New computer: Windows or Mac - and accessories

[Hal Wilson]

One more thing to think about. The Mini has much better cooling so rarely (or never) thermal throttles and slows down. The Air will though. The Air throttling normally only comes into play in extended heavy processing though (batch imports/exports, video editing, etc.).

Fro the kind of thing the vast majority of us do, this wont' be an issue. For multi-layer video production, maybe, but then you'd not be choosing a lower end laptop for that anyway. A friend uses a 2020 Air for some pretty intense number-crunching stuff, and never has any problems with it. Not something to really worry about.

On my 2021 M1 iMac, the fans only ever kick in when playing No Mans Sky on high settings for instance. And that's some serious work being done by the GPU etc. The rest of the time, it's completely silent. Macs are very efficient in this respect. Amazingly so tbh; I had a graphics card in my ancient 2006 Mac Pro that sounded like a 747 taking off, even for pretty moderate tasks. It was like having a portable heater under the desk; great in winter, not so good in summer. Those days are long gone!

 

[PLShutterbug]

Thanks all for your comments and advice.

I have decided to keep my Dell after all. The upgrade cost is more than I thought it would be and after some here and elsewhere have discussed the transition to MacOS, I think I will avoid it for now.

 

[bakubo]

Thanks all for your comments and advice.

I have decided to keep my Dell after all. The upgrade cost is more than I thought it would be and after some here and elsewhere have discussed the transition to MacOS, I think I will avoid it for now.

As long as it is working for you then that seems like the best thing to do.

 

[PLShutterbug]

Thanks all for your comments and advice.

I have decided to keep my Dell after all. The upgrade cost is more than I thought it would be and after some here and elsewhere have discussed the transition to MacOS, I think I will avoid it for now.

As long as it is working for you then that seems like the best thing to do.

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

 

[bakubo]

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

Your Dell tower with an i7-13700, GeForce RTX 3060 12gb, and 64gb RAM should provide excellent performance. Is your C: drive with Windows and apps an SSD or HDD? If it is an HDD then I recommend replacing it with an SSD. The old C: HDD can then be made a D: drive just for data. An SSD for the C: drive will speed many things up. I suspect your C: is already an SSD though if you bought the PC only 18 months ago.

Make sure you keep the GPU studio driver up to date.

 

[GodSpeaks]

Hi -

I need help deciding whether to jump from Windows to Mac for personal use.

Have you actually tried a Mac? It is a different (quite different) OS than Windows. If you are not used to it, it could be quite a learning curve.

No, I haven’t - and I realize about the learning curve.

Well, before you spend your hard earned cash, I would suggest you spend a little time using an apple computer, to see if you can adjust to it. It will be quite a bit different than windows.

If you can make the adjustment to apple, all is good, but if you cannot, it would become a sore point while trying to use it.

It would also be a good time to test the theory that an apple computer would significantly improve your processing time.

My personal Windows machine is a Dell 3020 tower (13th gen i-13700, 64GB RAM, 12GB NVidia graphics), a Viewsonic VP32684K display,

Clarification required here. 13th gen i?-13700 CPU. What version? i3, i5, i7, i9?

Oh. Oops! I omitted the 7. It’s an i7-13700, with a GeForce RTX 3060.

Well the i7 should give you sufficient horsepower and the RTX3060 is no slouch. You stated you had 64GB of memory, so that should be a fairly robust machine.

You could upgrade the RTX to a 4080 or even a 5080, but I am not sure how much faster that would process your images. It would be a big improvement if you were a gamer though.

You could also look at upgrading the CPU to an i9, but again, I am not sure how much you would gain over an i7. I have an i9-14700 in my desktop and it runs at around 6GHz.

Something else you could look at would be what is running in the background. Personally I keep auto-starts and other programs that run in the background to an absolute minimum, especially as many are just spying on you.

12GB nVidia (small "n") graphics. What model nVidia GPU? It could make a big difference. especially as we are now up to the RTX 5000 series.

Questions:

• Will I really see a dramatic photo/video graphics processing increase with the Mac vs. either my current Windows PC or buying a new one?

