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Mac Studio: M2 or M3?

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magic_mouse_max

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 3, 2023
13
8
Hi all,

I'm contemplating upgrading my 2020 M1 Mac mini to a Mac Studio with the Max chip. However, I'm torn between getting the M2 Studio now or waiting for the M3 Studio release.

My usage mainly involves mobile app development with tools like Xcode & Figma, and I don't tend to have many browser tabs open. I've reviewed numerous benchmarks on the performance leaps from M3 over M2, but I'm unsure if these improvements are significant for my specific needs. Also, energy efficiency is a priority for me, considering the rising electricity costs in the country I'm living in.

I have two specific questions:

1) Is newer always better? Given my usage and preference for power efficiency, would the M3's advancements be beneficial for me?

2) Regarding RAM, are there downsides to having "too much"? My current mini has 16 GB, which occasionally feels insufficient. With the M2 Max, I could opt for 32 or 64 GB, and with the M3 Max, 36 or 48 GB. Considering this is a significant jump from my current setup, I'm concerned about potential idle RAM. Could this be problematic, perhaps in terms of power consumption?

Thanks!
 
D

drrich2

macrumors regular
Jan 11, 2005
241
144
I don't know whether the M3 Max Mac Studio will have either of the following two upgrades, and what I've read about it doesn't indicate there's a high likelihood, but one or both are possible, so let me ask...would it benefit you if either of these were in the M3?

1.) Thunderbolt 5.

2.) Wifi 7.

magic_mouse_max said:
2) Regarding RAM, are there downsides to having "too much"?
Click to expand...
Not that I've heard. In another thread, someone pointed out that when RAM is insufficient the MacOS resorts to using your drive for 'swap,' and SSDs have a limited (albeit long) projected lifespan that is eroded away at the more you use it. In other words, if you took 2 otherwise identical systems where one had inadequate RAM and the other had plenty, the former's SSD might wear out sooner. I don't know how this works out practically in the real world, but it's a potential concern. I've never heard anyone complain about too much RAM.
 
O

okkibs

macrumors 6502a
Sep 17, 2022
963
893
magic_mouse_max said:
I'm torn between getting the M2 Studio now or waiting for the M3 Studio release.
Click to expand...
The simplest answer is always if you need it now buy it now. These Studios are released 9-12 months apart, so even if you buy a M3 version right as it comes out it might be succeeded just 9 months or so later. Right now you'll be waiting 3-6 months for a M3 version. If you don't need a new machine until June or so you can wait, but that's 6 months you could already be making good use of the extra performance. I personally wait a month or two, but half a year if I am unhappy with my current device?

I'd buy it now for two main reasons. One is that performance going from one generation to the very next is always a minor incremental one in the range of 10-20% of performance uplift. You won't notice that much since the M2 model is already extremely fast. The other reason is that from various retailers you can save money on the current model. That goes especially for any Mac's base model. There is no need to pay the full Apple pricing unless you want some custom config that the retailers don't stock.

magic_mouse_max said:
My usage mainly involves mobile app development with tools like Xcode & Figma, and I don't tend to have many browser tabs open. I've reviewed numerous benchmarks on the performance leaps from M3 over M2, but I'm unsure if these improvements are significant for my specific needs.
Click to expand...
Again a simple answer, absolutely not, mobile app development will be fine on a M2 Max Studio base model. It would be fine on a M1 Max Studio base model. All of the M1/M2 Pro/Max chips are significantly faster than your entry level M1 chip in your older Mini. That was a rather rushed chip with lots of drawbacks/restrictions and the M2 Max in the current Studio is so much faster you'll be happy with that for sure.

magic_mouse_max said:
Also, energy efficiency is a priority for me, considering the rising electricity costs in the country I'm living in.
Click to expand...
All Minis and Studios in all configurations no matter how much RAM are very efficient. None are bad. That should answer both of the questions you had. If you can easily get by with 16GiB most of the time then 32GiB should suffice for your use case.
 
D

drrich2

macrumors regular
Jan 11, 2005
241
144
magic_mouse_max said:
1) Is newer always better?
Click to expand...

