Anyone move from M3 Max to M4 Pro? Especially 14-inch.

[Mity]

I know there are few reasons to buy an M4/Pro/Max machine if you already have the equivalent M3 version. But I would like to hear from anyone that did actually move from and M3 Max to an M4 Pro, especially the 14-inch.

How is the heat & fan noise? Previously, the M3 Max was known to be much noisier than the M1/M2 versions. Obviously Apple has been increasing the TDP on every new iteration to show performance gains. I'm wondering if that is a reason to go with the M4 Pro this year?

Is the 48GB of RAM sufficient for your needs, especially if you do any dev work? Or did you skip the M4 Pro because you can't get it with 64GB like the M4 Mac mini (what a strange decision by Apple)?

 

[xraydoc]

The move from the M3 Max to an M4 Pro seems pointless, IMHO. Gain a few points in single thread performance and lose many more on the GPU side...

I can potentially see going from an M3 Max to an M4 Max if you're already pushing the M3 Max to its limits. But if not, seems like one step forward and one step back.

 

[Mity]

I was thinking in terms of heat and fan noise, that's why I asked especially for the 14-inch chassis. I think that in the past, people felt the need to upgrade to the Max but the new Pro chip in some use cases (like music production) actually beats out the M3 Max, according to this video that I watched.

 

[NeonNights]

I briefly contemplated going from my base M3 Max MBP 14 to an M4 Pro, either 14" or 16", but have decided against it for the following reasons:

1. I bought a base M4 Mini but returned it due to heat, limited 256GB, and desire for 10gbe. To me, the single-threaded speed improvement was not all that noticeable in my normal workloads.

2. The more reviews I see of M4-series in MacBooks, the less impressed I am. There is a significant drop off in battery life compared to M3 when you push the machine.

3. You lose a media engine going from M3 Max to M4 Pro. This hurts video export times.

If someone is going to abandon an M3 Max so soon, it would be better to wait another year and jump to an M5 in redesigned 2025 MacBook Pros.

EDIT: Looks like redesigned MacBook Pro is not expected until 2026 at the earliest. M3 Max should still hold up extremely well until then.

 

[emeka09]

I know there are few reasons to buy an M4/Pro/Max machine if you already have the equivalent M3 version. But I would like to hear from anyone that did actually move from and M3 Max to an M4 Pro, especially the 14-inch.

How is the heat & fan noise? Previously, the M3 Max was known to be much noisier than the M1/M2 versions. Obviously Apple has been increasing the TDP on every new iteration to show performance gains. I'm wondering if that is a reason to go with the M4 Pro this year?

Is the 48GB of RAM sufficient for your needs, especially if you do any dev work? Or did you skip the M4 Pro because you can't get it with 64GB like the M4 Mac mini (what a strange decision by Apple)?

I made the jump because I was still within my return window. I had the m3 max 36gb ram and moved to the m4 pro 48gb ram. The main reason I did it was for the significantly better battery life and nano texture display. The M3 max is definitely noisier but was still quiet for most tasks; it does get warmer though. The M4 pro is definitely quieter and cooler and has noticeably better battery life. In terms of performance for regular tasks, there's no difference but with things like video export times, the M3 max is unsurprisingly faster. I was happy to trade off slightly slower export times for the other benefits I stated above!

 

[NeonNights]

Hmm, that's interesting about the fan noise comparison. Same tier chip, M4 seems to have 25%  less battery life when you push the system, and fans spin faster and louder than M3 line due to higher TDP.

However, you’re going from Max to Pro line so I'm intrigued you're seeing such noticeable improvements in battery life, noise, and temperatures. I admit, the nano texture is probably the most appealing aspect about the M4 line to me. I regularly work next to a window at work and, although I love the natural light, there is a strong reflection and glare during certain parts of the day.

Great that you were within M3 Max return window. In that situation I probably would've done the same and went with an M4 Pro with nano display. Alas, I would have to sell my M3 Max to upgrade and that is definitely less appealing. The video export is still almost twice as fast on the M3 Max compared to M4 Pro, but perhaps worth the trade off for that nano-texture option. (Telling myself, don't do it, lol.)

Thanks for sharing and happy holidays!

 

[emeka09]

Hmm, that's interesting about the fan noise comparison. Same tier chip, M4 seems to have 25%  less battery life when you push the system, and fans spin faster and louder than M3 line due to higher TDP.

However, you’re going from Max to Pro line so I'm intrigued you're seeing such noticeable improvements in battery life, noise, and temperatures. I admit, the nano texture is probably the most appealing aspect about the M4 line to me. I regularly work next to a window at work and, although I love the natural light, there is a strong reflection and glare during certain parts of the day.

Great that you were within M3 Max return window. In that situation I probably would've done the same and went with an M4 Pro with nano display. Alas, I would have to sell my M3 Max to upgrade and that is definitely less appealing. The video export is still almost twice as fast on the M3 Max compared to M4 Pro, but perhaps worth the trade off for that nano-texture option. (Telling myself, don't do it, lol.)

