The Mac Studio Makes No Sense... Here's Why

Apple just announced the new Mac Studio and M1 Ultra chip. While its an absolutely insane work of engineering, and there's a lot of good reasons to be excited, I think this is going to end up being a dud.

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0:00 - Intro
0:24 - Event Recap
1:51 - Why Mac Pro is Epic
3:05 - Who Is This For
4:20 - The Weird Thing
4:34 - Apple's Blunder
5:50 - The Problem with the Mac Pro

[martagalanoficial]

"I dont need that power for what I do so I consider it useless...'

Just brilliant.

[luckyduck]

I think you are missing a few things in your analysis. I am a professional video editor in Hollywood, and this machine intrigues me greatly. I haven't worked on a truly "Modular" Mac Pro with PCI express at home or a studio since 2018 (when I was working on a 2010 cheese grater). It's been iMac and iMac Pros since. Thunderbolt provides all of the "modularity" 90% of post-production professionals need.

Take your analysis and reverse it. I think this machine will sell bonkers, but the Mac Pro will be more of a "flop". Professionals are going to look at the Mac Studio and say, "This had more power than I will ever need and for a fraction of the cost of the Mac Pro. Why pay more?"

This is especially true for creative professionals who now work from home because of the pandemic. It is also true of agencies. Particularly if you are an agency or post house who needs to buy 30 computers, no one in their right mind is going to spend all of the money they have on Mac Pros for offline editors who still largely cut in 1080P. Mac Pros are truly for a very, very select group of people: color correctonists, and top-end VFX artists.

For the vast, VAST majority of creative pros - from editors to sound mixers to record labels - the Mac Studio is the perfect machine, and one we have been waiting for for a long, LONG time.

[digitalclips]

I've worked with Macs since 1984. At every juncture of Macs technological advancement, some opine it's more power than we, 'normal people, ' will ever need. Then why don't people that say that use a Mac Plus? The same is said with every technology going. Take video as an example. When I made the early HD videos, I was told no one could possibly need 1920 x 1080 pixels. Some begrudgingly admitted 720p was Okay. Now, anyone making videos in anything but 4K is failing to realize HD is dead and gone or soon will be. All new material at the professional end is shot in 8K. And so it goes, in a decade, you will look back and see what you considered overpowered in 2022 is a joke in 2032. Buying a little bit more power than you 'need' is called future-proofing.

[manvince]

I couldn't disagree more with you because I've never see a computer that makes sense to so many professionals like me. I work full time in music production and this ticks all the boxes.

[cheesun]

Dude, its already doing well. Its gone from a month to 3 month queue...trust me, people want it. Everyone was saying the Max was overkill on the MBP's, so clearly now that the Ultra is out, why would the next level not be even better. Trust me, it'll do well. Amateurs want what the Pro's want as well.

[montex]

Saying the M1 Ultra Mac Studio is over powered for most users sounds a lot like when Bill Gates said nobody would ever need more than 640k of RAM.

[michaelhubbell]

People are overthinking this release, it's going to sell phenomenally well. There are a ton of people who wanted the form factor of a tower but either couldn't afford the Mac Pro or didn't want its footprint. These people were likely waiting for the higher end Mac mini release when m1 was announced and they are the ones who are happy and rushing to buy them. I think these same users are still trudging along on the trashcan Mac Pro. Although the power of the M1 Ultra might be more than most people need today, a lot of pro users, or normal users alike, usually purchase these systems for the long haul and upgrade every 5 years or so. In 5 years, I doubt this thing is going to be considered overkill for even the average user who uses Apples creative apps. Also, if Apple didn't announce the upcoming Mac Pro, it would have been disrespectful to the customers who were waiting to shell out the money for the highest end M series release and it would have been interpreted as a way of intentionally hiding Apples roadmap to try and get more sales which is not a position that Apple needs to make given their popularity right now. The only criticism I have is that they didn't release a 24" studio display for sub 1k. I would like to see the M1 Ultra in a 27" iMac in the future, I'm not sure if that will happen

[FifalianaFR]

Dude, it's the most powerful system that Apple offers right now and it's cheaper than most 4k capable editing PCs, than most high end laptops that are not as capable.... it's literally a no brainer choice for people who are looking for editing pc right now... I don't say this often or ever about an apple product, but it's actually a good deal.

[OliverLeu_Gitarrenunterricht]

If I learned one thing since the 80's: There was always need for more power - maybe not now, but the machine will perform still quite well in 5+ years.

[groovejunky]

Speaking from the stand point of a freelance mix engineer with a semi pro home studio, the Mac Studio is perfectly targeted for the shift towards creative professionals working from home who need god level horsepower in a practical package. Commercial studios have been shutting down steadily since my foray into professional recording and mixing over a decade ago and pro and semi pro home studios are on the rise. I think someone at Apple is very wise to finally take advantage of what my colleagues and I have seen coming for a very long time. My friends in graphic design, video editing and photography feel the same way. I can’t see any of us needing The Max Pro model at this point, and with the exception of people working with video, the M1 Max Studio seems more than sufficient.