Usually. Of the M3 releases, the one I've seen people express ambivalence about is the M3Pro, compared to the prior generation.

magic_mouse_max said:
I'm contemplating upgrading my 2020 M1 Mac mini to a Mac Studio with the Max chip. However, I'm torn between getting the M2 Studio now or waiting for the M3 Studio release.

My usage mainly involves mobile app development with tools like Xcode & Figma, and I don't tend to have many browser tabs open.
Click to expand...

I'm not familiar with those apps. Another poster's answer got me wondering about something:

okkibs said:
If you don't need a new machine until June or so you can wait, but that's 6 months you could already be making good use of the extra performance.
Click to expand...

I wonder how much you, in the context of how you use your machine, will benefit from that extra performance in the real world. So I'm asking...of the things you commonly do on your M1 Mac Mini, do they often involve substantial delays? Are you waiting around 20 or 30 minutes, or however long, for processes to complete, such that you hope a new Mac Studio will cut that time a good deal? Do you expect to be substantially more productive with the Studio?

In other words, how much real world practical benefit do you think the Mac Studio is going to give you? That answer might help inform whether 6 months' wait, for example, would be worthwhile.
 
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Andrey84

Andrey84

macrumors 6502
Nov 18, 2020
258
218
Greater London, United Kingdom
magic_mouse_max said:
Hi all,

I'm contemplating upgrading my 2020 M1 Mac mini to a Mac Studio with the Max chip. However, I'm torn between getting the M2 Studio now or waiting for the M3 Studio release.

My usage mainly involves mobile app development with tools like Xcode & Figma, and I don't tend to have many browser tabs open. I've reviewed numerous benchmarks on the performance leaps from M3 over M2, but I'm unsure if these improvements are significant for my specific needs. Also, energy efficiency is a priority for me, considering the rising electricity costs in the country I'm living in.

I have two specific questions:

1) Is newer always better? Given my usage and preference for power efficiency, would the M3's advancements be beneficial for me?

2) Regarding RAM, are there downsides to having "too much"? My current mini has 16 GB, which occasionally feels insufficient. With the M2 Max, I could opt for 32 or 64 GB, and with the M3 Max, 36 or 48 GB. Considering this is a significant jump from my current setup, I'm concerned about potential idle RAM. Could this be problematic, perhaps in terms of power consumption?

Thanks!
Click to expand...
Two questions:
1. Can you really wait for 6-9 months for the M3 studio, or do you have to buy something now?
2. Do you consider yourself a very rational person, or can you get emotionally attached to things, like your computer?
If the answer is yes and 'can get attached', then of course you should wait.

Benefits:
1. M3 Macs will be supported for 1 year longer for new MacOS's compared to M2. Apple drops Macs from new OS's when they become just 6 years old. For you this impacts the XCode version you can install, which in turn impacts the deployment target OS versions.
2. M3 hardware will last longer without the need to upgrade.
3. Emotional aspect: you'll feel like you're working with the best and latest hardware for an entire year.

Direct answers to your questions:
1. Of course not, but M3 is significantly better than M2. There are no direct benefits of M3 for software development that I know of. However, you might feel the difference 5 years after buying it. Some workflows, for example building the solution and sharing your screen at the same time require lots of CPU power. My wife was almost unable to work in her prototyping software (Adobe XD) and share the screen in Zoom at the same time using her base spec iMac 2017 with Core i5-7500. We had to upgrade.

2. The only negative consequence is the cost. Again, I'll use specific example of my wife's iMac. She has 128GB RAM now, and I checked her usage randomly 5 times. Her tasks are very broadly similar to ours, but it's app prototyping, not development. Her memory usage was at least 45GB and the maximum was 65GB. This is considering she has 16GB extra for VRAM via the discrete video card. Mac SOCs share the 'unified' memory with the video chip. So, going for 64GB is a no-regrets decision. 32GB is the bare minimum for you.
 
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Pressure

Pressure

macrumors 603
May 30, 2006
5,081
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Denmark
CWallace said:
The M3 Studio (MAX or ULTRA) will have significantly better CPU and GPU performance then the M2 Studio based on all the reviews of M3 MAX MacBook Pros, so if you can wait, you probably should. The most logical release window for the machine will be WDCC 2024.
Click to expand...
If I was a betting man I would say March 2024 at the latest, just like they did with the M1 Max and M1 Ultra.
 
