I think your criticisms are completely valid, and gives potential buyers a good "head up". My experience with my base model M1 Studio has been better than yours, but it's pure luck. Moving up from an M1 Mac mini I had peripherals that worked, but only because they were less sophisticated than your setup (cheapo wireless mouse, 1080p monitor, etc.).
I like your videos, FYI multi-function Thunderbolt hubs/docks *do* need drivers. Whether connecting by USB or Thunderbolt, external devices with controller chips like Ethernet adapters, audio interfaces, USB controllers, etc. need to have OS support (drivers) for the particular controller chips used by the device, in order to function on the OS. This is true on any OS, particularly on Linux and Mac there is not guaranteed support for all possible controller chips, so known-supported controllers are sought after, like “look for this particular Realtek chip.” Many PC-brand Thunderbolt docks by HP, Lenovo, and Dell for example do not function perfectly on Macs as they were not designed with controller chips that already have MacOS driver support, and they do not provide Mac drivers either. Brands like Belkin, OWC, Sonnet, StarTech etc tend to always design products with full Mac compatibility. If you’re a Mac user now, checking for Mac compatibility before buying is just part of life, welcome to the club! :) I also think it’s pretty widely understood that Blender Cycles renderer only has a primitive level of Apple Silicon compatibility and still has a long way to go before it could be considered truly “optimized” for the strengths & weaknesses of Apple Silicon GPU design, tile based rendering etc. And sorry you weren’t aware of how Apple does “Retina” scaling. It’s Apple’s version of HiDPI that’s very different from Windows, been this way since the first Retina Macbook Pro in 2012. By default it renders a HiDPI desktop that’s the equivalent size to 1/2 the native pixel resolution of your monitor, so the text and graphics look super sharp and are a readable size. That’s why some people are excited by 27” 5K monitors like the Studio Display, at 2x Retina default resolution it’s equivalent to a 1440p sized workspace. For everyone else without a rare 5K monitor there’s scaled Retina resolutions, which do the job but aren’t quite as sharp as a perfect 2x scale. Apple themselves were shipping computers set to non-2x scaled resolutions by default, due to lack of perfectly sized 2x panels. Check out the “RDM” Retina Display Menu app which lets you choose from a wider variety of Retina/non-Retina resolutions. Thanks for sharing your ongoing experiences, glad it’s mostly working out for you!
Correct. It is true for any OS. Any device that has specific/private functions, and not generic usb audio/lan etc, it will require drivers to communicate with the kernel. Current Thunderbolt is a glorified usb port with a few extras (integration of pcie). Any device that connects to a port and has specific private function will always need to identify those functions through driver software for kernel hence hardware to understand what/how it does those functions. without it, there is no communication, just unknown device. on windows sometimes some devices can work partially work like gfx card but only in limited functionality. this is not windows/apple/linux problem, it is oem issue if they develop software for particular os and not another, not much u can do obviously.
You’re answering so many question I’ve had about the Mac Studio, thanks! 1000€ for 3700X/RTX3070/16G or 2300€ for Mac Studio base model - not so hard to choose, when 3D rendering is included.
While your build is probably at least 1200€ (at least in Germany, brand new parts. Unless you already own some components, in which the comparison lacks slightly, but is still fair, as you can use existing components for a new PC but not for a mac studio), you are still right. If you want to do 3D rendering, particularly making use of Optix, go for a PC. It is miles ahead. A mac studio is a beautiful piece of engineering and has many use cases, but you get more bang for your buck with a PC in that situation, hands down.
@@XTJ7 Mac Studio is poorly engineered: ram and ssd impossible to repair or upgrade, cooling fan will eventually be choked with dust and no easy way to clean it, Windows compatibility is poor, and Mac Studio is terrible for gaming. Mac Studio is a dead-end machine, and very user-unfriendly.
@@DerekDavis213 I wouldn't say it is poorly engineered, I'd say it was malicious and with the intention of making user repairability and upgradeability as hard as possible. In which they succeeded. F*ck them for that. However, getting THIS much performance out of such a small device that barely consumes energy and makes very little noise, that is without a doubt great engineering. You will be able to clean the fan (although you need to remove a glued rubber foot at the bottom to do so, thanks Apple), hence I'm not really worried about it failing. Also the cooling system has been designed with a lot of capacity to spare, so even if it is partially clogged it will be fine for quite some time. Windows compatibility is worse than with Intel, but that is an ARM issue, not a Mac Studio issue. Personally I don't miss it, never really used bootcamp on my machines anyways, but for others this may be more of a problem. Affects the entire current and future mac lineup though. Lastly gaming: yes and no. It performs great for a mac. But that is exactly it: "for a mac". The raw performance is quite good, but lack of support from games is the biggest issue here. That has never been great though, even with Intel machines. Whoever buys a mac for gaming really has no clue :) There is one aspect to it though: iOS gaming becomes bigger every year. And all these games run on a mac too. So depending on what type of games you play, it may actually be not bad at all. In conclusion: I don't think it is a dead-end-machine. You make some good points, so I liked your comment, but the machine itself is very powerful and for a lot of use-cases fantastic.
@@XTJ7 'THIS much performance out of such a small device that barely consumes energy' Why does small even matter? Look at cylinder Mac Pro or cheese grater Mac Pro. You just put them on the floor, under your desk or next to your desk. Gone and forgotten. And barely consumes energy? Again, desktop users pretty much care ZERO if the computer uses more wattage. What is 5 or 10 dollars more *per* *month* on the electric bill? Software, Usability, Speed, Flexibility, Upgradeability are what matters. 'You will be able to clean the fan' I have seen people attempt to open up the Mac Studio, that's *major* *surgery* that most people will not want to do, or are not capable of doing. 'Windows compatibility is.....an ARM issue, not a Mac Studio issue' And Apple *CHOSE* to put an ARM processor in the Mac Studio, thus throwing Boot Camp and near 100% Windows compatibility in the garbage can. Apple could have used the latest 12th-gen Intel or Ryzen processors, but instead opted for more control and profits, *at* *the* *users* *expense* . About gaming. Raw performance is pretty much *WORTHLESS* if the most popular games don't run on Mac Studio, or run poorly on Mac Studio. And even the most enthusiastic Mac M1 fan will admit that compared to Windows, gaming on Mac is *terrible* . Regarding Mac Studio as a dead-end machine: it *MOST* *CERTAINLY* *IS* . A year from now, I can buy the next monster video card from NVidia or AMD, and install them in my Windows workstation. Also the next ultra-fast SSD drive, that will put today's drives to shame. Super-easy upgrades on a Windows machine. Mac Studio in 3 years will be an out-dated doorstop. And of course, that is *EXACTLY* what Apple Corporation wants.
@@DerekDavis213 Mac is certainly not for you. Other milage may vary. For some, the Mac Studio is a compact and powerful workhorse. I have a powerful PC for image editing and a MacBook Pro M1 14 Inch. I will replace my PC in the next 2-3 years with a Mac Studio because this machine is perfect for what I do.
I had similar Problems with Monitors. It was solved with different cables. Instead of normal USB-C now we are using TB4 Cables for the Monitors and now the Displays have the right resolution.
If you set the screen to 1080p resolution on a 4k display, the Mac will only scale the interface to match the target size. The rest of the image, will still be shown at 4k, just as the display is intended to show. 🤩 I believe...
Yes, that's true. 1080p resolution on a 4k display is the native scaling Apple designs macOS to do, just like 1440p resolution on their 5k Retina display.
great positive and negative criticisms. I think you nailed it. ! Me personally am getting the M1 pro 16 inch 10core 32gb mem version. still waiting for it almost 2 months into ordering it.
This is the best video review I have seen for the practicality of actually using a piece of computing gear vs showing ugly graphs of benchmarks which mean nothing usually. Thanks! Subscribed!
Loved seeing the quick clip showing you using the speed editor with Davinci Resolve. That is how I got my Studio license. Resolve sings with using control panels. BTW - I saw a good presentation. I was using ASUS 1440 Pro Art displays and they work just fine - as you say because of the Mac scaling - 4K does not work correctly - that is a long technical discussion people have to be aware of. One last thing - the Thunderbolt hubs from OWC and Bridge worked just fine - with my Macbook Air, Mac Mini, and now Mac Studio Max. Also, I have weaned myself off Adobe Products and moved on the Affinity which has done a great job and also works on my iPad Pro to make life even better.
I ended up getting the Macbook Pro 16 w/M1 Max/32GB RAM/1TB SSD instead of the Mac Studio. I was debating between them since there was such a big price difference. With the student discount, it was $3199 for the MBP 16 and $1799 for the studio. For that extra $1400, I got 1TB storage instead of 512 and the full 32 core GPU instead of 24 And then the main difference of it being a laptop and therefore including its own keyboard/trackpad/screen and being portable. I rarely leave the house anymore but I do find the ability to use it on the couch when working on something that requires more power to be very nice. All-in-all, if you have the extra cash, I do recommend the MBP 16 over the studio for the ability to take the power on the go.
