# Does anyone use an M1 machine full time?



## KallumS (Jul 28, 2021)

I bought an M1 Mac mini the moment it came out however due to some plugin companies dragging their feet on compatibility (mainly Native Instruments) I haven’t really used it for music. 

Has anyone been using an M1 machine as their main music making device? If so, how well does Rosetta work for your plugins in general (especially NI)?


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## davidnaroth (Jul 28, 2021)

KallumS said:


> I bought an M1 Mac mini the moment it came out however due to some plugin companies dragging their feet on compatibility (mainly Native Instruments) I haven’t really used it for music.
> 
> Has anyone been using an M1 machine as their main music making device? If so, how well does Rosetta work for your plugins in general (especially NI)?


Does Kontakt not work with M1 machines? I was about to buy a macbook air for travelling and kontakt library development


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## KallumS (Jul 28, 2021)

davidnaroth said:


> Does Kontakt not work with M1 machines? I was about to buy a macbook air for travelling and kontakt library development


Kontakt does work in theory, but it doesn’t run native and needs to be run using Rosetta. I heard some early reports of memory leaks with Rosetta and I was wondering what people’s experiences were now that the machines have been out for a while.


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## rnb_2 (Jul 29, 2021)

I don't do anything heavy, but haven't had any issues on my M1s in a long time (since Logic was updated to work with MidiFX plugins). There is the occasional plugin that doesn't work with the Rosetta bridge while Logic is running in native mode (seems to be mostly IKM effects for me), but most work just fine - remember that Rosetta 2 is (mostly) ahead-of-time translation, rather than emulation, so the M1 is running ARM code, just not optimized.

The biggest issue with the M1, of course, is the RAM limit, but if you can fit everything into RAM (or a reasonable size swap file - see @Soundbed's thread where he tested a fairly heavy template on an M1 MBP), you should be fine. I did some testing recently that showed, against expectation, that running Logic in native ARM mode doesn't actually seem to impose a RAM penalty vs. running Logic in Rosetta mode.


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## KallumS (Jul 30, 2021)

rnb_2 said:


> I don't do anything heavy, but haven't had any issues on my M1s in a long time (since Logic was updated to work with MidiFX plugins). There is the occasional plugin that doesn't work with the Rosetta bridge while Logic is running in native mode (seems to be mostly IKM effects for me), but most work just fine - remember that Rosetta 2 is (mostly) ahead-of-time translation, rather than emulation, so the M1 is running ARM code, just not optimized.
> 
> The biggest issue with the M1, of course, is the RAM limit, but if you can fit everything into RAM (or a reasonable size swap file - see @Soundbed's thread where he tested a fairly heavy template on an M1 MBP), you should be fine. I did some testing recently that showed, against expectation, that running Logic in native ARM mode doesn't actually seem to impose a RAM penalty vs. running Logic in Rosetta mode.


Good to know. I’ve been using a 16gb RAM MacBook so having 16gb in an M1 mini doesn’t really bother me. It’ll be great once Apple releases 32gb and 64gb machines though!


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## davidson (Jul 30, 2021)

No issues with the M1 here apart from the thunderbolt ports randomly un-mounting external drives. Seems to be an issue which wont be fixed with this gen (judging by the forum posts and complaints), but you can bypass it if you connect the drive to a usb hub instead.

FWIW, rosetta hasnt been an issue for me. Some cpu heavy synths which would make my cpu glitch out with a single key on a 2013 mac pro 6-core are now virtually impossible to break on the M1. Ram limitations aside, I could never go back.


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## rnb_2 (Jul 30, 2021)

davidson said:


> No issues with the M1 here apart from the thunderbolt ports randomly un-mounting external drives. Seems to be an issue which wont be fixed with this gen (judging by the forum posts and complaints), but you can bypass it if you connect the drive to a usb hub instead.


Interesting - I haven't experienced this issue on either my M1 Mac mini or my M1 MacBook Air. The mini has almost always had drives connected via a powered Thunderbolt dock or hub, but I have a Thunderbolt SSD attached directly to one of the ports on my Air and have not had any disconnects.

Is this something that happens on computer sleep? If so, that would explain why I haven't seen it, since I only sleep my displays. I haven't used the Air mobile yet - it's essentially a desktop at this point - but I finally gave up on an iPad Pro being a solution for travel photography for my workflow. If I'd known just how good the M1 was going to be, I would have bought the Air on release day instead of the mini, but the latter made more sense at the time, and will make a fine server when the higher end Mac mini is released (hopefully with the MacBook Pros in Sep/Oct).


