10 ms·

Ask HN: M1 Pro 14' still worth it for development?

17 points by psikomanjak 4y ago

People that own a M1 Pro 14' and have been using it for a while do you think it is still worth it for development mainly React and Flutter?

lvl102 4y ago
I love mine. It’s actually not that much bigger than the new M2 Air and weight is negligible for me (although difference is there). It’s the perfect form factor for the times you want to code away from your desk.
schwartzworld 4y ago
Can't speak for Flutter, but you could probably develop react with a lot less computer than that.
ActorNightly 4y ago
Depends on what your use case is and what you consider worth. In terms of hardware, M1s are portable, and battery life is great IF you use sparse apps that don't hog up the cpu all the time (running Slack, VSCode, and a bunch of docker containers isn't going to make your battery last anywhere close to advertised, although still respectable). The processor is great, but not significantly faster than competitors at similar price points. External monitor support sucks, external hubs are annoying, keyboard is good but not the best. Long term repairability is also probably not a thing, Apple wants you to buy a new laptop instead. Software wise, this is personal preference on what you like/want or dislike. Personally, having used Mac OS for work on my work issued M1, I still prefer Linux every time. The two main reason is being able to run a lightweight tiling windows manager like i3wm that starts up way faster than Mac's UI, and not having to deal with permission system for things like camera, microphone, e.t.c. If you don't travel often, I still maintain that the best possible use of 2 grand for computer is to build a desktop for around $1500, monitor included, and then get a cheap used laptop.
- aristofun 4y ago
  > processor is great, but not significantly faster than competitors at similar price points Don’t missguide people please! M1pro is crazy fast in comparison to other laptops at similar price point. I literally got ruby etc compiled in seconds, while in minutes for top intel based macs.
eimrine 4y ago
Any computer is usable as a typewriter except of those you can find in museums.
iamevilhead 4y ago
I have M1 MacBook Air base model and I use it mostly for React/Node projects, and it's pretty good actually.
minimaul 4y ago
We've standardised on the M1 Pro 14" for work in a webdev environment (Python, JS, and some PHP) - works really well for us. They're fast, they run docker & other nice dev tooling, they have great displays for text, and they're super quiet.
cercatrova 4y ago
What do you mean "still?" They only released a few months ago, of course they're still worth it, not like they're outdated. That being said, I got the 16" due to wanting more screen space.
allig256 4y ago
Of course it is! It’s a fantastic device
kingkongjaffa 4y ago
It's not a good question tbh (http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html) If your question is about whether to wait for the next iteration see: https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#mac https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#mac As a general purpose machine for development / web dev, then the answer is yes, it's still worth using because it was worth using when it first launched and that didn't change. Many guides come with instructions specifically for OSX including homebrew install commands etc. https://brew.sh/ https://brew.sh/ The MBP 14' M1 laptop is a powerful, robust machine with great battery life. If you enjoy that, first class support for all common webdev tool chains, and enjoy OSX, then it's still worth it for web dev. An overlooked point is many courses and youtubers will be making videos using the same machine as you on OSX so it's good for that purpose as well (i.e. to learn and see the instructor using the same environment as you are.)
- powerhour 4y ago
  > It's not a good question tbh ESR is mostly wrong about this. He assumes that the person asking the question is not writing in good faith or that they have not considered and dismissed alternatives, without evidence. It's almost always appropriate to assume the person asked what they asked for a good reason ignore the question if you don't know the answer. SO is plagued with this nonsense, where people answer the question they wish was posted (because it's all they know?) instead of just moving on.
- riolu 4y ago
  I cannot recommend brew for react development (NPM). Installing NPM packages through brew is not supported by projects that require global packages. NPM installed through brew frequently runs into issues by projects that expect packages via NPM to be in /usr/local but are not symlinked. This is not even mentioning all other flaws of brew, such as owning /opt or /usr/local to your user breaking multi user support, being based on git and subsequently very slow, brew breaking on even point releases of macOS. I recently started a job that requires react and docker so here's what works for me. Install node.js from their website, use npm to install typescript language server globally, docker binaries like Minikube suggest using `sudo install minikube`, reading the manual for `install` says it simply copies the binary over to /usr/local/bin (already in path! security issue for brew owning this to your user??). You can then use `install` for any CLI tools you need (jq!). macOS was never designed for package managers, brew does an exceptionally poor job at being a package manager while also fighting against macOS to stay functioning. I highly recommend avoiding brew, it is certainly not a necessity nor supported by packages it hosts.