This is one of the best videos I've seen. Measured and clinical and you've touched on points that have made me scratch my head as well.. ( Apple's misleading GPU comparisions, for example ). Also, thenks for your comments about PPW - there's been too much of a fixation on this. As a desktop user, I really couldn't give a rat's ass how much power I use - just give me the horsepower I need.
u should care, at least a little bit...as the more energy you use, the higher and harder your system has to work, which in return = wear and tear..... for fast results, im on board..but I also want my $3000 + system to last more than just 3-4 years at optimal performance.
I'm really enjoying your channel. Extensive REAL LIFE tests. I can care less about the Export times and Benchmarks only tell part of the story. I care more about the scrubbing , scaling images, keyframming, coloring , speedramping, playback etc. I think I've cancelled and ordered the Mac Studio at least 4 times. no joke. My work flow is Adobe Premiere, After Effects and Photoshop for Professional and Personal Projects. I have a iMac 2019 i9 3.6Ghz 8-Core 64GB RAM 1TB (working off thunderbolt 8TB RAID 0 SSD 2.5Gb/ Drive Enclosure )and bring it to its knees with my workflow. The RAM constantly swaps and compresses and the machine freezes/crashes at least 5 times per project. At the moment, I've narrowed it down to M1 Ultra 48GPU 128GB 4TB. Do you think this is overkill? I appreciate any feedback 🙏🏼
It probably is overkill, TBH it's probably overkill for 99% of people but if the cost isn't a huge concern why not. Although I would definitely look into the problems the M1 Ultra is having especially with GPU performance. In many tasks the M1 Ultra is barely outperforming the M1 Max if at all.
Agree with all of your points and I'd like to add to your point about the CPU being a beast with regards to programmers / developers. I've got a base-model Studio and use it primarily for mobile game development in Unity. This thing is awesome for making iOS and Android builds of our project, and has been a huge time-saver when we're trying to test performance optimisations on hardware and need to make multiple builds in succession to validate our optimisations. The jump probably feels even bigger for me because I've upgraded from a 6-core Intel mini and a Windows notebook with an 8th gen i7 - probably wouldn't have been if I had a newer desktop. Biggest gripes are that UE5 crashes too often to be used reliably (not yet native for Apple Silicon - probably will be a long time before that happens), that there's no hardware-accelerated ray-tracing (I knew this before getting it) and that I can't do console development on it since all the tools for all platforms are Windows only, so I still have to swap over to Windows PC for that. Having said that, it made sense to get the Mac Studio because iOS is one of our major target platforms.
I think GPU performance per Watt is relevant a) if you're using a notebook and want the battery to last, b) the computer runs cooler so the fans aren't going crazy when you need/want a quiet environment or c) there's too much load on your circuit. Otherwise yes, the performance/watt doesn't really matter if absolute performance is what you need.
It will also be relevant if NVIDIA keeps upping the juice required for their highest end GPUs. It's rumored the 4090TI will suck back 800 watts on its own. I mean if they keep using "moar power" as the solution to getting more performance instead of innovating, people in the US are going to have to put their PC on a dedicated wire like you do for your dryer.
here in italy actually from 1^ october 2022 the energy power cost more or less 0,60 euro/h (taxes and everything comprensive), crazy i know, and almost every country in europe is suffering from same crazy elettricity rate., i use a xeon hp z440 with 2 nvidia quadro (m4000 for video and rtx a4000 for render) and even if it has low consume and very low noise when on load works its about 300w and on summer i need air condizionat. or it start noise alot more or even throttle...so professionist and hobbyst that pay eletricity bill need to consider one more " d)" point to your post.
Man I’m waiting for my first max m1 Mac Studio 32 core gpu. It’s brand new and I found it in a great price 1800 euro. I was about to buy a maxed out m2 pro mini but I found this. Will serve me for years to come with my music and video work!!! Can’t wait cheers!!!!
Others here have pointed out the mistake re the monitors. The mac is recognizing them as 4K and outputting full resolution. By default macOS uses a scaled resolution -- a "virtual" 1080p -- so that the UX elements aren't too tiny. By holding option key down you can select any supported resolution, including native 4K (which would be too tiny for most people). It doesn't "downscale" anything. Windows also has a somewhat scalable UX. The number of pixels is always the same so everything looks very crisp. In order to get that mac to output *actual* 1080p on that monitor you have to force it (and the preferences tab informs you it'll look bad). Anyhow good video but you don't understand how mac "retina" display tech works.
I’ve just ordered a Mac studio and was concerned about people taking about the res. So from what you’re saying it’s fine and I can just change it and it’ll look crisp?
Regarding the POWER consumption and cost. Don't forget that your workstation made you buy an AIRCON for your room. Add the power of the aircon when making the computation :)
Summer is only about a month and a half here in Colorado and in all honesty my solar roof returns more net power to the grid annually so my power bill is a net gain.
It doesn’t think they’re 1080P, it does a super resolution type thing, but the display tends to still use all the pixels. You are right though, if there’s one thing that bugs the hell out of Mac Users it is that you can not adjust the font size for the menu bar at the top, without modifying it for the whole system and ir sucks. As for a dock, Satechi and Caldigit are the best options for Mac and pretty much guarantee no issues. Of course your claims about thunderbolt are wrong too, it’s and Intel technology and even on my AMD systems that had compatibility for it, devices didn’t always work right. Crud, my Asus ProArt display would cause my AMD laptop to reboot when connected via the thunderbolt cable. As for the software you want, how about Procreate? Logic Pro? Garage Band? The truth is, Apple has some advantages, especially if you have an iPad as well and as they expand more of the iPad OS apps to work on the M1 Macs, you will find more and more software that will not run on the PC.
This was a great watch, it’s good to hear from someone who uses a similar wide array of software and has experience of all use cases! Real world performance over benchmarks FTW!
I will add two more shortcomings. First one is that I have the same Base Mac Studio configuration and when it goes to sleep I cannot get it to connect to my 55" tv unless I reboot it. Second shortcoming is that when I use the mouse to wake up the computer screen if I put the cursor anywhere toward the lower left corner I have to use my fingerprint to log back into the system. Love your videos.
Uh, the second issue could be you have set up a hot corner to turn your screen off or sleep your computer. Look up Settings or System Preferences and look up Hot Corners MacOS online to see if they are on. The first problem I would solve by turning off sleep. You can still have it turn off your display but it shouldn’t disconnect it, and the computer itself should not go to sleep. That seems to be how people are working around it for now.
@@randallbrander8157 Of course. I like to set them up for myself in a way that speeds up the task at hand, but every once and a while I forget they are there and I do something like log myself out by swiping to the wrong corner while browsing or something. It’s annoying if it’s an accident, but really helpful if you set them up to speed up different tasks. It’s really nice to have it immediately turn on your screen saver or turn off your display to keep your screen protected. But if you do it accidentally it can get frustrating real fast.
In the process of finding a platform for Davinci Resolve Studio, DAW and more - and Mac Studio is on the list. Appears to me that if I go Mac I will more or less have to by into the entire eco-system and by that ditch a lot of my existing equipment. Being a Linux user for 20+ years both private and professionally I will go for the 'traditional' PC setup. Luckily Davinci Resolve Studio runs on Linux. Thank you for the input. Really appreciated.
Only thing I would disagree with is software issues. You make it sound like a lot of things don’t work. I use m1’s for animation, video and game development and nothing I have tried is broken. Some use rosetta but work fine, most better than on my intel macs. Unless you know an app you use doesn’t work don’t be put off by rosetta. There are only a handful of these on my machine now as the others have been updated to work on m1. Some like Lightwave 3D will never get an update but even a massively complex app like that still works fine… the point is it’s not broken, I can still use it
I never use apple-brand monitors or peripherals with Macs and have never had an issue in that department. I am a pro 3D artist who primarily uses PC's, but I've used a ton of macs and have several at home right now
I encounter the logi keyboard problem is because a incapable dongle. It works prefect with capable equipment or isn’t directly to the built port. The thunderbolt dongle may be it does work for me, it is just because I doesn’t plug in with input power in usb link on the small Hub that the input need. But then is just too many cables.
I love my MaxBook Pro 16 but what's killing me is the lack of HDMI 2.1 even if you use Thunderbolt 4. From what I understood, Apple is limiting TB4 -> HDMI 2.1 because of some licensing issue. The fact that this problem even persists with the Mac Studio is absolutely unacceptable and Apple NEEDS to fix it.
@@rayamc607 Ever heard of 4k 120Hz? Oled/Mini-LED TV's which are much better than any available monitor right now don't have DisplayPort, only HDMI 2.1. Since the MacBooks can't do that regardless of adapter you're stuck with 4k 60Hz, which is unacceptable.
After a 7 week wait, my Studio Max with 1TB upgrade finally showed up last week. I’m still setting it up (as time allows, manually from my Trashcan Pro NOT using Migration Asst.) waiting for some adapters to connect my external HD’s to Thunderbolt. The limited Indesign/Photoshop I’ve done on it so far has been buttery smooth. Looking forward to seeing this thing ramp up. Very happy with it.
