M2 vs M1 recommendation?

[satcomer]

My work machine is a 2014 5K iMac that was maxed out. Great machine, still serves me well. I recently bought an M1 Max MacBook Pro for home use and to tackle some jobs that are a little slow on the iMac. Man the M1 Max is impressive (I am sure the M1 Pro is as well). It is a HUGE difference and noticeable in everyday. I am using Adobe CC - Indesign, Illustrator and Photoshop and huge huge huge speed improvements here, and really there should be when comparing to a 2014 computer. These 3 apps have M1 releases so they are optimized for the M1 chip, can't speak for other apps in the CC but the 3 I use run amazing. As others have said, the M2 is not out, but you can bet it will be faster and better then the M1, they need to give reasons for people to keep upgrading. So yes you could wait and get an even better computer whenever it releases and after a long wait. Took about 2 and a half months to get my M1 Max, hear things are slower now then they were. You will not be disappointed with an M1 computer, and the batteries on the MacBook Pro are amazing. I will rarely get down to 50% in a 10 hour day (that is not using it for the full 10 hours, but still using all 3 apps regularly as well as a Windows 11 VM).

You could get free applications
TinkerTool and Onyx and run it's maintenance routines and let reboot your Mac about once every 3 months to clear caches and maintenance routines including Spotlight rebuild!

 

[jav6454]

There’s the case of AE in which it makes a huge difference. If preview is available instantly or in let’s say 1 second, you feel the freedom to tinker with things. If it’s 2-3 sec, it feels very limiting. With my Late 2014 iMac 5K, sometimes I experience render times of 7+ sec per frame which drives me crazy. And some of these plugins dont allow you to preview at half or quarter res as the render looks way different from what the frame actually looks like in full res.

In PS, the problem starts with very high res stuff or a lot of layers. It may even suffocate to the degree that you can’t really draw - it has a lag of 2-3 sec to show what you’re actually doing. So yeah seconds do matter.

Here is the thing, video encoding in general will always benefit from a faster or more efficient CPU. Photo editing benefits from RAM.

That said, my advice is to wait right now until WWDC. If Apple doesn't release M2 there, then it means that an October refresh is likely. Now the question is, how badly do you need a computer right now? If very badly, going with an M1-flavoured CPU will not be a mistake.

My personal take is that we will see M1 still in WWDC as most likely the Mac Pro will be transitioned then.

 

[wonderings]

You could get free applications
TinkerTool and Onyx and run it's maintenance routines and let reboot your Mac about once every 3 months to clear caches and maintenance routines including Spotlight rebuild!

Not having issues with my 5K iMac, I was comparing my M1 Max to my iMac. 7 years apart, the M1 Max should be faster, no amount of maintenance is going to increase the speed of my iMac.