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The current RAM restrictions in the M1 are dumb restrictions resulting from the fact that you can't get LPDDR4X chips larger than 8GB in size (the M1 has two on

by DCKing 5y ago

The current RAM restrictions in the M1 are dumb restrictions resulting from the fact that you can't get LPDDR4X chips larger than 8GB in size (the M1 has two on SoC LPDDR4X chips). This year we should see a lot of CPU manufacturers change to (LP)DDR5 for memory - high end Samsung and Qualcomm SoCs are already using LPDDR5. It's a safe bet Apple is also switching to LPDDR5 which would put the upper limit on 64GB for the M2. This is notably still lower than the 128GB you can put in the current 27" iMac (for an eye watering $2600 extra), but is an amount far more pro users can live with.

hajile 5y ago
Samsung makes a very large 12GB module. I’m sure that offering would be taken advantage of by a lot of people if they’d just put it in the table. The real issue is not shipping the M1 with LPDDR5 support. We already have tons of Qualcomm phones and even Intel processors shipping with since last year. If Apple had done the same, we wouldn’t be talking about this today.
- DCKing 5y ago
  > The real issue is not shipping the M1 with LPDDR5 support. I brought this up before but it was pointed out to me that the only manufacturer of LPDDR5 last year was Samsung, which was producing not-completely-standardized LPDDR5 at the time and probably didn't have enough spare volume for Apple anyway. Having 12GB LPDDR4X modules from one vendor (24GB total) probably is not enough reason for Apple to switch up their supply chain either, not for the M1 at least. And, to be fair, I think Apple did get away with shipping low memory computers by targeting only their cheapest computers.
  - jolux 5y ago
    16GB is not "low memory" for the vast majority of users.
    - monocasa 5y ago
      You'd be surprised how quickly a regular user can eat that these days with electron apps and a browser. My MIL would pretty routinely get out of memory errors at 16GB and she's hardly a power user. Somehow her Facebook tab would clock in at over a GB alone.
      - jolux 5y ago
        I pretty regularly have Slack running while compiling Erlang in the background, running a Docker container, several dozen Firefox tabs, and a Microsoft Teams call going, and I do not have problems with 16GB on x86. Perhaps ARM Macs use more memory or something. My next MacBook will definitely have more than 16GB if it’s available, but that’s more for future need rather than present.
        monocasa 5y ago
        She has problems with 16GB on x86. A single docker container and compiling erlang really don't use that much. It's many tabs of office 365, google docs, and social media, and how every app is an electron app now that eats memory. I think we as programmers have lost sight of how a single gif in memory is about the same size as a whole docker container.
        jolux 5y ago
        I don’t think that’s accurate, because Docker on macOS involves virtualization. And Teams is the worst resource hog I’ve used. Though I don’t use Office or social media much (Twitter occasionally) so maybe that’s it.
        monocasa 5y ago
        > because Docker on macOS involves virtualization Go check out the resource usage. Yes, it involves virtualization, but the stripped down virtualized kernel uses very little resources. Getting that information is a bit complicated by the fact that it's difficult to see the difference between the virtualized kernel and it's applications in a way that's consistent with the host OS, but it's really in the dozens of megabytes range of overhead for something like docker on mac.
CalChris 5y ago
That could make an M2 Mac Mini into a scary on prem machine.
anaerobicover 5y ago
Just to side note, the 27" iMac RAM is the rare component that is upgradable by the user. You should be able to get 128GB for under $700 if you do not buy the RAM from Apple.
dillondoyle 5y ago
My current almost 2 year old 16" has 64gm ram already. Is this new version faster despite lower amounts of storage?
- dijit 5y ago
  It’s faster ram, and a faster CPU. Memory only really gives you “number of active things that the CPU can switch to” (meaning, open idle programs) and cache. If the nvme drive is fast enough, the filesystem cache is not as noticeably effective, and if you have aggressive “suspend” of processes (like iOS) then lack of RAM capacity does not really impact performance at all. But memory latency, speed and the CPU do.
  - dillondoyle 5y ago
    very cool thank you! for me video cache would be really helpful, but after effects and especially premiere right now seem absurdly slow. premiere especially i can hit play on a non-edited clip in preview and it takes multiple seconds to start... maybe i have a wrong setting somewhere

