more RAM option as storage is expandable in a way but RAM is not and shared with the GPU.

 

[Ethosik]

A couple notes in my time as an engineer:

* Leaders in a space have zero incentive (or more accurately, negative incentive) to help a competitor be more competitive. MS licensing the DirectX API to Apple is not that different from handing a mugger your weapon. Nvidia similarly will not license CUDA to AMD or Apple.
* Subsidizing developers doesn’t really work if they aren’t interested in your platform to begin with. If the interest is there, but they are on the fence, sure. But if they aren’t on the fence, it doesn’t matter unless you outright buy them out. I’ve seen that first hand on a project.
* Subsidizing developers also only makes sense if the developer won’t freak out when the subsidy goes away. You don’t want the developer to feel like the subsidy is what keeps the platform profitable, or it will turn into a shakedown.

Unreal Engine already supports macOS as a platform target, as does Unity. Game developers working with Unity build their stuff using .NET IIRC, and so the engine handles everything for the different platforms on your behalf for the most part (Kerbal Space Program relied on this for Mac support). Larger publishers though use in-house engines and creation tools. EA‘s Frostbite for example. So you get into a problem where you’re basically trying to convince a publisher to port their (legacy) ecosystem to a new platform, and you have to do it on a publisher by publisher basis.

Yes, you have to start somewhere, but I’d argue that it’s already been the case that Apple has done that work a while ago by working with Epic and Unity, deprecating OpenGL in favor of Metal which is faster and easier to port to from DirectX, etc. iOS demonstrates that Apple platforms are viable targets for game development, from a technical perspective. Epic wouldn’t have pulled the stunt they did with Fortnite if there wasn’t so much money on the line. Targeting the Mac would remove barriers compared to iOS and funnel a larger share of revenue to the developer, but even that’s not happening in any big way. There’s more to it than simply Apple’s disinterest. And it’s not like Apple to try a bunch of deals, fail, and then start whinging on about it in public when it falls though (or most companies, really).

One thing I’ve learned working on certain large engineering projects has been: Sometimes, you can do everything in your power, and still fail.

Agreed with this. As a game developer I’m only working on a Windows version. Why? Purely marketshare. My game currently runs on roughly 10 year old hardware. Any Mac should run it fine. I am placing it on Steam when it’s ready. Which has 96% Windows and the rest between Mac and Linux. So yes I’m focusing my game on the 96% potential sales (I’ll never get every windows user to get it but you know what I am saying). If Mac market share was more even with Windows, this would be different.

 

[l0stl0rd]

Agreed with this. As a game developer I’m only working on a Windows version. Why? Purely marketshare. My game currently runs on roughly 10 year old hardware. Any Mac should run it fine. I am placing it on Steam when it’s ready. Which has 96% Windows and the rest between Mac and Linux. So yes I’m focusing my game on the 96% potential sales (I’ll never get every windows user to get it but you know what I am saying). If Mac market share was more even with Windows, this would be different.

Yeah makes sense, that why I don’t expect it to change any time soon and I will get a PS5 for gaming.
Perhaps a different story in 5 years or so.

 

[Ethosik]

Mac and gaming are still mutually exclusive, for now.

This line of thinking always makes no sense. “Gaming” is just fine on Mac. Few were listed here like Civ and Baldur’s Gate. There is also WoW, StarCraft, EVE, Tomb Raider, Stardew Valley, Factorio, Terraria, Borderlands, Minecraft and more. These are games are they not? Just like Xbox doesn’t have Spider-Man or God of War also doesn’t mean Xbox isn’t capable of “gaming”. Windows has exclusives.

 

[edfoo]

This line of thinking always makes no sense. “Gaming” is just fine on Mac. Few were listed here like Civ and Baldur’s Gate. There is also WoW, StarCraft, EVE, Tomb Raider, Stardew Valley, Factorio, Terraria, Borderlands, Minecraft and more. These are games are they not? Just like Xbox doesn’t have Spider-Man or God of War also doesn’t mean Xbox isn’t capable of “gaming”. Windows has exclusives.

