Apple Silicon M1 - system-on-a-chip to Rule Them All.

Ah! Of course! User error strikes again. Many thanks, Steve.

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I added a branch with a clean Rack v1.1.6 build just prepared for arm, which contains no adaptions made by me:

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Testing… I’ll share my opinion sometime soon, about the Mini M1.

In the photo, Rack (official) running on the Mac mini M1, the iPhone is sending clock pulse (covariant) to Rack through Mac wired protocol (or whatever it’s called) tethered to the Mac.

The iPad (running Polyphase which is triggering a couple of synths loaded in AUM) is receiving Ableton Link also from the iPhone, and is sending stereo audio to Rack in the Mac mini. Also tethered through Mac wired protocol.

Hence the 3 audio-core modules loaded in Rack, which crazy as it seems are working with no hangs. I could never even try this on the Windows laptop. I can only imagine how much fun this will be when multi audio-core module is officially supported.

For now I am able to get it all running in sync, with some trial and error, but it already is running 15 minutes in sync at the time I took this picture.

All while uploading this photo and writing this post on the iPad, with absolutely no flicker, stutter or whatsoever… ehh Crazy stuff…

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interesting monitor :slight_smile: - how did you get that connected to the mac mini?

It’s an old Vaio laptop butchered screen :slight_smile:

Connected through HDMI (adapter board specifically for that screen, aliexpress).

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Hi all, I noticed a couple of small-ish glitches in VCV on my M1 Air. Working on a medium-ish patch (following along to an Omri generative patch tutorial) I noticed a few times where I would start connecting a cable and after clicking through to the colour I wanted (say red) it would suddenly glitch to another colour (say yellow) once I started dragging it to make the connection. It was quite a small glitch, and wasn’t replicable once I quit and re-loaded the patch, so I’m not sure if it’s at all to do with M1 and rosetta emulation etc. The other small bug was some control knobs behaving mysteriously when being adjusted. In both cases, it disappeared after re-loading so I’m not sure what the issue is!

Sorry to distract the topic a little bit away from VCV, but I’m attempting to build one of my VST/AU plugins for Apple Silicon, and I was wondering if anyone on this thread who has access to one of the M1 machines would mind testing it for me? The link to download is here. Feel free to reply as a DM to avoid polluting this thread. Any helps is much appreciated!

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Problems with “jumping knobs and values and mice” has been reported for years in Rack. It’s better now but probably not completely solved.

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This summarises the current state of knowledge/rumour with the MBPs:

Good to see the MagSafe coming back and I hope the removal of the TouchBar will signify the end of the T2 chip (the cause of me returning the 2018 MBP and buying a windows laptop).

Hoping that better thermals will allow me to move back to a MBP.

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Yeah, it all sounds very good, lots of good moves from Apple on the hardware front. But remember that it’s all rumours and 9 months away. I say that unless you absolutely need to run Windows on it, or need a really beefy machine, then grab one of the current M1 computers. They’re fabulous and very reasonably priced for what you get. But of course you should first check out whether some of the hardware/software you run now happen to be incompatible with the M1’s and what the plans are to fix that. This is a good place to start: https://doesitarm.com/

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Not for me at the current time. I am a user of 17" notebooks. The 2018 15" felt tiny so I’ll be holding out for the 16". You can never have enough screen estate (especially if you have poor and worsening eyesight) :wink:

Mac Mini + a nice 27" screen? That’s where I’d go…

Not on my knees where it spends 95% of its time :slight_smile:

:laughing: No, that wouldn’t work too well.

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That’s what I got. Works well!

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Allright, so i been using the new computer for about 2 weeks now.

Firstly i should say this is my first Mac ever. I been using PC/Windows for about 30 years. So have always been biased in favour of Windows and building custom PC’s/Laptop by myself.

Though i have been fond of how well the Mac had a leap ahead in technical architecture within its OS for audio applications. And how audio hardware usually works very well with Mac OS. Especially this last decade, and the development of audio applications on IOS.

That said, i am very much enjoying this quiet little Mac mini! So far i am having no problems running my hardware with it which is a RME Babyface Pro fs & RME Digiface. It took a little system diving to get it to work , but RME is great at giving advice and directions on how to get their stuff to work well…

Currently i am testing out VCV Rack / Ableton 11 & Reason 11

Haven’t encountered any crash from Rack by itself for no reason, and it is performing very well so far on this Mac Mini.

I do sometimes feel a slight system instability, which to me is more related to Big Sur. And the newness of this whole ARM thing? So i would not recommend this as a daily driver for professional production, if your business was relying on it. I still have my beefy laptop nearby incase i would need it.

But to be honest i am very surprised and happy with the results so far with VCV Rack by itself! I can imagine how an optimised version will be like.

I have been able to route through ADAT / Blackhole virtual driver or RME virtual routing. All seem to work well, with minor occasional glitches from Big Sur, most of the time all is running steady in sync no fuss. :slight_smile:

I have been able to overload the CPU once, but that was a ridiculous large patch with tons of modulation, and would not make sense in a normal creative process. As mostly i would be splitting parts of the creative process over several of devices/external gear.

Here is a little something that i was noodling with, that is absolutely no sweat for this Mac and remains at least 75% of idle time on the system. While recording the screen with VCV Recorder compressing to mp4 video, and VCV framerate set to max.

edit:

(And for historical reasons and archiving of it hehe, i still manage to get fantastic sync lock with the bridge vst & and Expert Sleepers SW Sync plugin combo, not present in the patch above though)

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About that Bridge VST & Expert Sleepers SW Sync plugin combo…

And the computer didn’t even flinch, while capturing the whole screen. (My WIndows laptop would be taking off by now with all fans at max :sweat_smile:)

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Thanks for sharing your initial results Latif, and congratulations with your new machine! I’m sure you’ll come to enjoy the diminished amount of pain with drivers and audio, and other system stuff. You’re welcome to PM me if you have any general Mac headscratcher problems or questions.

Could you briefly describe what you’ve experienced? I think it goes without saying but you should definately upgrade to the latest version of Big Sur right away. They fix bugs you know :slight_smile:

Nice example of a real-life/real-size patch, great to see! If you are using VCV Recorder to record MP4 video, at some point you should try and record screen+audio with QuickTime Player instead, virtually routing the audio to it. In that way you’ll steal no CPU from your patch, and spread the load nicely over your other cores, and Quicktime really is very easy to use and produces great results for e.g. uploading straight to YouTube.

Nice, fluid graphics there! I’m happy for you.

Hi Lars! Thanks :slight_smile: And will sure drop you a pm when i need to know something, thanks for the offer!

Actually i can’t exactly, since this is a both a new system for me and for them who created it. For example i see some artefacts when i use background image on the desktop. That are only there when i use a background image. It could be because of the HDMI output that i am using.

I seen some other glitches when using graphics software, that randomly happened. I noticed slight instabilities when running more than one audio application, that i have not been able to reproduce. Needs more investigation .

But most of these little things were not bothering me that much to actually need to spend time on them.

Yes certainly, i am always on top of that :wink:

Yes, my point was to stress the cpu :slight_smile: that is why i used the vcv recorder with mp4 compression in the first video.

The second video was recorded with Quicktime, notice the stop button up in the taskbar :slight_smile:

I will update my findings here, if i encounter any serious problems regarding VCV Rack on this system. Until then, have fun making music!

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I just happened to see this video now, and that issue sounds like what he’s demonstrating at 10:30 :