Non-techie here looking for advice about purchasing a new MacBook Pro

[Valentineviolin]

Hi All,
I just registered as a newbie here because I am intending to purchase one of the new M1 Pro MacBooks but I feel confused by the range of options. I am also staggered by the price - the one I was looking at is $5249.00 Aussie dollars (16", 10-Core CPU, 16-Core GPU, 32 GB of ram and 2TB of storage), and I want to make sure I am making an informed decision before I put down $4-$5K+ on one of these things. Please be gentle - I am a non-techie lol

Background info - I have a beloved 27" iMac that is getting close to 10 years old (2012). Here are its specs:
Processor - 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory - 32 GB 1600 MHZ DDR3
Graphics - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 689MZ 2048 MB
Storage - 3.12 TB Fusion Drive

At the time I bought it, I specced this machine out to future-proof it and it has done me so well over the years. I had to replace the hard drive once but apart from that it's been amazing!
However, I feel worried how much longer it's going to last given its age and feel it's getting important to update as I run my business from home and it's my workhorse. I have been waiting and waiting for the newest iMac to come out but as it won't come out until next year sometime I have concluded I will get a new MacBook Pro in the meanwhile.

Here's my question - my old iMac had 32 GB of RAM. But it seems the baseline memory for all of the variations of the M1 chip is only 8 or 16GB of memory. I'm sure the technology has changed over the years but I want to understand whether to fork out the extra $600 (Aus) for 32 GB? Even with 32GB of RAM, my old iMac does have slow moments - starting up is frustratingly slow for example. I am also interested in doing video editing work for uploading on YouTube. Would this justify paying for the 32GB? I have seen reviews of the M1 chip machines from the past year and many of the YouTubers report their computers would slow down when editing video. But maybe those people only had the 8GB option?

Please don't laugh but I am also a "gamer" in that my favourite game is The Sims 2 (released 2004 lol). I am hoping to run this game on my new MacBook Pro via Parallels. At the moment I have it working on Windows 10 on Bootcamp but I've heard Bootcamp is going to be scrapped.
Will 16GB of ram be enough to run The Sims 2 and more recent versions of this game? If you download custom content, the game can run out of memory and start crashing a lot.

Would the base 10-Core CPU and 16-Core GPU be good enough for this type of "gaming"? To go up to the next level is another $300 Aus!

 

[leman]

I am quite sure that even the regular M1 will suffice your needs for years to come. If you want something nicer, the 14” with 16GB and 8 core will be more than plenty. Don’t get trapped with 32GB etc - if you are not editing high-res video professionally or do other resource intense work, you dint need it.

 

[Valentineviolin]

I am quite sure that even the regular M1 will suffice your needs for years to come. If you want something nicer, the 14” with 16GB and 8 core will be more than plenty. Don’t get trapped with 32GB etc - if you are not editing high-res video professionally or do other resource intense work, you dint need it.

What's confusing to me is how 32GB of old ram can be substituted with 16GB of the new type? I know I must seem ignorant but what is the difference technically speaking?

 

[LeeW]

What's confusing to me is how 32GB of old ram can be substituted with 16GB of the new type?

It can't. If you are using up to 32GB of Ram in your current machine, you will need 32GB in any new machine. Ram is Ram, the new Apple chips have improved efficiency but that does not mean you need less Ram.

That said, it does not sound like your use case requires 32GB or that you used that much in your current machine.

 

[leman]

What's confusing to me is how 32GB of old ram can be substituted with 16GB of the new type? I know I must seem ignorant but what is the difference technically speaking?

As the poster above said, it cannot. But I wold be very surprised if you need 32GB RAM. In fact, I am almost convinced that 8GB RAM will more more than sufficient for you. Don't forget that the new hardware is much much faster than your iMac.

