I prefer to use my things at their full potential the longest possible. That's often less expansive over time than always change.
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М1 8Gb vs 16Gb
- Thread starter yellowhelicopter
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There are some bazaar statements in this thread, 8gb m1 = 16gb intel for example. 1kb = 1kb, 1mb = 1mb, 1gb = 1gb regardless of system. If you're loading up 60megapixel photos or video to memory for editing, you're loading in 60megapixel photos or video. 8gb will be fine for most, if you're a creative I'd go for 16gb, the size of the data/images/video footage you're using is the same regardless of m1 or intel.
Thank you. This whole "Swapping is bad and should be avoided....especially on SSDs" just don't understand that even 10GB of swap every single day, even weekends, would be a drop in a very very large bucket for these SSDs. And it would still last 5 years!
For basic 1080p video editing, which makes me money, I think the new Mac mini with even 8GB will be more than enough for my needs. IN fact, I tested my 1080p workflow on my 2019 i9 iMac - which I got 128GB of RAM due to "more RAM the better" comments anywhere. 8GB vs 128GB made no difference in 1080p video editing.
Not true. I have testing this with 5 hour, 1080p 60fps videos and 8GB is more than enough to edit such a long video.
If anybody makes a blanket statement of "More RAM = greater performance", then they don't understand how a computer works. We don't all need to understand the details or care about them, but nobody should make these blanket statements.
The SoC is exciting, but doesn't change how much space a 100 MB file takes. For certain type of workloads ram does equal more performance, but for many workloads ram doesn't increase performance but ensures you it doesn't slow down when loading big files or running multiple apps.
Just for fun, let's use a car analogy to compare the 8 GB and 16 GB version.
The 16 GB version is like an Audi RS 6 Avant. It's very very fast and since it's a wagon it can carry a lot of stuff.
The 8 GB version is like an Audi RS 5. It's also very very fast but it can't carry the same amount of stuff.
So for workloads where you need to move a lot of stuff, the RS 6(16 GB) will be faster. The RS 5(8 GB) version can move the same amount of stuff, but it will have to drive multiple times back and forth, making it take longer.
For situations where you don't need to move a lot stuff, you just need to move it fast. They will be more or less identical in performance.
😁
The 16 GB version is like an Audi RS 6 Avant. It's very very fast and since it's a wagon it can carry a lot of stuff.
The 8 GB version is like an Audi RS 5. It's also very very fast but it can't carry the same amount of stuff.
So for workloads where you need to move a lot of stuff, the RS 6(16 GB) will be faster. The RS 5(8 GB) version can move the same amount of stuff, but it will have to drive multiple times back and forth, making it take longer.
For situations where you don't need to move a lot stuff, you just need to move it fast. They will be more or less identical in performance.
😁
And I think this is what we see in almost every YouTube ’influencer’ video, they’re demonstrating video exports, scrubbing, photo exports etc, and in almost every case Final Cut or Lightroom etc is the sole app they have open. 8gb looks to work great and fires up their referral links, but real world for some will look more like photo editing in Lightroom while on a slack call and replying to an email while cutting and pasting from a browser with a few tabs loaded. No replacement for displacement in this more real world scenario, as they say... to lend from you analogy 😀
Thank you. I am tired of the non stop "more memory = better performance" arguments. This is why I wasted $600 of my money getting 128GB when I only need 8GB. I got the 8GB i9 iMac in 2019 and got 128GB after market for $600. I tested my workflow out on 8GB when I took some online courses and the lecturers (some are very popular) mention that 8GB is good enough for 1080p video work. So I tested it and sure enough, no issues.
And also file size does not mean it will take up that much of your RAM. I have a 5 hour 1080p 60fps video file that is 148GB in size and in Final Cut Pro its only taking 1.66GB of my RAM.
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A better analogy I have used with non technical people is books. If you have a bookshelf in your basement with a lot of books, going down to your basement to place your book somewhere that is faster - some container by your bed for fast access is what RAM is about. However, what if you only have 1 book for example? Is a bigger container in your bedroom going to be beneficial?
