Switching from Windows PC to MBP M2 14 - need advice

[nrzm]

Hello,

This is going to be my first MBP bought for myself, so I'm looking for some guidance on specs. Currently, I'm running on PC with following specs: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X, 32GB RAM, 2070Super, 1 TB SSD - probably overkill for music production, okayish for gaming.

I'll be looking for laptop mainly for music production (Logic Pro), little bit of virtualization (Virtualbox, VMware) and some programming. No gaming, I'll be fine with cloud gaming. Probably the most CPU, RAM and GPU intensive will be when using Logic Pro and later Final Cut. I don't plan to have the biggest projects in the Logic Pro - Kontakt (w/ some drum samples), several VST instruments, recording DI's, mixing and mastering. For recording I'd like to have low latency when recording DI.

Current plan for M2 setup:

M2 14 Pro 10 core, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD.

Will this MBP with specs above will handle my needs? I don't really know how well optimized apps are on M2. Afaik there is some slow speed SSD with base models should I upgrade to 1TB to have full performance or it does not matter? Or should I get more powerful M1 spec?

 

[coffeemilktea]

I don't really know how well optimized apps are on M2.

Apple's own apps are very well optimized. I haven't tried Virtualbox on Apple Silicon, though I've always found it pretty fast and efficient on any hardware.

Personally I think the setup you have planned will do really well; the only concern would be that Logic Pro projects can take up quite a bit of space if you add a lot of stuff to them. It's not an issue if you move old projects to an external hard drive, but on 512 GB, you may run low on storage space eventually if your projects get larger than expected. (I'll say right now this is a very minor concern)

 

[nrzm]

Yeah, space storage for me is not biggest concern since I'll move my old projects to my external SSD regularly. I may upgrade the SSD to 1TB to have full potential of having 2 NAND

 

[raythompsontn]

I may upgrade the SSD to 1TB to have full potential of having 2 NAND

I think that would be a wise decision. Applications and storage needs generally never decrease over time but only increase. Get the space now while you can as upgrading in the future may be expensive. I opted for a 1 TB on my MacBook even though I currently only use about 150 Gig. The future needs are unknown, except that it will take more space.