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How much memory would you get?
- Thread starter jqc
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The last Mac I replaced was because after 7 years, 8GB wasn’t enough any more. Something I had to run for a job literally wouldn’t load without more memory. Other than that the machine was still quite useful.
I’ve got 16GB now (which is very comfortable) and my next machine (most likely the v2 14”) will have 32GB for future proofing.
Do I (or most people not doing data science or high res video processing on their laptops) need it now? No. Will it increase the useful lifespan of the computer? Almost certainly.
I’ve got 16GB now (which is very comfortable) and my next machine (most likely the v2 14”) will have 32GB for future proofing.
Do I (or most people not doing data science or high res video processing on their laptops) need it now? No. Will it increase the useful lifespan of the computer? Almost certainly.
@OP : We have the EXACT same workflow (do we have the same job lol). I also have an M1 with 8GB, and in Monterey I'm often getting warnings that I take too much memory and I should close an app. My graph is identical to yours. No red, just yellow.
Really curious to know what you'll end up taking, and screenshots of the Activity Monitor with your new config.
If it's worth anything, I think you'd be okay with 16GB. Why ?
First, I had 32GB on my 2013 iMac, and rarely used it all.
Second, Teams is your worst offender here, just like on my computer. It'll become native one day.
Third, I've seen a few WWDC videos explaining memory management in Apple Silicon, and Apple convinced me that 8GB of Apple Silicon is worth more than 8. Not 16. Maybe 10, maybe 12, maybe even 14, it depends on what you do.
The thing is, in a PC (or Intel Macs), for a processor to communicate with the GPU:
1. The processor stores things in your RAM
2. Your RAM copies stuff in your VRAM (the RAM in your GPU)
3. The your GPU has access to it.
And it goes the other way around to communicate from the GPU to the processor.
But in Apple Silicon :
1. The processor stores things in your unified RAM
2. The GPU has access to it
And the other way around.
Much simpler. This is what enables the MBP to be the first production platform in the world to have a theoritical amount of 64GB of VRAM (minus what the OS takes obviously).
Really curious to know what you'll end up taking, and screenshots of the Activity Monitor with your new config.
If it's worth anything, I think you'd be okay with 16GB. Why ?
First, I had 32GB on my 2013 iMac, and rarely used it all.
Second, Teams is your worst offender here, just like on my computer. It'll become native one day.
Third, I've seen a few WWDC videos explaining memory management in Apple Silicon, and Apple convinced me that 8GB of Apple Silicon is worth more than 8. Not 16. Maybe 10, maybe 12, maybe even 14, it depends on what you do.
The thing is, in a PC (or Intel Macs), for a processor to communicate with the GPU:
1. The processor stores things in your RAM
2. Your RAM copies stuff in your VRAM (the RAM in your GPU)
3. The your GPU has access to it.
And it goes the other way around to communicate from the GPU to the processor.
But in Apple Silicon :
1. The processor stores things in your unified RAM
2. The GPU has access to it
And the other way around.
Much simpler. This is what enables the MBP to be the first production platform in the world to have a theoritical amount of 64GB of VRAM (minus what the OS takes obviously).
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It’s always worth going for a little more RAM than you think you need. It’s the first thing that will bring your computer to its knees if it runs low. Swap files are not a fun place to be.
Over time the GPU, OS and Apps will take an increasing share leaving you with less and less.
I’d recommend 16Gb min for anyone unless you are upgrading in the next 2 years
Over time the GPU, OS and Apps will take an increasing share leaving you with less and less.
I’d recommend 16Gb min for anyone unless you are upgrading in the next 2 years
Orange is only an issue if it's running slow. I had an 8GB 13 M1 for a while that I tried to beat into submission. It was constantly running in the red. If I let it idle, it idled in the orange because I overloaded it with so many programs. The poor thing was probably green for only about 1% of the time I was using it.
Despite all this, it was still at least as fast as my 2018 15" with 32GB.
If you're not doing anything resource intensive, 16GB is plenty and then some. People underestimate how capable an 8GB machine is. An 8GB Intel Mac is already quite capable and an 8GB M1 Mac is even better.
