p.3 #1 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
PIOK wrote:
None of you mention what MacMini M4 Pro you are using?
Memory...?
CPU ?
When I check upgrade of Mac Mini M4 PRO is only like $300 less than studio ( no way I will give up all ports and thermals for such low difference ) Studio looks better to me
I got the 12-core CPU/16-core Neural engine mini M4 Pro
48BG unified memory
2TB SSD
10GB Ethernet upgrade.
I'm running it with two 27" monitors.
I have more ports that I can use — 3 Thunderbolt ports plus 2 USB-C on the mini, and another 6 USB-C via the monitors for a total of 11 TB/USB-C ports. (I'm not counting the 2 — one per monitor — used to connect the monitors to the mini.)
p.3 #2 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
The new Macstudios are coming out tomorrow. I'm sure in a few days that ArtisRight will have some good videos. I'll be curious how the Mac mini compares to the Studio (depending on the config of the mini).
I have the M1Max Macstudio and it has a lot of life left in it but I wouldn't be surprised if I move to a macMini on my next upgrade in a few years (3 or more).
p.3 #3 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
BillD208 wrote:
The new Macstudios are coming out tomorrow. I'm sure in a few days that ArtisRight will have some good videos. I'll be curious how the Mac mini compares to the Studio (depending on the config of the mini).
I have the M1Max Macstudio and it has a lot of life left in it but I wouldn't be surprised if I move to a macMini on my next upgrade in a few years (3 or more).
When looking at a comparison like that it is useful to keep a few real world perspectives in mind.
1. The new studio machines, at least at the middle and higher end of the spectrum will undoubtedly spec faster than even the mini M4 Pro.
2. Having the fastest and mostest only matters if a) you are proud of having the fastest and the mostest for its own sake or b) the better specs actually make a meaningful difference in your work.
3. Typical photography apps (like the Adobe products) already run really fast on teh M4 Pro mini, so for most photographers using such applications the difference is likely to be tiny if even perceptible.
4. All bets are off if you are doing truly processor-intensive stuff like high-end video work or maybe frequently mass processing raw files.
I’ve been using computers for a long time, including back when you really needed a truly high-end machine to do things we take for granted today — audio recording, photography post-processing, etc. It took me until the last decade or so to finally get it through my (sometimes thick) skull that modern computing has advanced to the point that the number of people who really need the expensive high-end machines is now quite small. It is still kind of hard for me to wrap my brain around how powerful that little mini is.
At a high level, it sounds like the M3 Ultra shines more for video editing than photo editing. I am curious to see someone benchmark an AI program like photo AI on the M3 Ultra vs M4 Max.
p.3 #6 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
gdanmitchell wrote:
When looking at a comparison like that it is useful to keep a few real world perspectives in mind.
1. The new studio machines, at least at the middle and higher end of the spectrum will undoubtedly spec faster than even the mini M4 Pro.
2. Having the fastest and mostest only matters if a) you are proud of having the fastest and the mostest for its own sake or b) the better specs actually make a meaningful difference in your work.
3. Typical photography apps (like the Adobe products) already run really fast on teh M4 Pro mini, so for most photographers using such applications the difference is likely to be tiny if even perceptible.
4. All bets are off if you are doing truly processor-intensive stuff like high-end video work or maybe frequently mass processing raw files.
I’ve been using computers for a long time, including back when you really needed a truly high-end machine to do things we take for granted today — audio recording, photography post-processing, etc. It took me until the last decade or so to finally get it through my (sometimes thick) skull that modern computing has advanced to the point that the number of people who really need the expensive high-end machines is now quite small. It is still kind of hard for me to wrap my brain around how powerful that little mini is.
I think with more and more MP’s and AI usage it’s actually swinging the other way, depending on use, but certainly for a lot of stills photographers.
Take a 60-100 MP file and start adding a lot of layers and/or panos and stacks, high-rez mode, etc… and you’ll want lots of RAM and GPU, and potentially NPU once that becomes more efficient.
Not doing that, then you’ve nothing to worry about for awhile.
Then there’s the fact that buying a middle-ground machine, but not under-powered, and upgrading more often is more cost-effective than trying to future-proof.
I do think as soon as you upgrade the M4 Mini Pro a bit, it becomes a bad value compared the base studio, just as it was with the last Studio over the equal generation mini, and this time the base Studio even has more RAM.