If you can answer the above questions, it will help answer that question

The only other thing that could be an issue would be drivers for any devices you want to attach to a Mac computer. And of course, there is the software you use for image processing.

I use NX Studio for initial viewing of Nikon NEF files, and Affinity. Both have Apple versions.

Thanks for the prompts.

 

[PLShutterbug]

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

Your Dell tower with an i7-13700, GeForce RTX 3060 12gb, and 64gb RAM should provide excellent performance. Is your C: drive with Windows and apps an SSD or HDD? If it is an HDD then I recommend replacing it with an SSD. The old C: HDD can then be made a D: drive just for data. An SSD for the C: drive will speed many things up. I suspect your C: is already an SSD though if you bought the PC only 18 months ago.

Make sure you keep the GPU studio driver up to date.

It came with a terabyte-plus HDD. I immediately bought an SSD and use that for everything I’m working on. All stored data goes on my SAN.

Yes, I update my graphics drivers as they come out.

 

[bakubo]

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

Your Dell tower with an i7-13700, GeForce RTX 3060 12gb, and 64gb RAM should provide excellent performance. Is your C: drive with Windows and apps an SSD or HDD? If it is an HDD then I recommend replacing it with an SSD. The old C: HDD can then be made a D: drive just for data. An SSD for the C: drive will speed many things up. I suspect your C: is already an SSD though if you bought the PC only 18 months ago.

Make sure you keep the GPU studio driver up to date.

It came with a terabyte-plus HDD. I immediately bought an SSD and use that for everything I’m working on. All stored data goes on my SAN.

Do you mean the SSD you added is just used for data (it is not the C: drive)? Or do you mean you made the SSD the C: drive (boot drive) and installed Windows and apps on it?

Yes, I update my graphics drivers as they come out.

 

[RLight]

• Will I really see a dramatic photo/video graphics processing increase with the Mac vs. either my current Windows PC or buying a new one?

Yes, Apple Silicon aka ARM aka RISC (AMD64) optimized software alone increases IPC by 20-40% from X64_64 aka CISC (Intel/AMD).

Now, take into account that the M4 Pro or Max, are also as far as Geekbench is concerned, 1.53x faster in single core than the 13700K, and, 2x faster in multicore than the 13700k, you're talking closer 2x-3x faster after both ARM optimization and M4 performance gains.

• Will I be able to continue using my Viewsonic display with a Mac given the relative dearth of ports on a MacBook?
  • My monitor's manual states: 'For a MAC with Thunderbolt output, connect the mini DP end of the “mini DP to DisplayPort cable” to the Thunderbolt
    output of MAC. And connect the other end of the cable to the DisplayPort connector on the rear of the monitor.'
    • My Viewsonic display has 2xHDMI, 1 full-sized DisplayPort, 1 mini-DP, and four USB type-A ports. It does not have any USB-C ports.

You should in theory, yes. However M based Macs have arbitrary limits to max number of monitors connected. I have an Intel Mac, but as a systems engineer, I marvel at the M series sheer horsepower and architecture design, however I'm also aware of its limits. I don't think driving 4, 8K monitors on an M4 is a good idea (it's not). But any single monitor should be fine.

• Right now both PCs I use are connected to my network via Ethernet, not WiFi. I liked the faster performance and no latency this provides for photo work. Any issues connecting a MacBook using a USB-C to Ethernet dongle?

That's a good question. I use the CableMatters 2.5G thunderbolt dongle on my Intel Mac to get 2.5G. Apparently, it doesn't work on the M2? Don't know if it works on the M3-M4. You'd have to dig on that one.

• I think I'll probably have to replace my A/B switch to one that accepts USB-C connections, and possibly Thunderbolt. Any suggestions, I'll appreciate.
• I store most of my images on a Synology DiskStation DS224p and will probably work from it. Any challenges with that and Mac gear? I don't expect any but ...

No, the Synology DSM has "secret sauce" to work well with the Mac. I'm about to do a writeup on UGREEN DXP2800 compared to the Synology DS224+ I'm coming from now; Synology has done some serious work to make sure their DSM plays well out of the box.