When I first read the headline to your video I thought I was going to hate it with a passion… And then I realized you’re a really smart guy. I have the ultra with 128 gigs of RAM and it does everything I need it to do perfectly. Yes I’m mostly an editor and graphic design and this is as fast as I need it to be. I used to dabble in cinema 4D, but since I don’t do that anymore… Not worried about its performance. I used to be a premier pro guy who is now switched over almost entirely to resolve… And resolve is a beast on the Mac Studio ultra. I have the Mac Studio display 5K so I don’t have any issues with sharpness. I didn’t know there was any issues with sharpness. So I didn’t hate your video… And if you’re a master of fusion… You should make some videos. I’m an after effects guy trying to learn fusion and although it’s quite impressive it’s also a cluster fuck.
I got the Studio @$2000 I just want to archive my VHS tapes. I had the 2017 IMAC it worked fine with the Canopus ADVC-100 that doesn't seem to be noticed anymore by the noted newer 2023 version of Premere Pro. All options in premier are grey in color not able to be accessed. Don't know if it is My Premere settings or that The ADVC-100 isn't Compatible with the MAC Studio. Also what is recommended for video import of DV cams like Canon GL-1 Or GL-2 and HD- Cams. Please help.
The monitor is the big issue for me. I run my homebuilt PC and a Mac Mini M1 through a 1080p screen at present but now I feel stuck. There are virtually no 5K monitors that will run happily with both and if I go to 4K there are the scaling issues you describe. With the other issues and delays Apple are going through at the moment I must say I'm tempted to try going from Final Cut to Resolve or even Premiere and doing everything on my very large PC desktop. The latter is very quiet as it has very large fans in the largest Fractal case that they make. Like you, I want the versatlity and choices that a PC desktop can bring. Gen 13 PC systems are looking very promising as they can take DDR4 RAM if you don't feel ready to dive into DDR5. A lot to consider.
@@dannyh1891 Not yet and I don't hold out much hope. I may even go back to editing on my Windows PC so I can have a large choice of 4K monitors. I still edit in Final Cut but I am interested to see if Apple start using a subscription model for Final Cut and Logic now they have initiated this with iPad. I already have a Creative sub with Adobe so I don't really want to duplicate. Things are getting interesting and I'm not completely sure that Apple value customers like me anymore.
I have a 9990k with 32gb of ram and 2080ti and I am doing mostly 1080p stuff and eventually 4k editing. Is this studio a significant upgrade or not worth the upgrade? My desktop pumps out lots of heat too which is terrible in the summer. Thanks a lot!
I have thoroughly enjoyed your Mac Studio episodes and I seriously considered buying a Mac Studio. However after watching as many episodes from as many TH-cam channels and trying to decipher the Apple Hype, I decided to stick with my powerful PC and swap out the RTX 3070 for a RTX 3090 graphic card. I have no regrets what so ever and don't have to have sleepless nights with buyers remorse.
I got a ryzen 3900x and nvidia 3090, and 64gb mem, and 8tb ssd storage. I had this now for 3 years while nvidia card for almost 2 years. Just now 2 years later we have a less power unit that almost competes with my setup, still cant compete, as the 3090 and pc ecosystem let me do anything and run any software. I mean the negative sides of M1 ecosystem atm is OK for a laptop, even a powerfull laptop, but for a desktop machine where you just want things to just work, its not good enough yet. And the fact rosetta is still in the loop is a big laugh.
You can change the display scaling. I have a 28" 4k gigabyte monitor and it is set up like this: Go to system preferences -> display and select scaled and select the resolution you want.
Thanks for this review. It is really valuable to have such a balanced, experienced based feedback on that device. It confirms my initial feeling that Apple is selling again a nice walled garden. It works great for media Apple & Adobe software suite and 'Apple certified' (or Apple taxed) peripherals but not so great for anything else.. Nothing really new in Apple's strategy unfortunatelly.
But there ARE several new things with M1, compared to Intel-based Macs: -terrible for gaming -Boot Camp is gone, therefore -near 100% Windows compatibility is gone -Mac Studio is locked down, non upgradeable, even cleaning the fan is impossible -many hardware peripherals for Intel Macs do NOT work on M1
Although I prefer MACOs instead of windows, I fully agree with you, I don't mind less performance, but because of the software limitations, compatibility and issues, I bought a Desktop PC, but as portability, I'll definitely go with a mac instead of a windows laptop. Thanks for you video.
I use a whole host of software on my m1 macs and nothing has issues. All run better than on my intel macs even the rosetta ones. Native apps are obviously better nothing I use is broken. A cae in point is Lightwave 3D, the grand daddy of 3D animation and, it works great even though it would be much faster native… i can use it, its not broken and better than my intel imac
Great review and very timely for me. I have a 12 core Xeon 64GB RAM PC and an old MacPro. Thinking of next step and software compatibly is the biggest issue for me
Nice comparison. A good question for you is: Do you put out video's on video rendering in Solid Works? I have taken classes in the past but I do forget some stuff and everything updates like crazy. A little CADD never hurt either. I know that is my weakest point. Not sure in this day and age how many companies are still living on CADD over the Solid Works platform?
I bought a base model M1 Studio, and I love it, I had some problems installing at the beginning, cause I got a mouse and a keyboard Logi. But now I'm so proud ion my machine.
Sounds like you have may have deep and debilitating issues if you become "seriously disturbed" by something as inconsequential as someone's choice of web browser.
Re device connectivity issues: short answer is that Macs are not PCs. Macs have never had the huge variety of devices that PCs have. Macs tend to work better with very high-end equipment designed specifically for them (e.g., the many Mac Pro add-in cards). You're right it can be frustrating, but generally a bit of research (or just buying from Apple) will solve most of those issues. For people who REALLY need a lot of expansion? Those people get Mac Pros. The folks I deal with use bonded 40 gps fiber to massive SAN clusters, with more than 20 editors connected at once. The Mac Studio isn't for people who need a ton of peripherals.
I'm hearing a loud and thunderous HELL NO! to Mac. I see this coming in for very specific usage situations. Outside of those, I'm not giving up my PC any time soon.
Not really though. I mean for example he can probably edit videos much smoother and faster, and that equals more productivity. Plus thumbnails and photoshop and all the other tasks required to run this channel. If you mean for yourself, that depends on what you actually do with your machine. I find having a Mac and a PC would be the best case scenario, and probably a Mac laptop and a windows desktop is the way to go for most people.
Granted, they said you could bring your peripherals. They didn't talk about actually connecting them. Tim's a bean counter. Always read the fine print. 😋
I’m a bit confused by the display issues. Your issue seems to be that it defaults to 1080p (which makes a lot of sense as 4K is just 1080p@2x) rather than 1440p, but then you say you use scaled 1440p anyway. Isn’t that your problem solved then, as you get the screen space you expect? You do take a performance hit but there’s no way around that if you don’t use an integer scale factor (and I’ve not actually noticed any performance difference on my machine)
@@ElevatedSystems The point was more about the physical resolution (in pixels) versus the usable resolution (in points). I have 3 monitors in my setup: a 5K iMac, a 4K 28” screen, and a 1440p 27” screen. However, all 3 have a usable resolution of 2560x1440, they just all use different numbers of pixels to render that. The reason the Mac defaults to a usable resolution of 1080p on a 4K display is that it treats 4K as “retina” and so does 1080p @ 2x. You can go for a 4K usable area, but as you’ve said, everything is small (and you don’t get the benefits of more pixels used to render text and UI elements). Running a 4K monitor at a usable resolution of 1440p is a good compromise in terms of size, and you only lose a bit of crispness and performance (though like I say, I don’t see any on my machine and it has just a Radeon 580X powering 3 displays)
A lot of thunderbolt devices are a ‘normal’ PCIe device behind a thunderbolt bridge, the device will require drivers while the bridge chip will work out of the box. In monterey apple removed support for a number of drivers, so my 10G ethernet stopped working :/ I wish OEMs were a lot more on the ball with driver support for recent macos versions.
I know at least a few Mac Users who are still holding onto their old Intel MacBooks because of Apple Silicon incompatibility issues with some software they use.
As an Apple user I can tell you that the things that make choose MacOs vs Windows has very little to do power and performance or even price. I think it's important to keep that in mind. I think Mac is about the whole experience. The design, the materials, the ecosystem, availability etc. I get such joy of using such well thought out devices, people don't talk about that, yet is very important. No offense, but just looking at and hearing a big tower vs a neat setup is something that needs to be quantified.
Just personal opinion but the magic keyboard and mouse feel like children's toys. I only accept chiclet style keyboards on a laptop because it's nessasary. And the mouse is an ergonomic nightmare designed for very tiny hands.
@@ElevatedSystems .... Thanks for the reply .. So which keyboard and Mouse do you recommend for the Mac Studio. Will I need to get a Mac keyboard & mouse to configure the system before using the one you are recommending
@@joraphpictures Periferals are entirely personal preference. I always recommend going to a physical store that has them on display and finding one your comfortable with. You shouldn't need an apple KB to set up the system but there are instanceses where it was nessasary.
i have several new apple keyboards and mouse fail on me, in my opinion they are very badly engineered and are impossible to repair. much like most of the hardware sadly. apple should step up their repairability game, it is immoral to contribute to the giant amount of electronic waste and resource depletion which causes all kinds of environmental destruction and pollution.