 

[NotTooLate]

As others have said , if your current iMac is doing what you need I won’t get that mega M1 pro mac , for the more informative folks , does his iMac has “target mode “ ? If so then a Mac mini plugged to the iMac would be sufficient and very cheap as well

 

[JahBoolean]

As the poster above said, it cannot. But I wold be very surprised if you need 32GB RAM. In fact, I am almost convinced that 8GB RAM will more more than sufficient for you. Don't forget that the new hardware is much much faster than your iMac.

8GB of RAM in 2021 with integrated components is just asking to create E-WASTE down the line.

Even in the more mundane usecases.

16GB is futureproofing considering this is shared memory and you may want to check some graphically intensive game down the line.

I'm not sure wether you should shell out for the pro chips, as said above an m1 chip could cover you for at least 5 years so long as you stick to *vintage* video games

 

[Jochheim]

Hi, the thing that is slowing down your machine the most at the moment is the Fusion Drive. With a proper SSD you will gain the most in performance and I am sure that this was also the reason for your slowdown.

What you can do, before spending that much money: Run your typical tasks and then some (what you will stress your Mac the most) and then open „activity monitor“ (use spotlight search). Then look for RAM right to „CPU“ (sorry if it is spelled different, my system is German). You will see a graph of you RAM usage. Don’t worry about the stats as macOS will always use the maximum amount of ram, even if you don’t actually use it. What is important is if the graph is green, yellow or even red. If it is yellow or red, i would settle for 32 gb. But as others have stated, i don’t think you need that much.

 

[Valentineviolin]

Hi everyone thanks for your fast replies! They certainly helped clarify to me which way to go. I realised I hadn't checked the minimum requirements for Sims 2. I did that and realised I am probably more than safe with 16GB Ram - the minimum is 1GB and even Sims 4 only requires 4 GB!

I did want the bigger 16" screen to play Sims 2 on while out and about. I also do a lot of playing around in Photoshop so that was another reason to get the bigger screen. I also needed extra onboard hard drive space for all the Sims custom content.

I just purchased this model:

16-inch MacBook Pro — Silver​

With the following configuration: Apple M1 Pro with 10-core CPU, 16-core GPU and 16-core Neural Engine 16GB unified memory 2TB of SSD storage 16-inch Liquid Retina XDR display Three Thunderbolt 4 ports, HDMI port, SDXC card slot and MagSafe 3 port 140W USB-C Power Adapter Backlit Magic Keyboard with Touch ID — US English Accessory Kit​

A$ 4,649.00​

 

[Valentineviolin]

Hi, the thing that is slowing down your machine the most at the moment is the Fusion Drive. With a proper SSD you will gain the most in performance and I am sure that this was also the reason for your slowdown.

What you can do, before spending that much money: Run your typical tasks and then some (what you will stress your Mac the most) and then open „activity monitor“ (use spotlight search). Then look for RAM right to „CPU“ (sorry if it is spelled different, my system is German). You will see a graph of you RAM usage. Don’t worry about the stats as macOS will always use the maximum amount of ram, even if you don’t actually use it. What is important is if the graph is green, yellow or even red. If it is yellow or red, i would settle for 32 gb. But as others have stated, i don’t think you need that much.

Oh thanks so much for the super helpful reply! I appreciate you walking this newbie through how to do this.

I just purchased my MacBook with 16GB ram. I feel so much more confident it's the right choice after all the advice I read here!

 

[m1maverick]

Oh thanks so much for the super helpful reply! I appreciate you walking this newbie through how to do this.

I just purchased my MacBook with 16GB ram. I feel so much more confident it's the right choice after all the advice I read here!

Curious: Did you consider the M1 iMac?

 

[Valentineviolin]

Curious: Did you consider the M1 iMac?

Yes I did. I went to the store to look at them in person. They were beautiful but I felt I really couldn't down-size to 24" after enjoying a 27" screen all these years. I will hook the new MacBook Pro into a monitor to get the bigger screen-size. I may still get the updated iMac but I felt I can't wait until sometime next year in case my old one gives up in the meantime.

