Observation on Silicon Macs
I noticed a bunch of things on the new Macs that might interest some of you.
- Everything about how fast they are appears to be mostly true at least on speed testing,
- For all the academic folks who pound out in Office, Microsoft is releasing a Silicon version very soon
- Heavy multitasking might not be happy with the current RAM ceiling. How well Silicon manages this is kind of unknown. My guess is that Silicon is really efficient, more so than what we use. But if you are inclined to use 32GB or more, you might want to verify this. My current laptop has 32GB and a dedicated video card, so I am spoiled.
- Apple is rather lightweight on ports with these machines. These might chain with adapters, but if you like to hook a lot of things up, this generation might not do it for you just yet.
- I think Apple is more than content on this series because they are marketing primarily to an audience that steps up from iPads and iPhones so they don't need all the add ons. They might be a lot longer coming out with more models with the stuff some of us crave.
I still want one, but I am holding off a couple of weeks to make sure this isn't just infatuation.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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mab said:
Everything about how fast they are appears to be mostly true at least on speed testing,
I read this morning that Craig Federighi (Apple software VP) said that Apple itself was surprised at how powerful the M1 is.
mab said:For all the academic folks who pound out in Office, Microsoft is releasing a Silicon version very soon
I've been a Mac user since the MacSE days (I was the very first student at Talbot with a laptop, a MacBook 100.) I don't think I've ever seen as many apps updated for a new chip system as quick as this. Of course, Apple's Xcode platform probably requires nothing more than a recompile to suit the new chip, at least for basic programs. Logos (like others) is NOT just a basic program, and so it might take the a little longer to produce an M1 version. From what I read this morning, Rosetta 2 will actually translate an Intel app into an M1 app, and then run that executable instead of the original. I believe (could be wrong on this) that Rosetta 2 will also save that translated code, so that the next launch and use gets faster and faster over time.
mab said:Heavy multitasking might not be happy with the current RAM ceiling. How well Silicon manages this is kind of unknown. My guess is that Silicon is really efficient, more so than what we use. But if you are inclined to use 32GB or more, you might want to verify this. My current laptop has 32GB and a dedicated video card, so I am spoiled.
That will be a big test. My MacBook Pro 16 (2020) has 32GB. The new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro have 8GB. We're being told that SSD speeds are doubled because of the M1 chip, and that could make a huge difference, especially in apps like Logos, that have to do so much interaction with the drive. Perhaps the 8GB will be offset by the SSD speed.
mab said:Apple is rather lightweight on ports with these machines. These might chain with adapters, but if you like to hook a lot of things up, this generation might not do it for you just yet.
As I mentioned, I have a 16" MacBook Pro (2020), which has 4 USB-C ports. That isn't enough, actually, and so I use a CalDigit T3, which is completely filled up. The CalDigit is not cheap (they run about $250), BUT the cost difference between my current machine and the 13" MacBook Air is about $2,000, which makes the CalDigit (or equivalent) a bargain.
mab said:I think Apple is more than content on this series because they are marketing primarily to an audience that steps up from iPads and iPhones so they don't need all the add ons. They might be a lot longer coming out with more models with the stuff some of us crave.
I agree; it'll probably be June before they announce a full size MacBook Pro. But in the meantime the MacBook Air has suddenly become far more than a tablet with a built-in keyboard. If the speeds are actually as projected, it will do everything that I want to do. I use a large external monitor for the majority of my office work, so the 13" is not too much of an issue for me.
mab said:
I still want one, but I am holding off a couple of weeks to make sure this isn't just infatuation.
I (ahem) actually ordered one, and will have it next week. We just started streaming at our church, and I think it might be the right tool to manage OBS for us at a low cost. I'll reporting on Logos and Proclaim performance on this forum as soon as I can.
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Gregory Lawhorn said:
I (ahem) actually ordered one, and will have it next week. We just started streaming at our church, and I think it might be the right tool to manage OBS for us at a low cost. I'll reporting on Logos and Proclaim performance on this forum as soon as I can.
We all will love to hear how this turns out. I expect it to shine. I have no doubts about Logos only about how good it might be on this new platform.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Just want to point out that the M1 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are available with 16GB memory. You needn't settle for 8! But the next gen could offer more.