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## davidson (Jul 30, 2021)

rnb_2 said:


> Interesting - I haven't experienced this issue on either my M1 Mac mini or my M1 MacBook Air. The mini has almost always had drives connected via a powered Thunderbolt dock or hub, but I have a Thunderbolt SSD attached directly to one of the ports on my Air and have not had any disconnects.
> 
> Is this something that happens on computer sleep? If so, that would explain why I haven't seen it, since I only sleep my displays. I haven't used the Air mobile yet - it's essentially a desktop at this point - but I finally gave up on an iPad Pro being a solution for travel photography for my workflow. If I'd known just how good the M1 was going to be, I would have bought the Air on release day instead of the mini, but the latter made more sense at the time, and will make a fine server when the higher end Mac mini is released (hopefully with the MacBook Pros in Sep/Oct).


It only seems to affect the minis. I thought it was sleep related but it was also happening on screensaver too. Not a massive deal, just a little annoying. Other TB3 peripherals run fine, such as my apollo interface. 

I'll definitely be upgrading as soon as a more powerful model's released, but I'm more than impressed so far. It finally feels like technology has taken a leap forward rather than the incremental baby steps we've had for the last 10 years.


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## rnb_2 (Jul 30, 2021)

davidson said:


> It only seems to affect the minis. I thought it was sleep related but it was also happening on screensaver too. Not a massive deal, just a little annoying. Other TB3 peripherals run fine, such as my apollo interface.
> 
> I'll definitely be upgrading as soon as a more powerful model's released, but I'm more than impressed so far. It finally feels like technology has taken a leap forward rather than the incremental baby steps we've had for the last 10 years.


Yeah, the M1 is very impressive. They handle anything I throw at them (faster than the 2018 i7 mini the M1 mini replaced), runs absolutely silent, never gets hot. The GPU is also decent enough that not being able to use my Vega 56 eGPU isn't an issue - I can run a scaled 2560x1440 Retina resolution on my 4k display with no issues, which required the eGPU on the Intel mini because of the weak integrated GPU.

While it's nice that the M1 can handle some professional work (it helps that I've basically stopped at 20-megapixel cameras and 4k video), they really reset the bar for what can be expected from a premium entry-level computer. Apple will never compete at the $400 level, but the base MacBook Air is as close to a no-brainer recommendation for anyone buying a laptop for a student as you can get at $900 - that combination of performance, weight, and battery life just isn't available anywhere else.


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## Soundbed (Jul 31, 2021)

I didn’t have issues with the M1 running Kontakt via Rosetta 2 during my week of daily orchestral use / testing. I also didn’t have Thunderbolt drives disconnect but I was using a MBP not a Mini.


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## pcarrilho (Aug 7, 2021)

Hi!
I replied in another post 5 minutes ago about M1, and i copy to here my experience using M1 at Full Time on my music related work:


For 3 months now, I have been using my MacBook AIR M1 (16Gb Ram) as the main tool on my set (in addition to the mocbook air M1, I have a Mackbook Pro Intel 6 core I7 from 2018, and a Windows desktop I7 8700K with 64Gb of Ram ).

The M1 serves 90% of my current work, which at this moment is essentially:
- Lib Development for Kontakt
- Production Music
- Game Coposing
- some TV Composing

My main tools are:

DAW:
- LOGIC PRO X

SYNTHS:
- OMNISPHERE
- NEXUS 3
- ALCHEMY

Sample Libs:
- KONTAKT (with several orchestral libs)
- Spitfire BBC SO PRO
- Spitfire AROAD
- VSL
- EW OPUS
- Fabfilter Plugins
- OZONE
- UAD Plugins

On M1 I can run more than 95% of my projects. The only times I have to use one of the other PCs is when I really need to use OZONE (in some specific situation), or some big orchestral project that needs for example 64Gb of memory (but even in this case, sometimes use VE PRO using Desktop PC as sample server, continuing to use M1 as main computer.

I use it connected to a CALDIGIT HUB thunderbolt 3

Some observations:

- I ALWAYS use LOGIC in NATIVE mode (NEVER with Rosetta)
- OMNISPHERE, NEXUS and ALCHEMY are NATIVE M1... yeahhhhh!!!
- Kontak runs smoothly! ... even using Logic in native M1 mode;
- OPUS runs without problems!... even using Logic in native M1 mode;
- OZONE Does not work!
- SPITFIRE Doesn't work! I've tried it several times, following all the steps recommended by spitfire, without success, so at the moment I use these Libs less.
- FABFILTER is NATIVE!
- UAD runs without problems (hardware and plugins)
- As I mentioned in a post a few months ago, I tried doing a stress test, and I managed to run projects that used almost 30Gb (and I remember that the macbookj air M1 has "only" 16Gb).

I confess that at the time I thought about waiting for the new generation of M!s (M1X, M2...) But I decided to take a risk on this basic M1. At the end of this time of intensive use, I confess that I am delighted with this M1.
Although I don't use video editing much, this machine's performance in video editing is impressive (but here it's really good to use native M1 software like Final Cut).

