What would the M3 need to make you upgrade from an M1?

[Yebubbleman]

Only two things would make me upgrade:

1) Realizing that I wanted to move to a higher-tier of SoC (i.e. from Base to Pro or Pro to Max, etc.), but this would really just be coinciding with the fact that the M3 would happen to be the newest available SoC at the time.

2) There being a new deployment/support convention that would benefit me to experience firsthand

Otherwise, there isn't likely to be anything I need to do that I currently can't do on an M1 that I would be able to do on an M3. That'd be the only other reason to upgrade in my opinion. But that's extremely unlikely to be applicable.

So many people on here obsess over 3nm like they understand what it'll actually do for them practically and so many just NEED to have the latest and greatest all the time as though the previous thing didn't do it for them. I actually need a reason to get an M3 based Mac in order to justify it. Novel concept, I know.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

I agree with your first comment and believe that will be the case — as the M3 SOC is expected to deliver 2 generations of performance and efficiency improvement over M1. Given this, you can paraphrase my wish as “I hope the 2023 MacBook Air includes an SOC configuration that matches the 2021 M1 Max MacBook Pro CPU/GPU specs. This allows the 2023 MacBook Pro to exclusively offer M3 Pro/Max top-end performance.

This wish is not driven by a desire for a lower-cost device — after almost 1.5 years of loving and lugging my 2021 M1 Max 16” 32GB MacBook Pro through one too many airport security lines, I simple want a lighter, less-bulky device with comparable screen size and CPU/GPU performance. I’m happy to pay a premium AND trade away many of the current “Pro” features (Mini-LED, HDMI, CF slot, extra ports) for a lighter, thinner device with better SOC. This could potentially be a higher-margin product for Apple and suspect that I’m not alone in desire and willingness to pay for such a configuration.

Good comment. I too would only want for M3 if (as I expect) they use M3 to make "...a lighter, less-bulky device with comparable screen size and CPU/GPU performance." And I also am willing to pay. Our wishes differ in that I want MBP, and do not want to sacrifice ports or i/o bandwidth. IMO excellent i/o capability has been the most important feature of MBPs since 2011.

 

[Ifti]

My M1 Max 16" is a desktop replacement, so is never moved from my desk most of the time, hence I'm not to fussed on size and weight. It does everything I need for now so I have no desire to move to the M3 just yet.

 

[Yebubbleman]

Have you tried to use Windows lately? From my perspective, as a 30+year Mac user, Windows has become an opaque nightmare. It is simply anathema to my workflows, much worse than macOS.

The bit in bold tells me everything I need to know about how objective your opinion on Windows will ever be.

Incidentally, I use both Windows and macOS and have for multiple decades and, barring a few annoying creative decisions made on two UI elements in Windows 11, macOS has, by far, been the one entailing the highest number of noticeable bugs and things not working the way they have and the way they should. Microsoft's Windows team seems to have something Apple's macOS team has been lacking lately: quality control.

 

[gpat]

Personaly I can't think of anything that an M3 MBP could offer that would make me feel its viable to upgrade from my M1. An OLED screen would tempt me, but I'd probably still wait for an M4 or M5.

That's easy.
Dual external displays without resorting to the bulkier option.

 

[vasim]

Typically Macs get new OS versions for 6 years or so, but they can get security updates for much longer. E.g. my 2016 MBP topped out at Monterey but it still gets security updates to Monterey.

Often I have skipped entire OS versions anyway. Unfortunately I do want Handoff so I do now need Ventura. That plus the crippling effect of only 16 GB RAM in the 2016 MBP put it at end-of-life for my desktop usages. I will buy a Studio Max immediately if Apple would just put an M2 in it; no need to wait for M3 for my needs.

My problem is the Xcode. If I wasn't a mobile developer I wouldn't care if I had older versions of macOS. So I need to be updated all the time.

 

[PineappleCake]

Have you tried to use Windows lately? From my perspective, as a 30+year Mac user, Windows has become an opaque nightmare. It is simply anathema to my workflows, much worse than macOS.