adhall 4y ago
I don't work a lot with React or Flutter, but there have been few times I've run into show stopper issues getting older projects with older dependencies (mainly Python) running on M1. It's an incredible machine for the price though.
cybrexalpha 4y ago
I recently got a MacBook Pro with an M1 Max. So a little bit more powerful than what you're looking at. Overall I'm pretty happy with it. I know a souped-up M2 (Likely a "M2 Max") is likely this year, but the difference between The original M1 and the M2 is so marginal that I doubt it's worth the wait for a hypothetical "M2 Max".
- ranguna 4y ago
  Isn't the m2 twice as slow as the m1?
  - speedgoose 4y ago
    The smallest SSD on the M2 MacBook is twice as slow as the smallest SSD of the equivalent old M1 yes.
    - ranguna 4y ago
      I read that ssd speed somehow affected the apple silicon cpu speed. If that is true, the m2 is effectively a downgrade, is that correct?
aristofun 4y ago
Sure. It’s a beast. But don’t expect crazy battery life in dev mode for 14”
throwaway675309 4y ago
This machine is only six months old, and with the rise of Apple Silicon the tooling and backwards compatibility is only going to get better. Also, Flutter and react are not exactly the most demanding development frameworks.
daviddever23box 4y ago
Go for the 16"; the extra size gets you better cooling, screen real estate and battery life for roughly another $250 or less.
- pavel_lishin 4y ago
  Is there ever a reason to go for the smaller factor? At work, we got 13" macbooks, and I wish we'd gotten the one-size-up ones. I'm a reasonably healthy human being, and can easily carry the slightly larger version - not that I do, because 99% of the time it's sitting on my desk, anyway. When I'm away from my large monitor, it irks me that I don't have more screen real-estate.
  - camgunz 4y ago
    It's lighter and easier to travel with. The 16" doesn't really fit on an airplane food tray, for example, and I don't think it fits in my messenger bag either.
    - daviddever23box 4y ago
      Sad truth is that the 13in Pro doesn't fit when opened on an airline fold-down tray, unless you are flying first-class!
      - camgunz 4y ago
        I've flown w/ the 14" in economy and didn't have a problem. You do have to be alert in case the passenger in the seat in front of you reclines suddenly (snatched the lid of an x60 out of the way just barely fast enough once), but it should be OK. Now that I'm thinking about it I didn't have a problem w/ the 15" Intel either, and the dimensions are pretty similar. I'm pretty slim and short though; I don't feel like a T-Rex typing.
- opan 4y ago
  Are there any numbers on the difference in cooling? Is it significant? I don't generally want a laptop that large, but I have also had many laptops that run too hot in the past.
jmartin2683 4y ago
In terms of cpu it’d still be gross overkill for the application.
Mo3 4y ago
Of course. The M1 is already lightyears ahead of any kind of other past Macbook model. I have the Air M1 (that doesnt even have active cooling) and it's blazingly fast in anything I throw at it. Granted, maybe it's a valid consideration for video editors and the like, but you won't notice significant differences in our line of work.
twohaibei 4y ago
Im using it since it came out (16 GB ram, M1 Pro 10 core CPU - meaning: the middle one.), including React development - it is more than enough and a pleasure to work with. Docker is also much faster than on Intel based MBP 2015 15".
riolu 4y ago
I will argue that M1 Pro 14 is not necessary for development. M2 MacBook Air is enough though if you're using docker I recommend upgrading ram to at least 16gb for the qemu VM alone.
rowanG077 4y ago
Considering that there is nothing better out there I would definitely say yes. The M2 is incredibly thermally constrained so I wouldn't advice it for developers.
Spooky23 4y ago
No. Get a Dell Latitude 5480.
speedgoose 4y ago
I use a M1 pro 13" ans it’s more than good enough. Some coworkers have the 14" but it’s a lot more chubby and I’m not sure the performance gain is worth the size increase unless you do more GPU work (but you would want a better GPU anyway). I’m not using flutter but react development is very smooth on the M1, especially when you use vite. But you absolutely need at least 16GB of ram is you use a VM or two.
eliwang 4y ago
React is not that demanding in terms of computer performance, especially if you switched to esbuild.