I think for those who work exclusively with big orchestral projects, big templates, maybe the 16GB memory limitation might be a problem, but as I mentioned, it's the only situation where I use my desktop that has a lot of memory.

Another thing I love is the silence! And temperature!

I am really impressed with the performance of this little machine, and I will certainly upgrade to new models in the future.


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## pcarrilho (Nov 13, 2021)

Using my Air M1 macbook (16Gb Ram) with high demand Libs in terms of cpu processing resources and memory (stars war opening theme) using Spitfire Abbey Road One mixed with BBC SO. At this stage the processor rarely exceeds 25% of capacity. Impressive this "little" M1 processor/computer! (My 2018 Macbook with 6 core I7 can't run this project at all).


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## ridgero (Nov 13, 2021)

pcarrilho said:


> Using my Air M1 macbook (16Gb Ram) with high demand Libs in terms of cpu processing resources and memory (stars war opening theme) using Spitfire Abbey Road One mixed with BBC SO. At this stage the processor rarely exceeds 25% of capacity. Impressive this "little" M1 processor/computer! (My 2018 Macbook with 6 core I7 can't run this project at all).


Do you use the native Silicon versions of the SA plugins?


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## pcarrilho (Nov 13, 2021)

ridgero said:


> Do you use the native Silicon versions of the SA plugins?


Yes i do. 


ridgero said:


> Do you use the native Silicon versions of the SA plugins?


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## Alex Fraser (Apr 18, 2022)

Bump.

I'm sick of my Intel 2019 MbP wheezing itself through the day. The fans are rarely off full hoover mode.

Just noticed that with an Apple trade-in, a new M1 with 16gb can be mine for around £500. Which puts it in seriously tempting territory.

Are things more or less settled on the M1 front now? Literally all I use is Logic, Kontakt and the Spitfire Player so I should be good to go? I rarely step into full on orchestra territory so I'm thinking the mini might be a tidy stopgap. All comments from the front line welcome.


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## KEM (Apr 18, 2022)

Alex Fraser said:


> Bump.
> 
> I'm sick of my Intel 2019 MbP wheezing itself through the day. The fans are rarely off full hoover mode.
> 
> ...



You’ll be fine


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## mscp (Apr 18, 2022)

KallumS said:


> I bought an M1 Mac mini the moment it came out however due to some plugin companies dragging their feet on compatibility (mainly Native Instruments) I haven’t really used it for music.
> 
> Has anyone been using an M1 machine as their main music making device? If so, how well does Rosetta work for your plugins in general (especially NI)?


Yes. I have an M1 Max and I'm kind of struggling to use everything I need in it without issues. Luckily, I have a PC running VEP (Ethernet) --- until everything goes fully native.


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## rnb_2 (Apr 18, 2022)

Alex Fraser said:


> Bump.
> 
> I'm sick of my Intel 2019 MbP wheezing itself through the day. The fans are rarely off full hoover mode.
> 
> ...


I wouldn't say that things are settled yet - while many sample players are now native, there can still be the occasional odd spike - but with that mix of software, I think you'd be fine. I used an M1 mini and M1 MacBook Air for several months, and they're both brilliant computers.


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## Soundbed (Apr 19, 2022)

I still use my Intel MBP 2018 for about half of my work. Transitioning slowly to a Mac Studio. 

The M1 glitches during QuickTime screen captures, and some of my plugins (iZotope RX 7) don’t work with it … if your software is compatible then you should be fine.


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## mscp (Apr 19, 2022)

Soundbed said:


> I still use my Intel MBP 2018 for about half of my work. Transitioning slowly to a Mac Studio.
> 
> The M1 glitches during QuickTime screen captures, and some of my plugins (iZotope RX 7) don’t work with it … if your software is compatible then you should be fine.


Logic on the M1 seems to hang for a few milliseconds after I load a plugin and turn a knob/dial a parameter. It doesn't happen all the time, but I haven't seen things like that happening on the Intel version.


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## mgpqa1 (Apr 19, 2022)

KallumS said:


> Kontakt does work in theory, but it doesn’t run native and needs to be run using Rosetta.


According to NI's site, Kontakt (at the time of this writing) is the lone product with native M1 support:








Apple Silicon (M1) Compatibility News


On November 10th, 2020, Apple announced the release of the first Mac computers to contain Apple Silicon, their new generation of processors. Apple Silicon Macs require Apple’s latest macOS operatin...




support.native-instruments.com





And from the product page...


> Apple Silicon Macs (via Rosetta 2 & *natively on ARM in Standalone or in hosts that support it*)


I'm trying to think of which DAWs currently have native M1 support. Logic and... Digital Performer for macOS(?)... anyone know what else?


