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Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

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Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#51

Post by rattray »

perardi wrote: post #46
rattray wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as another sad owner of a Macbook Air (pre-M1), I do wish Apple made it more clear that they can't drive monitors well, but I agree with your overall sentiment – OP probably would have been much, much happier with a higher-spec'd M1 MBP (though given the price and their OS preference, maybe still not happy enough).

I too agree that the display limitations are non-obvious. I’m not sure if it’s a typical use case to run 2 displays on an Air, but that is a way more obvious set of affairs on a Mac mini, especially for a developer porting/testing software for the new architecture. You can run 2 displays on the Mac mini…but not the same way you used to. https://thesweetsetup.com/running-multiple-monitors-on-an-m1... (That is actually…

Yeah, another gotcha is that my MBA can't even drive a single 4k display at 60FPS, which I'm not sure was visible anywhere on the product page. (Not sure whether this limitation holds for the M1 MBA).

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#52

Post by sundaeofshock »

rvz wrote: post #39
smoldesu wrote: post #15

Honestly, I'm starting to understand Louis Rossman's indifference towards these computers. In one of his most recent streams, someone asked him what he thought about the M1 Macs, and he simply responded "it's faster than the last computer Apple made", which summed up a lot of how I feel about it too. I'm saying this as my M1 Macbook Air sits on a shelf collecting dust a few feet away from me, which is definitely not…

> I can't use my OS of choice on it, I can't use my software of choice on it, I can't upgrade or fix anything on it, and I can't trust the swap to not shred the SSD. It is just as locked in like an iPhone. When at least one component of that computer is ruined, as you said it can't be simply swapped out and it time for a trip to the Apple Store if you're using it for the long term. If the SSD in the M1 is dead for so…

> If the SSD in the M1 is dead for some reason, you might as well buy the same model again but with your data lost. Really? I would imagine that professional creators and developers would know enough to back-up their data.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#53

Post by MarkSweep »

rattray wrote: post #35
least wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I bought the Macbook Air with the intention of using it to replace my aging desktop rig, but was pretty surprised to find that it couldn't drive both of my monitors. > I can't use my OS of choice on it, I can't use my software of choice on it, I can't upgrade or fix anything on it, and I can't trust the swap to not shred the SSD. Minimal due diligence would probably have helped you not waste 1000+ dollars on a lapt…

Speaking as another sad owner of a Macbook Air (pre-M1), I do wish Apple made it more clear that they can't drive monitors well, but I agree with your overall sentiment – OP probably would have been much, much happier with a higher-spec'd M1 MBP (though given the price and their OS preference, maybe still not happy enough).

Both the MBP and MBA say this in their tech specs, so getting the MBP would not help:

> Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display at millions of colors and: > One external display with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz

The M1 Mac Mini can drive two displays: 6k on Thunderbolt and 4K on HDMI.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#54

Post by cowmoo728 »

rattray wrote: post #35
least wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I bought the Macbook Air with the intention of using it to replace my aging desktop rig, but was pretty surprised to find that it couldn't drive both of my monitors. > I can't use my OS of choice on it, I can't use my software of choice on it, I can't upgrade or fix anything on it, and I can't trust the swap to not shred the SSD. Minimal due diligence would probably have helped you not waste 1000+ dollars on a lapt…

Speaking as another sad owner of a Macbook Air (pre-M1), I do wish Apple made it more clear that they can't drive monitors well, but I agree with your overall sentiment – OP probably would have been much, much happier with a higher-spec'd M1 MBP (though given the price and their OS preference, maybe still not happy enough).