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Mark Nolette said:
Just want to point out that the M1 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are available with 16GB memory. You needn't settle for 8! But the next gen could offer more.
By all means, it makes sense to extend the usefulness with 16GB. I updated my old Mac to 16GB and that was for a 2012 machine. Wise people buy Macs for the duration and configure them accordingly.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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This just in. even under Rosetta emulation, m1 is till faster than current macs
https://www.macrumors.com/2020/11/15/m1-chip-emulating-x86-benchmark/
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Gregory, when is your supposed to arrive? Mine says that it will arrive tomorrow on the 16th, I wonder if it really will or if UPS will have to hold it since I think Apple said the 17th or 18th was the release date
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Gregory Lawhorn said:
I've been a Mac user since the MacSE days (I was the very first student at Talbot with a laptop, a MacBook 100.) I don't think I've ever seen as many apps updated for a new chip system as quick as this. Of course, Apple's Xcode platform probably requires nothing more than a recompile to suit the new chip, at least for basic programs. Logos (like others) is NOT just a basic program, and so it might take the a little longer to produce an M1 version. From what I read this morning, Rosetta 2 will actually translate an Intel app into an M1 app, and then run that executable instead of the original. I believe (could be wrong on this) that Rosetta 2 will also save that translated code, so that the next launch and use gets faster and faster over time.
I didn't have the MacBook 100, but I did lug my MacSE around Talbot (I graduated in 1983 -- did our paths cross?) I still remember the exhilaration of learning the hidden Greek keys on the Mac and turning papers in without having to hand draw the characters!
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Tony Walker said:
Gregory, when is your supposed to arrive? Mine says that it will arrive tomorrow on the 16th, I wonder if it really will or if UPS will have to hold it since I think Apple said the 17th or 18th was the release date
The tracking says tomorrow, the 16th, but it hasn't left Alaska yet. Not that I have (ahem) checked it three times this afternoon [*-)]
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John LeBlanc said:
I didn't have the MacBook 100, but I did lug my MacSE around Talbot (I graduated in 1983 -- did our paths cross?) I still remember the exhilaration of learning the hidden Greek keys on the Mac and turning papers in without having to hand draw the characters!
I graduated in 1993, so I doubt we came across each other. I still have great memories of profs like Saucy, Gomes, Holloman, Finley, and others. The Lord chose not to answer my prayer to find a church in SoCal; I would have continued on in seminary, I loved the environment.
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I had all those profs, and now serve in a church in SoCal with John Hutchinson. Nice to meet you Greg.
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That's great; good to meet you too, brother!
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John LeBlanc said:
I didn't have the MacBook 100, but I did lug my MacSE around Talbot (I graduated in 1983 -- did our paths cross?) I still remember the exhilaration of learning the hidden Greek keys on the Mac and turning papers in without having to hand draw the characters!
Oh, and I bow before anyone who would shlep a MacSE (hopefully in that soft case they made) around campus!
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I'm looking forward to seeing how the new M1 chip goes with Logos.
Disappointing that the new MacBooks won't support 2 external monitors
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Gregory Lawhorn said:Tony Walker said:
Gregory, when is your supposed to arrive? Mine says that it will arrive tomorrow on the 16th, I wonder if it really will or if UPS will have to hold it since I think Apple said the 17th or 18th was the release date
The tracking says tomorrow, the 16th, but it hasn't left Alaska yet. Not that I have (ahem) checked it three times this afternoon
My MacBook Air is now in Louisville, and scheduled for delivery tomorrow. I've been working on the comparison video for the MacBook Pro part, and I'm all ready for the Air.
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Logos installed and now downloading is at 20% of my 34GB of resources
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at 38%... but in the meantime it is funny feeling to install the iPad version from the App Store of the popular 'Bible' app and also installed the esv app from crossway. It appears to work like you would expect an iPad app to run on a MacBook...
but none of the faith life apps are showing up in the Mac app store under the iPad app category... so I am assuming they have it disabled. I also searched for Audible and Hoopla and they do not show up as well. perhaps a rights issue?