Yes, Apple has tightened the UI, and done some things I really dislike. But the doors to doing what you need to do are still there, just obscured a little by arrases. If they kill the ability to use Go to Folder to get to / or ~/Library, or disallow those directories in the sidebar, that will piss me off. But most of the annoying phone-like features can strangled or stomped on in Prefs.

They are making an OS that is easy to use, and maybe since 87.4% of computer users have ditched the big hot box in the study for the phone in hand, their increasing moves toward simplifying a niche-use product are ill-considered. But, as long as they keep the nerd doors and the prefs settings that make me happy, the other stuff is fine with me.

I actually like Windows 11 more than macOS now. For instance external monitor support and general use cases such as snappiness and stability is better on Windows 11 than Ventura.
I can edit video/photos, play all games and code on Windows.
It suits me very well and a lot of other people.

Have you seen the new System Settings for macOS, you can't tven resize the window and it has a huge side bar sucks on 27/32" monitors

Most people have ditched desktops but people still use laptops and TVs. Almost nobody watches, codes, edit Pro videos on phones.

 

[unrigestered]

Windows is and has been alright for a long time now.
i also think that it's actually the easier system for "computer dummies" as everything is what you see is what you get with just using the mouse, while the Mac in my opinion only begins to shine if you are handling it the "geeky" way with a good bit of keyboard input aswell. (don't get me wrong, i like it that way!)
Plus Windows (and pretty much anything on this planet) has better window handling than Apple software.

though for me personally, Windows topped at v7. never really liked working with 8 and onwards at work.

tried Win 11 on my new laptop that i had planned to dual boot with an additional Linux partition. Long story short: those Windows partitions have been removed

 

[NoelWalker]

My M1MBA is already powerful enough to handle everything I need. So to answer your question, nothing, because I won’t be upgrading anyway. I will upgrade when either it dies or there is a new hardware feature I want.

 

[Warped9]

The only reason someone would upgrade from M1 to M3 is…
- the M1 is no longer up to their needs as they thought it would be, or
- they simply feel they have to have the latest and greatest.

 

[CasualFanboy]

Have you tried to use Windows lately? From my perspective, as a 30+year Mac user, Windows has become an opaque nightmare. It is simply anathema to my workflows, much worse than macOS.

Yes, Apple has tightened the UI, and done some things I really dislike. But the doors to doing what you need to do are still there, just obscured a little by arrases. If they kill the ability to use Go to Folder to get to / or ~/Library, or disallow those directories in the sidebar, that will piss me off. But most of the annoying phone-like features can strangled or stomped on in Prefs.

They are making an OS that is easy to use, and maybe since 87.4% of computer users have ditched the big hot box in the study for the phone in hand, their increasing moves toward simplifying a niche-use product are ill-considered. But, as long as they keep the nerd doors and the prefs settings that make me happy, the other stuff is fine with me.

Most of this I generally agree with. You're more forgiving of their missteps than me, but that's just a matter of degrees.

Apple is very lucky that Microsoft has assisted them by making Windows such a horrible product to use.

 

[livmatus]

just bring back multiple external displays support (natively) on base devices and I am sold ... giving the base model 16/512GB spec would also be nice... well it's 2023 ... 8/256 is pathetic

and for those who say it's enough, just look at how the Mac mini 2014 or MBA 2015 with 4GB of RAM perform ... I expect about the same from 8GB of unified memory in a couple of years

 

[Rafterman]

Have you tried to use Windows lately? From my perspective, as a 30+year Mac user, Windows has become an opaque nightmare. It is simply anathema to my workflows, much worse than macOS.

Yes, Apple has tightened the UI, and done some things I really dislike. But the doors to doing what you need to do are still there, just obscured a little by arrases. If they kill the ability to use Go to Folder to get to / or ~/Library, or disallow those directories in the sidebar, that will piss me off. But most of the annoying phone-like features can strangled or stomped on in Prefs.

