The Cinebench numbers for the M1 are so-so. Meanwhile, “battery life” for someone who mainly does typing, web surfing, and perhaps compiling some web pages, is great! As is performance, both of the CPU, and the disk in the new systems.
For DAW work, and for other “workstation” work, the M1 isn’t “there” yet, although clearly it’s better to have support than not have it!
Steinberg doesn’t write code in x86, they write it in C++
High-performance VST code needs to use a lot of x64-specific intrinsic functions, that don’t work the same on other architectures, so there’s probably some significant tuning to be done for the ARM versions of things to run as well on ARM as the tuned x64 things run on x64. I don’t know how far along they are with that, but I know it is significant amounts of work.
I have personal experience of porting VST/AU/AAX audio plugins from Apple x86 to Apple Silicon. I’ll chime in since I’m not clear whether the earlier commenters can say the same or not. I can tell you it’s much easier than the PPC->x86 transition. And it’s easier than a Mac<->Windows port.
That said, there are tricky parts if you want to do it well. And, regardless of whether the port itself is easy or not, the real expense comes down the road as you must support one more platform. The testing alone adds significantly to the expense of every release.
Logic has been on a frequent and aggressive development cycle in the last couple of years, with a major release, for free, very recently. It’s an app they continually use to demonstrate new Mac releases at events. They use it to tempt people to buy a Mac, it’s not going anywhere.
It’s also tied into GarageBand, and ultimately, the iPad.
Apple’s aim is to make their apps available on all of their devices. In coming years Logic will run on the iPad, then the iPhone.
They’ve said themselves, in coming years they want the iPhone to be the computer. Plug it into your screen in the studio and use Logic as if it were a desktop.
Most crossplatform plugins run within a standard or developer specific wrapper nowadays don’t they? i.e. would i be right in thinking a company like waves would mainly have to update their underlying framework as the bulk of getting their plugin suites over?
I’ve worked on plugins myself, but they’ve all used frameworks which do all the leg work for you, so i’ve got very limited experience beyond that.
Yes, as I’m sure you know, it’s the very existence of cross-platform frameworks that makes it possible to even contemplate cross-platform support. And much of the user interface and file system idiosyncrasies are isolated there. The term “wrapper” is usually reserved for the shim that adapts to different plugin protocols. Regardless, there are always issues that come up in a port. But it’s the architectural differences that pose particular problems, for example SIMD code. The bottom line is: simple plugins will be simple to port. Complex plugins? Not so much.
Don’t get me wrong…I LOVE Logic. I’ve been on the platform since Emagic Logic 5…and I love the way Apple have incorporated Core MIDI and Core Audio into the OS. I just can’t help but think of myself as the jilted lover who is being asked to give it, “one more chance” with a manipulative partner in regards to chipset switchover. And I mean really…how many YEARS of professionals asking for a return to integrated PCIe slots did it take them to trash the Trashcan? And yeah…they finally did it and gave us a proper upgrade for the Mac Pro…but holy a nus-tearing hell is it expensive! And NOW they want to switch to ARM??? I mean…I didn’t even upgrade to Catalina because THAT broke tons of stuff initially.
I think you are absolutely correct…they want EVERYTHING to be iOS / iPad / iPhone centric…and frankly…I don’t. I like having a dedicated computer.
All that butt-hurt is what finally pushed me over the edge towards a PC / Cubase…and to be honest, even though I am still in the ‘getting to know you’ phase, I like it a lot. Sure there are things Logic makes easier (I still don’t quite feel comfortable enough to quickly set up Aux Sends in Cubase), but overall…I think it will work out fine…and I saved enough on the computer alone to upgrade the rest of my small studio.
Prices not bad? Maybe for a Mac but looking to the specs I am still surprised (in a negative way) how expensive these toys are.
1400++ Euro for a device having the power of a 600-800 AMD/Intel Win Laptop?
