Computing Power for Post Processing: Macbooks

[padrepaul]

Apologies if I should post this in "Post Processing," but just curious what folks who are Apple people use.

I currently do my work on my Macbook Pro with a 16 inch monitor; it has a 2.3 GhZ processor and 16 GB Ram.

I was considering upgrading to a newer one with 32GB of Ram, but is this necessary?

I use this for all my work too. It runs fine, and is about 3 years old now, just wondering if it's a good thing to upgrade or best to wait?

I do zero video, just process large RAW files from my Z9 and run plug ins.

Thanks,
Paul

 

[Nimi]

Apologies if I should post this in "Post Processing," but just curious what folks who are Apple people use.

I currently do my work on my Macbook Pro with a 16 inch monitor; it has a 2.3 GhZ processor and 16 GB Ram.

I was considering upgrading to a newer one with 32GB of Ram, but is this necessary?

I use this for all my work too. It runs fine, and is about 3 years old now, just wondering if it's a good thing to upgrade or best to wait?

I do zero video, just process large RAW files from my Z9 and run plug ins.

Thanks,
Paul

Not necessary until you start working on 8k or Nraw vid.

 

[RichF]

Or do HDR/pans, focus stacking, ... Question is how large are your images, how patient are you, ..
Extra memory is always nice, faster SSD is always nice, healthy balance in your bank account is always nice, .. one or the other ..

 

[RecalcitrantRon]

I am looking at upgrading from a 2017 27 inch iMac with 40GB of RAM. From the research I have done, in the Intel days, large amounts of RAM was essential, but with the new M series processors from Apple, what I am seeing is that it is not the case anymore and 16GB of RAM on an M1 Pro really is enough for photo editing. That said, everyone's needs and expectations are different. I think what I am going to do is start with 16GB of RAM and see how it runs. If I don't like it, I'll exchange it during the free return period.

 

[Dusty Pane]

As others have pointed out, the HW requirements depend on the size of the files you process, what processing you do, ... In any case, though, RAM is more important than CPU. From own experience I can say that an M1 Macbook with only 8GB RAM is not enough to process the large RAW files from my D850 in a reasonable amount of time. I consider 16GB the absolute minimum

 

[jadewolf]

When I upgraded my MBP about a year or so ago, I maxed out everything except the local drive size, since I heavily utilize external storage. But I did go with an SSD drive, because the read/write speeds are vastly better.

The problem with Macs these days is that the hardware components are basically all soldered into the board. So you don't have much option for upgrading down the line (extremely frustrating to me when I worked in IT). For my needs, I wanted to future proof as best I could. If you think there's even a possibility of needing more RAM, just get it at the start. Buy once, cry once.

If you can't afford to max out across the board, definitely put more into RAM than CPU. Especially if you're going to be using things like Topaz AI which tend to have heavy utilization on that side. I'm running a 2.3GHz processor and 32GB RAM and Topaz still chews through my resources on larger/raw images.

 

[BrianMM]

If you can afford to wait the next generation MacBook Pro's will probably be released in Spring 2023. You would then have the choice of the latest model or the current model discounted by the likes of Amazon, etc., (but with maybe fewer model options). I also routinely check the Apple refurbished site for deals because they carry the full Apple warranty along with the optional extended warranty options and I've had good success going that route in the past.

 

[RecalcitrantRon]

If you can't afford to max out across the board, definitely put more into RAM than CPU. Especially if you're going to be using things like Topaz AI which tend to have heavy utilization on that side. I'm running a 2.3GHz processor and 32GB RAM and Topaz still chews through my resources on larger/raw images.

Have you tried or looked at running Topaz on the M1 Pro as opposed to an Intel processor?

 

[jadewolf]

Have you tried or looked at running Topaz on the M1 Pro as opposed to an Intel processor?

Not yet, but I'm eyeballing those new Mac Studio setups with envy. If I hadn't bought the Z9 this year, I probably would have picked one up. Maybe next year. I have a feeling it's going to blow my i7 quad-core out of the water.

 

[padrepaul]

Much appreciate the replies; my laptop works great, I was just thinking about it as frankly the "shift" button is sticking a bit as I type so much but it's not too bad, so got me to thinking about when to upgrade. I was not aware they came out with newer ones in spring, so I'll probably do that most likely. It's a great computer, but a touch more speed is always nice.