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## HCMarkus (Apr 19, 2022)

DP11.04 is working well on my Studio Ultra running in Native Mode. Soundtoys, Eventide, Waves, Arturia, Kontakt, all running natively. Interestingly, many non-Native AU plugins will run under Rosetta while DP is running Native. I've run into trouble with BFD3 and NI's FM8, but Altiverb is working (after installing, restarting, and opening with DP running in Rosetta Mode, then re-opening DP in Native Mode... this trick has worked with several different plugins that weren't being initially scanned by DP in Native Mode.) MODO Bass is working. I was able to move to the new machine mid-project with only a couple of issues, and the speed of the Mac Studio is making up for any time lost.


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## rnb_2 (Apr 19, 2022)

mgpqa1 said:


> According to NI's site, Kontakt (at the time of this writing) is the lone product with native M1 support:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Many DAWs are native now - Logic, DP, Studio One, Ableton, Bitwig, Tracktion WaveForm definitely are.


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## colony nofi (Apr 19, 2022)

rnb_2 said:


> Many DAWs are native now - Logic, DP, Studio One, Ableton, Bitwig, Tracktion WaveForm definitely are.


As is cubase 12 and end of month, nuendo 12. 

Am madly installing everything I can onto my new studio that arrived today. Things have been going quite well on the m1 max mbp. 

Will know loads more in the next week or two. 

I *was* going to just install all native only but since Rosetta has been quite smooth so far, I’m going to go down that route for now. Still about 30-40% of plugs are Rosetta (or worse) only.


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## KEM (Apr 19, 2022)

For those that use Cubase or are just curious about it in general, here’s all vst3 plugins I own/use that aren’t native yet (if you see one that you know for sure is native and I just might not have updated it yet let me know!)


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## sydcomposer (Apr 20, 2022)

HCMarkus said:


> DP11.04 is working well on my Studio Ultra running in Native Mode. Soundtoys, Eventide, Waves, Arturia, Kontakt, all running natively.



Nice to see a fellow DP user - and good to hear it’s working well, natively on the Ultra.

I‘m planning to upgrade to the Studio soon - but I’m finding it hard to figure out how much better the Ultra would be vs the Max. I often have 20-30 VIs running (mostly Kontakt, Omnisphere, U-he synths…) and plenty of AU plugins… I know that DP uses multicore processing so it obviously would help to have more cores… but I wonder how much I’d actually ‘feel’ the difference. Would a project using 20 cores processing @ 20% ‘feel’ any different to 10 cores processing @ 40%?

What made you choose the Ultra over the Max?


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## HCMarkus (Apr 20, 2022)

sydcomposer said:


> Nice to see a fellow DP user - and good to hear it’s working well, natively on the Ultra.
> 
> What made you choose the Ultra over the Max?


Here's what I wrote over on MOTUNation:



> Fully expecting Apple to release an M1 Plus/Max Mini, I was stunned by the emergence of the Studio. While still in a state of shock, I ordered the Ultra because I just couldn't resist. I am replacing my 2010 12 core 5,1 with the new machine, and fully intend for the new Mac to serve as my studio's heart for years to come. Whether this decision will ultimately turn out to be a cost-effective one is currently unclear.


To answer your question re: performance difference, there may be some projects that will push the Mac Studio hard enough that th Ultra will perform noticeably better than the Max. Will it be one of YOUR projects? Really hard to say. As you can see, my "logic" in going for the Ultra was not logical in a detailed sense; it was simply a Mac I could afford (as compared to the current Mac Pro) and plan to use for a long time. 

In line with the "long time" plan, I am paying the annual $60 fee for Apple Care. Unlike the cheesegrater Mac Pro (easy to replace CPU, GPU, RAM, Internal Storage, Motherboard, etc), these new machines are not easily user-upgradeable or repairable. OTOH, they run a lot cooler and quieter and are A LOT quicker and more powerful.


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## simfoe (Apr 21, 2022)

Last piece of the M1 puzzle for me are the Slate Digital plugins and then I can finally ditch Rosetta.

Looking at their website, we're expected to get native versions next month. Finally!


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## KEM (Apr 21, 2022)

simfoe said:


> Last piece of the M1 puzzle for me are the Slate Digital plugins and then I can finally ditch Rosetta.
> 
> Looking at their website, we're expected to get native versions next month. Finally!



We got it today!!


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## KEM (Apr 21, 2022)

(Almost) all Slate plugins are now Apple Silicon native!!


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## simfoe (Apr 22, 2022)

KEM said:


> We got it today!!