For instance an decent Asus Zenbook with bigger SSD is alomst 50% less…but I’m afraid Apple will sell their stuff like bread
I am a skeptical person myself and I will not purchase a 1st gen Apple Silicon computer but did you look at the audio performance I mentioned above? It doesn’t seem underpowered at all - at least for audio. It’s almost too good to be true, but Apple leads the mobile CPU development since 5-6 years so it can be that good, after all. With M1 CPU being so fast, I can imagine a desktop workstation class (Dual-Quad-Octo-etc-Mx) wiping the floor with any 48-core x86 CPU in existence. In 10 years we’ll hook up the iPhone 22 to a monitor, mouse, keyboard and audio interface and work in Cubase/Logic right from the phone.
Well, it is less about the machine itself and the performance but the pricetag. Powermacs were overpriced, iMacs barely expandable and at such high costs, not to mention the Macbooks. They are too greedy.
100% true. Also, emulation of those instructions (e.g., Rosetta) on architectures that do not have native support for them are going to be slow as ships out of the port of molasses. Even if you have similar SIMD capabilities, nobody in the world is going to write a translator from one intrinsic set to another. Even if you get the translation right, you have to completely redo the register scheduling and deal with architecture quirks. Sure, it is possible, you are never going to get the same performance anyway, so it is better to just hire someone to rewrite the code for the new native ISA.
Currently on Dell’s shop the XPS i9 17” is $2.450 while the latest i9 Macbook Pro 16” is $2.799. Bare in mind, dell’s display is not as high in resolution ass Apple’s. With a proper display, the XPS goes up to $3.049. So is really Apple that expensive when compared (fairly) with a computer from a similar class?
Depends how willing you are to be consumed within their eco system. If you’re running Logic/FCP and a Mac then the overall pricing as a bundle is phenomenal due to the software being subsidized.
If you’re buying a Mac and running third party apps as your core tool set then it changes the perspective somewhat. If you have multiple machines then it changes the perspective greatly if you can’t take advantage of sharing app store purchases too.
And while it’s quite subjective i think Apple offers some of the most consistently best, long-lasting hardware available. Unfortunately the ‘free’ software upgrades are what ultimately brings the hardware into obsolescence. But even then it’s around the 7-8 year mark.
The real comparison to the MacBook pro is the Razer Blade, IMO. It has the same volume, the same rounded shell, the same price, but it has significantly higher-performance NVIDIA graphics chip, and you can order it with more RAM for the given computer generation. I’ve used MacBooks (including the “glass Escape key” – ugh!) and Razers and Dells, and I’m honestly happiest when I’m using a real workstation where I don’t have to worry about disk space, RAM, available threads, or GPU performance at all.
Most of my friends with MacBooks complain as soon as the fan spins up, which means … they’re not even using their computer that much at all, most of the time! Might as well get a Chromebook then
Anyway, I’m all for competition in CPUs. AMD finally kicked Intel’s butt on both desktop, workstation, and server, and now is coming up from behind on laptops. Amazon has had ARM server instances for a while, and their latest Graviton is pretty good value for money. Apple is going ARM. Microsoft tried, a few years ago, but were probably too early. And with any luck, our friends at SiFive will scare up some significant performance out of their next RISC-V “big core” – the current iteration is already quite impressive!
As Apple said – give them a few years. They’re not competitive with workstation chips yet, which is kind-of weird – the last three times they switched technologies (6502 → 68k, 68k → PowerPC, PowerPC → Intel) they actually switched across the board, and they can’t really do that now, so living with “fat” binaries and “dual” targets for a longer time might be quite some challenge. Then again, they have the war chest to stand up to it, if only they choose to
Usually, when evaluating computers for music production, people are primarily interested in cpu power. The benchmark numbers so far show the low end Macbook Air M1 beating i7 Windows laptops pretty handily.
Most of my friends with MacBooks complain as soon as the fan spins up, which means … they’re not even using their computer that much at all, most of the time! Might as well get a Chromebook then >
They’re trying to, but most of the stuff we do at work has a minimum 32 GB RAM requirement and works better with 64 GB.