@@checkanr138 On my PCs and Macs, I find the Microsoft Intellimouse Pro wired device is, for me, a very capable 5 button solution; and I run the Steermouse control panel on the Mac side to custom configure the mouse.
weird, I have a 2070 on my machine and don't really have issues when I edit raw in resolve using previews. But I do have some very good very fast hard drives. I would also prolly go with one of the specific pci cards for decoding/encoding video.
Thanks for your very forthright commentary. HELP! I think I've narrowed down that I want the Mac Studio, but I'm having the hardest time finding an affordable 4k Display for around $300-$400. Any suggestions, or does this automatically set off a laugh track? haha
@@ElevatedSystems I'm hoping to get a 4k, 32" screen. I am using it for high-end Photoshop work. I do a lot of compositing (stock photos) to create one editorial image. My workflow is multiple open Adobe apps. Usually, InDesign and PS together, and sometimes Illustrator as well. I always have multiple Google Chrome tabs open and am constantly searching through endless Stock Photo pages to help with my concepts.
@@mattjohnson88 Save up an extra $100 for the monitor budget and get the 32" 4K LG Ultrafine. You can usually find them for around $500 or even less if you find a sale.
@@ElevatedSystems Ok. That’s what I needed-a push in the right direction. Thank you! In a way though, it is another example of how hard it is to accommodate Apple hard drives if you can’t afford all of their other products. Whew!
It seems you don’t understand how to access all the scaled retina resolutions in Display preferences. You just option click on the drop down menu and all the scaled resolutions are available. No OS update will help you if you’re not using the correct way of even viewing all the resolutions available. I run a retina scaled resolution of 2560x1440 outputting at 4K 60hz under Catalina on my Mac Pro daily without issue this way.
I understand. That just shows a few more resolutions between the ones already listed. You don't seem to understand that Windows and Linux have figured out how to scale just text and menus without scaling the entire application, and can do it fractionally.
@@ElevatedSystems That is how Retina Display mode on Macs has worked for years before Microsoft copied it with High DPI mode. The interface literally just scales interface elements exactly as you describe and then outputs at the full resolution of the display. Exactly the same thing. If there's bug in Retina resolutions on Apple Silicon I stand corrected.
There is technically no such thing as a "Thunderbolt" display. They just use the DisplayPort alt mode of the TB/USB protocol so do the exact same thing my USB-C to DP cables do. The problem isn't the resolution as even HDMI 2.0 can reach 4K at 60Hz. The problem is how the MacOS software scales the resolutions. Windows and most Linux operating systems fixed this years ago by rendering a 1:1 pixle resolution but dynamically scaling the UI and text.
@@JerridFoiles You don't need TB. The HDMI output on the thing can do 4k. That dosen't change the fact the Mac sucks balls when it comes to properly scaling the display.
This is an excellent review video. I was considering getting a Mac Studio for machine learning models and CAD engineering and simulation work but now I think I’ll look into powerful PCs and GPUs
Why pay for a 4K monitor and only use 1/4 of the available resolution? If you are going to look at a 1080P scaled image just buy a 1080P monitor and save a lot of $. I paid for a 4K display to use all 8.2 million pixels.
@@ElevatedSystems You can literally pick a different scale factor. The "normal" setting looks like 1080p since most normal people would find the text "too small". So if you want true 4k set the scale to the "More Space" setting, or something slightly smaller if you find that things are too small for your eyes. Connecting a 4k monitor to my M1 shows the "More Space" setting as running natively at 3840x2160. I find that the text and UI glyps are too small at the native 4k resolution, so I run it at the setting just below "More Space" (scaled to 3360x1890). You aren't forced to use a 1080p looking display.
@@dudblock4201 I said I use the 1440p scale for most things but that renders each frame at 5k and then downscales every frame to 1440p which uses quite a bit of GPU power on a system that's already GPU limited. There is no reason to do that when every other OS can render at native resolution and just dynamically scale the text and UI elements. On Windows I can get the full 4K screen space but still read the menus on any monitor. Even most linux distros with 3 or 4 person dev teams and no budget have figured this out.
@@ElevatedSystems Ok, now I understand. You may be able to get non-scaled resolutions in MacOS but they hide it from you. In the display settings, if you hold down Option and then click on "Scaled", it should bring up a drop-down list of resolutions. If you click on "Show all resolutions", it will allow you to pick the "low res" version , which if I recall, will turn off the font and glyph scaling that eats your GPU. Apple does limit those options for sure, but they ultimately "look nicer" and is consistent across all apps. Individually setting the font and glpyh sizes tend to be inconsistent across most apps in the OS's that support it (some apps get the proper sizes while others have tiny buttons and fonts).
Do you think the eventual apple silicon mac pro will result in some upset maxed out mac studio buyers? I think they've left a lot of performance on the table when that thing barely spins up the fans and the mac pro variant will be let loose
@@ElevatedSystems Agreed. I priced-out a Mac Pro with 24-core Xeon processor. It came to $17,000 USD. A Windows 10 Ryzen PC with similar performance costs just $3000.
@@memcrew1 I’m saying it’s a 4K image with objects size like FHD. Basically 4K quality on a magnified user interface. That’s why, for example, even if you set a 1080p GUI, the GPU actually outputs at 4K and if you play a 4K video it shows in proper 4K. Believe me, it just works and works well.
I just can't get behind the M1 Apple's. They basically built the things to fill landfills in four years. As soon as the newest version come out, people will toss this guy out, part hackers will resell it, then it will die after two years of uses(ruffle a four year process, some times longer.) No room for upgrades, no room to change out memory, or wifi cards, nothing.
Wait are you comparing the 24 Core GPU to to 3050? The apple chart is comparing the 32 Core version. And the M1 Ultra has up to a 64 core GPU. So the GPU is only as underpowered as you want it to be.
Also your screens are outputting at 4K, the UI elements are just sized as if they are 1080p so each element has more detail. You can just change the scaling if you want the Ui to be sized at 4K, everything will just be small.
The Apple Chart is comparing the 32 Core to a 3060 TI (4864 Cuda Cores). I used a RTX 3050 (2560 Cuda Cores) in my comparison to the 24 Core M1 Max GPU. Just FYI the RTX 3050 also has more raw GPU power than the 32 Core M1 Max GPU.
I think your criticisms are completely valid, and gives potential buyers a good "head up". My experience with my base model M1 Studio has been better than yours, but it's pure luck. Moving up from an M1 Mac mini I had peripherals that worked, but only because they were less sophisticated than your setup (cheapo wireless mouse, 1080p monitor, etc.).
Very good review. No dumb jokes. No junk introduction. Just straight to business, like a pro.
I like your videos, FYI multi-function Thunderbolt hubs/docks *do* need drivers. Whether connecting by USB or Thunderbolt, external devices with controller chips like Ethernet adapters, audio interfaces, USB controllers, etc. need to have OS support (drivers) for the particular controller chips used by the device, in order to function on the OS. This is true on any OS, particularly on Linux and Mac there is not guaranteed support for all possible controller chips, so known-supported controllers are sought after, like “look for this particular Realtek chip.” Many PC-brand Thunderbolt docks by HP, Lenovo, and Dell for example do not function perfectly on Macs as they were not designed with controller chips that already have MacOS driver support, and they do not provide Mac drivers either. Brands like Belkin, OWC, Sonnet, StarTech etc tend to always design products with full Mac compatibility. If you’re a Mac user now, checking for Mac compatibility before buying is just part of life, welcome to the club! :)
I also think it’s pretty widely understood that Blender Cycles renderer only has a primitive level of Apple Silicon compatibility and still has a long way to go before it could be considered truly “optimized” for the strengths & weaknesses of Apple Silicon GPU design, tile based rendering etc.
And sorry you weren’t aware of how Apple does “Retina” scaling. It’s Apple’s version of HiDPI that’s very different from Windows, been this way since the first Retina Macbook Pro in 2012. By default it renders a HiDPI desktop that’s the equivalent size to 1/2 the native pixel resolution of your monitor, so the text and graphics look super sharp and are a readable size. That’s why some people are excited by 27” 5K monitors like the Studio Display, at 2x Retina default resolution it’s equivalent to a 1440p sized workspace. For everyone else without a rare 5K monitor there’s scaled Retina resolutions, which do the job but aren’t quite as sharp as a perfect 2x scale. Apple themselves were shipping computers set to non-2x scaled resolutions by default, due to lack of perfectly sized 2x panels. Check out the “RDM” Retina Display Menu app which lets you choose from a wider variety of Retina/non-Retina resolutions.
Thanks for sharing your ongoing experiences, glad it’s mostly working out for you!
