Mac mini - Logic Pro

[mattmh_]

Looking for buying advice. I'm considering purchasing an M1 either Mac mini or MacBook Pro 13 inch as an interim solution and I thought I'd seek some viewpoints/knowledge/advice about what to do.

Logic Pro is my primary reason for owning a Mac. I'm a hobbiest music producer using logic on my MacBook Pro 13-inch retina dual core 2.4ghz (late 2013) with 8GB RAM. I love my Mac, however it's becoming very slow for using Logic with - it can handle ~70 tracks but then I often get the overload notice which is super annoying and I've had to reduce the sample rate to 44.1khz and ideally for using samples etc. I'd rather have projects at 96KhZ. I mostly use software instruments and stock plugins though I'm now using a few third-party ones which seem to really drain the CPU... My interface is an Apogee Element 24 - fairly good with low latency recording but I prefer to go directly through Logic's input monitoring if possible. My music isn't anything crazy like a film score usually 3-5 mins.

I have long wanted to upgrade with my sights set on a 16-inch MacBook Pro specced out but what with the change to Apple Silicon, the lack of a recently upgraded MacBook Pro processor (yes I'm being snooty about the 2019 one, it's a lot of money and even this site advises not to buy) and seemingly overheating/fan issues I see a lot of people talking about with that Mac, I've held off waiting for an Apple Silicon 16 inch MacBook Pro. However, I really would like to be able to upgrade my system for music production ASAP, and still maintain the goal of eventually getting the 16 inch Apple Silicon MacBook Pro. As such I'm considering one of the new M1 devices with an upgraded 16 GB RAM in the meantime.

My decision would be on the basis of the following:

- How low can the the I/O buffer be lowered and still record using a mic i.e. can it do sub-128 with ~70 tracks? (I wanna record on a project with say ~70-ish tracks with low latency and not have to freeze it- demanding I know!)

-How fast is the M1 at bouncing tracks - would it make freezing and unfreezing tracks fairly often a less arduous ordeal? (Usually this would be a productivity killer on my current Mac)

- Can an M1 Mac cope with running a 4k screen and Logic Pro AND recording? (This combo kills my MacBook Pro 13 inch)

- How loud is the fan? Is it distracting for recording? (I have to pause at times with my MacBook Pro)

- Would an M1 Mac be comfortable with recording/projects at 96khz?

- Are there any glaring compatibility issues?

- How can I trial my workflow with Apple Stores closed and limited ability to use any M1 Macs even in store...?

- What/any other questions/issues should I be considering?

I don't do music live (yet) and rarely use my Mac outside my home so I'm semi-convinced that a desktop solution would be the right way to go in the interim.

I think ideally I'd get an M1 Mac mini with 16GB RAM and 1TB space for £1299. I already have a cheapish Samsung 4K screen and the mini has ample ports for what I want which makes it preferable to the 13 inch MacBook Pro and I'll then keep my old one til I also get an updated 16inch MacBook. The hope would be that the Mac mini then remains a very much viable desktop solution for several years in its own right and stave off a Mac running into £000s for a while.

So would this work as a desktop solution? Or would another desktop Mac be better suited? The Mac mini is desirable due to the ports, price point, M1 chip and small form factor. Or is this current M1 Mac a bit too early for music production and should I wait for the next iteration/desktop apple silicon?

TL;DR Apologies! Logic Pro on an M1 Mac mini, what are peoples' experiences?

 

[chabig]

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=m1+logic+pro

 

[mattmh_]

Thanks, looking more for people who have direct personal experience/know the issues - already watched many vids!

 

[jayducharme]

I should have my new M1 mini set up in a few weeks. I can tell you then. I use Logic Pro and my 2018 mini has been great for music production. I expect the new mini will be even better, but obviously I won't know for sure until I'm using it.

 

[pmiles]

Personally I'd wait for the next ARM Macs to come out. They won't be the low end models like these 3 are. You may find they are a better fit overall. If you've lived with your current setup this long, you can live with it a little longer. The plus is you can start setting aside some money for the day in which you do actually pull the trigger and get the one you want versus the one you can just afford.

 

[macsound1]

Honestly your usecase has very little to do with the compter processor but actually the amount of ram and storage bandwidth.

You can easily compare this to a photoshop file. Open a 9GB photoshop file on a mac with 8GB of ram, manipulating everything will be slow.

We were all doing 70 track multitrack sessions with 2010 mac pros, but you needed fast raid storage and lots of ram to feed all that data in real time.

