Impressions from test driving base M3 & 12 core CPU M3 Pro

[3SQ Machine]

'Tis the season for holiday shopping and... low(er) prices on Apple products and longggg return periods. Every couple years when in the market I like to test drive some of the "latest" and "not-so-greatest."

This season I test drove a base 14" 8gb M3 MBP & the 14" 12-core CPU 18gb M3 Pro 1Tb. These are the most available models @ Best Buy. Discounts were $200 on the base M3 and $400 on the M3 Pro 1 tb (open box-excellent--had only 2 cycle counts on the battery, I don't think it was ever activated).

Workflow: Logic Pro & Office Productivity (sorry, nothing GPU-intensive); Comparison: 16" M1 Pro MBP

Impressions: The base M3 MBP exceeded my expectations given all the criticism of it, but it of course is not as buttery smooth as the M3 Pro. The M3 Pro, while better, was less than my expectations--which were admittedly mixed. However, I do like the SB.

Impressions of Base M3:

• Expected this thing to be a dog. It was not. I purposefully ran a Zoom call, connected an external monitor, started mixing in Logic, opened up Safari, Brave, and Firefox with 25+ tabs, and opened up a word document for good measure--all at the same time. I was utterly shocked that I only got yellow memory pressure and around 200MB+ of swap used. There were no beachballs. Granted, I don't use memory-intensive samples for Logic nor do I use anything with video/rendering. YMMV
• Oddly, the screen was not as nice as the M3 Pro. I don't know why as they are supposed to be the same. I work on a lot of MBPs and never noticed any disparity except on this model. This panel seemed just a smidge of lower quality. I had web pages and documents side-by-side on the machine and the base was just slightly less crisp. I honestly don't think anyone but me would notice. And it could just be a variation in the panel--this happens. See 5K iMac.
• Base M3 came preloaded with Ventura which was annoying for migration as it required an extra step of installing Sonoma. Speaking of migration, this has gotten much better. It was blazing fast over TB (took about 15 minutes or so). I also didn't have to manually re-load into the libraries all my custom instruments, user patches, preferences, etc. after transferring--this was a nice change! Logic was identical on the one machine or the other (minus reinstalling the stock sound library). Apple seems to have finally figured this out -- thankfully.
• Regarding Logic, I noticed only a minor performance difference between the machines. I had a crackle on one project with the base but not the M3 Pro. Logic oddly only uses the performance cores, and I've read that forcing it to use the efficiency cores can lower performance. My M1 Pro seems better optimized for Logic. HOWEVER, on any Apple silicon I have had a heck of a time getting any of my projects to overload. I haven't suffered with system overloads or needing to freeze tracks since Intel.
• Sound quality (e.g. speakers) were identical on both machines.
• Visually, it's an MBP. It definitely feels a smidge lighter but I never had a 14" one in the space gray color and it wasn't bad. It looked sharp especially at an angle.
• I have not heard the fans once.
• Mediocre, but not terrible R/Ws of around 3200 on blackmagic

Impressions of M3 Pro 12 Core

• Still getting to know the computer, but overall this is sharp and I do like the experience. Let me just say that overall I think Apple nailed it with the color. It is a much more immersive experience. I took a look at the 16" and that seems even more impressive. You WILL need to have a microfiber brush around, though. And why haven't they optimized the keyboard coating to avoid the glossy fingerprinting?
• The screen is crisper than the base, but seems identical to other MBPs I've used.
• I have not heard the fans once.
• Blazing R/Ws--6200+ read/5100+ writes on blackmagicST.
• Performance-wise, I'm not Apple's target market because I don't do GPU intensive work. If anything, this machine is "not quite right" for office productivity and music production. I truly believe an M1 Pro would be just fine. However, in comparing with the M1 Pro, it is undoubtedly faster to load apps + switch and I wouldn't say from a user experience that there is not an increase. This machine is better. I did not feel that way with the M3 base--the more frequent memory compression is a likely culprit for multitasking but I can't say it was any slower than my M1 Pro, despite the insufficient ram. That felt sideways--which is still impressive given the price difference between that and what I bought my 16" for a few years ago.
• With Logic, it again uses only the performance cores and there is at least one more with this model. However, Logic has a nasty habit of spiking one core and that happens on every machine. Nevertheless, there were no crackles and pops on this one, unlike the base, but there was also nothing that blew me away either. Logic really needs that single core performance and for that any of the M series will deliver. Maybe it will get optimized for the M-series over (a long) time.
• Am I disappointed given the cost differential? Yes, but only because I know too much about Apple's new product segmentation and the gap between this one and the Max. If I knew a little less, I would find it a completely worthy upgrade. However, my sense is that the full potential of the M-series is yet to be fully realized and I'm going to take advantage of the next few weeks to delve into it some more. There may be more under the hood here than early influencers and hot-take commentators have uncovered.