Correct. It is true for any OS. Any device that has specific/private functions, and not generic usb audio/lan etc, it will require drivers to communicate with the kernel. Current Thunderbolt is a glorified usb port with a few extras (integration of pcie). Any device that connects to a port and has specific private function will always need to identify those functions through driver software for kernel hence hardware to understand what/how it does those functions. without it, there is no communication, just unknown device. on windows sometimes some devices can work partially work like gfx card but only in limited functionality. this is not windows/apple/linux problem, it is oem issue if they develop software for particular os and not another, not much u can do obviously.
You’re answering so many question I’ve had about the Mac Studio, thanks! 1000€ for 3700X/RTX3070/16G or 2300€ for Mac Studio base model - not so hard to choose, when 3D rendering is included.
While your build is probably at least 1200€ (at least in Germany, brand new parts. Unless you already own some components, in which the comparison lacks slightly, but is still fair, as you can use existing components for a new PC but not for a mac studio), you are still right. If you want to do 3D rendering, particularly making use of Optix, go for a PC. It is miles ahead. A mac studio is a beautiful piece of engineering and has many use cases, but you get more bang for your buck with a PC in that situation, hands down.
@@XTJ7 Mac Studio is poorly engineered: ram and ssd impossible to repair or upgrade, cooling fan will eventually be choked with dust and no easy way to clean it, Windows compatibility is poor, and Mac Studio is terrible for gaming.
Mac Studio is a dead-end machine, and very user-unfriendly.
@@DerekDavis213 I wouldn't say it is poorly engineered, I'd say it was malicious and with the intention of making user repairability and upgradeability as hard as possible. In which they succeeded. F*ck them for that. However, getting THIS much performance out of such a small device that barely consumes energy and makes very little noise, that is without a doubt great engineering.
You will be able to clean the fan (although you need to remove a glued rubber foot at the bottom to do so, thanks Apple), hence I'm not really worried about it failing. Also the cooling system has been designed with a lot of capacity to spare, so even if it is partially clogged it will be fine for quite some time.
Windows compatibility is worse than with Intel, but that is an ARM issue, not a Mac Studio issue. Personally I don't miss it, never really used bootcamp on my machines anyways, but for others this may be more of a problem. Affects the entire current and future mac lineup though.
Lastly gaming: yes and no. It performs great for a mac. But that is exactly it: "for a mac". The raw performance is quite good, but lack of support from games is the biggest issue here. That has never been great though, even with Intel machines. Whoever buys a mac for gaming really has no clue :) There is one aspect to it though: iOS gaming becomes bigger every year. And all these games run on a mac too. So depending on what type of games you play, it may actually be not bad at all.
In conclusion: I don't think it is a dead-end-machine. You make some good points, so I liked your comment, but the machine itself is very powerful and for a lot of use-cases fantastic.
@@XTJ7 'THIS much performance out of such a small device that barely consumes energy'
Why does small even matter? Look at cylinder Mac Pro or cheese grater Mac Pro. You just put them on the floor, under your desk or next to your desk. Gone and forgotten.
And barely consumes energy? Again, desktop users pretty much care ZERO if the computer uses more wattage. What is 5 or 10 dollars more *per* *month* on the electric bill? Software, Usability, Speed, Flexibility, Upgradeability are what matters.
'You will be able to clean the fan'
I have seen people attempt to open up the Mac Studio, that's *major* *surgery* that most people will not want to do, or are not capable of doing.
'Windows compatibility is.....an ARM issue, not a Mac Studio issue'
And Apple *CHOSE* to put an ARM processor in the Mac Studio, thus throwing
Boot Camp and near 100% Windows compatibility in the garbage can. Apple could have used the latest 12th-gen Intel or Ryzen processors, but instead opted for more control and profits, *at* *the* *users* *expense* .
About gaming. Raw performance is pretty much *WORTHLESS* if the most popular games don't run on Mac Studio, or run poorly on Mac Studio. And even the most enthusiastic Mac M1 fan will admit that compared to Windows, gaming on Mac is *terrible* .
Regarding Mac Studio as a dead-end machine: it *MOST* *CERTAINLY* *IS* .
A year from now, I can buy the next monster video card from NVidia or AMD, and install them in my Windows workstation. Also the next ultra-fast SSD drive, that will put today's drives to shame. Super-easy upgrades on a Windows machine.
Mac Studio in 3 years will be an out-dated doorstop. And of course, that is *EXACTLY* what Apple Corporation wants.
@@DerekDavis213 Mac is certainly not for you. Other milage may vary. For some, the Mac Studio is a compact and powerful workhorse. I have a powerful PC for image editing and a MacBook Pro M1 14 Inch. I will replace my PC in the next 2-3 years with a Mac Studio because this machine is perfect for what I do.
software compatibility is a huge thing. This hardware is really nice but no use if your software cant run on it. Thank you for the review.
I had similar Problems with Monitors. It was solved with different cables. Instead of normal USB-C now we are using TB4 Cables for the Monitors and now the Displays have the right resolution.
If you set the screen to 1080p resolution on a 4k display, the Mac will only scale the interface to match the target size. The rest of the image, will still be shown at 4k, just as the display is intended to show. 🤩 I believe...
Yes, that's true. 1080p resolution on a 4k display is the native scaling Apple designs macOS to do, just like 1440p resolution on their 5k Retina display.
great positive and negative criticisms. I think you nailed it. ! Me personally am getting the M1 pro 16 inch 10core 32gb mem version. still waiting for it almost 2 months into ordering it.
This is the best video review I have seen for the practicality of actually using a piece of computing gear vs showing ugly graphs of benchmarks which mean nothing usually. Thanks! Subscribed!
Fantastic review. Very rarely do you see such an informative review. Thanks man, this was super useful!
Loved seeing the quick clip showing you using the speed editor with Davinci Resolve. That is how I got my Studio license. Resolve sings with using control panels.
BTW - I saw a good presentation. I was using ASUS 1440 Pro Art displays and they work just fine - as you say because of the Mac scaling - 4K does not work correctly - that is a long technical discussion people have to be aware of.
One last thing - the Thunderbolt hubs from OWC and Bridge worked just fine - with my Macbook Air, Mac Mini, and now Mac Studio Max. Also, I have weaned myself off Adobe Products and moved on the Affinity which has done a great job and also works on my iPad Pro to make life even better.
I ended up getting the Macbook Pro 16 w/M1 Max/32GB RAM/1TB SSD instead of the Mac Studio. I was debating between them since there was such a big price difference. With the student discount, it was $3199 for the MBP 16 and $1799 for the studio. For that extra $1400, I got 1TB storage instead of 512 and the full 32 core GPU instead of 24 And then the main difference of it being a laptop and therefore including its own keyboard/trackpad/screen and being portable. I rarely leave the house anymore but I do find the ability to use it on the couch when working on something that requires more power to be very nice. All-in-all, if you have the extra cash, I do recommend the MBP 16 over the studio for the ability to take the power on the go.
This is one of the best videos I've seen. Measured and clinical and you've touched on points that have made me scratch my head as well.. ( Apple's misleading GPU comparisions, for example ). Also, thenks for your comments about PPW - there's been too much of a fixation on this. As a desktop user, I really couldn't give a rat's ass how much power I use - just give me the horsepower I need.
u should care, at least a little bit...as the more energy you use, the higher and harder your system has to work, which in return = wear and tear..... for fast results, im on board..but I also want my $3000 + system to last more than just 3-4 years at optimal performance.
I'm really enjoying your channel. Extensive REAL LIFE tests. I can care less about the Export times and Benchmarks only tell part of the story. I care more about the scrubbing , scaling images, keyframming, coloring , speedramping, playback etc. I think I've cancelled and ordered the Mac Studio at least 4 times. no joke. My work flow is Adobe Premiere, After Effects and Photoshop for Professional and Personal Projects. I have a iMac 2019 i9 3.6Ghz 8-Core 64GB RAM 1TB (working off thunderbolt 8TB RAID 0 SSD 2.5Gb/ Drive Enclosure )and bring it to its knees with my workflow. The RAM constantly swaps and compresses and the machine freezes/crashes at least 5 times per project. At the moment, I've narrowed it down to M1 Ultra 48GPU 128GB 4TB. Do you think this is overkill? I appreciate any feedback 🙏🏼
It probably is overkill, TBH it's probably overkill for 99% of people but if the cost isn't a huge concern why not. Although I would definitely look into the problems the M1 Ultra is having especially with GPU performance. In many tasks the M1 Ultra is barely outperforming the M1 Max if at all.
Agree with all of your points and I'd like to add to your point about the CPU being a beast with regards to programmers / developers. I've got a base-model Studio and use it primarily for mobile game development in Unity.
This thing is awesome for making iOS and Android builds of our project, and has been a huge time-saver when we're trying to test performance optimisations on hardware and need to make multiple builds in succession to validate our optimisations.
The jump probably feels even bigger for me because I've upgraded from a 6-core Intel mini and a Windows notebook with an 8th gen i7 - probably wouldn't have been if I had a newer desktop.
Biggest gripes are that UE5 crashes too often to be used reliably (not yet native for Apple Silicon - probably will be a long time before that happens), that there's no hardware-accelerated ray-tracing (I knew this before getting it) and that I can't do console development on it since all the tools for all platforms are Windows only, so I still have to swap over to Windows PC for that.