The thing that uses the processor in real time would be plugins. You didn't mention use of any plugins but I assume you're not using izotope on every channel since it sounds like you're using sampled instruments or something.

 

[mattmh_]

I ordered one coming early January hopefully it does the trick!

 

[jayducharme]

Let us know! Mine’s supposed to be in this week. So I’ll know soon.

 

[fastlanephil]

I ordered one coming early January hopefully it does the trick!

I think you’re that type of audio user that the M1 Mac Mini is for.

 

[mattmh_]

So I finally got it! Overall, very fast computer and I think I actually prefer using the Mac in the form of a desktop - feels more like a workstation! For anyone considering a Mac primarily for music I would say that the desktop has many advantages if you want to take music production etc. seriously - can now free up my MacBook towards perhaps live/portability. Just thought I'd answer my own questions I originally had in case anyone had the same questions...

- How low can the the I/O buffer be lowered and still record using a mic i.e. can it do sub-128 with ~70 tracks? (I wanna record on a project with say ~70-ish tracks with low latency and not have to freeze it- demanding I know!)

Definitely can do sub ~128 but as yet there are still issues with latency without using low latency mode which is disappointing - the processors do not reach very high usage when this is occurring so I'm going to play around with project size etc. because this point would have been a game changer! Potentially could be due to incompatible plugins etc. or just messy large projects. As yet I haven't got many third party plugins installed so I'll try with those and come back to this question.

-How fast is the M1 at bouncing tracks - would it make freezing and unfreezing tracks fairly often a less arduous ordeal? (Usually this would be a productivity killer on my current Mac)

A lot faster in many cases - though not crazy fast it now makes waiting for the audio to bounce a thing rather than leaving the project to do something else as it is a lot quicker.

- Can an M1 Mac cope with running a 4k screen and Logic Pro AND recording? (This combo kills my MacBook Pro 13 inch)

Yes and it's also great with switching between the internet and other apps with recording which is great to multitask properly without long waits/glitches/projects failing and crashing.

- How loud is the fan? Is it distracting for recording? (I have to pause at times with my MacBook Pro)

Fans and heat are no longer issues it seems so far. I've not had to stop anything due to overheating and there is no repetitive scramble for the charger after 30 mins.

- Would an M1 Mac be comfortable with recording/projects at 96khz?

Seems to be so, but still Logic has issues with converting projects, things get lost along the way.

- Are there any glaring compatibility issues?

Yes.

 

[4sallypat]

.....
- How loud is the fan? Is it distracting for recording? (I have to pause at times with my MacBook Pro)

Fans and heat are no longer issues it seems so far. I've not had to stop anything due to overheating and there is no repetitive scramble for the charger after 30 mins.

- Would an M1 Mac be comfortable with recording/projects at 96khz?

Seems to be so, but still Logic has issues with converting projects, things get lost along the way.

- Are there any glaring compatibility issues?

Yes.

This I agree 100% - my M1 Mini is ice cold all day and not a sign the fan is even spinning.

OTOH- my 2012 Mini Server i7 quad with 16GB of RAM ran way too hot & fans whistling all the time requiring a cooling fan pad underneath to prevent thermal throttling, same issue I had with the 2019 16"MBP that I hated for it's awful battery life and thigh burning features...

The M1 just blew both Intels out the water!

 

[mattmh_]

I think my major takeaway so far is strangely just how good the audio quality/processing is overall so far. I use a plugin called Dexed and I always thought it sounded a bit corny/basic on my MacBook Pro. I've used it on my new M1 Mac and some of the patches sound COMPLETELY different and how I imagine they're meant to actually sound.

The Apple built-in plugins also seem to work a lot better with compressors having a much more noticeable effect. I've had fewer crashes also. Having a large screen to arrange on also saves so much time and is more efficient. I'm excited to see what iOS apps port over and whether more machine learning will come into Logic over time as potential new areas for this environment to expand.

Overall, the transients have more punch, Logic is more responsive, music has a better stereo image etc etc. It's easier with this Mac to actually produce music as I feel like what I'm hearing through headphones sounds closer to speakers and it's easier to pinpoint where mixes are going wrong. I think I've figured out how to eliminate latency, but I'm continuing to work on that. So far I've not maxed out any project I've been working on which is astonishing seeing as everything used to constantly crash in the past even at 1024 samples and now I'm using 64?! Furthermore, I can now produce at 96kHz and the computer has no issues. I've still not heard a fan - is it even there?!