They are making an OS that is easy to use, and maybe since 87.4% of computer users have ditched the big hot box in the study for the phone in hand, their increasing moves toward simplifying a niche-use product are ill-considered. But, as long as they keep the nerd doors and the prefs settings that make me happy, the other stuff is fine with me.

It seems that for most people, there is little difference between a standard equipped 2020 machine and a stacked 2023 machine. Unless you are doing 3D modeling or something. The OP's question is probably more suited to those high end users, like video editors. Not to normal usage people, who do work stuff like email and web.

 

[playtech1]

This question has made me ponder exactly what's missing from M2 MBPs and the only things I can think of are an OLED screen, FaceID and a slight reduction in size/weight.

The rest of what I want is really more about Mac OS and the software getting better.

 

[_ale]

Personaly I can't think of anything that an M3 MBP could offer that would make me feel its viable to upgrade from my M1. An OLED screen would tempt me, but I'd probably still wait for an M4 or M5.

I don't care about performance, I just want that notch to go away (and with camera continuity I would really do without an integrated webcam). At least give me a dynamic island to begin with.

 

[xraydoc]

The rest of what I want is really more about Mac OS and the software getting better.

Yes. The hardware is more than good enough.

 

[spnc]

Total disk space, I get (I'm somewhere north of 30 TB now), but how much actually needs to be in my machine vs on external drives? 2TB is just fine for me. Now if I was doing video editing, maybe it'd be different. But that's just for live working space - anything other than current files can easily live offline.

The can't in my case. I need all of it to be on the same (local) disk at any given time.

 

[spnc]

This question has made me ponder exactly what's missing from M2 MBPs and the only things I can think of are an OLED screen, FaceID and a slight reduction in size/weight.

The rest of what I want is really more about Mac OS and the software getting better.

FaceID on Apple laptops would such be a massive addition. Hard to live without it.

 

[dmccloud]

In decades of buying every type of Mac (except AIOs, which make no sense to me) I can say that I have never built a Mac purchase so poorly as to need to replace it in just two years. My premise is to buy hardware appropriate for 3-5 year life cycles.

Others may plan for shorter/longer life cycles for their own good reasons. Or an unanticipated new app's hardware needs might prematurely age out a Mac, of course. However in my experience short life cycles are most often the result of planning failures, especially buying inadequate RAM for a full 3-5 year life cycle. Constantly in these fora we see folks talking about today's RAM needs, when new purchase planning should be for RAM needs expected 2-3 years from now or later. RAM needs always increase over time.

Apple's Mac OS memory management does a great job and today's Mac SSDs are really fast for swop, but Apple's Unified Memory Architecture (UMA) is orders of magnitude faster. Top MBPs already can opt for up to 96 GB RAM. Mac buyers should expect app and OS engineers to be designing to take advantage of UMA and more of that newly available fast RAM.

Internal (fast) SSD capacity should also be over-specced to ~2x expected needs for various reasons. Spending an extra +$400 for fast internal SSD capacity is usually a sound investment.

Some important caveats to note here:

1. Most software developers design towards the mean, so they're aiming at 8 or 16GB RAM rather than 32GB or more. That is where the majority of the market is, so that's where you'd want to target with your software. If a developer suddenly required 32GB+ of RAM to run their software, they would lose significant chunks of their target audience. Specialized software is a different matter altogether, but for "mainstream" software, that 8-16GB RAM is the sweet spot.

2. The rate at which computer hardware is updated far outpaces the rate at which software requirements are updated, regardless of platform. Looking on the Windows side, the hardware requirements for Windows 11 are not significantly different from the latest version of Windows 10 (TPM requirement notwithstanding). Therefore, unless you're already pushing up against your available RAM today, there may not be a pressing need to upgrade to the next tier (e.g, 8GB to 16GB or 16GB to 32GB, for example).