I agree that the M1 is very nice speed-per-watt, and also very nice battery-life. However, there’s a reason they only put them in the lower-end boxes – the “workstation” laptops, as well as the real desktops, still work better on the Intel/AMD side. A Cinebench score of 7508 (M1) is very nice, but the workstation CPUs give you more than twice that. In DAW terms, that means more than twice as many plugins, which is a difference that may matter.
Now, Amazon’s “Graviton” servers (which also use ARM, but use Amazon-ARM, not Apple-ARM) are about twice as powerful as their “Xeon” servers at 70% of the cost. Those things are amazing! I wish I could have one on my desk.
The real take-away is that, with some real pressure on the x64 ecosystem in general, and on Intel in particular, we may be in for very nice upgrades in the future, which makes everything better
You were comparing an M1 Macbook to a Razer Blade, not a desktop. That’s what I was responding to. If you want to compare an M1 Mac to computers with price tags that are far higher…sure its cpu power doesn’t compare favorably to a million dollar supercomputer either . Anyway, good luck to you in your wait for Intel to catch up.
I’d ask for a promotion if people around you are ordering 16GB machines for tasks that has a 32GB Min requirement.
The real take-away is that, with some real pressure on the x64 ecosystem in general, and on Intel in particular, we may be in for very nice upgrades in the future, which makes everything better >
Honestly, i think Intel are dead in the water at this point. AMD have been showing them up on their own patch for a while now, and now Apple are not only walking away from them as a customer, but seemingly leading the way for mainstream CPUs.
Intel have been ‘bolting on’ to their CPUs for decades, and it’s the end of the road now, they’re too bloated, wasteful and hot - and it’s going to get more embarrassing when Apple unveil the more performant CPUs, and AMD keep pushing the Ryzens.
Intel need an entirely new path, and that’s not easy with so many legacy machines and o/s’s out there to maintain support on. I honestly don’t know what they’re going to do longterm - obviously they’re fine short term due to the mass market they have.
I think companies like TSMC are the ones to watch, they’ve been working in the background and securing such deals with Apple (Silicon) and Microsoft (Azure), plus the demand for Windows ARM will really ramp up in the coming years when mainstream see what the MB Air can achieve.
My hope, personally, is that Linux ARM comes through as a valid audio platform whereby products like Cubase may exists.
One things for sure, for audio, Apple Silicon is looking killer - and this is only the first step of an entirely new era.
Eagerly waiting on updates for this. Watched an interesting video on Slate & Izotope plug ins which had severe graphic glitches which people were theorising were due to Metal API implementation - but they opened and seem to process audio.
Im hoping for an ARM build soonish for Cubase but dont have high hopes, not that I dont have faith in the developers, I just suspect its not as easy as some seem to hope, hope to be proven wrong and we see a build this side of Christmas.
I make money from audio but its not my main source so im happy to take the plunge for science sooner rather than later as ive been looking for a cost friendly way to enter the Apple ecosystem for a while- does Cubase have a beta tester program?
I’d ask for a promotion if people around you are ordering 16GB machines for tasks that has a 32GB Min requirement.
Ha! I work in a tech organization where checking out some new hardware just to learn from it is an okay thing to do. Plus, I co-founded the company, so dunno what a “promotion” would look like. Probably even more work
My hope, personally, is that Linux ARM comes through as a valid audio platform whereby products like Cubase may exists.
When I heard about the Maschine+, I brifely hoped they had built it on something like an NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX (the big brother to what’s in the Nintendo Switch,) but, sadly, it was just a quad-core Atom.
One things for sure, for audio, Apple Silicon is looking killer - and this is only the first step of an entirely new era.
Every day is the first day of the rest of your life
I wouldn’t be so quick to rush to “M1 looks killer for DAW” – the Neon instructions on the ARM are not as good as the SSE and AVX instructions on Intel, and no vendor has achieved parity there yet. M1 looks killer for text editing and web surfing and carefully chosen benchmarks that don’t run long enough to start slowing down the systems from heat (apparently, a real problem for the MacBook Airs.) I’m entirely expecting the next generation to be significantly more appealing and the MacBook Pros and Mac Pros to switch over at some point. The current “some of this, some of that” is IMO a more confusing situation than they were in when going PPC to x86.
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