Air or Pro for very long term programming/stats? First ever Mac.

[goldmac2006]

@goldmac2006 @Fishrrman I ended up getting a new M4A 24/512, $1600.

The 14" would have almost certainly been too small a screen for me. I've used a 16" (Dell) for the last 7 years so even going down to 15" will be a change.

16" was an extra $1000, unfortunately.

I plan tomorrow on spending the full day learning about how best to maximise its longevity. If either of you have any recommendations or helpful links etc it would be much appreciated.

MacBook Air with the highest possible, non-custom RAM as 24GB.

It should cut it for light coding and not big full stack applications. Like iOS development, medium apps or doing programming.

However for LM studio and ai stuff, would need to give you a reminder. You won’t be able to run huge LLMs on it.

My models take up a lot more as mines are Llama 🦙, Qwen with image processing, etc.

 

[cmecmac]

My models take up a lot more

Interesting. What are your specs/device and what's your use case?

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote in reply 25:
"I plan tomorrow on spending the full day learning about how best to maximise it's longevity."

I already told you how to do that in reply 23 above.
Get enough RAM and SSD storage, because you can't "upgrade" these critical components later on.

There is no way to avoid this reality.
You have to spend the money up front, now.
Nothing else can change this.

 

[goldmac2006]

Interesting. What are your specs/device and what's your use case?

Mines is the MacBook Pro 14-inch model features the M4 Pro processor, 48GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. It has a 12-core and 16-core configuration and is available in Space Black.

This MacBook Pro is used for various tasks, including:

- Fusion 360
- AutoCAD
- Xcode for C++ and Swift programming
- Windows and Ubuntu virtualisation on VMware Fusion
- Windows for applications that cannot run on the Mac, such as Altium Designer for my electrical engineering class and other software
- Ubuntu for programming
- Gaming (Roblox only)
- Keynote for presentations and graphic design
- Running AI models with Apple Intelligence and LLMs on LM Studio

Besides regular user tasks like word processing and browsing, this MacBook Pro is equipped to handle demanding applications and tasks.

OP wrote in reply 25:
"I plan tomorrow on spending the full day learning about how best to maximise it's longevity."

I already told you how to do that in reply 23 above.
Get enough RAM and SSD storage, because you can't "upgrade" these critical components later on.

There is no way to avoid this reality.
You have to spend the money up front, now.
Nothing else can change this.

Hey there! Just a heads-up: you can only upgrade Apple silicon Macs before you buy them. I remember back in my MacBook Pro hunting thread suggesting getting more RAM and storage when you were looking for a MacBook Pro. So, OP, are you really comfortable with just 24GB of RAM? If so, maybe reconsider your order and grab a pro model with more RAM, like a MacBook Pro with a M4 Max chip and at least 36GB of RAM. I’ve got a MacBook Pro with the M4 Pro And 48GB of RAM, and it’s fantastic!

 

[cmecmac]

maybe reconsider your order and grab a pro model with more RAM, like a MacBook Pro with a M4 Max chip and at least 36GB of RAM

Yes, and I could use it inside the Ferrari

 

[cmecmac]

I already told you how to do that in reply 23 above.
Get enough RAM and SSD storage

You did.

And I did.

That doesn't mean there aren't perfectly valid and smart things to do on top of that.