The act of going down to the basement putting one book back and getting another is similar to how swap works (again for non-technical people I talk to on the phone here so not going in to crazy details). If you have 10 books you read regularly, and only have a container that can fit 5 books, you will be going to the basement often to swap some out. So you should get a bigger container.
Not many people have dozens of apps open. I don't usually have other things open when working on FCP projects.
Have you seen this video though?
I have now, the 8gb is impressive and definitely punching above its weight due to it being on chip, but from looking at the amber memory pressure and the size of the swap and the lag in LR, I concluded to go with the 16gb version from this video
I should add, this is for my use case, I’ll be coming from a 48gb Mac Pro (5,1) where I am usually using 60%+ of that memory. So I am expecting to get better performance from the m1 Mac mini and it’s 16gb memory for my usage
In previous machines I always went with 16GB. My current iMac even has 32GB.
For my M1 Air I went with 8GB. And it's snappier than all my previous machines, even my 2019 iMac with SSD and 32GB.
M1 is so fast, and the SSD is so fast, that you don't even realize when the RAM is running out. It can page to the SSD and I see no slowdown whatsoever.
For my M1 Air I went with 8GB. And it's snappier than all my previous machines, even my 2019 iMac with SSD and 32GB.
M1 is so fast, and the SSD is so fast, that you don't even realize when the RAM is running out. It can page to the SSD and I see no slowdown whatsoever.
Well do you have Lightroom, FCP, Xcode, Chrome, Logic Pro, Safari and all the other programs open at the same time?
Why would I code while exporting and editing videos while editing music ???
Use case *must* stay realistic please.....
Use case *must* stay realistic please.....
Well that is the point of stress tests. You want to push a system to its limits. You do this all the time in IT. If you need to show swapping and high memory pressure with ONLY stress tests, then that proves these systems are very good under NORMAL realistic conditions.
Lightroom & Photoshop or... visual studio, vscode/sublime, iTerm, Remote Desktop... plus the following... slack, mail, safari, iMessage, outlook, onenote, word, excel, itunes... quite often.
edit: Lightroom, photoshop plus the other sundry items is usually my worst case with 61mp & 41mp raw file editing.
This is Max's stress test video. If you watch his other video, Lightroom Classic was no different between 8GB and 16GB. He had to open all those productivity apps to stress test before the 8GB version showed some slowness in LR.
Yep, and you could see his memory pressure in amber (4:45min mark-ish, he only shows it briefly), that's not a place I wanna start at with a new machine as apps and the OS gets more bloated over time
All the time ?
Stress is only ONE test among others. A stress test is to show up to which point a system (software) can be tolerant to a certain workload. It can be part of a test suite, among other tests. And it’s not always relevant. It’s commonly used in server applications.
In this scenario, you want to test a use case which is barely not human. One can not do all that at the same time. This kind of test is not relevant at all because it is not realistic. It simply show the point of failure of a system you will never reach. It might be a cool experiment, but irrelevant in reality.
Max did do other tests. This is just his stress test video.
And that still proves that the 8GB model is good for normal human workloads. Nobody should have Xcode, FCP, Logic, Lightroom, Photoshop, and more open at the same time working on large files at the same time. You are one person, you cannot do all those things at once. But Max tested under normal situations and was criticized for not stress testing it. So he did and now people are criticizing him for it too. The fact that Max had to find some difference between 8GB and 16GB by this stress test is proof that the 8GB version is not something to be laughed at.
And yes, I do this for a living. You typically find the breaking point of your change, server implementation, whatever you are doing so your managers/leadership is aware that you testing things right. And you can properly speak to the point where things break. For example, if you make a change to a SQL stored procedure, you stress test it to the breaking point. 15,000+ calls to the stored procedure in 30 minutes until you start seeing a problem? Good, now the company understands that if they grow to REACH that limit, then things need to be addressed.
Again, if you need 8K or 16K video editing, or thousands of tracks in Logic Pro, or virtual machines, or more high end workflow you already know you cannot get by with even 16GB. But these systems are not even designed to do those types of workflows.
I mean it just beggars belief. That you actually think that is true and are others are beliving it as well, sad, sad, sad.