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MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

sharpai.org

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Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#61

Post by nateb2022 »

beoberha wrote: post #59
psyclobe wrote: post #28

I have always envisioned a ai server being part of a family's major purchases e.g. when they buy a house, appliance, etc. they also buy a 'ai system'. Machine hardware evolution is slowing down, pretty soon you can buy one big ass server that will last potentially decades as it would be purpose built for ai. Things like 'context based home security' yeah thats just, automatic, free, part of the ai system. Everyone wi…

I don’t think there’s anything different between what you’re suggesting and a homelab. Most people do not have a homelab and are happy to offload services like photo storage or security to remote providers.

Strongly agree. Plus, for all but very specific usecases, most people will spend less money by paying for cloud services, with "most" here referring to the general population.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#62

Post by idle_zealot »

anoopengineer wrote: post #48
jagged-chisel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's not going to happen any time soon because there's no recurring revenue to be gained from users/homeowners for such a thing.

With that logic, there wouldn't be anyone selling refrigerators or dishwashers.

If dishwashers were invented today they would be rented out to homes and businesses with DRM to lock you into buying approved detergent and tableware. Times change, and more exploitative arrangements are normalized. This ratchet is primed to go in one direction, and only moves the other way in fits and starts borne of great effort.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#63

Post by hparadiz »

brandall10 wrote: post #40
hparadiz wrote: post #6

Currently the barrier to entry for local models is about $2500. Funny thing is $2500 is about the amount my parents paid for a 166 MHZ machine in 1995.

My first 'real' machine was a Price Club (now Costco) 386sx for $3800 in late '89, which would be nearly $10k adjusted for inflation. 16 MHz, 1 MB RAM, 40 MB hard disk. That was bargain basement for that era. IBMs, Compaqs and the like were ~$5k similarly configured, and the first 486s were in the $7-9k area.

This picture of the Ryzen AI Max+ blew my mind.

https://images.prismic.io/frameworkmarketplace/Z7aVJZ7c43Q3f...

Look this isn't an ad. I've been building my own desktops since I was 14. It's always been a CPU and motherboard and memory separate type of deal but this thing has it all integrated. Look how small it is. I use Gentoo. I compile all the things. I know exactly how long it takes to compile gcc because I do it all the time.

This thing compiles the linux kernel in 62 seconds. And it uses less power than my current machine to do it. I am jealous. The computer age is not slowing down. It's in fact speeding up. Am I the only one excited as fuck about what's coming?

You don't even need a GPU because it handles gaming tasks like it's nothing.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#64

Post by hparadiz »

BoredPositron wrote: post #50
hparadiz wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For coding and personal assistance the context window on 16GB is not good enough. Ideally I want a context window of 100k.

In the other reply you said 50k. 16GB vram provides 40-70k on the 9b depending on the implementation and quant. Which is more than enough for the tool we are discussing in this thread but it looks like you are just changing your story instead of admitting that your initial comment was made in a hunch. Adding ever changing context in responses "to be right" is just bad manner.

50k is what I consider bare minimum but I would like to have 100k. Honestly I'd like to have as much as I can get. Context window is what makes it useful. I wanna feed it all the information at the same time. If I can feed it my entire code base it becomes much more useful than if I feed it only some of my code base.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#65

Post by j45 »

beoberha wrote: post #59
psyclobe wrote: post #28

I have always envisioned a ai server being part of a family's major purchases e.g. when they buy a house, appliance, etc. they also buy a 'ai system'. Machine hardware evolution is slowing down, pretty soon you can buy one big ass server that will last potentially decades as it would be purpose built for ai. Things like 'context based home security' yeah thats just, automatic, free, part of the ai system. Everyone wi…

I don’t think there’s anything different between what you’re suggesting and a homelab. Most people do not have a homelab and are happy to offload services like photo storage or security to remote providers.

Home labs feel wholly different and requires custom setup and maintenance.

A home appliance like a toaster would be in the case of an AI server are ready to go appliance that’s preloaded and confined and connect to everything in your home and help you manage it likely by just voice chat or some amount of interface.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#66

Post by BearOso »

nateb2022 wrote: post #55
psyclobe wrote: post #28

I have always envisioned a ai server being part of a family's major purchases e.g. when they buy a house, appliance, etc. they also buy a 'ai system'. Machine hardware evolution is slowing down, pretty soon you can buy one big ass server that will last potentially decades as it would be purpose built for ai. Things like 'context based home security' yeah thats just, automatic, free, part of the ai system. Everyone wi…

I disagree. Let's take the M1 vs the M5 ( https://www.macrumors.com/2025/11/10/apple-silicon-m1-to-m5-... ): - 6× faster CPU/GPU performance - 6× faster AI performance - 7.7× faster AI video processing - 6.8× faster 3D rendering - 2.6× faster gaming performance - 2.1× faster code compiling Over the span of 5 years. Plus, realistically what makes an "ai" server different from a computer? This "lineage info of the fami…

That first bullet is a bit sketchy. Benchmarks, particularly geekbench, may have increased 6x, but that's being manipulated.

The GPUs have become much larger, so 6.8x is believable there, as is the inclusion of a matmul unit boosting AI.

The 2.x numbers are the most realistic, especially because they represent actual workloads.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#68

Post by sbarre »

beoberha wrote: post #59
psyclobe wrote: post #28

I have always envisioned a ai server being part of a family's major purchases e.g. when they buy a house, appliance, etc. they also buy a 'ai system'. Machine hardware evolution is slowing down, pretty soon you can buy one big ass server that will last potentially decades as it would be purpose built for ai. Things like 'context based home security' yeah thats just, automatic, free, part of the ai system. Everyone wi…

I don’t think there’s anything different between what you’re suggesting and a homelab. Most people do not have a homelab and are happy to offload services like photo storage or security to remote providers.

I think that attitude is (very) slowly changing though and might not be the default forever.

My elderly parents have asked me about "local backups" of their cloud stuff, their Facebook history etc..

If they're thinking about the risks/tradeoffs of being in the cloud..

I think people use the cloud because there's no better/easier option today.

But at some point there might be. A home appliance (which may be similar to a homelab under the hood but the user experience is where things change) that provides a bunch of automation and home services could be quite attractive if it got to a point of being very turnkey for the average family.

Just like a TV or a gaming console is today.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#69

Post by re-thc »

anoopengineer wrote: post #48
jagged-chisel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's not going to happen any time soon because there's no recurring revenue to be gained from users/homeowners for such a thing.

With that logic, there wouldn't be anyone selling refrigerators or dishwashers.

A lot of the leaders of that century have been going downhill, ever since, e.g. top Japanese manufacturers.

Re: MacBook M5 Pro and Qwen3.5 = Local AI Security System

#70

Post by c-hendricks »

shmoogy wrote: post #37
infecto wrote: post #22

Can someone share how this stacks up to a Frigate? What I am struggling with this is how it sits in the security stack. Is it recording things of interest with motion or is it only a layer on top of the existing nvr

Buy a coral TPU for frigate - it can handle a ton of inference and is very cheap for what it offloads off the cpu

Depending on the age of your hardware, you might already have something more powerful
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