Hey Enthusiasts.
I’m being having my arm more or less twisted to force me to buy a macbook. Granted, with brands like lenovo shutting down on urp and arch Linux these days having a list of show-stopping issues longer than your phone’s scrolling ability, uh, why not. Meh tho.
Local corner shop still has 'pro in M1pro/16GB ram or M2"basic"/8GB ram for not unaffordable prices. Single Core benchmarks puts the M2 at maybe 10% better than M1pro, but Multicore and “Metal” (???) says M1pro is better than M2 basic, sometimes by a lot (geekbench).
I don’t understand benchmarking, especially with such variation in results.
I need a machine able to play 12 tracks of 16bits .wav files + some effects (Ardour) and / or output video in 1080p on 2 outputs + some gimmickery (Isadora). Or you know, run qlab like everybody else, with fades and envelopes and stuff.
Which one should I buy?
deleted by creator
Thanks for the actual “M1” answer.
I’ll be still mixing and mastering (and lighting) on Linux, as I’ve been on anything from Slackware to SuSE to Arch since 2006 ; I believe my current showstoppers are bad luck with secondhand hardware, and pebkac on pipewire software. It just happens that for live, real-flesh-on-stage-and-audience, I can’t afford the risks. It hurts.
deleted by creator
Agreed on the M1. Anything entry level for Apple is decent but not really meant to push the envelope very far. I had a 16GB Mac mini and it served me very well for software development. I had to run multiple ram hogging tools at the same time so it did have pauses when switching between them. Other than that it was a beast. It held up well compared to my higher end MacBook Pro i9 with 32 GB Ram. The M1s run very cool. You’ll wonder if your machine even has a fan except if you’re doing a long intensive processing job. The M2s from my experience run hotter. I have an M2 iPad that I’m betting becomes thermally throttled just by watching Netflix. Not that it stutters, it just becomes warm to the touch.