not possibility, i meant actual requirements. apple does not cater to the 5% of computer users, but to the 95% because they don't create that many choices.
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Can We Put the 16GB "Pro" Myth to Rest?
- Thread starter aevan
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Quite a few professionals where their systems are paid for by work no longer have the option of laptop + separate workstation; in some cases they can spin up VMs on local servers or in the Cloud, in others it can be a locked down mess, making the ability to at least have an 'almost OK' portable 'workstation' a huge benefit.
That's the reality, along with people being more mobile in meetings, working remote or late nights, etc.
The ability to spin up VMs on demand, or using the host to run UI vs a VM-ed backend build concurrently or for debugging, has quite a bit of merit in the real world, as does the need to run multiple VMs. Note the apps bering run, and sometimes their data sizes, dictate what is 'needed,' not marketing nor statements from those whom have no need for additional RAM or CPU power.
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And herein lays the problem. What works for one is being assumed and pushed as it 'must' work for all. It doesn't.
I've run out of app memory and been swapping like mad even without VMs running, let alone several VMs, one of which is running an app server + DB + data. I am quite sure others hit similar scenarios, and they are not all 'easily avoidable' depending on the work you do, but here comes junior to let you and everyone else know 'works for them, so it should work for you!'
Unreal.
Many of the dev team at work were waiting for the latest models; not a single one will be going with the current new model. Why? Lack of RAM vs many other options. We'll be deciding to either hold off and see what the next refresh brings, or back to Think or elsewhere. No matter the preference to stay on Apple laptops, a 16GB limit simply isn't going to work for us, let alone on a refresh cycle of several years.
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Now you're busy lumping everyone into one huge pool. This whole thread seems to be you believing you somehow know best, along with every single person's 'needs.'
FWIW, could care less about the ports - not 100% true as it's an inconvenience but I see the longer term benefits.
I've been using OS X for a decade+, and sold several friends, co-workers, etc. on MBs or MBPs.
The current model doesn't work for me, nor anyone outside of Sales and Marketing at work, where an Air or MacBook retina would work fine. The rest remain waiting for some semblance of a system that will give an instant boost right now as well as remain viable for at least 2 full years. preferably more.
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This is close enough to reality. People arguing over the definition of 'Pro' is somewhat meaningless, as even there, the levels of need across CPU performance, GPU performance, RAM, ability to drive N displays/resolution, or connectivity are not always intersecting among them. This does not negate people finding a lack of value in the current offering, nor those who are in fact fine with the offering as is.
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+MANY.
Yep.
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Look a the growth in image and video sizes for a good example. From a few MP to 16, to 24MP and higher even in prosumer cameras, and from SD -> HD -> 4k and beyond for video in a relatively short period of time.
To answer your Q, sure - my 2006 MBP C2D did OK overall, until I ran out of RAM as projects grew and I needed to start running at least one VM regularly, so I shifted to a Santa Rosa white MacBook for a bit, maxing out at 8GB of RAM and it greatly increased my productivity.
My 2011BTO MBP was bought with 8GB of RAM, and to let you know just how important added RAM was, the going price was ~$1600 for 3rd party RAM at the time. I bought 16GB the minute it went below $1k; pretty sure I paid ~$900 for that, and it was well worth it.
Now we're in 2017 shortly, and while RAM is nearly 'free,' we don't even have the option of more RAM vs a Pro in 2011, while up to 64GB is fairly readily available in other laptops.
My 2011 MBP served me quite well, and I likely would have kept it until the next refresh (or when 32GB of RAM is offered) if not for the crap battery life, even with a 3rd party 'new' replacement. It was currently limiting me due to the RAM, but I figured I'd wait because surely Apple would 'deliver' in the refreshed Pros.
They did not, but realistically I'll wait to see what the next refresh brings, as our apps are becoming more complex and significantly growing in data, and buying a system that marginally gets the job done today and would give me regrets within 6 months.