17 points by psikomanjak 4y ago

People that own a M1 Pro 14' and have been using it for a while do you think it is still worth it for development mainly React and Flutter?

lvl102 4y ago

I love mine. It’s actually not that much bigger than the new M2 Air and weight is negligible for me (although difference is there). It’s the perfect form factor for the times you want to code away from your desk.

schwartzworld 4y ago

Can't speak for Flutter, but you could probably develop react with a lot less computer than that.

ActorNightly 4y ago

Depends on what your use case is and what you consider worth. In terms of hardware, M1s are portable, and battery life is great IF you use sparse apps that don't hog up the cpu all the time (running Slack, VSCode, and a bunch of docker containers isn't going to make your battery last anywhere close to advertised, although still respectable). The processor is great, but not significantly faster than competitors at similar price points. External monitor support sucks, external hubs are annoying, keyboard is good but not the best. Long term repairability is also probably not a thing, Apple wants you to buy a new laptop instead. Software wise, this is personal preference on what you like/want or dislike. Personally, having used Mac OS for work on my work issued M1, I still prefer Linux every time. The two main reason is being able to run a lightweight tiling windows manager like i3wm that starts up way faster than Mac's UI, and not having to deal with permission system for things like camera, microphone, e.t.c. If you don't travel often, I still maintain that the best possible use of 2 grand for computer is to build a desktop for around $1500, monitor included, and then get a cheap used laptop.

aristofun 4y ago
> processor is great, but not significantly faster than competitors at similar price points Don’t missguide people please! M1pro is crazy fast in comparison to other laptops at similar price point. I literally got ruby etc compiled in seconds, while in minutes for top intel based macs.

eimrine 4y ago

Any computer is usable as a typewriter except of those you can find in museums.

iamevilhead 4y ago

I have M1 MacBook Air base model and I use it mostly for React/Node projects, and it's pretty good actually.

minimaul 4y ago

We've standardised on the M1 Pro 14" for work in a webdev environment (Python, JS, and some PHP) - works really well for us. They're fast, they run docker & other nice dev tooling, they have great displays for text, and they're super quiet.

cercatrova 4y ago

What do you mean "still?" They only released a few months ago, of course they're still worth it, not like they're outdated. That being said, I got the 16" due to wanting more screen space.

allig256 4y ago

Of course it is! It’s a fantastic device

kingkongjaffa 4y ago

It's not a good question tbh (http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html) If your question is about whether to wait for the next iteration see: https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#mac https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#mac As a general purpose machine for development / web dev, then the answer is yes, it's still worth using because it was worth using when it first launched and that didn't change. Many guides come with instructions specifically for OSX including homebrew install commands etc. https://brew.sh/ https://brew.sh/ The MBP 14' M1 laptop is a powerful, robust machine with great battery life. If you enjoy that, first class support for all common webdev tool chains, and enjoy OSX, then it's still worth it for web dev. An overlooked point is many courses and youtubers will be making videos using the same machine as you on OSX so it's good for that purpose as well (i.e. to learn and see the instructor using the same environment as you are.)

powerhour 4y ago
> It's not a good question tbh ESR is mostly wrong about this. He assumes that the person asking the question is not writing in good faith or that they have not considered and dismissed alternatives, without evidence. It's almost always appropriate to assume the person asked what they asked for a good reason ignore the question if you don't know the answer. SO is plagued with this nonsense, where people answer the question they wish was posted (because it's all they know?) instead of just moving on.
riolu 4y ago
I cannot recommend brew for react development (NPM). Installing NPM packages through brew is not supported by projects that require global packages. NPM installed through brew frequently runs into issues by projects that expect packages via NPM to be in /usr/local but are not symlinked. This is not even mentioning all other flaws of brew, such as owning /opt or /usr/local to your user breaking multi user support, being based on git and subsequently very slow, brew breaking on even point releases of macOS. I recently started a job that requires react and docker so here's what works for me. Install node.js from their website, use npm to install typescript language server globally, docker binaries like Minikube suggest using `sudo install minikube`, reading the manual for `install` says it simply copies the binary over to /usr/local/bin (already in path! security issue for brew owning this to your user??). You can then use `install` for any CLI tools you need (jq!). macOS was never designed for package managers, brew does an exceptionally poor job at being a package manager while also fighting against macOS to stay functioning. I highly recommend avoiding brew, it is certainly not a necessity nor supported by packages it hosts.