The 2020 M1 macbook pro made no sense though. It was a macbook air with a cpu fan, touch bar, improved sound + display for an extra $300. The CPU and GPU and ports were identical.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#55

Post by [deleted] »

smoldesu wrote: post #15

Honestly, I'm starting to understand Louis Rossman's indifference towards these computers. In one of his most recent streams, someone asked him what he thought about the M1 Macs, and he simply responded "it's faster than the last computer Apple made", which summed up a lot of how I feel about it too. I'm saying this as my M1 Macbook Air sits on a shelf collecting dust a few feet away from me, which is definitely not…

[deleted]

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#56

Post by smoldesu »

rattray wrote: post #51
perardi wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I too agree that the display limitations are non-obvious. I’m not sure if it’s a typical use case to run 2 displays on an Air, but that is a way more obvious set of affairs on a Mac mini, especially for a developer porting/testing software for the new architecture. You can run 2 displays on the Mac mini…but not the same way you used to. https://thesweetsetup.com/running-multiple-monitors-on-an-m1... (That is actually…

Yeah, another gotcha is that my MBA can't even drive a single 4k display at 60FPS, which I'm not sure was visible anywhere on the product page. (Not sure whether this limitation holds for the M1 MBA).

Yep, that was particularly disappointing to me. My 1440p panel supports up to 144hz, but MacOS only acknowledged 50hz and 60hz for the panel. Not that it made much of a difference in the first place, a flashing panel at 60hz is just as unusable as a flashing panel at 144hz.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#57

Post by rattray »

cowmoo728 wrote: post #54
rattray wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as another sad owner of a Macbook Air (pre-M1), I do wish Apple made it more clear that they can't drive monitors well, but I agree with your overall sentiment – OP probably would have been much, much happier with a higher-spec'd M1 MBP (though given the price and their OS preference, maybe still not happy enough).

The 2020 M1 macbook pro made no sense though. It was a macbook air with a cpu fan, touch bar, improved sound + display for an extra $300. The CPU and GPU and ports were identical.

Wow, right. The M1 MBP available now doesn't even have 4 ports. Definitely still worth waiting...

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#58

Post by AtlasBarfed »

marricks wrote: post #22
smoldesu wrote: post #15

Honestly, I'm starting to understand Louis Rossman's indifference towards these computers. In one of his most recent streams, someone asked him what he thought about the M1 Macs, and he simply responded "it's faster than the last computer Apple made", which summed up a lot of how I feel about it too. I'm saying this as my M1 Macbook Air sits on a shelf collecting dust a few feet away from me, which is definitely not…

Apple launch M1 for their smallest cheapest computers first, if you want drive multiple screens you are not their target audience. I think it's understandable devs are confused a bit, it's a flashy new thing and we want to try it, but it's not for power users. Another confusing aspect, at least to me, is it's stand out feature is battery life! We're all stuck at home though, so when is a charger more than 4 feet away…

Apple is "Premium" computing products company, and further advertises in the content creation space for artists, etc.

Not properly driving monitors is a major fail, if that's true. It also ignores the fact early adopters will be technical and have a "basic" technical need like that.

Apple almost always supports the highest-bandwidth ports, precisely to drive large high-resolution monitors.

I've been thinking about M1, but this comment just nixed it. Maybe when it's out of beta.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#59

Post by smoldesu »

sundaeofshock wrote: post #52
rvz wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't use my OS of choice on it, I can't use my software of choice on it, I can't upgrade or fix anything on it, and I can't trust the swap to not shred the SSD. It is just as locked in like an iPhone. When at least one component of that computer is ruined, as you said it can't be simply swapped out and it time for a trip to the Apple Store if you're using it for the long term. If the SSD in the M1 is dead for so…

> If the SSD in the M1 is dead for some reason, you might as well buy the same model again but with your data lost. Really? I would imagine that professional creators and developers would know enough to back-up their data.

Even still, that's not a fix for the machines that are broken. I'm more disturbed by the fact that my Macbook would become a unibody paperweight, the data is the easiest part to replace.

Re: Using Apple Silicon (M1) as a cloud engineer, two months in

#60

Post by smoldesu »

sys_64738 wrote: post #41
smoldesu wrote: post #15

Honestly, I'm starting to understand Louis Rossman's indifference towards these computers. In one of his most recent streams, someone asked him what he thought about the M1 Macs, and he simply responded "it's faster than the last computer Apple made", which summed up a lot of how I feel about it too. I'm saying this as my M1 Macbook Air sits on a shelf collecting dust a few feet away from me, which is definitely not…

Get a Display Link USB graphics dongle for USB port. This works seriously well.

I'll look into it, is it capable of driving 1440p@144hz?
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