The only power consuming thing I will do will be exporting in HD three 1,5 hour videos every week (merging from half an hour clips, adding credits, maybe silencing some parts). Plus once for a few months I'll probably use some After Effects one minute templates and render them. I will probably choose 1 TB SSD (or 512 and try to convince myself to use external hard drives). But would you recommend Air or Pro to me and how much RAM? Touch bar, battery life and weight is not ain issue for me. Thank you in advance for helping me out since this will be a big investment to me.
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Video editing - 8/16 GB, Air/Pro?
- Thread starter MiragePL
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I would go with either models, 16 GB!.
Take the MBA if you plan to upgrade to something more powerful the next 2-5 years, take the MBP if you keep it as your only mobile working device for the next 5+ years.
Take the MBA if you plan to upgrade to something more powerful the next 2-5 years, take the MBP if you keep it as your only mobile working device for the next 5+ years.
Because someday they will have m2, but then you probably should wait for m3, unless you’d rather play it safe and wait for m4.
m5?
Video professionals and educators all agree that 8GB of RAM is fine for 1080p video editing. If you are going in to 4K, then 16GB of RAM is a benefit. Things are not significant enough passed 16GB unless you are going into higher than 4K.
I tend to overbuy on my products and due to the constant "more memory the better" I fall in this trap, but I am looking to cut down on my next system. I have 128 GB of RAM on my system and I do 1080p video editing. Testing on 8GB of RAM it was no difference. Since I do like to overbuy, I would probably get the 16GB version.
I tend to overbuy on my products and due to the constant "more memory the better" I fall in this trap, but I am looking to cut down on my next system. I have 128 GB of RAM on my system and I do 1080p video editing. Testing on 8GB of RAM it was no difference. Since I do like to overbuy, I would probably get the 16GB version.
Again, this gets said way too much that causes people to over buy on products. 8GB of RAM 1080p video editing compared to 128 GB of RAM with the same files has no real difference. Just a few seconds faster encoding. Not really a big deal.
The app plays a part here, as much as the file. Lightroom, for example, loves ram. Maybe it’s mitigated with the m1 chip, but regardless, more is always better. After effects needs loads.
That doesn't make more RAM a requirement. I have a 30 second 1080p 60fps file in After Effects. On 128GB of RAM it uses 110GB, and on a system with 16GB of RAM it uses 11 GB because that is what I have it set to in preferences. The 128GB of RAM is no faster than my 16GB RAM system.
How about adding loads of real-time effects? Even in an m1 chip, which seems to handle ram allocations better, 16gb is better than 8gb.
Or else all we ever need is 8gb, and that’s just a ridiculous statement.
That is what my AE file is, an intro sequence at 30 seconds long with particles and effects. But its not any different on my 16GB system vs my 128GB system. I am disappointed by falling in the "more memory the better" trap because even after market 128GB of RAM was quite expensive and I really didn't need it.
Don’t be silly now. More ram is better for these thing, regardless of any benefits obtained by new chipsets.
I’m all for the m1, but if ram wasn’t a factor, they wouldn’t even offer more.
It’s clear the new chip is better at ram handling. It’s not suggesting anything at all along the lines that less ram is better.
My point is its not entirely true and it certainly affects people by purchasing more memory than they need. 128GB of RAM is a useless upgrade to be for just 1080p video processing. "More ram is better" is not always true and people say this in every thread as a blanket statement. Are you suggesting that for 1080p video editing even getting 4TB of RAM is better? My testing shows - by removing RAM modules, that it is NO different if I am using 16GB of RAM than using 128GB of RAM. So how is "more ram better" in my case if I performed my same workload and got no benefit? It is just like throwing hundreds of dollars down the toilet because I got 128GB of RAM when I did not need that much RAM to begin with.
No, I’m not saying things are not possible with lower ram, and the m1 proves that things are definitely not ram dependent on these systems. I’m saying that the more ram you have, if the programme (app) benefits, the better it will be. As much as you bemoan the blanket ‘more ram is better’, you’re blanketing it back with ‘it makes no difference’. But more ram is always better. Regardless of anything else.
No not for all cases. I tested on the same system, by removing my RAM stick. 16GB of RAM is just as good as 128GB of RAM. Even if my Adobe After Effects used 110GB of my 128GB of it. That is just what Adobe After Effects does. It made no difference in my workflow. So no, in some cases more RAM is not always better. I REALLY wish I didn't waste hundreds of dollars on the 128GB of RAM upgrade I put in my system as its no better than 16 GB of RAM for me.
If you are not fussed about the Touch Bar then I would go for the MacBook Air, as for all of the non video stuff you will not see any significant difference in performance, even with the video editing you will only see around a 15% reduction in speed. The money that you save can be invested in additional SSD storage. For HD editing you will be fine with 8GB, and if you are only planning on keeping for 3 years then I don't see the need to future proof to 16GB.
Then you are not doing much that needs ram. I’m sorry, but you need a better argument for this. Or else all production studios would be outfitted with 8gb per machine- and we all know. ALL KNOW. That’s an absurd statement to make.
I was simply stating that blanket statements that "more ram is better". You do know that there are some production studios that are working on 8K or even 16K footage right? Yes, more RAM will be better in those scenarios. I have build a couple of servers at work that have 4TB of RAM and 128 CPU cores because we NEED that performance for one of our clients.
Where did I say 8GB of RAM is fine for EVERY SINGLE USE CASE IN EXISTENCE? I did not. I was saying blanket statements that "More ram is better" is not a good thing to say. You need to weigh what the person needs. In this case, the original poster is only doing HD video editing, so 8GB is fine for him. Not "More RAM is better".
So please, tell me where I made the argument that 8GB of RAM is useful for every possible workload in existence. If a production studio only does HD video, then yes 8GB of RAM is all that is required. If you go in to 16K video or multiple 8K streams, then yes obviously more RAM is needed. Just like if you want to have dozens of Virtual Machines (which explains the 4TB of RAM we have on a couple of servers between program VM, database VM and many other virtual machines from Active Directory to DNS.
And if you read my first post on this, I specifically mentioned that 4K video editing benefits with 16GB of RAM. So your entire argument that I am claiming 8GB of RAM is good for all use cases is not valid to begin with. Otherwise I would not have said 16GB of RAM is better for 4K right?!
Op. If you have the money, get the best system you can afford. If you’re doing any sort of video editing, most systems can handle it, but the more ram the better. That’s true even in the era of the m1, and even taking into account what this dude is saying.
People certainly like to shove words down people's throats on this forum lately. Look at my FIRST post in this topic where I addressed the original poster's concerns.
8GB of RAM is fine for 1080p
16GB of RAM is better for 4K
RIGHT THERE...The second line above. OH MAN that is more than 8GB of RAM. So your entire argument that I am claiming 8GB of RAM is good for every workflow in existence is invalid. And, just like your response, yes production studios doing 4K will obviously have more than 8GB of RAM. So I fail to see why you are arguing this.
Geez I try to be helpful while not making people spend more money than they should. MANY MANY video professionals agree that 1080p production is fine on 8GB. 4K production go with 16GB.
So in my FIRST post I clearly provided a use case for needing more RAM. So why crawl up on my statements and twisting my words?
Its like nobody can give proper advise on this website and it is irritating.