adhall 4y ago

I don't work a lot with React or Flutter, but there have been few times I've run into show stopper issues getting older projects with older dependencies (mainly Python) running on M1. It's an incredible machine for the price though.

cybrexalpha 4y ago

I recently got a MacBook Pro with an M1 Max. So a little bit more powerful than what you're looking at. Overall I'm pretty happy with it. I know a souped-up M2 (Likely a "M2 Max") is likely this year, but the difference between The original M1 and the M2 is so marginal that I doubt it's worth the wait for a hypothetical "M2 Max".

ranguna 4y ago
Isn't the m2 twice as slow as the m1?
- speedgoose 4y ago
  The smallest SSD on the M2 MacBook is twice as slow as the smallest SSD of the equivalent old M1 yes.
  - ranguna 4y ago
    I read that ssd speed somehow affected the apple silicon cpu speed. If that is true, the m2 is effectively a downgrade, is that correct?

aristofun 4y ago

Sure. It’s a beast. But don’t expect crazy battery life in dev mode for 14”

throwaway675309 4y ago

This machine is only six months old, and with the rise of Apple Silicon the tooling and backwards compatibility is only going to get better. Also, Flutter and react are not exactly the most demanding development frameworks.

daviddever23box 4y ago

Go for the 16"; the extra size gets you better cooling, screen real estate and battery life for roughly another $250 or less.

pavel_lishin 4y ago
Is there ever a reason to go for the smaller factor? At work, we got 13" macbooks, and I wish we'd gotten the one-size-up ones. I'm a reasonably healthy human being, and can easily carry the slightly larger version - not that I do, because 99% of the time it's sitting on my desk, anyway. When I'm away from my large monitor, it irks me that I don't have more screen real-estate.
- camgunz 4y ago
  It's lighter and easier to travel with. The 16" doesn't really fit on an airplane food tray, for example, and I don't think it fits in my messenger bag either.
  - daviddever23box 4y ago
    Sad truth is that the 13in Pro doesn't fit when opened on an airline fold-down tray, unless you are flying first-class!
    - camgunz 4y ago
      I've flown w/ the 14" in economy and didn't have a problem. You do have to be alert in case the passenger in the seat in front of you reclines suddenly (snatched the lid of an x60 out of the way just barely fast enough once), but it should be OK. Now that I'm thinking about it I didn't have a problem w/ the 15" Intel either, and the dimensions are pretty similar. I'm pretty slim and short though; I don't feel like a T-Rex typing.
opan 4y ago
Are there any numbers on the difference in cooling? Is it significant? I don't generally want a laptop that large, but I have also had many laptops that run too hot in the past.

jmartin2683 4y ago

In terms of cpu it’d still be gross overkill for the application.

Mo3 4y ago

Of course. The M1 is already lightyears ahead of any kind of other past Macbook model. I have the Air M1 (that doesnt even have active cooling) and it's blazingly fast in anything I throw at it. Granted, maybe it's a valid consideration for video editors and the like, but you won't notice significant differences in our line of work.

twohaibei 4y ago

Im using it since it came out (16 GB ram, M1 Pro 10 core CPU - meaning: the middle one.), including React development - it is more than enough and a pleasure to work with. Docker is also much faster than on Intel based MBP 2015 15".

riolu 4y ago

I will argue that M1 Pro 14 is not necessary for development. M2 MacBook Air is enough though if you're using docker I recommend upgrading ram to at least 16gb for the qemu VM alone.

rowanG077 4y ago

Considering that there is nothing better out there I would definitely say yes. The M2 is incredibly thermally constrained so I wouldn't advice it for developers.

Spooky23 4y ago

No. Get a Dell Latitude 5480.

speedgoose 4y ago

I use a M1 pro 13" ans it’s more than good enough. Some coworkers have the 14" but it’s a lot more chubby and I’m not sure the performance gain is worth the size increase unless you do more GPU work (but you would want a better GPU anyway). I’m not using flutter but react development is very smooth on the M1, especially when you use vite. But you absolutely need at least 16GB of ram is you use a VM or two.

eliwang 4y ago

React is not that demanding in terms of computer performance, especially if you switched to esbuild.