No worries. I use both, but Windows is deep in my dna. And I am still a bit uncomfortable when using a Mac, I feel as if I have become a Yuppie myself. Although they seem to be fine machines. The Macs, not the Yuppies.
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Heh 
I think those days are mostly over. Macs are the perfect mom/pop/student/normal-person machines because they’re the least amount of headaches, can take the abuse and just keep working. I recommend it to them any day. In my estimation it actually takes quite an amount of technical expertice to get a Windows system to run fairly well, not so with a Mac.
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Thanks, Lars.
Is it, in your opinion, worth the money to invest in a higher priced Macbook Pro, let’s say the apple-macbook-pro-14-2021-m1-pro-8-core-cpu-14-core-gpu-16gb-1tb-space-gray? How much of that extra money goes into the larger screen (which is quite useful in Rack, as we all know), and how much into better performance?
Btw I really appreciate all the input I am getting here, thanks everyone so far!
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i just have a bottomless deep distrust of apple as a company, and wouldn’t want to be found dead with any of its products. but that’s me. in the final analysis, we’re all here for the music.
i’m actually a linux guy, and spent some years volunteering for gentoo linux. but i switched (with some distaste, but ultimately out of pragmatism) to windows for music production and gaming.
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It’s a great machine.
I’d say roughly equally. You get more multicore performance but not really more singlecore performance, which is already stellar. So for software that can utilize the extra cores you’ll feel the performance gain. In Rack to utilize that you then need to up the number of threads to use those cores and in that way it will raise the ceiling for the max. size of patches you can run on it. But you mostly won’t need to because those M1 cores are extremely powerful and Rack runs extremely well on just one of those.
Oh sure, I hear you and I don’t particularly like the company either. So for me it’s a “dance with the devil” pragmatic decision because I can’t deny the hardware and the OS. And my disdain for Microsoft as a company, particularly historically, is on par with that of Apple
I’m the same but switched to macOS instead of Windows If Linux ran every bit as well on Apple hardware as macOS I’d use it in a heartbeat. I doubt that’ll ever happen though, because one of the things that make the hardware+OS combo a great experience is the extreme level of vertical integration and polish, and that’s a pretty tall order. But never say never…
I can’t argue with that. I almost pulled the trigger and spent the extra couple hundred dollars. If I was into sample based music production then I definitely would have done that, but for some reason that process leaves me cold. I enjoy hearing what others produce, but I’m not interested in doing it myself. Without using sample libraries, I don’t know that I will ever wish I had 16GB memory any time soon.
It does rub me the wrong way that you cannot upgrade the memory - you are stuck with what you originally purchase. But I am comfortable with what I have.
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Yeah, it’s one of the trade-offs with the M1 machines. You say goodbye to the “upgrade components as Lego pieces” flexibility but what you get in return is extreme performance and efficiency. So it means that when you buy the new Apple machines you need to make damn sure that you get the right specs. for it’s entire lifetime! I don’t really have a problem with that and the tradeoff suits me Ok, but it’s definately something a buyer needs to know - buy the right machine from the start, that’ll last you the next 5-10 years. Of course there’s a very healthy second hand market for Apple machines so it might not be a big concern, and you can always upgrade, if you made a mis-calculation, by selling and buying a new one.
I just am one of those guys who love taking the system apart, upgrading components, and fiddling with stuff. I still have an old Windows machine that I use to run a Scope (Sonic Core) PCI system. Old skool computer nerd experience. IRQ conflicts, anyone? So from that definitely Windows perspective, it feels like going dark side when crossing to the Mac legion. Which will also give me loads of sneers from my band colleagues.
I used to be like you, back in the day. Built loads and loads of PC’s for people (and in a shop). So if you still value upgrading CPU’s or RAM (or internal disk) on a regular basis, the Macs are not for you. I’d say the prime feature of a modern Mac is that you buy it and then you completely forget about it and just use it. I find it to be quite a refreshing experience actually. As I get older, the less things I need to worry about, or fiddle with, the better, so I can just concentrate on the things that matter to me.
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Yes, that’s definitely true.
So what’s the main difference between a MacBook Pro and a MacBook air?
Is there a difference in the way they are cooled?
as someone said, above, the higher end air and a lower end macbook overlap a bit, and always have.
I’ve never had an M1, but where I work there are were two intel macbook pros you can get - the big one and the little one. I don’t use the screen on my laptop much, so I got a small one. but it turns out the little one has a weaker CPU, so next time I got a big one. which I still use. Just compare screen size, cpu speed, and amount or ram. the rest will not make a difference for you (I think).
And for sure (like everyone says) don’t get an intel/AMD laptop for mac or windows. They will always turn the fans up high and make a racket with VCV.
Obviously if you don’t need to travel, a quiet tower for win or linux is great (I have a moderately quiet tower that runs win-11, it’s great). But if you need to move around laptop style, get an M1.
Also, I have always disliked apple. But I do own an iPad, because only a crazy person would get a windows tab. and if I needed a laptop I would go mac. I even “let” my wife get a macbook of some sort, it’s been great.
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The main difference between the M1 MacBook Air and all the other M1 machines is that it is completely passively cooled, no fan what so ever. So the cheapest M1 MacBook Pro has a fan and a different cabinet design, and maybe better speakers and other little things to make it different from the Air, but otherwise they use the same chip and are quite similar. Because of the fan it means that you can push it like 15% harder before you hit its thermal max. but the fans will never be screaming like the Intel Macbooks, all the M1’s are very quiet. After that is a series of progressively bigger, faster and more expensive M1 Macbook Pro’s that all can do more; more graphics, more screen, more CPU cores, more cooling, more RAM, more disk, more ports, etc.
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Thank you, everyone. Macbook Pro M1 appears to be the wise decision.
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