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M

magic_mouse_max

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 3, 2023
13
8
Pressure said:
If I was a betting man I would say March 2024 at the latest, just like they did with the M1 Max and M1 Ultra.
Click to expand...
This will be fantastic. However, considering the rumoured Q1 release of the new iPads and the Vision Pro headset, not to mention that Apple is yet to update the Mac mini and the Air, I'm not sure if they'll do anything about the Studio before WWDC.
But I still hope for an early release. :)
 
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O

okkibs

macrumors 6502a
Sep 17, 2022
963
893
Even if it releases in march we don't know that now. And if it doesn't work out then OP will surely be told to wait another 3 months because then it's definitely June "at the latest".... for what's the exact same device just with a one generation newer chip. And I see no indication that OP would benefit from the M3 generation. That Mac will likely spend more than half its lifetime idling.

And for the argument that the M3 Max will be as fast as the M2 Ultra: OP could just buy a M2 Ultra Studio right now if they needed the extra performance. App development won't make any use of the GPU to begin with and that workload likely won't use 12 CPU cores, let alone the 24 of the Ultra. (Edit: Because you need workloads/code that can be parallelized to this extend, otherwise a couple CPU cores are at their limits and the rest is doing nothing going to waste. Very little software is optimized to run 24 task in parallel. Very little.)

Let's not forget a Mac Mini M1 currently does the job well enough. The only reason I recommend a Max chip to OP is that the Studio doesn't come with a cheaper configuration. If there was a M2 Pro Studio I'd have recommended that instead. (The M2 Pro Mini makes no sense since pricing is similar to the Studio with the same config.)
 
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picpicmac

picpicmac

macrumors 65816
Aug 10, 2023
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okkibs said:
If there was a M2 Pro Studio I'd have recommended that instead. (The M2 Pro Mini makes no sense since pricing is similar to the Studio with the same config.)
Click to expand...
Yes, and I could use those front ports and SD reader. So I'm wishing for an M3 Pro Mac Studio. I suspect Apple could push the M3 Max a bit more upmarket, and given the MacBook Pro M3 Max versions start at 48GB, and are an $800 price jump over the M3 Pro versions of said laptops, there might be a price window for a lower cost Studio.
 
E

ewitte

macrumors member
Jan 3, 2024
39
23
picpicmac said:
Yes, and I could use those front ports and SD reader. So I'm wishing for an M3 Pro Mac Studio. I suspect Apple could push the M3 Max a bit more upmarket, and given the MacBook Pro M3 Max versions start at 48GB, and are an $800 price jump over the M3 Pro versions of said laptops, there might be a price window for a lower cost Studio.
Click to expand...
Just got a m2 pro with 16GB. The ram is a bit limiting but I've been dealing. It isn't used really all that much I'll probably upgrade to the m3 studio at some point to get at least 32GB. I'm used to 64GB on my main machine (windows).
 
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Fomalhaut

macrumors 68000
Oct 6, 2020
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1,595
majus said:
Gurman wrote "end of 2024, maybe early 2025."
Click to expand...
I wish they would separate the release of Mx Max and Mx Ultra versions of the Studio. It seems to miss a sales opportunity to not release the M3 Max version shortly after the MacBook Pros.

Who wants to buy an M3 Max Studio if the M4 Max has just been released or is imminent?
 
Mac Hammer Fan

Mac Hammer Fan

macrumors 65816
Jul 13, 2004
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I'll skip the M3 Max. While the CPU improvement is nice, the GPU is rather disappointing. Hopefully the M4 Max will have significantly more GPU cores.
 
C

crsh1976

macrumors 68000
Jun 13, 2011
1,588
1,804
Boil said:
Since you don't really need the GPU horsepower, maybe wait for the M3 Pro Mac mini...?
Click to expand...
The M3 Pro is a small bump (if at all) over the M2 Pro tho, so it may not be worth waiting for unless the next Mac Mini comes with other upgrades like Wifi 7, more ports, etc.

On the other hand, the M3 Max is a big jump over the M2 Max (not counting in other potential upgrades listed above) - buying a Mac Studio M2 Max right now is a bit pointless unless you need one right away or want to save a few hundreds with a refurb model.
 
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