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## jneebz (Apr 22, 2022)

Soundbed said:


> and some of my plugins (iZotope RX 7) don’t work with it …


With regard to RX7…You mean doesn’t work natively, correct? Works with Rosetta 2? Or not at all? Curious with my Mac Studio coming soon…thanks


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## rnb_2 (Apr 22, 2022)

jneebz said:


> With regard to RX7…You mean doesn’t work natively, correct? Works with Rosetta 2? Or not at all? Curious with my Mac Studio coming soon…thanks


Not sure about RX7 - RX8 worked via Rosetta (though was not supported, I think), but was a bit slow. Izotope is currently offering me a $49.99 upgrade to RX9 from RX8, so check if you have something similar.


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## colony nofi (Apr 22, 2022)

rnb_2 said:


> Not sure about RX7 - RX8 worked via Rosetta (though was not supported, I think), but was a bit slow. Izotope is currently offering me a $49.99 upgrade to RX9 from RX8, so check if you have something similar.


And confirming rx9 works very well under Rosetta on Mac studio. 

Has anyone figured out any 2C audio plugins under Rosetta?


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## Soundbed (Apr 23, 2022)

jneebz said:


> With regard to RX7…You mean doesn’t work natively, correct? Works with Rosetta 2? Or not at all? Curious with my Mac Studio coming soon…thanks


I have a producer bundle with RX 7 Standard plug-ins like ‘Voice De-Click’ and they do not work at all on my M1, not even with Rosetta.

The audio is silenced when they are inserted and active. The plugin GUI does not appear on screen ever (only the surrounding DAW controls for every plugin displays). 

It’s the best voice de-click I have. I may need to upgrade to RX 9 Standard to continue using it.


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## jneebz (Apr 23, 2022)

Soundbed said:


> I have a producer bundle with RX 7 Standard plug-ins like ‘Voice De-Click’ and they do not work at all on my M1, not even with Rosetta.
> 
> The audio is silenced when they are inserted and active. The plugin GUI does not appear on screen ever (only the surrounding DAW controls for every plugin displays).
> 
> It’s the best voice de-click I have. I may need to upgrade to RX 9 Standard to continue using it.


Ah crud. Thanks for the reply. Guess upgrading will be my future also…


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## HCMarkus (Apr 23, 2022)

I generally use RX in stand-alone mode. I drag and drop files from my DAW, process, then import. I don't use it often, but it has saved the day on more than a few occasions... weird acoustic guitar string finger noises, noisy electric guitars with that last chord ringing into a hissy fit, sampled pianos when the last chord decays into a noisy mess. I've got other tools like better for real-time processing. I haven't tested in depth, but even RX5 seems like it's working under Rosetta.

Pretty sure RX9 is supposed to be Apple Silicon Native now.


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## Soundbed (Apr 25, 2022)

HCMarkus said:


> I generally use RX in stand-alone mode.


Can't believe I've never actually launched the standalone version. Until today. I guess it's because I always put my mouth de-click plugin after my gate and before my de-esser, but I could certainly throw my voice over files into RX standalone from now on. Thanks for the reply!

* (I launched it on my Intel i9, but maybe it will run in Rosetta on the M1, even if the plugin version does not.)


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## davidson (Apr 25, 2022)

KEM said:


> We got it today!!


Weird, it doesn't seem like they actually announced anything?


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## jneebz (Apr 25, 2022)

Soundbed said:


> Can't believe I've never actually launched the standalone version. Until today. I guess it's because I always put my mouth de-click plugin after my gate and before my de-esser, but I could certainly throw my voice over files into RX standalone from now on. Thanks for the reply!
> 
> * (I launched it on my Intel i9, but maybe it will run in Rosetta on the M1, even if the plugin version does not.)


Not sure what DAW you use, but in Cubase, Direct Offline Processing is a super easy way to export an audio file, edit in RX, then send back….easier than export-edit-import IMO.


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## simfoe (Apr 25, 2022)

davidson said:


> Weird, it doesn't seem like they actually announced anything?


Not all of the plugins in the All Access Pass are native yet, I think we're waiting on ANA2 and FG-X, so maybe they'll do the announcement once those two are ready. I'm a big fan of ANA2 so I'm looking forward to that.

I had a bit of trouble with the update overall though, actually. The plugins would pass validation in Logic but would throw an error (something to do with an audio plugin causing the system to be unstable) and then Logic would quit. This was a project with only Slate and Brainworx/Plugin Alliance plugins - and all of the latter are working great on M1.

So might continue using Rosetta for now and see if the next update fixes it.