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https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/apple-macbook-air-m1-late-2020 Noted here near the bottom was awesome battery life. For mobile folks that is surely going to be important.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Very much looking forward to your findings Tony and Gregory.
if you guys have external monitors one thing I would love to know is whether it really can’t handle 2 external displays. That’s part of my workflow.
and of course how it handles logos!
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resources have downloaded and it's installing. I don’t have an external monitor though
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My MacBook Air arrived! today I’ll be installing everything. Tomorrow morning I’ll run the tests, and then get them uploaded.
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I hope you'll address in your reviews:
1. Launch time of Logos from a cold boot.
2. Heat when indexing and under normal use and where the heat comes from.
3. Overall responsiveness.
4. SSD space available to the user out of the box before you install anything.It would be really great if you could upload a video. [:)]
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consider it done - video tomorrow
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Just an update as of 8:26 central time - Logos is still downloading (I've got close to 40 gigs of data). I confess that I interrupted it at one point, thinking I could just transfer everything in Target Mode. Well, there IS no Target Mode for the M1 Macs; it's "Mac Sharing" instead, and it's accessed in Recovery Mode. It would get about a third of the way through and then drop the connection. So, I started the download again about 7:45 (it's 8:25 now), and I'll check it in a bit. My plan is to have a brief report here AND a video on YouTube tomorrow afternoon sometime.
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Sorry I can't put a video together, but here is what I observed on the new Mac mini (M1, 2020) with 16GB of memory and 2TB SSD.
Logos was the first thing I installed on the machine. After about 90 minutes of downloading resources (42.5GB worth), it began indexing. Indexing was much faster than I expected - a total of 100 minutes (for 12,000+ resources).
I am coming from a late 2014 27" iMac Retina (3.5 GHz i5) with 24GB of DDR3 RAM and with a 1TB Fusion drive. Logos is MUCH peppier and responsive on the new Mac mini than it was on my previous machine, even though it is not a native app. Having seen some of the benchmarks leaked over the past few days, I still did not expect Logos to run so well. Books open almost instantly. The passage guide populated very quickly and links from it opened immediately. The Factbook runs very quickly and the Information panel also updates very quickly as well. I saw no spinning beachballs!
Launch time was 10 seconds to a blank layout. This was likely because of the new architecture and the very fast SSD (3.3GB/s).
Heat is not an issue with the Mac mini, since it is a desktop version of the M1 with a fan. That said, the fan never came on (at least it wasn't audible if it did), even when heavy indexing with the CPUs pegged at 630%.
I understand this is all subjective, so if there is an objective test using Logos you'd like me to try, I'll give it a shot.
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JH said:
Heat is not an issue with the Mac mini, since it is a desktop version of the M1 with a fan. That said, the fan never came on (at least it wasn't audible if it did), even when heavy indexing with the CPUs pegged at 630%.
I think that you have a machine designed for sustained performance may have made some difference. All sounds very good. Nice to hear a good report. Thank you!
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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mab said:JH said:
Heat is not an issue with the Mac mini, since it is a desktop version of the M1 with a fan. That said, the fan never came on (at least it wasn't audible if it did), even when heavy indexing with the CPUs pegged at 630%.
I think that you have a machine designed for sustained performance may have made some difference. All sounds very good. Nice to hear a good report. Thank you!
Perhaps, but the testing I am seeing others do is showing comparable results across the new MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and the Mac mini. The reviews online are very positive about performance (even in a first generation chip).
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Greg's video was great to see. The only opinion I can add is that the Air (with no fan) was cool. surprisingly cool. Last night in bed, with the laptop laying on my covers on my lap (no airflow) the thing never even got hot. And that was about an hour of watching YouTube video, some sites in safari, and using Logos.
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This is worth a read. Answers some of my concerns about memory
https://www.macworld.com/article/3597569/with-m1-macs-memory-isnt-what-it-used-to-be.html
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Thanks for the link
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mab said:
This is worth a read. Answers some of my concerns about memory
https://www.macworld.com/article/3597569/with-m1-macs-memory-isnt-what-it-used-to-be.html
I can attest to this. I have 56 tabs open in Safari, plus MS Word and several other apps, and Activity Monitor is only showing that 12 out of 16 GB is being used. The M1 must be very efficient in the way it allocates memory. On my previous machine, I would have already exceeded the 24 GB of RAM it had and it would be swapping out to disk (making it very slow).
