Mac mini, m1, vrs intel.

[Chips Stephens]

So I have had yet another power supply fail on my 5,1 Mac Pro.
Less than a year ago, it got a new, but used, power supply and backplane to get sleep working again.

no power up again. This time just flat out dead...so who knows whats


At first was looking at the m1 Mac mini, 16g ram, and 1tb hard drive with military discount about 1200 ish.
Few problems here are many audio related programs do not currently run correctly on m1.
Also no bootcamp.
Also no egpu, support for external gpu.

I also have a high point mvme card I would like to use with 4tb of storage.
Who knows if that will run on m1? I know it will on intel...

it has me looking at the intel Mac mini, ram I can upgrade later, the external hard drive I have will work.
I will have bootcamp, and Windows for a few things I need Windows for.
And egpu support, I already have a few good gpu’s rx580 and a Vega 56.

with the cpu upgrade to the intel 7, and it has 512 hard drive the price is the same as the m1 Mac mini.


today is the day, I must make a choice....

what say ye!!

 

[Fishrrman]

"Few problems here are many audio related programs do not currently run correctly on m1"

If you are into audio production, I reckon the best advice is to NEVER "upgrade" to new hardware or software (i.e, a new version of the OS) until you KNOW that the hardware and software you currently use will work with it.

Another reason I'd let the m1 Mini pass by is that it has only 2 USBc ports instead of the 4 ports the Intel version has.
I want my ports!

 

[Dozer_Zaibatsu]

Upside of purchasing the M1 mini: if you find it doesn't work for you after playing around with it for a while, it's going to hold decent resale value.

With music production, it's really tough to jump to a new architecture. For certain workflows, it's certainly worth it. (My wife just couldn't load all her tracks in Reaper on a 2015 MBP with 8GB any more.) We use a lot of cross-platform things because we use different architectures, because she also loves her Lenovo Yoga for everyday work.

I would guess the NVME raid would work with USB-C on the Mini? I say so, since they are explicit about cross-compatibility, and there is a noticeable upgrade with the responsiveness of the M1 with I/O.

But with all the parts you do have, it's tough. I might also have to suggest building a PC to make full use of the cards.

 

[BrianBaughn]

It's too early for me to move to Apple Silicon and I think it's too early for you, also.

 

[IowaLynn]

I'm very happy with i5 6-core. Like that I could upgrade memory but 16GB is fine, Windows runs best ever, the internal drive just flies.

Maybe in a year - or two - an Mx something. Current version is more developers prototype starter kit.