• I use a Canon Pro-10 printer for photo printing, and an Epson WF-7720 for document printing. As librarian for a local symphony I print quite a lot of public-domain parts from Adobe Reader.

I have a Pro-10. It's broken right now. Let it sit too long in storage. No issues with software, in fact it's inherently supported. I need to find a way to fix it economically. Ugh.

• I don't travel as much as I used to, and generally don't do editing on the road. I have done some with Affinity on my iPad Air M2 13" and that is probably adequate. I struggle just a bit on Mac Mini vs. MacBook Air.
• Macs I'm considering:
  • Mac mini M4 Pro, 12-core CPU, 16-core GPU, 24GB memory, 512GB SSD
  • MacBook Air 13" M4, 10-core CPU, 10-core GPU, 24GB memory, 512GB SSD
  • These two are almost the same price.

Thanks in advance for any advice, and sorry this post is so long.

Buy the M4 Max is my 2 cents. I've written about the Max vs Pro and below recently. In short, it isn't just Max in name, it's got oomph and will also last you the longest in terms of longevity.

Side note, I'm commenting only regarding media editing. Again, for non-media work? Windows machines still suite a purpose, just Macs suit media work better for a variety of reasons, including, optimized media suites for them which we're entertaining that train of thought presently.

 

[bakubo]

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

Your Dell tower with an i7-13700, GeForce RTX 3060 12gb, and 64gb RAM should provide excellent performance. Is your C: drive with Windows and apps an SSD or HDD? If it is an HDD then I recommend replacing it with an SSD. The old C: HDD can then be made a D: drive just for data. An SSD for the C: drive will speed many things up. I suspect your C: is already an SSD though if you bought the PC only 18 months ago.

Make sure you keep the GPU studio driver up to date.

Here you can see some GPU benchmark scores for the RXT 3060 vs. M4 Pro 16 core GPU:

https://nanoreview.net/en/gpu-compare/geforce-rtx-3060-vs-apple-m4-pro-gpu-16-core

And the Passmark CPU benchmark gives these scores:

i7-13700: 36,389

M4 Pro 12 Core CPU: 32,930

 

[RLight]

Yes, it is only 18 months old. I thought it was older until I looked up the receipt. I figured I could upgrade for about $1,000, sell this to my neighbor (whose HDD died on his 15-year old machine) for $500, and have a better solution for about $500. Turns out the difference, after tax, is closer to $1,000. And there's software licenses to consider, etc. With everything else non-photo related going on in my life now, too, it will become a distraction.

Hmm. And I just remembered that I do a fair amount of CAD work for my woodworking hobby, so I'd have to fork out another $300 for a Mac copy of TurboCAD Deluxe, too.

Anyway. Thanks for your response and advice.

Your Dell tower with an i7-13700, GeForce RTX 3060 12gb, and 64gb RAM should provide excellent performance. Is your C: drive with Windows and apps an SSD or HDD? If it is an HDD then I recommend replacing it with an SSD. The old C: HDD can then be made a D: drive just for data. An SSD for the C: drive will speed many things up. I suspect your C: is already an SSD though if you bought the PC only 18 months ago.

Make sure you keep the GPU studio driver up to date.

Here you can see some GPU benchmark scores for the RXT 3060 vs. M4 Pro 16 core GPU:

https://nanoreview.net/en/gpu-compare/geforce-rtx-3060-vs-apple-m4-pro-gpu-16-core

And the Passmark CPU benchmark gives these scores:

i7-13700: 36,389

M4 Pro 12 Core CPU: 32,930

When considering media work, I highly recommend consideration of the Max series, not Pro. You should have a hard look at:

https://nanoreview.net/en/gpu-compare/geforce-rtx-3060-vs-apple-m4-max-gpu-40-core

Or even the older M3 series is still very respectable.

https://nanoreview.net/en/gpu-compare/geforce-rtx-3060-vs-apple-m3-max-gpu-40-core

In fact, even the M2 still holds it's own...

https://nanoreview.net/en/gpu-compare/geforce-rtx-3060-vs-apple-m2-max-gpu-38-core