That’s not necessarily true for everyone, but for many of us it’s the case.
Art actually shows GPU does matter, and that will only increase.
Adobe is also getting better utilizing multi-core.
p.3 #7 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
BillD208 wrote:
Adding internal storage from a kickstarter project is terrible advice. You've got a Thunderbay and are good to go.
Not true. Ever see a video on what it involves? It’s not even that hard for a fairly handy person. Even easier now that they’re just taking that process and making it available to us.
People already doing it on the Minis. I’ll get a 512SSD and put the savings towards more ram. Or just go external now that that isn’t slower than internal.
p.3 #8 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
PIOK wrote:
None of you mention what MacMini M4 Pro you are using?
Memory...?
CPU ?
When I check upgrade of Mac Mini M4 PRO is only like $300 less than studio ( no way I will give up all ports and thermals for such low difference ) Studio looks better to me
I have a M4 Mac Mini Pro - 12core, 48GB ram, 512 SSD - $1800 without any discounts. That’s the most I’d configure a M4 Mac Mini Pro, otherwise I’d go with a M4 Studio Max - 16 core, 48GB ram, 512 SSD - $2500. That’s a $700 difference - so it’s worth a pause.
(Realistically, if I went with an M4 studio max, I’d configure it with 64GB RAM - which would take the price to $2700, and a total of $900 price difference. That’s certainly worth considering whether you’d see the benefit or not)
p.3 #9 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
mike_the_kraken wrote:
I have a M4 Mac Mini Pro - 12core, 48GB ram, 512 SSD - $1800 without any discounts. That’s the most I’d configure a M4 Mac Mini Pro, otherwise I’d go with a M4 Studio Max - 16 core, 48GB ram, 512 SSD - $2500. That’s a $700 difference - so it’s worth a pause.
(Realistically, if I went with an M4 studio max, I’d configure it with 64GB RAM - which would take the price to $2700, and a total of $900 price difference. That’s certainly worth considering whether you’d see the benefit or not)
Obviously we should pick by our needs first and foremost, unless you’re well-off enough to not care. I look at that first comparison and think for 200 more I’d think hard about getting a base Studio over that mini. I’d be at 36GB’s instead of 48, and way ahead on everything else, including thermals, which can be an issue on the Mini Pro when pushing it. There’s the 10GB Ethernet on the Studio as well.
I think we think about it similarly as I noticed you don’t mention the upgraded Pro chip, going with that if you think you need it, makes the Studio a no-brainer. I was excited to see the new M4 minis, but figured, like the last round, that for me the Studio was going to make more sense once again.
p.3 #10 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
Depending on the type of photography you do (I know nothing about editing video) you can save more time using some of the AI editing programs out there rather than upgrading from M1 to M4 or paying more for M4Max instead of M4 pro etc.
For portraits Evoto AI will save you (possibly) hours of time if you have a big edit session with a couple dozen portraits.
For large batches of files Imagen AI will save you a lot of time compared to editing in LR.
Everybody's needs are different but you might save $$$ by changing your process rather than buying a new machine (which can also be fun I have to admit).
p.3 #11 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
aman74 wrote:
I think with more and more MP’s and AI usage it’s actually swinging the other way, depending on use, but certainly for a lot of stills photographers.
Take a 60-100 MP file and start adding a lot of layers and/or panos and stacks, high-rez mode, etc… and you’ll want lots of RAM and GPU, and potentially NPU once that becomes more efficient.
Not doing that, then you’ve nothing to worry about for awhile.
Then there’s the fact that buying a middle-ground machine, but not under-powered, and upgrading more often is more cost-effective than trying to future-proof.
I do think as soon as you upgrade the M4 Mini Pro a bit, it becomes a bad value compared the base studio, just as it was with the last Studio over the equal generation mini, and this time the base Studio even has more RAM.
That’s not necessarily true for everyone, but for many of us it’s the case.
Art actually shows GPU does matter, and that will only increase.
Adobe is also getting better utilizing multi-core.
I shoot a 50MP and a 40MP camera, and there’s no issue from that with the mini M4 Pro.
My workflow is Bridge/ACR/Photoshop based and shoot raw, do extensive pre-processing in ACR, and then always use layers (sometimes quite a few of them) in Photoshop. No issues.
