Need advice - replacing M1 Mac mini 8GB with the 16GB model

[VitoBotta]

I bought the M1 Mac Mini with 8GB of RAM and 512GB of storage less than two weeks ago, and I am regretting not buying it with 16GB of RAM. I should have gone with 256GB of storage (adding storage is easy) and more memory

Unfortunately I didn't buy from Apple or anyway online, but from a physical store of an authorized reseller, so I can't just return the unit. I am waiting for a more precise quote, but the reseller told me that I could trade it in for around 75% of what I paid because "it's not new anymore and it's activated". This upsets me a lot.

I would like to change the 8/512 with a 16/512, which normally would be the exact same price. But now I would lose around 250 euros if I trade it in with them. I could otherwise try to sell it privately, but I am gonna lose some money anyway.

What would you do? The problem I am having is that as soon as I have a few things open, the memory pressure goes high slowing things down. Usually it recovers by itself when I close some stuff, but this is unusable coming from an iMac with 24GB of RAM. I lose the speed benefits quite often basically.

I went with 8GB because I stupidly believed some reviews on YT that led me to think that 8GB would be enough. Some guys did a lot of stress testing with many heavy things running at the same time without any problem with 8GB. How on earth did that work for them?

For example until ten minutes ago I had these things open:

- iTerm
- Safari with a few tabs
- Chrome with one tab for dev
- Mail
- Calendar
- Todoist
- Apple Notes
- Typora
- VSCode
- SourceTree
- Slack
- Twitter
- Whatsapp
- Messenger
- Carbon Copy Cloner and Backblaze in background
- A few electron apps

As soon as I opened a Chrome tab with the dev tools open, the memory pressure went quite high and I had to close some things. Most of the things I listed are optimized for Apple silicon (including the electron apps, which are just web apps that I need open all the time) and most of them are quite light actually. So the load is not even comparable to what those guys did in those YT video. I have no idea of why the difference in memory performance with the 8GB but it upsets me.

Should I change the 8GB with a 16GB and lose some money? OMG I hate this. I wish I hadn't listened to those stupid videos. I usually buy as much RAM as I can afford (buying it not from Apple) but in this case I can't even add any.

To anyone who is reading this and is planning on buying a current M1 Mac, please, don't buy one with 8GB unless you keep a very few, very light things open at the same time.

 

[0128672]

Yes, that's a tough position to be in. If it was me, I'd take the loss and get the 16/256. Will this reseller maybe give you a discount if you buy the 16/512 that would be worth it to you?

 

[VitoBotta]

Yes, that's a tough position to be in. If it was me, I'd take the loss and get the 16/256. Will this reseller maybe give you a discount if you buy the 16/512 that would be worth it to you?

I doubt it, but will ask. I am so upset... I have a very limited budget at the moment due to other expenses and I have already lost some money when I traded in my iMac for this. I feel stupid to be honest. I love the machine when there isn't the memory issue but I cannot really work like this. It looks like I also have to reboot every now and then when it doesn't recover from high memory pressure easily/quickly...

 

[ADGrant]

Should I change the 8GB with a 16GB and lose some money? OMG I hate this. I wish I hadn't listened to those stupid videos. I usually buy as much RAM as I can afford (buying it not from Apple) but in this case I can't even add any.

To anyone who is reading this and is planning on buying a current M1 Mac, please, don't buy one with 8GB unless you keep a very few, very light things open at the same time.

Agreed, I think people pay far to much attention to YouTube videos when deciding which Mac to buy or how to set it up.

 

[deeddawg]

Sounds like the system you bought doesn't meet your needs. I'm presuming you've analyzed what apps are using the RAM and how that compares to your prior system.

The past choice of buying a brand new system with 1/3 of the RAM from a reseller with a less generous return policy than Apple's is water under the bridge. We all make mistakes. Learn from it but don't dwell on it. Face forward and make your choices on how to get where you need to be based on forward-looking options/facts.

Seems you need to move on to the system better fitting your needs, potentially waiting for the higher-tier Mini model to be migrated to Apple Silicon as it'll potentially allow for a higher memory configuration than 16GB.

The choice then is simply how much hassle you want to take on in terms of reselling yourself vs trading in. Choose, move on, enjoy.

As for advising on 8GB for others, do note that you list a bunch of apps beyond what a typical Jane Doe user tends to use - you're in power user territory.

 

[Apple_Robert]

What about keeping what you have and not using Chrome, seeing how it was what caused the spike? It doesn’t seem logical to return the M1 just because of Chrome.

 

[ADGrant]

As for advising on 8GB for others, do note that you list a bunch of apps beyond what a typical Jane Doe user tends to use - you're in power user territory.

Actually the OP appears to be a software developer. Personally, unless I was developing solely for MacOS or iOS, I would hold off for now and wait for the software ecosystem to mature a bit (and perhaps for the next generation of Apple Silicon).

 

[VitoBotta]

What about keeping what you have and not using Chrome, seeing how it was what caused the spike? It doesn’t seem logical to return the M1 just because of Chrome.

