Hi,
I’m still on a 12-core Mac Pro 2013 (the Trashcan or Vader). It is still a fast computer for what I use it. Due to compatibility reasons, I hope to still keep using it for one or two years.
But I wonder how faster is Dorico on the newer Silicon Macs. Are things like pagination or audio rendering perceivably faster? Is the beachball after entering notes lasting less?
I’m trying to understand if these quality-of-life improvements are worth a switch in a shorter time.
Paolo
What beachball? 
A 12-core 2013 Mac Pro has a Geekbench score of 680 for single-core and 4872 for multi-core.
A base M3 Mac has a single-core score of 3050; and multi-core of 11600.
The Pro and Max versions go from 15200 to 21300 for multi-core. Those numbers (even the base M3) are faster than a 28-core 2019 Mac Pro…!!
Now you can argue about benchmarks “in the real world”, but you should clearly see everything being several times faster.
If you want to send me a project file, I can time various actions on my M2 Pro Mini. I’ve got BBC Core and Noteperformer.
Apparently, this happens with big expression maps. For example, it happens when I’m using something as huge as VSL Duality Strings (with my own map), while it doesn’t with NotePerformer, whose expression map is indeed very light.
If you have never seen it, it’s a good sign, even if it may depend on the fact you are using lighter expression maps. If you have bigger expression maps, I would be interested to know if this happens.
I know the new machines are faster than the older ones (ignoring the Max versions, that is out of my price range, it’s typically three times faster than my Mac Pro), but it is exactly the real life behavior that I’m more interested into. I want to understand when slow is too slow.
It would therefore be more interesting to hear about the experiences after switching from an older to a new Mac, than measuring the raw data. All considered, I’m just using one third of my current Mac power when rendering audio from Dorico, and I doubt I’ll ever use the full power of a modern machine.
Paolo
I’ve seen there is another thread about Dorico speed on modern computers. But it indeed deals on raw numbers.
Just out of curiosity, have you shared your Duality strings expression map? I’d love to have one with colours and sordino included… but time is scarce these days!
Yes, but your machine has quite a slow single-core speed. An app might not use “most” of your CPU(s), because one task must wait for the preceding task to finish. So a faster single core will do work faster, even if the CPU is only using 10% of its capacity.