Having said that, it made sense to get the Mac Studio because iOS is one of our major target platforms.
I think GPU performance per Watt is relevant a) if you're using a notebook and want the battery to last, b) the computer runs cooler so the fans aren't going crazy when you need/want a quiet environment or c) there's too much load on your circuit. Otherwise yes, the performance/watt doesn't really matter if absolute performance is what you need.
It will also be relevant if NVIDIA keeps upping the juice required for their highest end GPUs. It's rumored the 4090TI will suck back 800 watts on its own. I mean if they keep using "moar power" as the solution to getting more performance instead of innovating, people in the US are going to have to put their PC on a dedicated wire like you do for your dryer.
here in italy actually from 1^ october 2022 the energy power cost more or less 0,60 euro/h (taxes and everything comprensive), crazy i know, and almost every country in europe is suffering from same crazy elettricity rate., i use a xeon hp z440 with 2 nvidia quadro (m4000 for video and rtx a4000 for render) and even if it has low consume and very low noise when on load works its about 300w and on summer i need air condizionat. or it start noise alot more or even throttle...so professionist and hobbyst that pay eletricity bill need to consider one more " d)" point to your post.
So the solution for the display issue affecting GPU will be to get a 1080p monitor? Or 1440p?
Man I’m waiting for my first max m1 Mac Studio 32 core gpu. It’s brand new and I found it in a great price 1800 euro. I was about to buy a maxed out m2 pro mini but I found this. Will serve me for years to come with my music and video work!!! Can’t wait cheers!!!!
I think that he just saved me a TON of MONEY!!!
The Thunderbolt, Resolution, and GPU just changed my WHOLE "Willingness Factor"!!!
Others here have pointed out the mistake re the monitors. The mac is recognizing them as 4K and outputting full resolution. By default macOS uses a scaled resolution -- a "virtual" 1080p -- so that the UX elements aren't too tiny. By holding option key down you can select any supported resolution, including native 4K (which would be too tiny for most people). It doesn't "downscale" anything. Windows also has a somewhat scalable UX. The number of pixels is always the same so everything looks very crisp. In order to get that mac to output *actual* 1080p on that monitor you have to force it (and the preferences tab informs you it'll look bad). Anyhow good video but you don't understand how mac "retina" display tech works.
I’ve just ordered a Mac studio and was concerned about people taking about the res. So from what you’re saying it’s fine and I can just change it and it’ll look crisp?
Regarding the POWER consumption and cost. Don't forget that your workstation made you buy an AIRCON for your room. Add the power of the aircon when making the computation :)
Summer is only about a month and a half here in Colorado and in all honesty my solar roof returns more net power to the grid annually so my power bill is a net gain.
Great video! I'm thinking of getting an Max Studio, would you recommend a 1440 Monitor instead of 4K?
The best tech review channel on TH-cam.
Great video! Thanks man. 💜
I must say this Mac really looks awesome in your studio. So that could be another plus 🤓
It doesn’t think they’re 1080P, it does a super resolution type thing, but the display tends to still use all the pixels. You are right though, if there’s one thing that bugs the hell out of Mac Users it is that you can not adjust the font size for the menu bar at the top, without modifying it for the whole system and ir sucks.
As for a dock, Satechi and Caldigit are the best options for Mac and pretty much guarantee no issues.
Of course your claims about thunderbolt are wrong too, it’s and Intel technology and even on my AMD systems that had compatibility for it, devices didn’t always work right. Crud, my Asus ProArt display would cause my AMD laptop to reboot when connected via the thunderbolt cable.
As for the software you want, how about Procreate? Logic Pro? Garage Band? The truth is, Apple has some advantages, especially if you have an iPad as well and as they expand more of the iPad OS apps to work on the M1 Macs, you will find more and more software that will not run on the PC.
This was a great watch, it’s good to hear from someone who uses a similar wide array of software and has experience of all use cases! Real world performance over benchmarks FTW!
You did well. Informative, thank you. Thanks for not having stupid purple lights and crazy edits.
what's your thought after one year? thanks
I will add two more shortcomings. First one is that I have the same Base Mac Studio configuration and when it goes to sleep I cannot get it to connect to my 55" tv unless I reboot it. Second shortcoming is that when I use the mouse to wake up the computer screen if I put the cursor anywhere toward the lower left corner I have to use my fingerprint to log back into the system. Love your videos.
Uh, the second issue could be you have set up a hot corner to turn your screen off or sleep your computer. Look up Settings or System Preferences and look up Hot Corners MacOS online to see if they are on.
The first problem I would solve by turning off sleep. You can still have it turn off your display but it shouldn’t disconnect it, and the computer itself should not go to sleep. That seems to be how people are working around it for now.
@@ghost-user559 Thank you for that info. System Preferences, Mission Control and then Hot Corners.
@@randallbrander8157 Of course. I like to set them up for myself in a way that speeds up the task at hand, but every once and a while I forget they are there and I do something like log myself out by swiping to the wrong corner while browsing or something.
It’s annoying if it’s an accident, but really helpful if you set them up to speed up different tasks.
It’s really nice to have it immediately turn on your screen saver or turn off your display to keep your screen protected. But if you do it accidentally it can get frustrating real fast.
The 'spinning wheel' is typically referred to as 'The Beachball of Death'.
Your editing is crisp and clean. Great video!
In the process of finding a platform for Davinci Resolve Studio, DAW and more - and Mac Studio is on the list. Appears to me that if I go Mac I will more or less have to by into the entire eco-system and by that ditch a lot of my existing equipment. Being a Linux user for 20+ years both private and professionally I will go for the 'traditional' PC setup. Luckily Davinci Resolve Studio runs on Linux. Thank you for the input. Really appreciated.
Great vid man, exactly what I was looking for today and I'm extremely pleased :D today's internet session was productive thanks to u
Glad you enjoyed!
Only thing I would disagree with is software issues. You make it sound like a lot of things don’t work. I use m1’s for animation, video and game development and nothing I have tried is broken. Some use rosetta but work fine, most better than on my intel macs. Unless you know an app you use doesn’t work don’t be put off by rosetta. There are only a handful of these on my machine now as the others have been updated to work on m1. Some like Lightwave 3D will never get an update but even a massively complex app like that still works fine… the point is it’s not broken, I can still use it
I never use apple-brand monitors or peripherals with Macs and have never had an issue in that department. I am a pro 3D artist who primarily uses PC's, but I've used a ton of macs and have several at home right now
I encounter the logi keyboard problem is because a incapable dongle. It works prefect with capable equipment or isn’t directly to the built port.
The thunderbolt dongle may be it does work for me, it is just because I doesn’t plug in with input power in usb link on the small Hub that the input need. But then is just too many cables.
I love my MaxBook Pro 16 but what's killing me is the lack of HDMI 2.1 even if you use Thunderbolt 4. From what I understood, Apple is limiting TB4 -> HDMI 2.1 because of some licensing issue. The fact that this problem even persists with the Mac Studio is absolutely unacceptable and Apple NEEDS to fix it.
Hdmi is great to have but TB4 works so well I am not sure why you would need hdmi 2.1? … unless your monitor doesn’t support it
@@rayamc607 Ever heard of 4k 120Hz? Oled/Mini-LED TV's which are much better than any available monitor right now don't have DisplayPort, only HDMI 2.1. Since the MacBooks can't do that regardless of adapter you're stuck with 4k 60Hz, which is unacceptable.
Just use DisplayPort
@@Smi77y1 point me to a 42-43” Oled/miniLED TV/Monitor with DP on it
@Brandon W they are all just 27inch or 32inch and waaay more expensive, like 2x the price
After a 7 week wait, my Studio Max with 1TB upgrade finally showed up last week. I’m still setting it up (as time allows, manually from my Trashcan Pro NOT using Migration Asst.) waiting for some adapters to connect my external HD’s to Thunderbolt. The limited Indesign/Photoshop I’ve done on it so far has been buttery smooth. Looking forward to seeing this thing ramp up. Very happy with it.
Great review. Thanks. Can I ask what chair you are sitting in?
When I first read the headline to your video I thought I was going to hate it with a passion… And then I realized you’re a really smart guy. I have the ultra with 128 gigs of RAM and it does everything I need it to do perfectly. Yes I’m mostly an editor and graphic design and this is as fast as I need it to be. I used to dabble in cinema 4D, but since I don’t do that anymore… Not worried about its performance. I used to be a premier pro guy who is now switched over almost entirely to resolve… And resolve is a beast on the Mac Studio ultra. I have the Mac Studio display 5K so I don’t have any issues with sharpness. I didn’t know there was any issues with sharpness. So I didn’t hate your video… And if you’re a master of fusion… You should make some videos. I’m an after effects guy trying to learn fusion and although it’s quite impressive it’s also a cluster fuck.
I got the Studio @$2000 I just want to archive my VHS tapes. I had the 2017 IMAC it worked fine with the Canopus ADVC-100 that doesn't seem to be noticed anymore by the noted newer 2023 version of Premere Pro. All options in premier are grey in color not able to be accessed. Don't know if it is My Premere settings or that The ADVC-100 isn't Compatible with the MAC Studio. Also what is recommended for video import of DV cams like Canon GL-1 Or GL-2 and HD- Cams.