That’s true purely from a technological
perspective.
From a usability perspective, more RAM isn’t worth $400 (or whatever the difference is), if you never need or notice it. Better off just upgrading earlier with the money saved.
Software is getting bigger and hungrier for memory, but I really don’t think that DOUBLE the RAM will be insufficient when 8 GB is still sufficient for him today. Even in 5-7 years, 16GB will be sufficient.
Laptops with 8GB of RAM and either 128 or 256 GB SSD has remained the standard for almost 10 years. Ten. The “standard” specs have started to increase, but think about how slowly this sort of thing truly evolves.
For common uses, people here are overestimating the speed of “progress”. I’m reading comments here saying “16GB will be good for at least 2-3 years” and I can’t help but laugh. ?
16gb m1 air, I've had my mouse pointer stutter very badly and activity monitor showed high ram usage with what i thought was fairly normal usage (tabs, multiple programs, etc) so something to consider
I still don’t feel that the ‘unified’ thing is being discussed enough. I am in the same boat as everyone. Undecided between 16 and 32.
Won’t 16 gb be little since its unified???
Won’t 16 gb be little since its unified???
I agree. If you have a traditional graphics card with 16Gb, how often and how much RAM does it usually use? Do multiple monitors affect it?
I played it safe and assumed the graphics card would need a dedicated 16Gb most of the time if i get an ultrawide monitor (absolute worse case scenario)
I played it safe and assumed the graphics card would need a dedicated 16Gb most of the time if i get an ultrawide monitor (absolute worse case scenario)
Do not forget that time comes and graphics get better as well requirements are higher.
We had HD in TV, Full HD, 4k and now 8k. Our mobile phones can edit 8k video and display HDR content.
so I really think 32 GB RAM will be standard near future.
and if you want to edit videos, better graphic is a must too.
We had HD in TV, Full HD, 4k and now 8k. Our mobile phones can edit 8k video and display HDR content.
so I really think 32 GB RAM will be standard near future.
and if you want to edit videos, better graphic is a must too.
Anyone know with certainty if that’s actually an issue? Surprised if the OS couldn’t deal with this, and surely idle/empty RAM must be a fairly low power user compared to CPU/GPU and screen?
I am in the same boat, trying to decide between 16GB and 32GB of RAM for my order. I hate paying $400 for 32GB of RAM, but at the same time in my last 30 years of Mac ownership I have always had to upgrade the RAM in my system after about 3-4 years to keep the computer useable.
So in the end I am trying to decide between saving the $400 in RAM now and planning to upgrade to a new Mac in ~4 years or shell out for the 32 GB now and hope my computer will hold up longer than ~4 years (I mean who knows how fast Apple Silicon chips will improve every year).
This is my first Mac where the RAM is not upgradeable....hence my first time with this dilemma.
So in the end I am trying to decide between saving the $400 in RAM now and planning to upgrade to a new Mac in ~4 years or shell out for the 32 GB now and hope my computer will hold up longer than ~4 years (I mean who knows how fast Apple Silicon chips will improve every year).
This is my first Mac where the RAM is not upgradeable....hence my first time with this dilemma.
I'm using ~20Gb of RAM on a daily basis for web devevelopment (Intellij + Teams + Outlook + Chrome) so I had to decide between 32Gb and 64Gb. I went for 64Gb because I wasn't sure about what unified memory means and would be kicking myself if I started getting memory warnings after 18 months.
This is the same issue I'm struggling with currently. 16GB & 1TB storage or 32GB & 512GB storage.
I will use it mainly for webbrowsing, e-mail, some casual Final Cut Pro and Football Manager.
The unified memory thing is what keeping me insecure what to do. I'm leaning towards 32GB because of the CPU / GPU memory sharing.
I will use it mainly for webbrowsing, e-mail, some casual Final Cut Pro and Football Manager.
The unified memory thing is what keeping me insecure what to do. I'm leaning towards 32GB because of the CPU / GPU memory sharing.