I do expect once Apple corrects their aversion to RAM, in the next refresh or the one after, I'll be buying that maxed out and it too will serve me fairly well for some 3+ years, but not before that.
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1. VMs(usually more than 1 at once...which are not 'happy' with 4GB per in general) + app development + data and analysis. Note VMs for different Ones will themselves have different base requirements to run reasonably well...before you get to the app or data requirements.
2. This is somewhat of a straw man. In general, I'd say Linux (or BSD variants) can run on the least RAM in a useful fashion, followed by OS X, followed by Windows. However, even years back now, I couldn't believe people were trying to run OS X on 4GB of RAM. All modern OSes (finally
) use 'extra' RAM fairly well for file and application caching, but that's freed up when an app requests actual memory for it's use. Beyond that, apps dealing with data or doing their own memory management...need what they need. For casual usage and occasional FCP or image editing, 8GB is likely fine for you, although few would fault you if you decided to go with 16GB if you can swing the extra $, as you no longer have the option to upgrade after purchase. If you'r eon an existing MBP or MB now, best thing you can do is load up your normal/'highest' usage scenario and monitor memory usage or 'pressure' or use other tools to see how much you're swapping to disk from memory. With SSDs becoming faster, it'll be less of a hit performance wise, but still significant (figure RAM vs SSD is still ~10x faster or more, but much better than platter drives).
You make a nice case, however, your requirements are very specific. Most people don't require that much RAM and I am not talking about casual users, but creative professionals, and making the laptop heavier because of a small group of people is not what Apple does. They make "mainstream" hardware - not meaning anything bad by that. If you want specialty hardware, you have to look elswhere. I am partially in that boat as well - I would actually love to get something like the Surface Studio - but from Apple, running macOS and using the Apple Pencil. This would be my dream machine. But I understand I'm in the minority here. So I'm forced to look at Wacom and hope they come up with some ok solutions (and they do). What I'm saying, I guess you should be looking at some HP Workstation, saying "damn, those MacBook Pros are nice - sadly, my work requires something else".
One honest question, though. I understand your job requires you to run a lot of VMs. But do you *have* to do it on a laptop? Laptops are all about compromise and they should (in my opinion) be built for mobility. Sure, laptops are cool - but some work is still best done on a desktop. But - perhaps you cen explain to me why I'm wrong here.
If you need 32GB ram, it's simple, it's a requirement , these are the people that will benefit from 16GB +.
If you don't need over 16GB and have no benefit, it would help if you stopped forcing your opinion on the ones that actually know what they need and not comparing their needs to yours . Here lies the problem .
I suspect a lot of the most vocal 8GB is plenty .
If you don't need over 16GB and have no benefit, it would help if you stopped forcing your opinion on the ones that actually know what they need and not comparing their needs to yours . Here lies the problem .
I suspect a lot of the most vocal 8GB is plenty .
Spot on
I personally would love to see a 32GB option available and again for me personally I would use it.............(long pause) for about 20% of the laptops use.
It's still a something I would love but if I had to be brutally honest I would say to myself "put the laptop down, get your arse out of the chair and do what you need on your iMac", or "can this job wait until you get home and do it on the iMac".
I'm fortunate to have a heavily populated iMac so that lessens my requirements.
For those who rely solely on a laptop, I feel for you but MH01 makes a valid point.
The most legit argument is "I am a consumer and I want it. Oh you don't have it I will go to your competitor"
(Edit: Note this is not me - I do need it for statistical modelling purposes as opposed to merely wanting it. What i'm saying is consumer demand is the most important reason)Do you not understand that some people travel for work? And before you say having a desktop and a laptop is not an optoin for many because a) their employer won't buy them both, or b) they are paying themselves and cannot afford both
Are you ******* kidding me?
The only ignorant person here is you.
I have a massive problem with ports I am sure as hell will not carrying or buying this dongle crap.
A portable machine is a machine that I can carry from a to b and interact with every peripheral that I meet along the way.