Let's wait till the Mac game collection increased by 10 fold first before we talk again.

 

[mcnallym]

Apple is not interested in trying to be all things to all people.
Even Steve jobs used to say that they couldn’t do everything, instead Apple focuses on certain area’s and then builds a product to do that well.
Current focus definitely seems to be in terms of Mac for the video processing, creation area.

If you can use your Mac for other tasks then great but it isn’t necessarily something Apple interested in.

Isn’t so much as doing it wrong with gaming on Mac but square peg and round hole where forcing the Mac into an area that not intended. If it works great. If it doesn’t then use the right tool for he right job.

With GPU then Apple definitely gone different route to windows with AMD or Nvidia. With things like media engine and neural engine then whereas AMD/Nvidia do that in GPU then Apple with the SOC gone different way so GPU potentially less powerful and so less for games but still has the power for what Apple requires as the GPU has less to do as such.

One of the biggest criticism of the 2013 MP was to focussed, and not really a general purpose workstation. Starting to see that now with the mbpro launch that more tailored for certain tasks.

MB air for general purpose and lower end mini and iMac.

So either be prepared to accept he limits that Mac as a games platform brings or get a separate system/console for gaming.

 

[smirking]

Apple is not interested in trying to be all things to all people...

Current focus definitely seems to be in terms of Mac for the video processing, creation area.

There is a loophole here though. The move to the M1 architecture means iOS games can be played on your laptop now. Straight up, it's a terrible experience, but adapting titles that were made for iOS and updating it for the Mac becomes much more appealing.

 

[vir]

You can have everything.

 

[mi7chy]

Stop making sense.

 

[Ethosik]

I am apparently just a troll on this forum for passionately rejecting Apple after being a hardcore Mac fan of 17 years that also happens to appreciate the artistic merit of the games medium (while also working and traveling, for any of those quick-to-sterotype limited thinkers), but I did in fact leave recently. I can understand and empathize with the dislike towards me (I am quite the ass), but whatever.

I am now on an operating system that plays any game out there, from any era, and it also happens to run every professional, scientific and business software application as well. Perhaps the laptop runs a few hours less on battery, and perhaps the M1 Max runs (the handful of) native apps out there faster than the competition, but good lord I don't really care. This PC runs fast enough for any reasonable and employable workload expectation, and 11 hours productivity is also a reasonable expectation ("Who reads for more than 10 hours?" - Steve Jobs on the iPad). I just want to run software, any software, ALL software, and that's the metric I stand by. The PC does that.

You can in fact, have your cake and eat it too. You can both game and work in a full, uncompromised professional capacity. You can have on system that does it all. Except live in the Land of Oz Candyland Apple ecosystem. You lose that one exclusive thing. Apple stuff. I'll be okay without those handcuffs, I think.

Edit: Oh wait, I CAN in fact run macOS, and stay with the Cult of Apple if I want to! If I boot into my Fedora partition and use VFIO GPU passthrough, I can have macOS on my PC with bare metal performance and NO compatibility or updating concerns. All 3 operating systems with native performance, Windows, Linux, and macOS on ONE laptop, just like before on my Intel MacBook Pros of the past! Yes friends, you can still have it all. You do not need to shackle yourself to Apple Silicon prison and lose native Windows, native Linux, native 32-bit apps, and soon (5 years max) native x64 apps. You can have it all again, and still use macOS. Apple Music, Apple News, Apple iWork, Apple Xcode, Apple TV, Apple this, Apple that, Apple here, Apple there, Apple everywhere, oh god the bliss! I have to go back! Just pour that Morning Show all over me, Apple! I'll wipe down after such a religious exertion with the Apple Polishing Cloth, paid for with my Apple Card!

Sorry. Not even Windows can play Spider-Man or Final Fantasy 7 Remake or Persona 5 Royal.