Thanks for sharing and happy holidays!

I’m using the 14” and the battery life has been significantly better from the m3 max to the m4 pro. Even on Apples website, it shows there’s about a 4 hour improvement between the 2 models. In terms of the rendering time, for the work I do, I’d say it’s about a 5/7 minute difference in export times, which for me is more than enough considering the most important things are battery life and fan noise. I also get the same FPS in the particular game I play. So all in all I’m happy with it

 

[NeonNights]

Macbooks have great battery life, but the ratings are based on light web use and streaming 1080 video. In real-life, my 14-inch M3 Max is nowhere near the claimed 18-hour battery life so I doubt the M4 Pro would net me an extra real four hours -- it may net me 1.5 extra hours, which is still meaningful.

The performance of both machines (M3 Max/M4 Pro) is great and the battery life still gets me through the workday. If I were to "upgrade" it would be for the nano texture display, possibly go to 16" again, and go back to silver (as I'm tired of taking off my watch to avoid scratching the Space Black). When I had silver MacBooks I never had to worry about what was on my wrist and the palm rest still looked pristine after 8 years. I keep waffling back and forth since those are pretty weak reasons to act on.

 

[emeka09]

Macbooks have great battery life, but the ratings are based on light web use and streaming 1080 video. In real-life, my 14-inch M3 Max is nowhere near the claimed 18-hour battery life so I doubt the M4 Pro would net me an extra real four hours -- it may net me 1.5 extra hours, which is still meaningful.

The performance of both machines (M3 Max/M4 Pro) is great and the battery life still gets me through the workday. If I were to "upgrade" it would be for the nano texture display, possibly go to 16" again, and go back to silver (as I'm tired of taking off my watch to avoid scratching the Space Black). When I had silver MacBooks I never had to worry about what was on my wrist and the palm rest still looked pristine after 8 years. I keep waffling back and forth since those are pretty weak reasons to act on.

From my experience. I definitely am getting 3-4 hours better battery life. However if I was past my return date, I definitely wouldn’t be upgrading from an m3 max to m4 pro; wouldn’t make sense.

 

[NeonNights]

From my experience. I definitely am getting 3-4 hours better battery life. However if I was past my return date, I definitely wouldn’t be upgrading from an m3 max to m4 pro; wouldn’t make sense.

Interesting, interesting. My M1 MacBook Air was the closest to its advertised battery life (15-16 hours real-world). My M3 Max gets somewhere between 8-10 hours real-world. Based on that, an M4 Pro would probably net me at most 2 extra hours under my normal use case.

The base M and M-Pro lines are getting so strong now it's really difficult to justify an M-Max chip for future generations.

 

[UbiCrea]

Hi, I've a MBP M3 Max base model (14CPU 30GPU) with 36Gb of Ram and 1Tb of ssd.
I bought the Mac Mini M4 Pro boosted (14/20) with 48Gb of Ram. I use both for graphic and video editing - no difference. However, I also use MLL and other AI tools like Stable Diffusion to generate images... all this locally. My M3 Max MBP has the fan running, but it's ok, my M4 Mini too. The M3 Max goes something like 50% faster than the M4 Mini.
I won't go for the MBP M4 Pro as it's less powerful. When using the full GPU for AI, battery life is not impressive, and wont be on any MBP Apple Silicon, the more GPU it has, the more drained is the battery.
I will definitely wait for the MBP redesign in a year or two to upgrade my M3 Max, apart if i find a super good deal on the second hand market, like selling my M3 Max at the same price as a M4 max (bargaining hard...).

 

[NeonNights]

Looks like I'm side-grading to the M4 Pro. I wasn't really utilizing my MBP 14 M3 Max to the degree I anticipated this past year and I was a little disappointed in the battery life, despite still 100% battery health. I was really impressed by the M4 nano texture display at the Apple Store last week too. I listed my M3 Max in the forums and Swappa and someone bought it yesterday.

I was actually going to delist the sale and keep the M3 Max after playing around with LM Studio and some LLMs, but I really won't be doing that very often. I am also tired of the Space Black color and fear scratching it every time I dock it or forget to remove my watch when typing. I figure I'll take this opportunity to switch to a silver M4 Pro, 24GB, 1TB with nano texture.

While the M3 Max is a sunk cost, at least the sale fully covers my new M4 Pro and I'm willing to exchange some RAM for more battery life, nano texture display, better webcam, Thunderbolt 5 (which I won't really utilize atm), and back to silver is a relief.

 

[NeonNights]

@emeka09, you were absolutely right about the battery life gains of the M4 Pro over M3 Max. I haven't used my M4 Pro long enough to get concrete numbers, but I can already sense the M4 Pro battery life is significantly better than my M3 Max under normal use case. I feel this is partly due to the nano-texture display since I don't have to turn the brightness up as high to fight glare and reflections when sitting in the office with a wall of windows behind me.

 

[3SQ Machine]

Great thread. Am considering the same move--purely on battery life.

Is everyone's experience still positive on 14" M4 Pro battery life vs. 14" M3 Max?