It's not just Chrome. That was an example when the memory pressure was already getting high and got worse with Chrome. But it happens also without Chrome.

 

[Apple_Robert]

It's not just Chrome. That was an example when the memory pressure was already getting high and got worse with Chrome. But it happens also without Chrome.

With that information, I agree about getting a system you are happy with.

 

[VitoBotta]

Actually the OP appears to be a software developer. Personally, unless I was developing solely for MacOS or iOS, I would hold off for now and wait for the software ecosystem to mature a bit (and perhaps for the next generation of Apple Silicon).

Yes I am a web developer. I don't have any particular issues software-wise, actually I am surprised that I only had to replace a couple of things (Crashplan and Google Drive) easily, and even for Docker I have a workaround which is fine. Everything else works just fine either natively or under Rosetta.

 

[ADGrant]

It's not just Chrome. That was an example when the memory pressure was already getting high and got worse with Chrome. But it happens also without Chrome.

Personally, I avoid Chrome as much as possible but certain things you need to use it.

 

[ADGrant]

Yes I am a web developer. I don't have any particular issues software-wise, actually I am surprised that I only had to replace a couple of things (Crashplan and Google Drive) easily, and even for Docker I have a workaround which is fine. Everything else works just fine either natively or under Rosetta.

What was your work around for Docker? What machine did the M1 Mac replace?

 

[chabig]

Personally, I avoid Chrome as much as possible but certain things you need to use it.

Couldn't those things be done just as easily using Brave?

 

[ADGrant]

Couldn't those things be done just as easily using Brave?

I guess that would depend on why you needed Chrome.

 

[VitoBotta]

Personally, I avoid Chrome as much as possible but certain things you need to use it.

I am using Chrome for the better dev tools. I could use Edge or other Chromium-based but Chrome is M1 optimized.

What was your work around for Docker? What machine did the M1 Mac replace?

I wrote about it here https://vitobotta.com/2020/12/04/docker-apple-silicon/

 

[MacManTexas56]

i can't imagine there being that huge of a difference though from just 8gb to 16gb. i could see something like 8gb to 32gb or something like that. unfortunately, sometimes we make bad purchasing decisions and have to take a hit on it. only have 2 choices really.....keep and know your limits and only run it how you're able to, or take a hit and swap machines. no one can really answer but you.

 

[ADGrant]

I am using Chrome for the better dev tools. I could use Edge or other Chromium-based but Chrome is M1 optimized.



I wrote about it here https://vitobotta.com/2020/12/04/docker-apple-silicon/

I use Chrome for developer related tasks too, most people do. I also use it for GCP. For almost everything else I use Safari.

Thanks for the link to your interesting write up on using Docker with an M1 Mac, I am going to stick to Docker for Mac on an Intel Mac for now though. Aside from Docker and Kubernetes, an M1 Mac isn't ideal for Android development either, you can't run virtual Android devices.

 

[hugodrax]

Why I bought the 16gb/1TB model Mac mini.

 

[hugodrax]

I doubt it, but will ask. I am so upset... I have a very limited budget at the moment due to other expenses and I have already lost some money when I traded in my iMac for this. I feel stupid to be honest. I love the machine when there isn't the memory issue but I cannot really work like this. It looks like I also have to reboot every now and then when it doesn't recover from high memory pressure easily/quickly...

Why did you trade in your iMac? was it no longer usable? It is better to wait patiently and save up to get what you really want VS compromising because you want it now.

 

[burgman]

It's not just Chrome. That was an example when the memory pressure was already getting high and got worse with Chrome. But it happens also without Chrome.

Are you upset because memory pressure went up or are you experiencing major system slowdowns/reloads? File swap on M1 architecture is very fast. If it was a simple return, then go for it, but since it isn’t, is it a real problem that is worth the financial hit.

 

[pugxiwawa]

OP I feel for you. I too fell into the same mistaking believing early reviewer/YT talking about how magically 8GB was, and then when I got my own 8GB/512GB I ran into the exact same issues as you. Luckily I bought directly from Apple so I can return and get the 16GB model. I would recommend you selling privately/locally. M1 is still relatively new so I think you should be able to get 85-90% of the value back with private sale. Good luck.

 

[aednichols]

Unfortunately I didn't buy from Apple or anyway online, but from a physical store of an authorized reseller, so I can't just return the unit

I would lose around 250 euros

Do they not have return policies where you live? One would think the EU would regulate that.

 

[jazz1]

I just got my MacMini today. It has 1GB RAM and 512GB SSD. In checking the available memory using Clean-My-Mac I was surprised to see only 1.6GB memory left. That is with Safari, Mail, Messages open. Is this weird or what???

 

[aednichols]

I just got my MacMini today. It has 1GB RAM and 512GB SSD. In checking the available memory using Clean-My-Mac I was surprised to see only 1.6GB memory left. That is with Safari, Mail, Messages open. Is this weird or what???

Just use your computer the way you want and don't worry about it.

 

[jerryk]

Maybe this is something you can troubleshoot. What processes are using the most memory?