[WorldNews]

We configured the Mac Studio ultra with 120GB RAM, 4 TB internal SSD, and 48GB GPU. This machine in this configuration is something we've been waiting for for the last 10 years.

Been making records for over 30 years, last recording studio was 4 1/2 million dollars, Studer 24 and 16 track machines analog, Neve Consoles, George Massenburg automation…

The Mac Studio is a game changer.

Update:
Computer arrived yesterday, Thursday, April 14. It's quiet as a mouse, no fan noise at all, cool air streaming out of the back… Can't hear any noise.

Connected three 32 inch Dell monitors, all came right up. This little sucker is heavy. Quite stout.

Installed Logic, Abelton Live, Akai MPX software, Roland TR 8S software, Novation SL61 MK3 software, Superior Drummer 3 and numerous libraries.

So much headroom it's ridiculous. Glad we bought it, perfect solution for our studio. Next stop RME interface.

[pangloss]

Memory is the issue. The M1 computers, Mini, iMac & laptops, don't come with enough unified memory. I'm doing music recording and production and when I load up a project with 60+ tracks and each channel is running plugins, I run out of memory on my recent M1P MBP. Admittedly, some of that may also be due to not all my software being updated for the Apple Silicon architecture and that could change in the future. Secondly, Thunderbolt busses are what I need. I have four audio devices, two monitors and two storage devices all running over Thunderbolt. Currently, all the Thunderbolt lanes on my M1P MBP are getting saturated by all my gear. Then there's the 10GBE connection. When I'm moving 50+ GB data files all over the network, I want that speed. Yes I could do it via a Thunderbolt ethernet adaptor?...eh, no. I actually had a 2019 Mac Pro and I sold it soon after I bought my M1P equipped laptop...I could see where things were headed and I got away from Intel, while the getting was still good. While I'm sure the new Mac Pro will be awesome, I'll bet that computer will likely be overkill for me. Hence, the Mac Studio is precisely the computer I've always wanted Apple to make. A step up from consumer models but not the machine folks working on the next Marvel movie want or need. As far as modularity goes, I don't want a new iMac Pro. I want to run multiple monitors on VESA mount equipped arms and I already own them. So yes, I ordered a Mac Studio with the M1 Ultra. It seems like a perfect fit for me and something tells me I'll have a very long and fruitful run with this machine.

[JohnSmith-pnvl]

you would be surprised how many audio people will buy this.
in Audio you can never have enough performance, you can easily overload any system for decades to come, it's not like video where you just wait longer for export.
in audio you need the performance in real-time.
now this depends on what you do as well, for many a basic m1 is plenty, for other, the ultra is still not enough.
since the mac pro will start at 10k minimum for the quad and 20k for the octa m1 max, i think the Studio fits perfect.
mac's are a huge deal in the music industry.
we will see, i think it will sell very well.

[Jarek.]

It's not about my needs. It's about my ego. Also - this whole lockdown/homeoffice trend these days - I haven't visited by company office for last 2+ years. So why I would need my (powerful) laptop anymore if I work from my desk? With all this in mind - I've just ordered Mac Studio 10c/32gc. My current MBP 2017 will be just an 'emergency' machine if I feel I need to do some work out of my couch 😀 Stay safe!

[MrAndrewFitzy]

im just trying to figure out where you got that shelf from... lol

[emmabentley]

Boy this video did not age well, the Studio has proved to be the most popular M1 Product yet, and the Performance proved to be what they said it is. The Studio is fantastic. Get Mine in 2 Weeks,

[yongdol]

Bro. That two lighting sticks behind you are way too bright. It is distracting. Before u talking about whatever, why don’t you tone those things down.

[griponreality]

My argument is that because Apple has done this rollout of AS starting with the lowest end and slowly working up, this was important to do to prevent a huge amount of frustration from those who may already be upset about how poorly the 2019 max pro aged, or being stuck with options that felt while faster than what existed prior, they were left being milked by Apple at each stage of rollout if they wanted the fastest Apple machine out there and without the option of one machine that would last them a long time without need for hardware upgrade. It made sense business wise, but given that only a few months separate wwdc from this event, it would wind them up in an M1 iPad Pro type situation where people bought based on reasonable expectations of Apple’s direction and then were hugely disappointed, harming their brand loyalty. Apple enthusiasts out there likely want to feel good about the decision to drop a car worth into a computer, so this is IMO a nice sign of respect to them. Especially considering the 2019 Mac Pro dropped right before Apple Silicon debuted.

[michaellemleyfilms]

Wrong here. This video exists just as clickbait.

[adeeb]

Cold water and you still did not test it. This is the most technical lacking video I saw on this Mac.