I dont bench 100 kg but I give a **** about 1 pound less weight the time where weight was an issue is long gone. Especially if the notebook weighs one pound less but I carry now three pounds of dongles with me.
I am a cross platform developer I use multiple vm's frequently at the same time to test the software I write.
On some vms I emulate a server with a in memory database and that costs a lot of ram.
You can not say we are ignorant or behaving childish just because you lack the sight to see our usecases.
I know many iOS-Mac developer who feel betrayed.
They waited years for a new machine, they dreamed of 2 TB ssd, 32GB ram and maybe a dedicated graphic card for the 13 inch.
And what happened? They got this piece of crap I don't know any iOS developer who is happy with that laptop and if the people who build the foundation of the ecosystem that you use on a day to day bases feel like they got ****ed you as a end-user should worry.
Apple has given an open and rational explaination of why they have stayed with a 16gb limit in its notebooks. They have their reasons and they are very good and serve the majority of customers.
If this means that the new MacBook Pro is not for you then it's simple don't buy one.
If this means that the new MacBook Pro is not for you then it's simple don't buy one.
Don't know if you're the author of that post? That need more context. I'm a software engineer and does web development for a day job. That kinda of RAM usage seems a little too much for web development.
If it were possible, I would put every single thing I have on a RAM disk so it's fast, but that would be 15-20TB of RAM. The question isn't really about whether one can use as much RAM as can fit in any laptop, it's one of, is the way you're using RAM reasonable?
Because Apple does not make proper laptops.
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2 years ago.
I'm one of those folks who don't need 16GB of ram, but I've enough posts here to see other folks do. I also see Apple's competitors offering computers with more then 16GB of ram. I've said this before, if apple offered user replaceable ram, this would not be an issue, the consumer would then then bear the responsibility for dealing with the lack of battery performance if he needs more then 32GB.
I understand why Apple made this choice, but I think they could found different options to alleviate the issue
I understand why Apple made this choice, but I think they could found different options to alleviate the issue
I don't think Apple has once marketed a Macbook Pro as a "workstation". HP Zbooks are workstations, workstation being a shorthand for desktop replacement giant of a machine.
I would say a small amount of people really need more than 8gb of ram,
I've bolded the relevant part of your post.
And I've said it over and over again. I can't take anyone's complaints about having to carry dongles with their work computer seriously. Because if you actually need to connect anything more than a power cable to your laptop in the past, you'd have had a bag of cables and dongles with you already. A bag that was constantly in flux as technologies changed. Cry me a river that you have to buy a few new cables today.
Doesn't care about the weight of the laptop.
Makes a big deal about carrying a few adapters.
Here's a thought. Just put in a couple of memory slots and let user's insert their own memory. Like the Macbooks were before Retina and how the Dell XPS 15 is today. And while they are at it, add a standard M2 with NVMe slot so we can upgrade the SSD with something from Amazon or NewEgg, like the XPS 15.
A lot of people complain about the lack of HDMI, despite it only being on the last device... Personally, I've never seen 'HDMI' as anything pro, it was a TV port. I appreciate it's been adopted into a lot of PC equipment more recently, but most computer stuff has been DVI or DisplayPort for the most part. So I'd need an HDMI-DisplayPort to hook it up to a monitor. Or yes I could use HDMI to hook it up to a TV, but why? So now I need a USB-C to DisplayPort, really makes no difference to anything, except that USB-C can do it all so more monitors in the future will have USB-C input. So just need a USB-C to USB-C cable, easy!
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Good luck finding LPDDR3 RAM that you can insert into a slot...
I'll take none replaceable fast and efficient RAM over user replaceable slower RAM for the time being. Computers just aren't like they used to be, software just doesn't take full advantage of the hardware. Years ago it would be common to upgrade your machine, and RAM was always the first option as prices come down. These days 16GB will still feel fast in 4-5 years, so I don't have a need to upgrade it. I also get these things to last 4-5 years so if the RAM lasts as long as the machine, I'll be looking to upgrade the system at that point not just the RAM. In the meantime, I get lightning fast RAM, low power consumption and a really portable machine.