Again, my actual experience is that the mini is quite capable. In fact, I’m pretty sure that if we set up two systems, one based on a mini M4 Pro and the other with a typical Studio setup or even a more expensive iteration, hid the actual computers where the user couldn’t tell which was in use, and let them play with both… that they’d be hard pressed to notice any difference in performance while running Lightroom and/or the ACR/Bridge/Photoshop combo.
The exception might be for the few doing very large batch processing or those doing high-end video. But for folks working on one photograph at a time? Nope.
I urge prospective buyers to keep an open mind about the power of the mini systems for running photography apps, and not just assume that the added value of the Studio will be worth the price.
p.3 #12 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
gdanmitchell wrote:
I shoot a 50MP and a 40MP camera, and there’s no issue from that with the mini M4 Pro.
My workflow is Bridge/ACR/Photoshop based and shoot raw, do extensive pre-processing in ACR, and then always use layers (sometimes quite a few of them) in Photoshop. No issues.
Again, my actual experience is that the mini is quite capable. In fact, I’m pretty sure that if we set up two systems, one based on a mini M4 Pro and the other with a typical Studio setup or even a more expensive iteration, hid the actual computers where the user couldn’t tell which was in use, and let them play with both… that they’d be hard pressed to notice any difference in performance while running Lightroom and/or the ACR/Bridge/Photoshop combo.
The exception might be for the few doing very large batch processing or those doing high-end video. But for folks working on one photograph at a time? Nope.
I urge prospective buyers to keep an open mind about the power of the mini systems for running photography apps, and not just assume that the added value of the Studio will be worth the price....Show more →
Well, the good thing is that we have empirical data on these machines, so we don’t have to guess.
p.3 #14 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
aman74 wrote:
Well, the good thing is that we have empirical data on these machines, so we don’t have to guess.
This is actually the hard part... and the core point I'm making.
the "empirical data" tell us that the fastest, best-equipped Studio tests faster than the fastest, best-equipped mini M4 Pro.
The objective tests will show that the faster computer is... faster.
But what does that mean in terms of real world performance for users?
if you are doing high-end, processor-intensive video production work the speed difference may well make a difference... or even be a requirement for your work.
At the other end of the spectrum, if you were just browsing the internet and dashing off a few emails, the speed would not be reflected in any meaningful (or even noticeable) improvement in your experience. In other words, your email app and your web browser won't feel any faster to you at all.
What about uses that lie between those extremes — like post-processing digital image files in Lightroom or the ACR/Bridge/Photoshop combination? For the great majority of us, the differences are so tiny (and in some cases non-existent) that they won't produce any meaningful advantage at all.
There's a long history among computer buyers (and I've been guilty of it in the past, too) of overbuying the Fastest, Biggest, Bestest hardware just because we imagine that it will make things go faster for us, or worrying that our computer will not be fast enough in five years. Lots of us have been on that carnival ride for decades. ;-)
A few among us will see some small benefit from the added speed from the Studio machine, which is a darned fine computer. But most of us, and not just people doing low-end work, will see no meaningful difference at all. is it really worth a few thousand dollars to see your noise reduction filter operate 5% faster?
p.3 #15 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
For me I figured to do the Studio it is about 600 more than what I spent on the M4Pro mini which in reality I still would have had to buy my TB 5 Hub and the externals I made with enclosures as im running bout 6 TB 5 ports right now so the Studio would not have saved me on the External stuff I have today . Worse for me is I travel with my setup and big reason I sold my M2 Studio was weight bulk and hauling this stuff around. So for me sure I lost a little speed in Processing with C1 but not that much. Also these new Silicon chips are so damn fast compared to years of fighting those Intel chips of the past. So right there we are all ahead of that era. Honestly I NEVER had a faster computer than the one sitting on my desk so im so far ahead im thrilled with the Mini. For others think about this and what your REAL need is . We tend to overbuy with computers and we always have so just think about it more.
No question some folks will need the extreme high end but is that really YOU. Thats what you need to figure out and 600 bucks is another lens.
p.3 #16 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
I think for most photographers, the deciding performance factor is going to be do you need the 40 GPU cores of the M4 max vs the 20 GPU cores of the M4 Pro. The 2 extra performance cores (10 vs 12) between the M4 Pro and M4 Max probably won't matter to most photo editing tasks. According to Geekbench the M4 Pro 14 core has a multi core score of 22,340 and the M4 Max 16 core has a multi core score of 25,646, which is a difference of only 15%. My experience is around 2020 CPUs got fast enough that most photo editing tasks where no longer CPU limited. So realistically maybe we will maybe see a 5% difrence in task time. There is also the question of Ram, but I doubt many photographers need more than the 64gb of Ram the M4 Pro offers.