So I'm still test driving both machines. I may keep one or none (but definitely not all). I think the issue is whether I want something that will exceed my expectations for less money, or something that may disappoint me at times for more money (performance-wise). But wow that color...

 

[John90976]

What a useful write-up! Seems like the base M3 Pro is the best value if you need the RAM, but the M3 does the job for most for a good bit less, especially at a discount! I feel the GPU on the Pro series really only exists to support the 2 displays and to give a decent bump over the base chip for the money, but I don't think it's particularly graphics-oriented as it has stagnated for 2 gens now. The CPU is still the star, and the 6+6 architecture actually made me think it was more office worker-oriented. On the go or docked, the system has a lot of cores to work with at varying power levels.

I am similarly testing out a bunch of laptops to get a feel of the landscape.

Lenovos P14s OLED with AMD 7840U/64Gb/1TB
ASUS Zenbook 14 with Intel Core Ultra 7/32GB/1TB
Robo & Kala 2-1 with Snapdragon 8 Gen3xc/16GB/512GB
14" M3 Macbook Pro 8GB/512GB

I have really been stuck on the idea of a 13" iPad Pro with macOS, so I gave the robo & kala a try. Windows on arm is actually really snappy in optimized apps, and the specs for the price were insane. The company, however, clearly has no actual engineering prowess or money to spend on implementing it, and so the hardware is quite mid. it also made me realize that unless Apple can squeeze 10hrs of macOS battery life out of an iPad Pro, this modular form factor is just too heavy to be good at everything. Laptops are just good. So that thing went back, despite being quite cool.

I decided to throw in the M3 14" because it is in a similar price bracket as the others, but it has 1/2 to 1/4 of the raw specs. I had the same idea going into the base 14" M3 and it has shockingly kept up with my 16" M1 Pro in almost every regard. I am fixin to replace the m1 pro because I am maxing out 16GB of RAM quite regularly. I have no intention of keeping the 8GB M3 but I did want to see how it fared. Frankly, it performs well enough to justify its price. because for $1299 you can get a "next Generation" 16 Core Intel Core Ultra 7 with 32GB of RAM and buddy, that thing is a laggy dog. Unbelievably bad. it's gotten all the updates. I was there at the beginning of M1 and it never had teething issues like this. Along with being a laggy, unresponsive mess, the system was very hot, drained the battery faster than you can imagine, and a touchscreen, unfortunately, causes wobble in a laptop display. No good. Experiences like this are why Apple can get away with saying "8GB on Mac is like 16GB on Windows." They could easily say its equal to 32GB on Windows. I would say it's disingenuous but come on ASUS/Intel/Microsoft.

