I Returned My Mac Studio with M2 Ultra

[adrianzaharia]

For serious work I use a custom built pc that I put togheter this summer after selling my mac studio m1max that I used for 2-3 months. My pc runs on a i7 13700k(16 core), a gigabyte z790 motherboard, 32GB DDR5 64--MHz(like the ram on the mac, same speed), a RTX 3070 8GB and 2TB ssd nvme 5GB/s(like the mac). It cost me 1700$ and it doesn't compare to that mac studio that I had. It is almost twice as fast in everything. And keep in mind that for a couple of weeks I owned them both so I did some real tests. Yes, the mac looks stylish, minimalist, bla bla but at the end of the day you keep it at home and work on it! If I had lots of money and afford to change te comptuer each year I would work on macs otherwise ... i'm pleased of this custom pc. Cheers!

[wolf_hg]

Sending you lots of love and wishing you a speedy recovery! Long time fan of your content and brilliant humor! - Alex

[FlipidusX]

when i got the brand new Mac Mini M1 in 2020 or 2021 i had trouble with mounted Samba shares. You can read from the Samba share BUT when you tried to write even a single byte, the Mac was crashing completely. The Apple support documented that, they watched this over my iPhone. The problem was fixed with the next macOS minor release.

[Nabeelco]

I've had that sort of experience a LOT with Apple lately, which is why I got rid of all my Apple stuff entirely... I'm all Windows and Android now, which was a big change for me since I've been Apple only since 2004.

[elkillerx]

I wanna say there is something wrong with Sonoma. I was running Ventura on my M1 Macbook pro without a single issue. I recently upgraded to Sonoma and have noticed all sorts of strange glitches. Apps randomly hang or take long to open. Also, when watching a Youtube video in 4k sometimes the video randomly freezes and I have to refresh the entire webpage. Never did that before. Either way Al, I think returning the mac was a good idea. Probably best to wait for the M3 or consider switching to an iMac or Mac Pro.

[ericonca]

Love that you use a $0.25 Microsoft mouse from 1998 with your $6, 000 Mac

[dangelo]

The benefits of Apple Silicon are obvious in laptops, but make less sense in desktop, especially as you go up the line. The best desktops Apple offers are the base Mac Mini and base Mac Studio with the M2 Max. The upgrades to the respective Pro and Ultra CPUs don’t make much sense relative to what Apple charges, IMO

[ferrisr]

I'm running Sonoma on an M2 Air with no issues. Firefox, homebrew, doing some light dev work, no issues.

[ashleycox]

IMO the Mac Studio is the Mac nobody asked for, nobody wanted and that doesn't really have a place. It's the Mac for people who really want a pro iMac but you can't get one now. Apple's product line is so convoluted with the Mac mini (with pro chip), Mac Studio and Mac Pro co-existing not ot mention all the models of MacBooks, and let's not even talk about the huge rang eo f iPads, iPhones and watches of different generations and different models that are for sale. When Steve jobs came back in the 90s and said "we'll have a pro desktop and a pro portable, and a consumer desktop and consumer portable", he had it right. That's what people actually want. Consumer phone, pro phone. Consumer iPad in a couple of sizes, pro iPad in a couple of sizes. The same with laptops and desktops. The software is getting bloated too. Sonoma is buggy as hell, the accessibility solutions are a shameful afterthought and this new, cutting-edge hardware feels just as slow as an old Core2Duo did running XP. Apple needs a release of MacOS that isn't focused on bringing features nobody wants, but optimising code to iron out the bugs and improve performance. These machines should be lightning fast not just in things like rendering, but in simple every-day tasks like opening apps and even booting up. I have an M1 Max MacBook Pro and I really do like it, but I'm getting fed up with software issues (I hate Sonoma) and I don't like how locked down the hardware is. Apple could really do with some proper leadership again.

[pretay]

That’s a huge bummer. I have used machines from all three M-chips and didn’t have any of those issues. My guess is it is a hardware issue.

[shubus]

Well, I pulled the trigger and ordered the top Mac Studio. Will see if I have the same problems you have, Alfred. I do wonder if you tried the browsers using *Rosetta 2* which runs Intel programs on the M2. Anywho, I have many friends running the same music programs I run on the trashcan in new native Apple silicon versions without issue. Will find out the answers to these and other perplexing problems in January.

[nathanwunderlich]

I was a day one for the M1 MacBookPro. I had some minor things when it first came out but since like January of ‘21 it is fine. The M series really is a mobile advantage vs a desktop advantage and I feel that there should be some monster chipset that says I don’t give a shit about power and blows the laptops out of the water- like the MacPro Xeons used to do with MacBook Pros.

[stefandziallas]

Alfred, I’m pretty sure, your M2 Studio has a hardware issue (RAM?). Buy another one, it will work fine.

[memberoffoxhound]

I’m surprised you got around to it within the return window. Great job!

[amacinside]

I have the base model Mac Studio and when Sonoma officially released it was a disaster and also the first couple of minor 'updates'. Went back to Ventura for a while. Just last weekend, did a fresh installation of the latest release of Sonoma (14.1.2) and *finally* don't have any issues (yet?). Yeah, one wonders why one actually updates to these versions, as they don't really offer anything except becoming more and more like a big iPad... :) Well, at least for me, the 'new' features are quite useless. Sad thing is that Windows is even worse ;)

[transitengineer]

Well since the year 2010, I have been a "Catfish" buyer ordering off EBay older out-of-date Apple desktop systems. In 2022, I picked-up for about $1, 200, a used space gray "trash can" size Mac Pro 8-core/D-700/64GB/2TB SSD model and, paired it with my already owned Apple 27-inch Cinema LED (none thunderbolt) display and, everything has been working great. In 2024, I plan to pick-up for about $1, 000, a base model space gray 27-inch iMac Pro to add to my collection. Yeah, I know why continue to buy Intel processor Apple desktops ... because they work well for my needs. In addition, they also support all three major operating systems Mac OS, Windows, and Linux (smile...smile).

[ncm]

that is what my patched macbook 7, 1 does (and that machine is running a core 2 duo) when trying to run photoshop, I wouldn't expect it from a brand new M2 machine wow

[zeppelinboys]

i'm sorry this happened, but i wont lie i love a good TekFail! be sure to sell that Apple stock before they take a hit like Disney. I know i'd be kicking myself if I owned a bunch of Disney stock right now. Merry Christmas and thanks for the 'Mordecai'!

[ConcreteAdvisory]

I have many problems with my M2 Max as well... Very slow in video editing for the price, and not relatable to what I've seen on the YTB tests. It's almost not faster than my previous PC with only RTX360, R5 5600X and 16Go RAM. Basically the M2 Max is the double on paper. Nonsense...
Tho my M3 Pro MacBook Pro has good performance, as good and even better than my previous DESKTOP PC. So very satisfied. And it's pretty with an amazing screen.

Tho on any Mac the apps boot very slowly. As well, not relatable to the YouTube tests... strange.

[techlover]

Wow what an absolute Tek-Fail for $8, 000 I would expect the machine to run perfectly. Apple quality control isn’t what it used to be imo