It would be nice to see someone benchmark a GPU heavy task like Photo AI or LR AI Denoise to see how much of a difference 20 vs 40 GPU cores make.
The more I read about the M3 Ultra, the more it sounds like a server grade chip, which means running a single intensive task probably won't net most people much of a performance benefit over the M4 Max.
p.3 #17 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
Maybe I overdid it but I priced out a Mini M4 Pro 14CPU/20GPU with 64GB RAM and 2TB storage to compare with the Studio M4 I have on order with 16CPU/40GPU, 64GB RAM and 2TB storage.
If I did it correctly, there's a US$500 difference; certainly not trivial but, for me the Studio's better ventilation and extra ports and the unknown future of AI (extra CPU cores?) are worth it to me who intends to keep such a machine for at least 5 years, perhaps longer.
p.3 #18 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
Where you can save some money is on the Hard Drives. I only went to 1 TB which I think is maybe the best solution for a internal and reason why is I built a T5 external drive that's delivering over 5600 reads and writes which is almost as fast but I only paid around 500 dollars for a 4tb drive not what Apple wants which is scary at 1200 bucks . The rest of my externals are TB 4 which run about 3700 reads and writes which is still fast as hell. I have 3 of those that I made.
Ram I think is still tricky to some degree I did not go under 48 and I think that's safe for us Photographers. I almost went 64 but wanted to save some cash . My M2 Studio was 96 which I knew was way to much that I needed. So in a sense that was a waste . Most of you are not working Pros which I am so that need is someone limited as you can wait those extra minutes. I can't as I usually have clients sitting in front of me while I process sometimes. Looking slow is not a good thing.
But future proofing yourself is not the worst you can do and if you do video and maybe the new AI stuff having a box that can handle that is a need for sure. Im closing out my career so im in downsize mode.
p.3 #19 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
gdanmitchell wrote:
This is actually the hard part... and the core point I'm making.
the "empirical data" tell us that the fastest, best-equipped Studio tests faster than the fastest, best-equipped mini M4 Pro.
The objective tests will show that the faster computer is... faster.
But what does that mean in terms of real world performance for users?
if you are doing high-end, processor-intensive video production work the speed difference may well make a difference... or even be a requirement for your work.
At the other end of the spectrum, if you were just browsing the internet and dashing off a few emails, the speed would not be reflected in any meaningful (or even noticeable) improvement in your experience. In other words, your email app and your web browser won't feel any faster to you at all.
What about uses that lie between those extremes — like post-processing digital image files in Lightroom or the ACR/Bridge/Photoshop combination? For the great majority of us, the differences are so tiny (and in some cases non-existent) that they won't produce any meaningful advantage at all.
There's a long history among computer buyers (and I've been guilty of it in the past, too) of overbuying the Fastest, Biggest, Bestest hardware just because we imagine that it will make things go faster for us, or worrying that our computer will not be fast enough in five years. Lots of us have been on that carnival ride for decades. ;-)
A few among us will see some small benefit from the added speed from the Studio machine, which is a darned fine computer. But most of us, and not just people doing low-end work, will see no meaningful difference at all. is it really worth a few thousand dollars to see your noise reduction filter operate 5% faster?
p.3 #20 · New Apple Studio Machines-Which one for LR/Photoshop with Sony A7RV?
doc4x5 wrote:
Maybe I overdid it but I priced out a Mini M4 Pro 14CPU/20GPU with 64GB RAM and 2TB storage to compare with the Studio M4 I have on order with 16CPU/40GPU, 64GB RAM and 2TB storage.
If I did it correctly, there's a US$500 difference; certainly not trivial but, for me the Studio's better ventilation and extra ports and the unknown future of AI (extra CPU cores?) are worth it to me who intends to keep such a machine for at least 5 years, perhaps longer.
AI is more about GPU cores than CPU cores. The M4 Max has 40 GPU cores and the M4 Pro has 20 GPU cores. So, in theory, the M4 Max is more future proof for AI tasks. (AI is all over the place currently, so it's hard to know for sure where hardware and software will be in a few years. For example will most AI software become cloud based)
