The Apple quandary (minor rant)

[wayne_rowley]

Apple also has a "lottery" of compatibility issues based on OS updates you can't prevent and can break things.

I’m not flinging mud. I’m well aware of this and I often wait 6-8 months before updating the OS.

Here‘s the big difference, with Apple I can choose to update or not. Microsoft has taken that choice away. I can only defer a Windows Update, and only for a while. I can’t prevent it.

 

[Technostica]

I don't think it matters if somebody is an actual pro or not. If somebody needs more than 32 GB of RAM for whatever they're doing, then Apple obviously considers those users as having pro needs, even if somebody is using their computer for a hobby. And Apple will gladly sell those people a higher end model in order to meet their needs.

Another thing to perhaps consider is that the higher-end chips have a much greater memory bandwidth than the lower end chips, so even if somebody could cram a bunch of RAM inside the lowest end chip, it would be worse than having the same amount of RAM on the higher end chips.

Only if your workload is bandwidth constrained and a lot aren't.
The bandwidth is there more for video workloads.
Even the base M1 has a large bandwidth that should suffice for audio.

 

[wayne_rowley]

I don't think it matters if somebody is an actual pro or not. If somebody needs more than 32 GB of RAM for whatever they're doing, then Apple obviously considers those users as having pro needs, even if somebody is using their computer for a hobby. And Apple will gladly sell those people a higher end model in order to meet their needs.

Which is my point, and problem.

But it’s not ‘pro’ just a niche use case, and one that was never an issue or constraint before AS.

 

[David Kudell]

To answer your question, the reason for this is that on Apple Silicon the memory is part of the chip, not just ram sticks that can be added, meaning that to increase the memory on the base chips it would also significantly increase the price.

Apple Silicon relies on integrated memory, for better and for worse

Apple's Unified Memory Architecture first brought changes to the Mac with Apple Silicon M1 chips. There are clear architectural benefits for the hardware — and it is both good and bad for consumers. Here's why.

appleinsider.com

This is the reason. It's not a conspiracy. It's just the way the chips work. They're not like PCs which have separate little slots for you to put your memory sticks in. On Apple Silicon, when you upgrade your chip, you're just getting a bigger version of the base chip, hence more RAM on the chip.

Knowing that, now what you're asking is for them to make an entry-level M3 chip that somehow has like 64GB of RAM on it. Making that makes no sense for Apple. Like .01 percent of people would buy that, because the total percentage of Mac buyers who are casual users who happen to like writing orchestral music are very few in the grand scheme of things. But there'd be all these Macs with that configuration nobody really wants and that takes away resources from making what people do want. Trust me, they know exactly how much to make of every chip, they have it down to a science.

 

[Technostica]

I’m not flinging mud. I’m well aware of this and I often wait 6-8 months before updating the OS.

Here‘s the big difference, with Apple I can choose to update or not. Microsoft has taken that choice away. I can only defer a Windows Update, and only for a while. I can’t prevent it.

I haven't had a forced upgrade on W10 Pro ever.
I do manually update after two years at most as they stop offering security updates for old versions eventually.
But two years is long enough for things to settle down in terms of bugs.
I can't speak for the Home version or W11.

 

[Pier]

But, Apple, why or why do you assume that ONLY power users want a lot of RAM!

Users that need more than 16GB of RAM are probably less than 10% of Mac users.

Users that need more than 16GB of RAM and don't need a Pro CPU are probably... huh... you and a couple other guys.



The number of users who might want a ton of RAM with the base chips is so small that it's probably an anomaly in Apple's eyes.

But it’s not ‘pro’ just a niche use case, and one that was never an issue or constraint before AS.

Because until Apple Silicon memory wasn't integrated into the SOC. At least for Macs. Of course it's always been the case for iPhones and iPads.

 

[wayne_rowley]

This is the reason. It's not a conspiracy. It's just the way the chips work. They're not like PCs which have separate little slots for you to put your memory sticks in. On Apple Silicon, when you upgrade your chip, you're just getting a bigger version of the base chip, hence more RAM on the chip.

Knowing that, now what you're asking is for them to make an entry-level M3 chip that somehow has like 64GB of RAM on it. Making that makes no sense for Apple. Like .01 percent of people would buy that, because the total percentage of Mac buyers who are casual users who happen to like writing orchestral music are very few in the grand scheme of things. Sorry!

Agreed, and understood. But Apple are going to price some hobbyists out of the Mac market. It is hard to justify the cost of a Max or Ultra processor system when frankly it’s not the CPU or GPU power I need, only the RAM.

 

[wayne_rowley]

I haven't had a forced upgrade on W10 Pro ever.
I do manually update after two years at most as they stop offering security updates for old versions eventually.
But two years is long enough for things to settle down in terms of bugs.
I can't speak for the Home version or W11.