3. There are multiple options for external storage which will approach internal SSD speeds at a significantly lower price. Instead of paying $400 to go from a 1TB SSD to a 2 TB SSD in my new MBP, I paired a Samsung 970 Pro 2TB SSD with a TB4 M.2 enclosure for just over $200, which I use as my primary storage drive for work-related assets. I also have a 5TB LaCie drive that's primarily used for Time Machine backups. The speeds between the external SSD and the Mac are blazing fast (transferred around 35GB of data in just a few seconds this morning, in fact) in both directions.

 

[dmccloud]

The bit in bold tells me everything I need to know about how objective your opinion on Windows will ever be.

Incidentally, I use both Windows and macOS and have for multiple decades and, barring a few annoying creative decisions made on two UI elements in Windows 11, macOS has, by far, been the one entailing the highest number of noticeable bugs and things not working the way they have and the way they should. Microsoft's Windows team seems to have something Apple's macOS team has been lacking lately: quality control.

I'd actually say the complete opposite. I've had more issues with Windows than Mac OS by far, especially since they released Windows 11. Microsoft broke so much common-sense stuff with the new OS that I openly wonder what the designers were smoking and drinking at the time. They nerfed the right-click context menu to hide 90% of the most commonly used options behind a second level, making right-click take 2-3 times longer than it did before. When I spend half an hour fixing what Windows 11 broke just to make the OS usable again, there's something decidedly wrong in Redmond.

 

[Bodhitree]

Finally, how much do you expect to last the M1-series Macs? When do you expect that they will get the last os version?

I’d like to think they would last longer than the Intel macs, because they are a more uniform engineering target. If you were to retire M1, you’d be retiring 20m devices, and that is a big batch. So perhaps we will get 8 years of new OS support or even longer. With 2 years of security updates, that would be 10 years.

 

[PineappleCake]

Windows is and has been alright for a long time now.
i also think that it's actually the easier system for "computer dummies" as everything is what you see is what you get with just using the mouse, while the Mac in my opinion only begins to shine if you are handling it the "geeky" way with a good bit of keyboard input aswell. (don't get me wrong, i like it that way!)
Plus Windows (and pretty much anything on this planet) has better window handling than Apple software.

though for me personally, Windows topped at v7. never really liked working with 8 and onwards at work.

tried Win 11 on my new laptop that i had planned to dual boot with an additional Linux partition. Long story short: those Windows partitions have been removed

Windows 11 is good. Not great but better than 8 and 10 imo.

You all make Windows like it's a horrid OS. I had more problems with Ventura than windows 11. macOS kernel panics so much these days and has usability issues

Oh and one person mentioned extra steps, yes that is bad but macOS Ventura has that too with the share sheet. Regressed too.

 

[Sydde]

Have you seen the new System Settings for macOS, you can't tven resize the window and it has a huge side bar sucks on 27/32" monitors

You have never been able to resize the system settings window on a Mac. All the way back to Puma 10.1, it has always been fixed size. Seems to me even before, you could not resize the Control Panel window, though I could be mistaken.

Not that big a problem really. One does not spend much time in it.

 

[kpluck]

What would the M3 need to make you upgrade from an M1?

This seems like a rather tough question without knowing about the price, and features, associated with the rest of the computer the chip is in. After all, we are not buying an M3 chip. We are buying a computer with an M3 chip inside.

That being said, the M3 Mac would have to provide a significant boost to my productivity over the M1 Max in my current MBP. I would have to feel like the M3 Mac would have to increase the amount of work I could get done to the point that the extra work would earn me the money spent on the M3 in 18-24 months.

-kp

 

[Admiral]

M1 Max owner here. I will likely get an M3 if
1) 24-hour battery (At least 30-40% increase in battery life compared to M1)

If Apple were to adopt an improved Low Power Mode which could disable some cores of the CPU and GPU to save power when they were not in use, we could see some amazing battery life improvement. The additional GPU cores in the M1 Max chew up battery life, but at the same time it's wonderful to have them when the workflow demands.

Maybe the introduction of Performance and Efficiency cores to the GPU would address this.