Please help.
The monitor is the big issue for me. I run my homebuilt PC and a Mac Mini M1 through a 1080p screen at present but now I feel stuck. There are virtually no 5K monitors that will run happily with both and if I go to 4K there are the scaling issues you describe. With the other issues and delays Apple are going through at the moment I must say I'm tempted to try going from Final Cut to Resolve or even Premiere and doing everything on my very large PC desktop. The latter is very quiet as it has very large fans in the largest Fractal case that they make. Like you, I want the versatlity and choices that a PC desktop can bring. Gen 13 PC systems are looking very promising as they can take DDR4 RAM if you don't feel ready to dive into DDR5. A lot to consider.
Did you find a monitor that was compatible?
@@dannyh1891 Not yet and I don't hold out much hope. I may even go back to editing on my Windows PC so I can have a large choice of 4K monitors. I still edit in Final Cut but I am interested to see if Apple start using a subscription model for Final Cut and Logic now they have initiated this with iPad. I already have a Creative sub with Adobe so I don't really want to duplicate. Things are getting interesting and I'm not completely sure that Apple value customers like me anymore.
I have a 9990k with 32gb of ram and 2080ti and I am doing mostly 1080p stuff and eventually 4k editing. Is this studio a significant upgrade or not worth the upgrade? My desktop pumps out lots of heat too which is terrible in the summer. Thanks a lot!
I don't get the problem with the displays? I just sue mine scaled to 1440p and it looks great. No perfomance impact either.
Thank you. This was great information. Appreciate you sharing.
Hey, love the show. What Samsung monitor are you using? thanks
I have thoroughly enjoyed your Mac Studio episodes and I seriously considered buying a Mac Studio. However after watching as many episodes from as many TH-cam channels and trying to decipher the Apple Hype, I decided to stick with my powerful PC and swap out the RTX 3070 for a RTX 3090 graphic card.
I have no regrets what so ever and don't have to have sleepless nights with buyers remorse.
I got a ryzen 3900x and nvidia 3090, and 64gb mem, and 8tb ssd storage. I had this now for 3 years while nvidia card for almost 2 years. Just now 2 years later we have a less power unit that almost competes with my setup, still cant compete, as the 3090 and pc ecosystem let me do anything and run any software. I mean the negative sides of M1 ecosystem atm is OK for a laptop, even a powerfull laptop, but for a desktop machine where you just want things to just work, its not good enough yet. And the fact rosetta is still in the loop is a big laugh.
Very nice video and thank you for the little note about the power consumption while rendering.
You can change the display scaling. I have a 28" 4k gigabyte monitor and it is set up like this:
Go to system preferences -> display and select scaled and select the resolution you want.
And you end up with a UI that is half the resolution you selected.
Beautiful review, great channel! Subscribed!
I’m ordering it now thanks
Thanks for this review. It is really valuable to have such a balanced, experienced based feedback on that device. It confirms my initial feeling that Apple is selling again a nice walled garden. It works great for media Apple & Adobe software suite and 'Apple certified' (or Apple taxed) peripherals but not so great for anything else.. Nothing really new in Apple's strategy unfortunatelly.
But there ARE several new things with M1, compared to Intel-based Macs:
-terrible for gaming
-Boot Camp is gone, therefore
-near 100% Windows compatibility is gone
-Mac Studio is locked down, non upgradeable, even cleaning the fan is impossible
-many hardware peripherals for Intel Macs do NOT work on M1
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Great review! Appreciate all the technical details.
Although I prefer MACOs instead of windows, I fully agree with you, I don't mind less performance, but because of the software limitations, compatibility and issues, I bought a Desktop PC, but as portability, I'll definitely go with a mac instead of a windows laptop. Thanks for you video.
I use a whole host of software on my m1 macs and nothing has issues. All run better than on my intel macs even the rosetta ones. Native apps are obviously better nothing I use is broken. A cae in point is Lightwave 3D, the grand daddy of 3D animation and, it works great even though it would be much faster native… i can use it, its not broken and better than my intel imac
Thanks for the great video. As a game dev, I'm going to wait until software compatibility catches up.
Power consumption is a big consideration for home users given the energy price situation right now!
Any update after a year on how TB4 is now on mac M1 Max ?
what a tease.... just going to have to wait and watch for your final conclusion! 🙂
Can you make an Video how you worked especialy with Davinci Resolve cutting or how is Resolve on the mac (Right mouse key) ect ?
Great and informative video! Thanks!
I really love the form factor
Great review and very timely for me. I have a 12 core Xeon 64GB RAM PC and an old MacPro. Thinking of next step and software compatibly is the biggest issue for me
Nice comparison. A good question for you is: Do you put out video's on video rendering in Solid Works? I have taken classes in the past but I do forget some stuff and everything updates like crazy. A little CADD never hurt either. I know that is my weakest point. Not sure in this day and age how many companies are still living on CADD over the Solid Works platform?
I have a Quad HD display that works great with the Mac Studio. Don't really need anything more than that.
Love your videos man!
I bought a base model M1 Studio, and I love it, I had some problems installing at the beginning, cause I got a mouse and a keyboard Logi. But now I'm so proud ion my machine.
I am seriously disturbed by the fact you use Opera
Sounds like you have may have deep and debilitating issues if you become "seriously disturbed" by something as inconsequential as someone's choice of web browser.
@@ElevatedSystems I am 99% joking
@@mvevitsis I was 98% joking, maybe 97.5% 😉
Opera may not be popular, but I like it! Anyone wanna tell me why it’s no good?
I took opera lessons (& sang in one).
Re device connectivity issues: short answer is that Macs are not PCs. Macs have never had the huge variety of devices that PCs have. Macs tend to work better with very high-end equipment designed specifically for them (e.g., the many Mac Pro add-in cards). You're right it can be frustrating, but generally a bit of research (or just buying from Apple) will solve most of those issues. For people who REALLY need a lot of expansion? Those people get Mac Pros. The folks I deal with use bonded 40 gps fiber to massive SAN clusters, with more than 20 editors connected at once. The Mac Studio isn't for people who need a ton of peripherals.
I'm hearing a loud and thunderous HELL NO! to Mac. I see this coming in for very specific usage situations. Outside of those, I'm not giving up my PC any time soon.
Not really though. I mean for example he can probably edit videos much smoother and faster, and that equals more productivity. Plus thumbnails and photoshop and all the other tasks required to run this channel.
If you mean for yourself, that depends on what you actually do with your machine. I find having a Mac and a PC would be the best case scenario, and probably a Mac laptop and a windows desktop is the way to go for most people.
this is a great real world review. thanks!
Granted, they said you could bring your peripherals. They didn't talk about actually connecting them. Tim's a bean counter. Always read the fine print. 😋
What option is good for 3d modeling/animation? Thanks. (Mac PC or Linux)
Great video. Agree with all but not sure what your monitor issue is. Works fine for me with LG 27 4k and lG 38 ultra wide
What is the "UI Looks Like" resolution of the "Default for Display" setting on the LG 4K?
I’m a bit confused by the display issues. Your issue seems to be that it defaults to 1080p (which makes a lot of sense as 4K is just 1080p@2x) rather than 1440p, but then you say you use scaled 1440p anyway. Isn’t that your problem solved then, as you get the screen space you expect? You do take a performance hit but there’s no way around that if you don’t use an integer scale factor (and I’ve not actually noticed any performance difference on my machine)
@@pilkycrc They are 4k displays, not 1440p.
@@ElevatedSystems The point was more about the physical resolution (in pixels) versus the usable resolution (in points). I have 3 monitors in my setup: a 5K iMac, a 4K 28” screen, and a 1440p 27” screen. However, all 3 have a usable resolution of 2560x1440, they just all use different numbers of pixels to render that. The reason the Mac defaults to a usable resolution of 1080p on a 4K display is that it treats 4K as “retina” and so does 1080p @ 2x. You can go for a 4K usable area, but as you’ve said, everything is small (and you don’t get the benefits of more pixels used to render text and UI elements). Running a 4K monitor at a usable resolution of 1440p is a good compromise in terms of size, and you only lose a bit of crispness and performance (though like I say, I don’t see any on my machine and it has just a Radeon 580X powering 3 displays)
A lot of thunderbolt devices are a ‘normal’ PCIe device behind a thunderbolt bridge, the device will require drivers while the bridge chip will work out of the box. In monterey apple removed support for a number of drivers, so my 10G ethernet stopped working :/ I wish OEMs were a lot more on the ball with driver support for recent macos versions.
or apple stop being screwy and keep breaking backwards compatibility
Exactly, a pc guy perspective. For a mac user none of the cons matters at all.
I know at least a few Mac Users who are still holding onto their old Intel MacBooks because of Apple Silicon incompatibility issues with some software they use.