Yes, that’s true for Win 10 Pro. But not for Home, and I’m not sure it’s true for Win 11 Pro now (though I don’t use Win 11 yet thankfully).

 

[rezoneight]

Agreed, and understood. But Apple are going to price some hobbyists out of the Mac market. It is hard to justify the cost of a Max or Ultra processor system when frankly it’s not the CPU or GPU power I need, only the RAM.

Absolutely. I couldn't afford a Max to get more than 36GB. Just not going to happen. But when I had my i9-based 5K iMac I was able to add more later. I wish it were the case now.

 

[vitocorleone123]

Agreed, and understood. But Apple are going to price some hobbyists out of the Mac market.

If you aren’t wiling to pay, they really don’t care. it just boosts their image to be used by “pros” and sells even more to that market.

I don’t agree but I’m also not a trillion dollar company.

 

[Technostica]

We are starting to see much higher density DDR5 chips, so in theory Apple could probably soon double the RAM configurations available compared to the past.
I am talking about technical limits rather than design caps that suit product segmentation.
It's good news for the high end where I assume they had hard technical limits.

 

[David Kudell]

Agreed, and understood. But Apple are going to price some hobbyists out of the Mac market. It is hard to justify the cost of a Max or Ultra processor system when frankly it’s not the CPU or GPU power I need, only the RAM.

Yeah, I sympathize with you. The base chips are so darn good that it's too bad there's no way to modify the RAM on the lower models. But it's just the way the chips work. However, you can lower the DFD buffer in Kontakt and Sine player to dramatically lower RAM usage.

 

[wayne_rowley]

Because until Apple Silicon memory wasn't integrated into the SOC. At least for Macs. Of course it's always been the case for iPhones and iPads.

I occasionally wonder what stops Apple making versions of the chips without the integrated memory on the SoC. Many reasons, but I wonder if one is that the performance degradation would be small, the practicality of the upgradability high and therefore people wouldn’t buy the SoCs with memory.

Let‘s be honest, they’ve produced a Mac Pro with integrated memory and no user upgradability of RAM - it’s never coming back to a Mac.

 

[mat1]

Agreed, and understood. But Apple are going to price some hobbyists out of the Mac market. It is hard to justify the cost of a Max or Ultra processor system when frankly it’s not the CPU or GPU power I need, only the RAM.

Just be happy your hobby isn't horse racing or Porsches. High ram needs for music is a niche within a niche within a niche.

 

[David Kudell]

Let‘s be honest, they’ve produced a Mac Pro with integrated memory and no user upgradability of RAM - it’s never coming back to a Mac.

I have the 192GB M2 Ultra and it really is enough. I'm running 1800 tracks and only using 140GB.

 

[vitocorleone123]

Yes, that’s true for Win 10 Pro. But not for Home, and I’m not sure it’s true for Win 11 Pro now (though I don’t use Win 11 yet thankfully).

You can disable in Win 11 pro. Just more Mac rumors

I don’t bother - my computer is always backed up and it’s easy to restore. Something that should be the case for anyone using their computer for a profession, and encouraged for everyone else.

 

[Technostica]

Yeah, I sympathize with you. The base chips are so darn good that it's too bad there's no way to modify the RAM on the lower models. But it's just the way the chips work. However, you can lower the DFD buffer in Kontakt and Sine player to dramatically lower RAM usage.

It's the way they were designed.
They needed a cheap Base M chip for the sub one thousand dollar devices.
It seems a reasonable compromise given the overall architecture.

 

[wayne_rowley]

Just be happy your hobby isn't horse racing or Porsches. High ram needs for music is a niche within a niche within a niche.

My other hobby is much cheaper… I keep tarantulas!

 

[Pier]

Apple is of course happy to take our money, like any other company. But this is not a conspiracy. They decided to integrate the memory to get massive bandwidths and sharing the memory with the GPU.

Intel CPUs only go up to 94GB/s.

IIRC the AMD Epyc CPUs can get as high as something like 200GB/s.

The Apple M3 Max goes up to 400GB/s.

Let‘s be honest, they’ve produced a Mac Pro with integrated memory and no user upgradability of RAM - it’s never coming back to a Mac.

Yep. It's never coming back.

 

[wayne_rowley]

Apple is of course happy to take our money, like any other company. But this is not a conspiracy. They decided to integrate the memory to get massive bandwidths and sharing the memory with the GPU.

Intel CPUs only go up to 94GB/s.

IIRC the AMD Epyc CPUs can get as high as something like 200GB/s.

The Apple M3 Max goes up to 400GB/s.

I don’t think it’s a conspiracy. It is very frustrating nonetheless.

Granted the memory access and bandwidth is faster, but how much does that benefit us musicians? Consensus seems to be its more helpful when working with video.