Apple never make upgrades very easy but it might be slightly easier to upgrade the SSD storage at a later date (or complement it with a USB-C external drive). For that reason I think i'd be tempted to go with the extra RAM over storage. Although some video editing here and there can quickly swallow up storage. Yeh difficult one.
I still have the 27" iMac with 2TB storage and a 4TB NAS. So I don't store much on the internal SSD of the MacBook Pro anyway. And if so I can just buy an external USB-C SSD.
On an M1 Mac of some description? Is that on Intel? Mac or Windows?
My work computer is a mid-level Windows desktop that’s well-specced but it is 4 years old. With just Chrome open with ~8 tabs, two RDP sessions, Excel, Teams, and use of some apps accessed via Citrix, it is using 10-11GB of RAM out of 16GB total. Does that mean I need 16GB for these menial tasks, or is it simply bad at managing memory? ?
There is someone in the DPReview forum literally post-processing Fuji GFX 102MP (medium format) photos on an M1 Air (8 GB) with no slowdown, editing these photos using many layers (up to 20) and breezing through it. ??
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I was looking at Activity Monitor on MacOS Mavericks on Intel. Appreciate ARM may make a difference but on the flip side i think Rosetta 2 will be quite hungry.
I always recommend to buy what you can afford or even a little bit more. Ram almost always makes a system run smoother even if it is not actually bottle-necking to the point where you are feeling the slowdown. With cloud storage available, more in-system storage is more of a convenience than a necessity, unless you are editing huge FCP or music files or need to keep a lot of files at hand for travel or instances where you are totally off the grid for an extended period of time.
We need to realize that these M1 Macs are going to last everyone for a LONG time. Developers have an installed base of many millions of lesser Macs who they can't just leave out in the cold by making their apps require this sort of power. App requirements for raw processing speed will ramp up slowly. Just like the M1 iPad pro, way more power than can be used currently. However, we have apps here today that will benefit from more ram, with likely 32gb being the sweet spot between cost and capability.
We need to realize that these M1 Macs are going to last everyone for a LONG time. Developers have an installed base of many millions of lesser Macs who they can't just leave out in the cold by making their apps require this sort of power. App requirements for raw processing speed will ramp up slowly. Just like the M1 iPad pro, way more power than can be used currently. However, we have apps here today that will benefit from more ram, with likely 32gb being the sweet spot between cost and capability.
This is the dilemma, you'r work usage intuitively seems "light" by today's standards but is using 11gb or RAM, and the point that apps and underlying files continue to get larger and require more processing power to process - 8GB picture files!!!
For those saying "8GB has been enough for the last 5-10 years", while I agree (I was using the same workflow with as 2012 13" retina MBP, 8GB RAM, during the first summer of the pandemic and it also did not slow down); my concern is that we basically saw intel chips stagnate on performance for the last ~5 years? and if Apple's silicon continues to get more power, even if not at the same rate, apps and media will also evolve to take advantage of it, so maybe the last 10 years isn't a good benchmark?
How much memory will I be getting?
16gb ought to be fine for me.
One other thing I'll do (assuming it can still be done):
I'll TURN OFF virtual memory disk swapping (using the terminal).
I don't want any unnecessary disk swapping/thrashing.
I've been running my Intel-based Macs for years now this way, smooth and stable, they don't crash, no memory-related problems at all.
16gb ought to be fine for me.
One other thing I'll do (assuming it can still be done):
I'll TURN OFF virtual memory disk swapping (using the terminal).
I don't want any unnecessary disk swapping/thrashing.
I've been running my Intel-based Macs for years now this way, smooth and stable, they don't crash, no memory-related problems at all.
I got 16GB, that's what I use now on my 2020 MBP 13". Kind of worried that it won't be enough since it's being shared unlike before, but I also don't have to worry about future proofing or whatever so if it's not the right call then in a year or two when I upgrade I'll just consider it again.
Also don't want to spend even more money on an already expensive computer that's already out of my needs
Also don't want to spend even more money on an already expensive computer that's already out of my needs