Great video, and god, you should have an awesome Kristopher Walken impression lol))
As an Apple user I can tell you that the things that make choose MacOs vs Windows has very little to do power and performance or even price. I think it's important to keep that in mind. I think Mac is about the whole experience. The design, the materials, the ecosystem, availability etc. I get such joy of using such well thought out devices, people don't talk about that, yet is very important. No offense, but just looking at and hearing a big tower vs a neat setup is something that needs to be quantified.
MoreFine's S500+ Ryzen 5900HX, is this pc any good????
Any good reason why you guys avoid Apple keyboard and Mouse
Just personal opinion but the magic keyboard and mouse feel like children's toys. I only accept chiclet style keyboards on a laptop because it's nessasary. And the mouse is an ergonomic nightmare designed for very tiny hands.
@@ElevatedSystems ....
Thanks for the reply ..
So which keyboard and Mouse do you recommend for the Mac Studio.
Will I need to get a Mac keyboard & mouse to configure the system before using the one you are recommending
@@joraphpictures Periferals are entirely personal preference. I always recommend going to a physical store that has them on display and finding one your comfortable with. You shouldn't need an apple KB to set up the system but there are instanceses where it was nessasary.
i have several new apple keyboards and mouse fail on me, in my opinion they are very badly engineered and are impossible to repair. much like most of the hardware sadly. apple should step up their repairability game, it is immoral to contribute to the giant amount of electronic waste and resource depletion which causes all kinds of environmental destruction and pollution.
@@checkanr138 On my PCs and Macs, I find the Microsoft Intellimouse Pro wired device is, for me, a very capable 5 button solution; and I run the Steermouse control panel on the Mac side to custom configure the mouse.
In winter time my PC is heating up my home, with Mac Studio I would freeze!
who caught the glitch at 12:17?
weird, I have a 2070 on my machine and don't really have issues when I edit raw in resolve using previews. But I do have some very good very fast hard drives. I would also prolly go with one of the specific pci cards for decoding/encoding video.
Thanks for your very forthright commentary. HELP! I think I've narrowed down that I want the Mac Studio, but I'm having the hardest time finding an affordable 4k Display for around $300-$400. Any suggestions, or does this automatically set off a laugh track? haha
What size display and what are you using it for?
@@ElevatedSystems I'm hoping to get a 4k, 32" screen. I am using it for high-end Photoshop work. I do a lot of compositing (stock photos) to create one editorial image. My workflow is multiple open Adobe apps. Usually, InDesign and PS together, and sometimes Illustrator as well. I always have multiple Google Chrome tabs open and am constantly searching through endless Stock Photo pages to help with my concepts.
@@mattjohnson88 Save up an extra $100 for the monitor budget and get the 32" 4K LG Ultrafine. You can usually find them for around $500 or even less if you find a sale.
@@ElevatedSystems Ok. That’s what I needed-a push in the right direction. Thank you! In a way though, it is another
example of how hard it is to accommodate Apple hard drives if you can’t afford all of their other products. Whew!
What about Ecamm live ?
It seems you don’t understand how to access all the scaled retina resolutions in Display preferences. You just option click on the drop down menu and all the scaled resolutions are available. No OS update will help you if you’re not using the correct way of even viewing all the resolutions available. I run a retina scaled resolution of 2560x1440 outputting at 4K 60hz under Catalina on my Mac Pro daily without issue this way.
I understand. That just shows a few more resolutions between the ones already listed. You don't seem to understand that Windows and Linux have figured out how to scale just text and menus without scaling the entire application, and can do it fractionally.
@Johnshigham no you don't understand lol
@@ElevatedSystems That is how Retina Display mode on Macs has worked for years before Microsoft copied it with High DPI mode. The interface literally just scales interface elements exactly as you describe and then outputs at the full resolution of the display. Exactly the same thing. If there's bug in Retina resolutions on Apple Silicon I stand corrected.
Are your displays Thunderbolt compatible? From what I understand you can get 4K that way, if you're using the HDMI, you're limited to 1080...
There is technically no such thing as a "Thunderbolt" display. They just use the DisplayPort alt mode of the TB/USB protocol so do the exact same thing my USB-C to DP cables do. The problem isn't the resolution as even HDMI 2.0 can reach 4K at 60Hz. The problem is how the MacOS software scales the resolutions. Windows and most Linux operating systems fixed this years ago by rendering a 1:1 pixle resolution but dynamically scaling the UI and text.
@@ElevatedSystems Hey that's great, but if you want 4K use Thunderbolt.
@@JerridFoiles You don't need TB. The HDMI output on the thing can do 4k. That dosen't change the fact the Mac sucks balls when it comes to properly scaling the display.
Hope this helps, guys. Good luck in the future.
Not true. Run a 4K display from HDMI on a Mac Pro for years.
great video!
speaking the Truth here
YESSS !!! 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥Mac Studio and #LUMIY Lightblade PEOPLE are BLOOOOWWN AWAY 🔥🔥🔥🔥
The biggest con for me is macos. Just can't get used to it. Love the hardware and sleek design but that's kinda moot if I hate using the thing. :P
Interesting experience.
This is an excellent review video. I was considering getting a Mac Studio for machine learning models and CAD engineering and simulation work but now I think I’ll look into powerful PCs and GPUs
Good job...jt
I don't understand the monitor issue. Why not rely on the scaled setting?
Why pay for a 4K monitor and only use 1/4 of the available resolution? If you are going to look at a 1080P scaled image just buy a 1080P monitor and save a lot of $. I paid for a 4K display to use all 8.2 million pixels.
@@ElevatedSystems You can literally pick a different scale factor. The "normal" setting looks like 1080p since most normal people would find the text "too small". So if you want true 4k set the scale to the "More Space" setting, or something slightly smaller if you find that things are too small for your eyes.
Connecting a 4k monitor to my M1 shows the "More Space" setting as running natively at 3840x2160. I find that the text and UI glyps are too small at the native 4k resolution, so I run it at the setting just below "More Space" (scaled to 3360x1890). You aren't forced to use a 1080p looking display.
@@dudblock4201 I said I use the 1440p scale for most things but that renders each frame at 5k and then downscales every frame to 1440p which uses quite a bit of GPU power on a system that's already GPU limited. There is no reason to do that when every other OS can render at native resolution and just dynamically scale the text and UI elements. On Windows I can get the full 4K screen space but still read the menus on any monitor. Even most linux distros with 3 or 4 person dev teams and no budget have figured this out.
@@ElevatedSystems Ok, now I understand. You may be able to get non-scaled resolutions in MacOS but they hide it from you. In the display settings, if you hold down Option and then click on "Scaled", it should bring up a drop-down list of resolutions. If you click on "Show all resolutions", it will allow you to pick the "low res" version , which if I recall, will turn off the font and glyph scaling that eats your GPU.
Apple does limit those options for sure, but they ultimately "look nicer" and is consistent across all apps. Individually setting the font and glpyh sizes tend to be inconsistent across most apps in the OS's that support it (some apps get the proper sizes while others have tiny buttons and fonts).
@@ElevatedSystems would buying a 5k monitor fix this?
My experience is that scaling on a Mac is infinitely better than a PC. Your issues sound very odd with that.
Do you think the eventual apple silicon mac pro will result in some upset maxed out mac studio buyers? I think they've left a lot of performance on the table when that thing barely spins up the fans and the mac pro variant will be let loose
Probably but my wallet isn't deep enought to find out.
@@ElevatedSystems Agreed. I priced-out a Mac Pro with 24-core Xeon processor. It came to $17,000 USD. A Windows 10 Ryzen PC with similar performance costs just $3000.
@@DerekDavis213 🧢
@@memcrew1 What did you want to say?
The Guys from eGPU io confirmed that it's a driver issue. Even with eGPU's.
Your observations about macos GUI scaling is totally wrong, it's DPI scaling at 1080p not "actual" 1080p... it's 4K quality with FHD UI
Are you saying the text is HD, while the rest of the image is 4K?
@@memcrew1 I’m saying it’s a 4K image with objects size like FHD. Basically 4K quality on a magnified user interface. That’s why, for example, even if you set a 1080p GUI, the GPU actually outputs at 4K and if you play a 4K video it shows in proper 4K. Believe me, it just works and works well.
@@PieroPontra ok
I just can't get behind the M1 Apple's. They basically built the things to fill landfills in four years. As soon as the newest version come out, people will toss this guy out, part hackers will resell it, then it will die after two years of uses(ruffle a four year process, some times longer.) No room for upgrades, no room to change out memory, or wifi cards, nothing.
Wait are you comparing the 24 Core GPU to to 3050? The apple chart is comparing the 32 Core version. And the M1 Ultra has up to a 64 core GPU. So the GPU is only as underpowered as you want it to be.
Also your screens are outputting at 4K, the UI elements are just sized as if they are 1080p so each element has more detail. You can just change the scaling if you want the Ui to be sized at 4K, everything will just be small.
The Apple Chart is comparing the 32 Core to a 3060 TI (4864 Cuda Cores). I used a RTX 3050 (2560 Cuda Cores) in my comparison to the 24 Core M1 Max GPU. Just FYI the RTX 3050 also has more raw GPU power than the 32 Core M1 Max GPU.