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## KEM (Apr 25, 2022)

simfoe said:


> Not all of the plugins in the All Access Pass are native yet, I think we're waiting on ANA2 and FG-X, so maybe they'll do the announcement once those two are ready. I'm a big fan of ANA2 so I'm looking forward to that.
> 
> I had a bit of trouble with the update overall though, actually. The plugins would pass validation in Logic but would throw an error (something to do with an audio plugin causing the system to be unstable) and then Logic would quit. This was a project with only Slate and Brainworx/Plugin Alliance plugins - and all of the latter are working great on M1.
> 
> So might continue using Rosetta for now and see if the next update fixes it.



The Liquidsonics plugins aren’t native yet either, at least Lustrous Plates isn’t, I didn’t take a look at Verbsuite yet


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## simfoe (Apr 25, 2022)

KEM said:


> The Liquidsonics plugins aren’t native yet either, at least Lustrous Plates isn’t, I didn’t take a look at Verbsuite yet


Liquidsonics just released their update today I think. VSC is already native


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## KEM (Apr 25, 2022)

simfoe said:


> Liquidsonics just released their update today I think. VSC is already native



I’ll give it a look as soon as I can


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## polyfonic (Apr 25, 2022)

I wasnt aware of the issue with M1 and plugins compability...
What will happen when they launch the M2? Will we experience the same problems?
It looks to me that most of the plugs I use, now are "Native".

I'm waiting for the M2, but with these kind of issues, I'm considering the recent MB-Air instead.
Anyone with a good advice in what do to?


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## KEM (Apr 25, 2022)

polyfonic said:


> I wasnt aware of the issue with M1 and plugins compability...
> What will happen when they launch the M2? Will we experience the same problems?
> It looks to me that most of the plugs I use, now are "Native".
> 
> ...



It’s the same architecture so yes, but you’ll be fine, running in Rosetta doesn’t cause much of a performance hit


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## rnb_2 (Apr 25, 2022)

polyfonic said:


> I wasnt aware of the issue with M1 and plugins compability...
> What will happen when they launch the M2? Will we experience the same problems?
> It looks to me that most of the plugs I use, now are "Native".
> 
> ...


Once plugins are Native, we shouldn't see big problems when new generations arrive, at least on the base M(x), M(x) Pro, and M(x) Max variants. The M1 Ultra required some software "tuning" in some cases, just to optimize performance over the much larger core count, but the 4-8+ performance core chips should be fine, generation to generation.


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## HCMarkus (Apr 26, 2022)

I think rnb_2 speaks truth... the move from X86 to ARM is a big one, but once things are ported to ARM (Apple Silicon), future required adjustments to code should be nominal. We're getting over the hump now, just like we who use Apple machines have had to do before, when Apple moved from OS9 to OSX and from Power PC to Intel CPUs, lo those many (17 or more) years ago.

I've actually been pretty darn impressed with how well Rosetta2 has performed. Although exceptions exist, most of my non-native software has continued to perform very well under Rosetta2, and I'm using my Mac Studio full-time now. I was even able to switch from the Mac Pro to this machine mid-project... the new Mac is so much faster, the time I spent setting up the new computer has been eclipsed by the efficiency I have been enjoying in course of my work.


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## David Kudell (Apr 26, 2022)

Fun fact: Apple built Rosetta 2 translation acceleration into the M1 chip itself, which is partly why it works so fast (and why native Apple Silicon apps often aren’t much faster than the Rosetta 2 versions).


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## Loïc D (Apr 26, 2022)

I transitioned to MBP M1Max recently.
My main concern was the lack of OSCulator plugin but I eventually found a workaround.
Otherwise everything is fine.
That machine is a beast and I have yet to hear the fans.


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## KEM (Apr 26, 2022)

David Kudell said:


> Fun fact: Apple built Rosetta 2 translation acceleration into the M1 chip itself, which is partly why it works so fast (and why native Apple Silicon apps often aren’t much faster than the Rosetta 2 versions).



Was not aware of this, very interesting


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## colony nofi (May 1, 2022)

So I've had the opportunity to now run a full composition project thru the Mac studio.
Full orchestra + sound design patches + loads of extras. 
And - well, its a mixed bag.
Lets get the negatives out of the way.
I installed everything from scratch. What I didn't realise is that when you install spitfire libs (which are not Kontakt based) it installs the version that is related to how you are running the spitfire app. At least I think that's what's going on. It meant that when I went to cubase 12 (and now Nuendo 12) under rosetta (which I have to run for other plugins) none of the spitfire plugs would work. I had to go back into the spitfire app and one by one repair them. Major pain.
Things are unstable. In any one 8 hour session I likely had complete "poofs" of cubase/nuendo around 4 or 5 times. And I couldn't put it down to any particular sample lib. 80% are in Kontakt. Wotan/Freja seemed to be the biggest culprits in Kontakt, but occasionally in spitfire Eric whiticre and BBCSO I'd get the poofs as well. I don't know what to do about this. I'm not used to an unstable environment for writing. This seems like there's not real solution right now. Is it cubase, Kontakt, spitfire sampler? Interactions of all of them? Rosetta? (will it go away without rosetta)
I composed WITHOUT plugins just to help with knowing about stability. 