I'm also going to be travelling to the USA in January due to medical reasons and may have to spend a lot of time alone in quarantine or just avoiding contact with the outside world in my hotel. So I felt a portable computer like the MacBook would be a smart option over an iMac or Mac Mini. That way I can do business stuff and also enjoy The Sims when I'm bored.

 

[theluggage]

Please don't laugh but I am also a "gamer" in that my favourite game is The Sims 2 (released 2004 lol). I am hoping to run this game on my new MacBook Pro via Parallels. At the moment I have it working on Windows 10 on Bootcamp but I've heard Bootcamp is going to be scrapped.

Just to be clear: there is currently no official, fully supported way of running Windows on the M1. Parallels will let you run the “insiders preview“ of Windows for ARM which may not run The Sims under emulation (you would need to check in one of the Windows threads to see if it is compatible - if it’s an old 2004 version you might be out of luck) but if it breaks you get to keep both parts. It’s possible that you would be breaking MS’s license terms by using the “preview” in that way and while you’re unlikely to get into trouble, MS could withdraw the preview version and/or block activation on a whim.

Hopefully, at some stage, this will be sorted but at the moment you can’t rely on Windows on M1 being supported.

For everything else - as others have said - if you really needed 32GB of RAM on Intel you’ll probably benefit from 32GB on M1 Pro but given what you are doing you‘ve probably got more RAM than you need (but then it was relatively cheap to stick extra RAM in an old iMac so why not) and you’d be fine with 16GB.

One of the downsides of most current Macs is that RAM can’t be upgraded - and while there are various technical advantages to that in terms of performance and power consumption it means that you are stuck with Apple’s sky-high option prices, and over-provisioning “just in case” is an expensive luxury.

The new M1 Pro MBPs look great and if you have the cash why not, but you’d probably be fine with an M1 machine such as the 24” iMac.

 

[Valentineviolin]

Just to be clear: there is currently no official, fully supported way of running Windows on the M1. Parallels will let you run the “insiders preview“ of Windows for ARM which may not run The Sims under emulation (you would need to check in one of the Windows threads to see if it is compatible - if it’s an old 2004 version you might be out of luck) but if it breaks you get to keep both parts. It’s possible that you would be breaking MS’s license terms by using the “preview” in that way and while you’re unlikely to get into trouble, MS could withdraw the preview version and/or block activation on a whim.

Hopefully, at some stage, this will be sorted but at the moment you can’t rely on Windows on M1 being supported.

For everything else - as others have said - if you really needed 32GB of RAM on Intel you’ll probably benefit from 32GB on M1 Pro but given what you are doing you‘ve probably got more RAM than you need (but then it was relatively cheap to stick extra RAM in an old iMac so why not) and you’d be fine with 16GB.

One of the downsides of most current Macs is that RAM can’t be upgraded - and while there are various technical advantages to that in terms of performance and power consumption it means that you are stuck with Apple’s sky-high option prices, and over-provisioning “just in case” is an expensive luxury.

The new M1 Pro MBPs look great and if you have the cash why not, but you’d probably be fine with an M1 machine such as the 24” iMac.

Yes I found this out from my research - that Parallels is the only option to play The Sims 2 at the moment. However I have seen several videos of Sims 2 working beautifully this way so I feel pretty confident I can make it work. If not, there is always the fall back option of the Mac version of Sims 2 but it is missing some expansion packs.

 

[darngooddesign]

I suspect that the 13” MBP with 16GB would be enough for your needs. Apple has a generous return policy, so get that Mac and use it for a week (returns become refurbs so the next person to buy your return will get a nice discount); while doing your most demanding tasks, leave Activity Monitor running to see how close to maxing out 16GB you are. If your memory pressure stays green then 16GB is going to be enough; however if it is regularly yellow then you would want 32GB to future proof against your doing even more demanding, video related tasks in the future. But yes, the base 14” with 32GB is going to be a really solid machine. Also, you can use your iMac as an external screen for your new MacBook.

PS. If you get the base 14” your need to upgrade the charging brick to 96W if you want fast charging.