 

[marklangner]

I recently (this summer) purchased a new MacBook Pro with the M1 max chipset. I maxed the memory and internal storage as I wanted my lightroom catalog stored on the laptop, and for reasons how I work. My archive of photo files in on external raid drives, and I move picture folders of the raw files off the desktop to the raid drives generally a month or more after I'm done with them. My main motivation for upgrading was the older MacBook Pro had a quite small hard drive the was causing me issues with the 45mp files from my R5, it didn't have a ton of memory, and the laptop would get quite hot doing my post processing. With the new laptop it now never gets hot, things run super quick, and I have tons of storage for maximum flexibility. I guess the main points were running cooler, speed, and storage for my needs.

 

[JustinGriggs]

I'm using a 2019 16" Macbook pro with 8 core 2.3 GHz i9, 32gb ram, and 8gb radeon 5500 graphics card. Personally I've not run into any issues with performance, even editing 8k N-RAW on Davinci Resolve. I'd love to get one with the M1 chipset, but right now I don't have any real need that would press me into upgrading right now

 

[BLev65]

Paul,
I moved from a MacMini (Quad i5 w/32GB Ram) to a 13" MacBook Pro w/ M2 chip and 16GB. I've turned this into my desktop machine and leave it connected to a 27" AppleStudio monitor. The laptop's performance destroys my prior machine. I used to wait up to 5 minutes for Topaz DeNoise on 40+ MP files and now it takes less than 20 seconds to do its thing. I went with the lowest internal storage, but I now regret that decision. In hindsight, I should have bit the bullet and maxed out the Ram at 24GB and gone with a 1TB hard rive. This would have allowed me to keep my LR catalog on the main computer and do all of the file work from my external drives.
I currently have my LR Catalogs on a TB3 1TB SSD and keep my files on a USB3 Lacie 2Big 8TB RAID... the system works great, but I'm looking to have an 8TB SSD RAID TB4 (thunderbolt) built to allow me to speed up video projects.

bruce

 

[FB101]

As others have pointed out, the HW requirements depend on the size of the files you process, what processing you do, ... In any case, though, RAM is more important than CPU. From own experience I can say that an M1 Macbook with only 8GB RAM is not enough to process the large RAW files from my D850 in a reasonable amount of time. I consider 16GB the absolute minimum

Fully agree. My MBP with M1 basic processor and 16MB memory works very well on Sony A1 files but it does get bogged down at times. Today I would pick an M1 max with the 32 core GPU and 64GB of RAM which is overspecced but would give me the processing headroom to handle anything.

 

[Anjin San]

Apologies if I should post this in "Post Processing," but just curious what folks who are Apple people use.

I currently do my work on my Macbook Pro with a 16 inch monitor; it has a 2.3 GhZ processor and 16 GB Ram.

I was considering upgrading to a newer one with 32GB of Ram, but is this necessary?

I use this for all my work too. It runs fine, and is about 3 years old now, just wondering if it's a good thing to upgrade or best to wait?

I do zero video, just process large RAW files from my Z9 and run plug ins.

Thanks,
Paul

I have a 14 M1 Pro MBP with 32 GB and it’s just fine…but OTOH my wife’s M1 Air with 16 runs LR and PS just as fine albeit a little slower but even it is still faster than my previous 2015 rMBP…the only drawback to the Air for PP is screen size but if weight and/or battery life for travel is an want to have and one had an external monitor for at home even the Air is a perfectly satisfactory PP platform. I’m glad I went for the lighter weight 14 over the 16.

As Ron noted…RAM is not as big a deal with Apple Silicon as it was with Intel machines… ut it’s still nice to have although with no video you won’t likely see any difference between 16 and 32 with the same processor. My Studio at home is faster still…it replaced an Intel 27 iMac but except for the fact that it is the home file server, scanner host, printer host, and Time Machine (actually CarbonCopyCloner, not TM) destination…I seriously considered just the MBP and Studio Display…but that would have shoved all those other functions onto my 2013 Mini and it’s just not equipped for that.

 

[padrepaul]

Oh, one question was on newer Macbooks they have an SDXC card slot; is this for photo memory cards? I use CF Express cards, Delkin Black; would i be able to plug it in or would I still use the card reader?

 

[Chris K]

Wait as long as you can! The M chips are improving very quickly, and the lightning-fast M1 I recently bought has already been eclipsed by newer models.

That said, I'm really happy with my MacBook Air even for processing GFX100S RAW files. So long as I render 1:1 previews I can cull a take from my GFX100S as quickly as I can my Z6. (That's to say, with zero delays.)

If you use CFE, you'll need a reader. I use the ProGrade CFExpress B/SD reader, and it's incredibly fast. If you don't want a reader, you can plug the camera directly into the computer.