To the good bits.

This machine can definitely handle quite a bit more than my trashcan Mac Pro composition machine. Which you'd expect - but also, its good for it to be confirmed. There was never a time that I thought I might get to over-taxing the machine. There was even a section of piano with fast repeated notes with sus pedal down, which often pushes things (LOTS of voices) for texture, but it didn't worry it. I am on 256 sample buffers - which is down from my usual 512 on my old machine.

And then there was the final render - which was TONNES quicker. Like - incredibly so. Now, there wasn't big fabfilter plugs / reverbs getting in the way - it was straight rendering Kontakt / Spitfire instruments. But to get a 3 min piece rendered in under a minute with stems was great. And then making it into a video felt more than 3x as fast as I'm used to. Some of that could be Steinberg changing things with N/C12 - but I have not had time to test.

I'm doing a large orchestral record for this piece in the next 2 weeks - which I'll then have mixed inside Nuendo. The piece also needs a vocal recording - which I might do at our studios (and just do straight into the session - will see. Budgets / availability of folk etc will come into play). 
The final mix will start pushing the plugin side. Likely 200 odd audio tracks. If there's still instability I'll render out any kontakt/spitfire instruments that are still used. Will report more. Then there is an install mix is for a non-standard immersive cinema room. It is a bespoke 15.2 system which will be mixed on site in about 6 weeks time. That final mixing for the space will be done in Nuendo on this machine as well, with the old Mac pro's being bought as backup just in case.


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## smashprod (May 17, 2022)

Pardon me if this has already been answered-- I want to replace my cheesegrater with a Mac Studio, but want to run DP11 in native mode. So far the only plugs that are not yet native (that I depend on) are Altiverb and VEPro 7. I gather that I can use the AU version of Altiverb and still run DP in native mode, so the final sticking point is VEPro 7 (all my VIs run on slave computers). VSL has been non-committal on a release date, though they claim it's a priority. Are there any workarounds _other_ that running DP11 under Rosetta 2?


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## ReleaseCandidate (May 17, 2022)

David Kudell said:


> Fun fact: Apple built Rosetta 2 translation acceleration into the M1 chip itself,


A part of it, M1 switches to x86 memory ordering for Rosetta code. So Apple can get away with only translating the x86 instructions to ARM64 ones.


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## AndrewS (May 17, 2022)

Loïc D said:


> My main concern was the lack of OSCulator plugin but I eventually found a workaround.


Are you running it in Rosetta? I’d be up a creek without OSCulator. Their forum seems to be pretty dead on the subject of whether or not native M1 compatibility is coming apart from one post asking when that’s going to happen.


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## rnb_2 (May 17, 2022)

smashprod said:


> Pardon me if this has already been answered-- I want to replace my cheesegrater with a Mac Studio, but want to run DP11 in native mode. So far the only plugs that are not yet native (that I depend on) are Altiverb and VEPro 7. I gather that I can use the AU version of Altiverb and still run DP in native mode, so the final sticking point is VEPro 7 (all my VIs run on slave computers). VSL has been non-committal on a release date, though they claim it's a priority. Are there any workarounds _other_ that running DP11 under Rosetta 2?


The OS will try to run *any* Intel AU via the built-in AUHostingCompatibilityService when Logic is in Native mode. This generally works well - the code is actually translated to Arm64 code on first run, so it's not doing emulation - but some plugins perform better than others. I'm sure there are several people who are running VEPro on an Apple Silicon Mac and can chime in on how it performs, but at this point, if you can get your important plugins to run satisfactorily in Logic in Native mode, that's preferable to running in Rosetta mode.


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## el-bo (Jun 12, 2022)

davidson said:


> It only seems to affect the minis.


Do you know if this issue has been resolved? Im currently in the market for an M1 Mini, and will need to connect my library ssd.


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## davidson (Jun 13, 2022)

el-bo said:


> Do you know if this issue has been resolved? Im currently in the market for an M1 Mini, and will need to connect my library ssd.


I highly doubt it. I switched to a studio and never had a single disconnect in months, it was heaven. Then I updated to 12.4 a couple of weeks ago and I've had several random disconnects since. I've been in touch with tech support several times and get the same useless advice. It's obviously OS related. If the studio wasn't so impressive in all other aspects I'd almost be tempted to ditch apple, _almost_...


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## el-bo (Jun 13, 2022)

davidson said:


> I highly doubt it. I switched to a studio and never had a single disconnect in months, it was heaven. Then I updated to 12.4 a couple of weeks ago and I've had several random disconnects since. I've been in touch with tech support several times and get the same useless advice. It's obviously OS related. If the studio wasn't so impressive in all other aspects I'd almost be tempted to ditch apple, _almost_...