The P14s OLED is a lot more comparable to a MacBook Pro, just dressed in durable black plastic for business. The 7840U genuinely keeps up with Windows without lagging and without much heat or noise emission. It feels like an M2+ and I enjoy using it. Windows on the other hand is a dog even with the best of hardware. My standard is a desktop 7950X, which beat out a 13900K in my user experience comparisons and even it has issues with Windows, the 13900K just had more issues and drew 2X the power, similar issue for Intel on laptops. Sadly, the P14s is not the best of hardware. Ports and build are excellent, and the OLED display is good, but dim and 60HZ, two knocks against it vs a base M3 Macbook Pro, and the speakers are utter garbage. The best thing about this particular P14s is that for $1129, it included 64GB of RAM. I am a regular user of at least 28-30Gb, and I have to say, under the same workloads, the 7840U is M-series quality for a laptop in performance and efficiency. However, I think the polish and responsiveness of even this 8Gb M3 14" just can't be matched by any Windows machine. Every single microscopic adjustment of your finger on the trackpad smoothly tracks with animation on screen, as quickly or as slowly as you want. This might seem trivial, but it contributes to an unmatched experience even in a woefully unfair specs comparison.

Still undecided about where I go next, but I would be crazy to try any more Windows machines. I guess I need to pony up for the RAM!

 

[3SQ Machine]

Great impressions, John, and thanks for the detailed write-up. Yes, as much as I can't stand saying it because I believe Apple needs to step up -- that base M3 overpeforms. And, like you, I wanted to see what all the criticism was about for myself. BUT I know it's relying on the impressive single core performance of the M3 to "mask" its low ram with memory compression and there is so much more potential under the hood shackled by 8gb.

I ended up returning the base M3 because of the screen panel difference. I couldn't get over it when my other machine was even more crisp. I do think that was just a manufacturing variation and it's not model-specific (but heck who knows). Also, I don't like holding on too long to a machine that I know I won't keep because, you know, accidents, nicks, drops or whatever else that would cause me to suddenly own it for life.

If the M3 Pro 18 core gpu is not right for my workflow, I might start looking for the 16gb M3 version. I've seen it on sale as low as $1499, but that still feels uncomfortably close to the M3 Pro on sale or with open box (I've seen the M3 Pro as low as $1680 for the silver model). I think 16gb on that base would make it formidable. We'll have to see how the M3 performs in the Air chassis to see what kind of throttling may happen as that could be a potential option.

Enjoyed the windows comparison. It's been so long since I've shopped for a windows laptop. I think it might be a little longer...

 

[John90976]

Great impressions, John, and thanks for the detailed write-up. Yes, as much as I can't stand saying it because I believe Apple needs to step up -- that base M3 overpeforms. And, like you, I wanted to see what all the criticism was about for myself. BUT I know it's relying on the impressive single core performance of the M3 to "mask" its low ram with memory compression and there is so much more potential under the hood shackled by 8gb.

I ended up returning the base M3 because of the screen panel difference. I couldn't get over it when my other machine was even more crisp. I do think that was just a manufacturing variation and it's not model-specific (but heck who knows). Also, I don't like holding on too long to a machine that I know I won't keep because, you know, accidents, nicks, drops or whatever else that would cause me to suddenly own it for life.

If the M3 Pro 18 core gpu is not right for my workflow, I might start looking for the 16gb M3 version. I've seen it on sale as low as $1499, but that still feels uncomfortably close to the M3 Pro on sale or with open box (I've seen the M3 Pro as low as $1680 for the silver model). I think 16gb on that base would make it formidable. We'll have to see how the M3 performs in the Air chassis to see what kind of throttling may happen as that could be a potential option.

Enjoyed the windows comparison. It's been so long since I've shopped for a windows laptop. I think it might be a little longer...

I will be near an M1 and M2 pro 14" in the next few days so I will try to do a side-by-side with the base m3 variant. I had just assumed the same and that Apple is sending the worst bins of all components to the cheapest variant of the 14" pro as that is how they treat the base model Airs and iMacs, interestingly the 15/16 Air/Pro do not get binned nearly as badly, so that $100-$300 of extra margin seems to make all the difference for Apple sometimes. Will be interesting to see.

And can't agree more, the open-box arena is ripe with good deals on virtually unused hardware. If you thought a sticker discount on a Macbook looked good, scroll down and see how good of a deal somebody in your city left for you! One of my favorite features of Best Buy. If this base model 14" doesn't do it for me, I will probably jump to the base model 14" max and call it a year! But I am very pleasantly surprised. I test-drove 8GB M2 Airs as well and they didn't hold up this well at all, I was definitely able to easily make mincemeat of the 8GB on those machines. Must be the single fan! Oh and the highly advanced node! I guess when they give a 2nm M5 8GB it will hold up well too, despite its potential.

