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MBP specs good enough?
- Thread starter Riffbear
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Based on my experience running LR and PS on a M1 Pro 16GB and editing 45mp raw files, I think 32GB ram is probably a good idea but I'm not sure how much you'll gain with the Max. If money is a limiting factor, I think you'd see a better payoff with more hard disc space. LR runs smoothly on my base machine (though I did get the 1TB upgrade) but it does dip into the swap quite a bit sometimes, especially with graphics acceleration on.
Cool thanks, How are you finding it with 1tb? I guess you could always use external drives right.
I have a Max on order but thought I'd check out the 14" MacBook Pro 10/16/16 16gb ram 1tb SSD
I use PS, Capture 1 Pro, Lightroom Classic, FCPx, Motion 5 with Nodes 3 for work. Sony A9 & Leica Q-P cameras all raw files.
This laptop has out paced the Mac mini i7 32gb ram, eGPU Vega 56 8gb ram. I have yet to really get it to trigger swap memory apart from maybe 120mb... bear in mind, these have been designed to use swap as well.
If you've ordered a max or higher spec, like me you'll have a reasonable wait and they only take the money when it's ready. I would recommend buying/trying the base model with 10/16/16 16gb 1tb machines. The likelihood is it will be more than good enough.
The Nodes 3 motion graphics plugin on Motion 5 @ 4k 60fps let me review, edit and playback at 45-55fps. It didn't even kick in the fans. I have a feeling you can't compare Ram on Intel based Macs with unified ram on these new systems.
I'm going to test this laptop for a few more days but at present, I'm finding it really hard to justify paying an extra £800+ for the custom build when the lower spec is as good as this. The base model above was available for £2150 at Amazon as well. Just something to consider.
Edit. I've seen a few videos that show the performance between 16 & 32gb ram as being more or less the same for most jobs. Couple of seconds in it. Unless you are doing really demanding 3d graphic modelling you may not see much benefit. The 1tb SSD is both faster and has more rewrites from what I understand and even with heavy swap use will still last 10 years or so apparently so very little risk of killing off the SSD with SWAP usage. Have a google for YouTube videos.
I had a 512GB 2013 MBP that was maxed out of space most of the time, so it’s nice to have a little more space. Even if I had a 8TB model I’m sure if fill it up though
I’m going to try to keep 100GB or so free on this for drive longevity (another reason I went to 1 TB) and do a better job moving photos to my external drives.
If I did this again, I might have gone binned 14 upped to 32Gb Ram and 1TB ssd—which would have been around the same price. I do most of my editing on an external monitor. But then again, my laptop is sorta my tv in other rooms of the house so that 16” screen size is good to have.