by DCKing 5y ago

hajile 5y ago

Samsung makes a very large 12GB module. I’m sure that offering would be taken advantage of by a lot of people if they’d just put it in the table. The real issue is not shipping the M1 with LPDDR5 support. We already have tons of Qualcomm phones and even Intel processors shipping with since last year. If Apple had done the same, we wouldn’t be talking about this today.

DCKing 5y ago
> The real issue is not shipping the M1 with LPDDR5 support. I brought this up before but it was pointed out to me that the only manufacturer of LPDDR5 last year was Samsung, which was producing not-completely-standardized LPDDR5 at the time and probably didn't have enough spare volume for Apple anyway. Having 12GB LPDDR4X modules from one vendor (24GB total) probably is not enough reason for Apple to switch up their supply chain either, not for the M1 at least. And, to be fair, I think Apple did get away with shipping low memory computers by targeting only their cheapest computers.
- jolux 5y ago
  16GB is not "low memory" for the vast majority of users.
  - monocasa 5y ago
    You'd be surprised how quickly a regular user can eat that these days with electron apps and a browser. My MIL would pretty routinely get out of memory errors at 16GB and she's hardly a power user. Somehow her Facebook tab would clock in at over a GB alone.
    - jolux 5y ago
      I pretty regularly have Slack running while compiling Erlang in the background, running a Docker container, several dozen Firefox tabs, and a Microsoft Teams call going, and I do not have problems with 16GB on x86. Perhaps ARM Macs use more memory or something. My next MacBook will definitely have more than 16GB if it’s available, but that’s more for future need rather than present.
      - monocasa 5y ago
        She has problems with 16GB on x86. A single docker container and compiling erlang really don't use that much. It's many tabs of office 365, google docs, and social media, and how every app is an electron app now that eats memory. I think we as programmers have lost sight of how a single gif in memory is about the same size as a whole docker container.
        jolux 5y ago
        I don’t think that’s accurate, because Docker on macOS involves virtualization. And Teams is the worst resource hog I’ve used. Though I don’t use Office or social media much (Twitter occasionally) so maybe that’s it.
        monocasa 5y ago
        > because Docker on macOS involves virtualization Go check out the resource usage. Yes, it involves virtualization, but the stripped down virtualized kernel uses very little resources. Getting that information is a bit complicated by the fact that it's difficult to see the difference between the virtualized kernel and it's applications in a way that's consistent with the host OS, but it's really in the dozens of megabytes range of overhead for something like docker on mac.

CalChris 5y ago

That could make an M2 Mac Mini into a scary on prem machine.

anaerobicover 5y ago

Just to side note, the 27" iMac RAM is the rare component that is upgradable by the user. You should be able to get 128GB for under $700 if you do not buy the RAM from Apple.

dillondoyle 5y ago

My current almost 2 year old 16" has 64gm ram already. Is this new version faster despite lower amounts of storage?

dijit 5y ago
It’s faster ram, and a faster CPU. Memory only really gives you “number of active things that the CPU can switch to” (meaning, open idle programs) and cache. If the nvme drive is fast enough, the filesystem cache is not as noticeably effective, and if you have aggressive “suspend” of processes (like iOS) then lack of RAM capacity does not really impact performance at all. But memory latency, speed and the CPU do.
- dillondoyle 5y ago
  very cool thank you! for me video cache would be really helpful, but after effects and especially premiere right now seem absurdly slow. premiere especially i can hit play on a non-edited clip in preview and it takes multiple seconds to start... maybe i have a wrong setting somewhere