Thanks! Gone down a bit of a rabbit-hole since I posted. Seems to be some solutions, but without a machine in front of me I have no way to test.

Are you using Samsung 'T' drives, by any chance?


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## davidson (Jun 13, 2022)

el-bo said:


> Thanks! Gone down a bit of a rabbit-hole since I posted. Seems to be some solutions, but without a machine in front of me I have no way to test.
> 
> Are you using Samsung 'T' drives, by any chance?


Believe me, I've spent so much time down rabbit holes with this one that I've grown a little bushy tail. I'm running a mixture of sandisk extremes, crucial mx500s, and samsung qvos in a mixture of mains powered ssd hubs, portable usb cases, and standalone units (sandisk extreme). The issue isn't specific to any of the combinations.


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## el-bo (Jun 13, 2022)

davidson said:


> Believe me, I've spent so much time down rabbit holes with this one that I've grown a little bushy tail. I'm running a mixture of sandisk extremes, crucial mx500s, and samsung qvos in a mixture of mains powered ssd hubs, portable usb cases, and standalone units (sandisk extreme). The issue isn't specific to any of the combinations.


Hmmm...I've gone from nervous excitement about potentially updating my age-old laptop, to being just nervous :(


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## rnb_2 (Jun 13, 2022)

el-bo said:


> Hmmm...I've gone from nervous excitement about potentially updating my age-old laptop, to being just nervous :(


I don't have the M1 mini any more (and my wife has my M1 Air), but I never saw this issue during the time I had it. I never sleep my computers or use a screen saver - I just sleep the screen after 10-30 minutes, and I never had a problem with drives ejecting. I don't know if I just got lucky, but that was my experience.


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## el-bo (Jun 13, 2022)

rnb_2 said:


> I don't have the M1 mini any more (and my wife has my M1 Air), but I never saw this issue during the time I had it. I never sleep my computers or use a screen saver - I just sleep the screen after 10-30 minutes, and I never had a problem with drives ejecting. I don't know if I just got lucky, but that was my experience.


It does seem that a lot of issues stem from sleep functionality, but not all of them. Seems that some have had success using a small powered hub, but with only one drive connected. Others have had all manner of random luck (or lack thereof).


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## HCMarkus (Jun 13, 2022)

On a Mac Studio Ultra, I have not experienced drives disconnecting. Monterey 12.3.1 and now 12.4. External Drives I'm currently running are:

Two Seagate 8TB Backup Plus connected to unpowered USB3.0 Hub connected to Mac via USB C
Costco currently has a very good price ($120) on these drives: https://www.costco.com/seagate-back...data-recovery-services.product.100458004.html


The hub: 

One Toshiba 2TB HD in USB3.0 Drive Dock connected to USB Hub built into one of the above-referenced Seagates. (This drive is sometimes swapped for other BU/Long-Term Storage drives)

Dock: 

Two SATA3 SDs (Samsung 860 Evo 500GB and Crucial MX500 1TB) in USB3.1 Cases connected to unpowered USB3.0 Hub connected to Mac via USB C (Same hub as above)

SATA SSD Cases: 

One Samsung 970 Evo Plus 2TB in OWC Envoy Express Thunderbolt case direct TB to Mac


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## davidson (Jun 14, 2022)

HCMarkus said:


> On a Mac Studio Ultra, I have not experienced drives disconnecting. Monterey 12.3.1 and now 12.4. External Drives I'm currently running are:
> 
> Two Seagate 8TB Backup Plus connected to unpowered USB3.0 Hub connected to Mac via USB C
> Costco currently has a very good price ($120) on these drives: https://www.costco.com/seagate-back...data-recovery-services.product.100458004.html
> ...



Consider yourself lucky! I do believe some people are just unlucky with their combinations of hubs, cases, docks, connection types, and OSX updates...it's just a lottery to find one that works. 

How long have you been running 12.4?


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## davidson (Jun 14, 2022)

rnb_2 said:


> I don't have the M1 mini any more (and my wife has my M1 Air), but I never saw this issue during the time I had it. I never sleep my computers or use a screen saver - I just sleep the screen after 10-30 minutes, and I never had a problem with drives ejecting. I don't know if I just got lucky, but that was my experience.


Same, never use sleep, always sleep screen instead (ctrl+shift+power?)


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## HCMarkus (Jun 14, 2022)

davidson said:


> How long have you been running 12.4?


I installed on or shortly after release date.

I listed the hubs/drives I'm using for the potential benefit of others. It is my hope that most folks are simply not bothering to post they aren't having the reported issues.


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