As for Windows, yes, we can easily continue to write Intel off, but I will say AMD is worth keeping an eye on and their "Strix Halo" releasing in a few months is supposed to be a direct Apple M series competitor, I hope for windows and for the sake of competition that it is comparable in experience.

 

[3SQ Machine]

By the way, just noticed that the beloved M2 pro 14" is back up on the Apple refurb store for $1599. That's probably the best option at this price point, although another $150 gets you into the M3 Pro which is now on sale. Apple's pricing ladder makes it hard to justify that base M3 for almost anything but its 8gb config on deep discount.

 

[3SQ Machine]

Just wanted to update this thread -- am keeping the M3 Pro 1tb. Best Buy dropped the price on the OB unit I bought to $1807 AND they price matched it, giving me a credit for the difference. That's an incredible value for this machine compared to the M3.

I also noted in another thread that the battery life on the M3 Pro has greatly exceeded my expectations -- by a lot. Basically, all the reasons to "compromise" on the M3 (battery life, cheaper price) has been negated by the extreme sales on the M3 Pros right now and the underlying performance/battery life balance that apple struck with this mid-range chip.

 

[dizmonk]

'Tis the season for holiday shopping and... low(er) prices on Apple products and longggg return periods. Every couple years when in the market I like to test drive some of the "latest" and "not-so-greatest."

This season I test drove a base 14" 8gb M3 MBP & the 14" 12-core CPU 18gb M3 Pro 1Tb. These are the most available models @ Best Buy. Discounts were $200 on the base M3 and $400 on the M3 Pro 1 tb (open box-excellent--had only 2 cycle counts on the battery, I don't think it was ever activated).

Workflow: Logic Pro & Office Productivity (sorry, nothing GPU-intensive); Comparison: 16" M1 Pro MBP

Impressions: The base M3 MBP exceeded my expectations given all the criticism of it, but it of course is not as buttery smooth as the M3 Pro. The M3 Pro, while better, was less than my expectations--which were admittedly mixed. However, I do like the SB.

Impressions of Base M3:

• Expected this thing to be a dog. It was not. I purposefully ran a Zoom call, connected an external monitor, started mixing in Logic, opened up Safari, Brave, and Firefox with 25+ tabs, and opened up a word document for good measure--all at the same time. I was utterly shocked that I only got yellow memory pressure and around 200MB+ of swap used. There were no beachballs. Granted, I don't use memory-intensive samples for Logic nor do I use anything with video/rendering. YMMV
• Oddly, the screen was not as nice as the M3 Pro. I don't know why as they are supposed to be the same. I work on a lot of MBPs and never noticed any disparity except on this model. This panel seemed just a smidge of lower quality. I had web pages and documents side-by-side on the machine and the base was just slightly less crisp. I honestly don't think anyone but me would notice. And it could just be a variation in the panel--this happens. See 5K iMac.
• Base M3 came preloaded with Ventura which was annoying for migration as it required an extra step of installing Sonoma. Speaking of migration, this has gotten much better. It was blazing fast over TB (took about 15 minutes or so). I also didn't have to manually re-load into the libraries all my custom instruments, user patches, preferences, etc. after transferring--this was a nice change! Logic was identical on the one machine or the other (minus reinstalling the stock sound library). Apple seems to have finally figured this out -- thankfully.
• Regarding Logic, I noticed only a minor performance difference between the machines. I had a crackle on one project with the base but not the M3 Pro. Logic oddly only uses the performance cores, and I've read that forcing it to use the efficiency cores can lower performance. My M1 Pro seems better optimized for Logic. HOWEVER, on any Apple silicon I have had a heck of a time getting any of my projects to overload. I haven't suffered with system overloads or needing to freeze tracks since Intel.
• Sound quality (e.g. speakers) were identical on both machines.
• Visually, it's an MBP. It definitely feels a smidge lighter but I never had a 14" one in the space gray color and it wasn't bad. It looked sharp especially at an angle.
• I have not heard the fans once.
• Mediocre, but not terrible R/Ws of around 3200 on blackmagic

