I had to buy a new computer when I fled my country. I compared the Macbook Pros M1 and M3. It just made zero sense to get the M3 right now. The extra money just isn't worth the slight performance gain. The M1 Pro is just a beast.
Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
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Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#32I had to buy a new computer when I fled my country. I compared the Macbook Pros M1 and M3. It just made zero sense to get the M3 right now. The extra money just isn't worth the slight performance gain. The M1 Pro is just a beast.
I love my M1 Pro, it's great, but if money is no object the M3 Max is a massive upgrade.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#33Surprising, but you really don't even need an M1 for those programs. You want fast external SSDs, though. I use the last Intel Mac mini for audio things, and it's fine.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#34The methology used in these tests is utter nonsense. Yes, there is something to be learned by his results but it has a the very least 50% to do with DAW internals and CPU vs the CPUs themselves. He used large numbers of tracks to test which isn't a valid measure of CPU optimization across different DAW platforms. There is widely varying CPU overhead issues among the different DAWs. Running 300 tracks in Ableton is go…
It's a music site. Showing that the efficiency cores aren't fully utilized by the DAWs is appropriate for the audience. It shows to less specialized users that they'll need to examine their tools and their use of efficiency cores to determine if an upgrade is worthwhile
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Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#35I just have a nagging feeling that the M3 Pro exists to salvage poor 3nm yield, whereas the M1 and M2 Pro could shine because of good 5nm yield.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#36Intel also has this problem where the older gen e-cores aren't used by games apparently
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#37I was going to trade in my M1 Pro for an M3 Pro (I love the black), but I'm seriously getting second thoughts. I guess you can make a product that's just too good, after all. Might keep my M1 until the M4 or M5 Pro.
Despite its 'anti-fingerprint' anodization, the black still shows smudges more than silver/space gray, fwiw.. do you really need to upgrade a ~2yr old laptop??
Paradigm-shifting events in AI in the last 1 year or so has really upped the ante on CPU, GPU and RAM requirements. That could be the case.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#38If you look at the specs of the regular, Pro and Max chips on the M1 and M3 generations, it's easier to see M1 Pro as a sort of "Max Lite" chip. You got identical CPU core counts on both the Pro and Max variants in the M1 and M2 generations, but that's no longer true with the M3. Apple seems to have realized that people with only CPU heavy workloads won't buy the Max variant, so it seems to me they've weakened the Pr…
Yeah, the changes they made to the M3 Pro were all about making it a less attractive option for people with CPU-heavy workloads who didn’t need/want the GPU horsepower. Unfortunately, it seems that in order to chase this product stratification goal, they actually made the newest generation chip perform worse than the previous generations.
IMO the significant differences in how Pro and Max are stratified in M1/M2 vs M3 will probably make a lot more sense when M3 Ultra comes out.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#39If only my M1 Max's speakers didn't randomly crackle whenever AU plug-ins consumed even as little as 20% of the CPU. Thanks core audio! It's a bizarre state when I'm forced to swap to my Windows 10 and MOTU with ASIO to make music without becoming absolutely infuriated.
Re: Apple M1 Pro Beats M3 Pro with Ableton, Logic and Pro Tools
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, the changes they made to the M3 Pro were all about making it a less attractive option for people with CPU-heavy workloads who didn’t need/want the GPU horsepower. Unfortunately, it seems that in order to chase this product stratification goal, they actually made the newest generation chip perform worse than the previous generations.
IMO the significant differences in how Pro and Max are stratified in M1/M2 vs M3 will probably make a lot more sense when M3 Ultra comes out.
I think it “makes sense” already. The previous generations of Pro were too tempting and Apple probably feels that hobbling them will push people to spend more on Max chips. I also bet the new Pro chips are less costly (node issues aside) since they have many fewer P cores. It’s just sad that the new M3 Pro is a sidegrade at best. I’m hoping M4 shows an actual performance increase for Pro chips now that they’re (hopefully) done cutting the P cores.