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M4 MacBook Pro

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Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#451

Post by Eugr »

tarruda wrote: post #388
mark_l_watson wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think regretting Mac upgrades is a real thing, at least for me. I got a 32G Mac mini in January to run local LLMs. While it does so beautifully, there are now smaller LLMs that run fine on my very old 8G M1 MacBook Pro, and these newer smaller models do almost all of what I want for NLP tasks, data transformation, RAG, etc. I feel like I wasted my money.

Small models retain much less of the knowledge they were trained on, especially when quantized. One good use case for 32gb Mac is being able to run 8b models at full precision, something that is not possible with 8-16gb macs

Or better run quantized 14B or even 32B models...

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#452

Post by spacedcowboy »

jjcm wrote: post #382
BrentOzar wrote: post #9

The M4 Max goes up to 128GB RAM, and "over half a terabyte per second of unified memory bandwidth" - LLM users rejoice.

For context, the 4090 has 1,008 GB/s of bandwidth.

... but only 1/4 of the actual memory, right ?

The M4-Max I just ordered comes with 128GB of RAM.

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#453

Post by jcalabro »

extr wrote: post #114
carlgreene wrote: post #94

What’s amazing is that in the past I’ve felt the need to upgrade within a few years. New video format or more demanding music software is released that slows the machine down, or battery life craters. Well, I haven’t had even a tinge of feeling that I need to upgrade after getting my M1 Pro MBP. I can’t remember it ever skipping a beat running a serious Ableton project, or editing in Resolve. Can stuff be faster? Tec…

I've owned an M1 MBP base model since 2021 and I just got an M3 Max for work. I was curious to see if it "felt" different and was contemplating an upgrade to M4. You know what? It doesn't really feel different. I think my browser opens about 1 second faster from a cold start. But other than that, no perceptible difference day to day.

I've found compile times on large C++ code bases to be the only thing I really notice improving. I recently upgraded my work machine from a 2017 i7 to a shiny new Ryzen 9 9950x and my clean compile times went from 3.5 minutes to 15 seconds haha. When I compile with an M2 Max, it's about 30s, so decent for a laptop, but also it was 2x the price of my new desktop workstation.

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#454

Post by philodeon »

To sum up the HN wisdom on Apple Silicon Macs:

Before the M4 models: omg, Apple only gives you 8GB RAM in the base model? Garbage!

After the M4 models: the previous laptops were so good, why would you upgrade?

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#456

Post by pw6hv »

Just replaced for the first time battery on my Macbook Pro 2015 Retina. Feel so good using such an old piece of hardware.

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#457

Post by spacedcowboy »

zurfer wrote: post #38

If I remember correctly, the claim was that M3 is 1.6x faster than M1. M4 is now 1.8x faster than M1. It sounds more exciting than M4 is 12.5% faster than M3.

There aren't that many people that upgrade something like an MBP every year, most of us keep them longer than that.

I've just ordered an (almost) top-of-the-range MBP Max, my current machine is an MBP M1-max, so the comparisons are pretty much spot-on for me.

Selling the M1 Ultra Studio to help pay for the M4 MBP Max, I don't think I need the Studio any more, with the M4 being so much faster.

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#458

Post by post-it »

thimabi wrote: post #148
post-it wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't done measurements on this, but my Macbook Pro feels much faster at swapping than any Linux or Windows device I've used. I've never used an M.2 SSD so maybe that would be comparable, but swapping is pretty much seamless. There's also some kind of memory compression going on according to Activity Monitor, not sure if that's normal on other OSes.

Yes, other M.2 SSDs have comparable performance when swapping, and other operating systems compress memory, too — though I believe not as much as MacOS. Although machines with Apple Silicon swap flawlessly, I worry about degrading the SSD, which is non-replaceable. So ultimately I pay for more RAM and not need swapping at all.

Degrading the SSD is a good point. This is thankfully a work laptop so I don't care if it lives or dies, but it's something I'll have to consider when I eventually get my own Mac.

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#459

Post by georgeecollins »

ActorNightly wrote: post #449
opjjf wrote: post #5

It seems they also update the base memory on MacBook Air: > MacBook Air: The World’s Most Popular Laptop Now Starts at 16GB > MacBook Air is the world’s most popular laptop, and with Apple Intelligence, it’s even better. Now, models with M2 and M3 double the starting memory to 16GB, while keeping the starting price at just $999 — a terrific value for the world’s best-selling laptop.

Im sorry but any laptop that costs $1000 should come with 64 gigs minimum, or expandable slots.

Tell me you are poor without telling me you are poor.

Just kidding! As an Apple Shareholder I feel like you should take what Apple gives you and accept the price. ;)

Re: M4 MacBook Pro

#460

Post by zubiaur »

pw6hv wrote: post #456

Just replaced for the first time battery on my Macbook Pro 2015 Retina. Feel so good using such an old piece of hardware.

I love mine, it has a fresh battery OEM battery as well. Runs the latest OS with OpenCore Legacy. But it's starting to get a bit annoying. Usable, but it is starting to feel slowish, the fan kicks up frequently.

I might still keep it another year or so, which is a testament to how good it is and how relative little progress has happened in almost 10 years.

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