Impressions of M3 Pro 12 Core

• Still getting to know the computer, but overall this is sharp and I do like the experience. Let me just say that overall I think Apple nailed it with the color. It is a much more immersive experience. I took a look at the 16" and that seems even more impressive. You WILL need to have a microfiber brush around, though. And why haven't they optimized the keyboard coating to avoid the glossy fingerprinting?
• The screen is crisper than the base, but seems identical to other MBPs I've used.
• I have not heard the fans once.
• Blazing R/Ws--6200+ read/5100+ writes on blackmagicST.
• Performance-wise, I'm not Apple's target market because I don't do GPU intensive work. If anything, this machine is "not quite right" for office productivity and music production. I truly believe an M1 Pro would be just fine. However, in comparing with the M1 Pro, it is undoubtedly faster to load apps + switch and I wouldn't say from a user experience that there is not an increase. This machine is better. I did not feel that way with the M3 base--the more frequent memory compression is a likely culprit for multitasking but I can't say it was any slower than my M1 Pro, despite the insufficient ram. That felt sideways--which is still impressive given the price difference between that and what I bought my 16" for a few years ago.
• With Logic, it again uses only the performance cores and there is at least one more with this model. However, Logic has a nasty habit of spiking one core and that happens on every machine. Nevertheless, there were no crackles and pops on this one, unlike the base, but there was also nothing that blew me away either. Logic really needs that single core performance and for that any of the M series will deliver. Maybe it will get optimized for the M-series over (a long) time.
• Am I disappointed given the cost differential? Yes, but only because I know too much about Apple's new product segmentation and the gap between this one and the Max. If I knew a little less, I would find it a completely worthy upgrade. However, my sense is that the full potential of the M-series is yet to be fully realized and I'm going to take advantage of the next few weeks to delve into it some more. There may be more under the hood here than early influencers and hot-take commentators have uncovered.

So I'm still test driving both machines. I may keep one or none (but definitely not all). I think the issue is whether I want something that will exceed my expectations for less money, or something that may disappoint me at times for more money (performance-wise). But wow that color...

Do you have any updates as to the real-world battery life on both?

 

[3SQ Machine]

Do you have any updates as to the real-world battery life on both?

Unfortunately, I did not keep the M3 base long enough to make a fair comparison. I will say that the M3 Pro has greatly exceeded my expectations in terms of battery life. I especially like the low power mode on the M3 Pro better than on the M1 Pro. I felt on the M1 Pro that I noticed lag and less smoothness, but that has not nearly been as evident on the M3 Pro. The geekbench results I ran, showed about a 30% reduction in performance using low power mode. However, it was not noticeable in everyday use. I was able to get the laptop to last for days in mixed use without having to plug it in.

Not very scientific, I know. But I believe PC Magazine did a standard 720 P runtime test where the M3 pro blew away every other laptop they have ever tested – – with a 30 hour battery life.

 

[dizmonk]

Unfortunately, I did not keep the M3 base long enough to make a fair comparison. I will say that the M3 Pro has greatly exceeded my expectations in terms of battery life. I especially like the low power mode on the M3 Pro better than on the M1 Pro. I felt on the M1 Pro that I noticed lag and less smoothness, but that has not nearly been as evident on the M3 Pro. The geekbench results I ran, showed about a 30% reduction in performance using low power mode. However, it was not noticeable in everyday use. I was able to get the laptop to last for days in mixed use without having to plug it in.

Not very scientific, I know. But I believe PC Magazine did a standard 720 P runtime test where the M3 pro blew away every other laptop they have ever tested – – with a 30 hour battery life.

Thanks. Yeah, I saw that PCMag article... Personally, I think it's not a very good test. A 720P run test?