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Good luck finding LPDDR3 RAM that you can insert into a slot...
I'll take none replaceable fast and efficient RAM over user replaceable slower RAM for the time being. Computers just aren't like they used to be, software just doesn't take full advantage of the hardware. Years ago it would be common to upgrade your machine, and RAM was always the first option as prices come down. These days 16GB will still feel fast in 4-5 years, so I don't have a need to upgrade it. I also get these things to last 4-5 years so if the RAM lasts as long as the machine, I'll be looking to upgrade the system at that point not just the RAM. In the meantime, I get lightning fast RAM, low power consumption and a really portable machine.
well, i for one have run out of RAM on 16 GB when working on current-gen (ps4-type console) game assets working in such apps as mudbox and photoshop - both 64 bits versions - concurrently, no sweat. reportedly the 64bit version of zbrush also consumes loads (and is otherwise a decent use case for a laptop since it's all CPU based, no fancy graphics card required.
my desktop machine regularly hits around 12 or so GB of RAM usage (out of 32) with today's software and i'm working in the realtime graphics side of things, i don't want to imagine what a heavy render workload requires these days.
generally being locked into 16 GB for years going forward is just daft for a machine bought now. although - clearly - the MBP is not really intended as a workstation level laptop anyway, starting with their choice of GPU and focus on fashionable slim design over expandability. the pro seems to designate simply the upper end of apple's lineup.
my desktop machine regularly hits around 12 or so GB of RAM usage (out of 32) with today's software and i'm working in the realtime graphics side of things, i don't want to imagine what a heavy render workload requires these days.
generally being locked into 16 GB for years going forward is just daft for a machine bought now. although - clearly - the MBP is not really intended as a workstation level laptop anyway, starting with their choice of GPU and focus on fashionable slim design over expandability. the pro seems to designate simply the upper end of apple's lineup.
Why did they move to USB-C? Because it's the "future" they said, oh but let's not offer 32 GB of ram because people don't need it now, maybe down the road. K
The frustration here is that the 32GB people are making claims that without it, these computers are incapable of doing ANY professional work AT ALL. They state that these are not professional systems JUST because of the lack of 32GB of RAM (and a few people mention GPU).
Why not go complain to Microsoft about the Surface Pro then? 15w CPU?
Why not go complain to Microsoft about the Surface Pro then? 15w CPU?
Computers have also come a long way and "pro" usage for one does not necessarily mean pro usage for another.
CPU may be the bottleneck for one, where memory may be the bottleneck for another.
Do you want a notebook to replace your desktop? You say your laptop runs out of RAM at 16GB, but your desktop is only hitting 12GB our of 32GB?
If you really want a notebook to replace it, it's going to be big and bulky and not really portable. It will still be underpowered when compared to a desktop. It will always be underpowered when compared to a desktop. A notebook is supposed to be a portable machine, for getting work done on the go. Apple has a focus on portability, not fashion.
I just don't understand a lot of the arguments coming from people. They say they want more power (Which would equal more weight) yet complain about having to carry around a few cables. They say they want more battery life, yet windows machines that offer this mythical workstation they desire only have a few hours (Because their designed to be plugged in because of the power consumption). Just don't understand, if you want a portable computer, buy a notebook, if you want a powerhouse, buy a desktop, if you want a reasonably powerful computer that is kind of portable, then buy a mobile workstation. Unfortunately, Apple only make Desktops and Notebooks, and have never made a mobile workstation.
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I appreciate that, but the use case for only needing max RAM over higher spec everything else is surely minimal? Most of the time if you need the most RAM, you're probably using software that also needs a higher spec CPU/GPU. They all tend to go in tandem, I don't see many dual core desktops running 64GB of RAM.