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Macs have had this thing about not readily releasing memory. If this overcomes that and manages it better, that is a real improvement.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Tony Walker said:
I am assuming they have it disabled. I also searched for Audible and Hoopla and they do not show up as well. perhaps a rights issue?
It is my understanding that the apps don't automatically appear... and that there is <some> work that needs to be done, even if minimal.
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My understanding is that it is fairly automatic but the developer can opt out
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mab said:
This is worth a read. Answers some of my concerns about memory
https://www.macworld.com/article/3597569/with-m1-macs-memory-isnt-what-it-used-to-be.html
It just occurred to me the one area you might want more memory with Logos is if you are fond of lots of floating panels. I usually don't have many, but they do have their place at times. A layout with lots of these will be snappier to pull up. 16GB should be plenty adequate on Silicon.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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mab said:
It just occurred to me the one area you might want more memory with Logos is if you are fond of lots of floating panels. I usually don't have many, but they do have their place at times. A layout with lots of these will be snappier to pull up. 16GB should be plenty adequate on Silicon.
You got me thinking, so I did a little test. Logos' performance didn't change, in spite of the extra RAM used.
The captions should suffice:
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Sheesh. You just convinced me to order one last night. [:D]
My oldest son is currently using an Air from 2012... but the battery dies very quickly. I will be selling it and giving him my MacBook Pro. [:O]
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JT, I think it is actually the opposite. If an app has not been touched, then it will show up in the with a qualifier that says it hasn't been optimized for the Mac (something like that I forget the wording). But if a developer does not want their mobile app to work on an M1 Mac they must go into their account/store/app (whatever that looks like for a dev, idk) and manual disable it.
I listened to Leo Laporte on the way to work this morning and that was what they said. He said the most obvious reason that would be would be people like Instagram that want you on their site (when on a desktop) and not in an app, so that is why their app isn't working on M1's.
Another post on Macrumors yesterday said that the computer can load .ipa files like a normal app (these would be the apps on the phones themselves). There are ways to get those ipa files off the phone but I dont know what it would look like if the app got "disabled" for M1 use. I'm just guessing but perhaps the "disabling" is only it showing/not showing int he Mac App Store and not anything with the actual app file itself.
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Gregory Lawhorn said:
You got me thinking, so I did a little test. Logos' performance didn't change, in spite of the extra RAM used.
That's amazing. The management in Silicon is remarkable. I would guess some of it might also be in Big Sur which is also improving performance for Logos by current reports, but that's a small RAM footprint.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Does anyone know if the new MacMini M1 can run two 4K monitor?
thanks
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Tony Walker said:
I listened to Leo Laporte on the way to work this morning and that was what they said. He said the most obvious reason that would be would be people like Instagram that want you on their site (when on a desktop) and not in an app, so that is why their app isn't working on M1's.
[Y]
My initial thought came from my recollection of the original announcement. Perhaps I was wrong. [:)]
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Steve Clevenger said:
Does anyone know if the new MacMini M1 can run two 4K monitor?
thanks
Yes - you run one monitor via HDMI and the other monitor via Thunderbolt 3 (USB 4) connection.
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JT (alabama24) said:
Sheesh. You just convinced me to order one last night.
My oldest son is currently using an Air from 2012... but the battery dies very quickly. I will be selling it and giving him my MacBook Pro.
That's great! We have three generations of hand-me-down-Macs.
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[Y] Thank you!
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This looks like it might serve some folks. Not cheap, but if you need to tether a new Mac.
https://www.macworld.com/article/3597053/corsair-tbt100-thunderbolt-3-dock-review.html
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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mab said:
This looks like it might serve some folks. Not cheap, but if you need to tether a new Mac.
https://www.macworld.com/article/3597053/corsair-tbt100-thunderbolt-3-dock-review.html
This looks more to my liking:
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Yes the OWC is at least a Benjamin better too!
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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