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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Mac Studio M1 Ultra - any thoughts?

My experience so far on an M1 Pro w/32GB RAM is very positive.
However, Im cutting mostly 4K/5K/6K DRAGON footage as well as Panasonic EVA-1 (converted to ProRes 422).
I'm pretty sure you wont have any issues with RED footage.
The internal drive on this MBP is insanely fast.
Not sure what the specs are for the Studio.
 
I recently purchased a Mac Studio Ultra 48 Core GPU / 64 GB memory to replace an 11 year old Mac Pro 5.1 with Dual 3.46 6 Core Xeon Processors and 96 GB Ram and Radeon VII ... the door latch had broken and I had the cover strapped on. Finally gave up when none of my software supported the older machine.

Two observations .... Komodo 6K and R5C 8K files are easily edited in DR Studio 18.0.6 ... rendering to ProRes LT as 4K DCI with 7 nodes including noise reduction and OFX film grain is about 8 - 12 FPS on a 24FPS timeline. Without NR and grain it is at or close to timeline FPS.

Big advantage is there is almost no noise ... while rendering ... and the amount of heat produced from the computer is negligible. My office is now 5 - 6 degrees cooler than when I had the older Mac Pro. Most of the heat from my system is from the stacked G Tech drives connected externally ....

All my important programs .... video photo audio ... run with no delays and the system itself is very fast ... opening and unzipping files about 5 times faster than the older computer.

The only Adobe programs I use are PS and classic LR. Capture One is great as is Logic Pro X. I have Final Cut Pro installed but it is there from a time that I had to transcode Canon 1DX III Raw files to ProRes so I could work in Resolve.

The little box is brilliant in design execution and should be usable for years.
 
James Page said:
Are you cutting converted RED, or do you mean native R3Ds?
Click to expand...

Usually, I stick with R3Ds but most of the time I have to move the projects to a lesser system so its proxy time.
Its a little bit of both I guess.
 
Mac Studio Ultra plays 8k R3D at 24 fps in beta build of Red Cine X (and I understand will do 30 fps), not able to in Resolve 18 (but with auto cache ON does this pretty fast), and not in FCP X better quality. MacBook Pro Max does not quite get there for Red Cine X, and slower in Resolve and FCP but will play fine in FCP better performance. I understand that if better optimized it should be able to do the same in Resolve and FCP X from what the people in Red tell me (if we can do it they should be able to). Short answer, get the Ultra if you want to play 8k R3D files from DSMC2. For the newer cameras (Raptor) that have different compression scheme, probably either would be fine, or for 6k either would be fine as well. I have both and notice the performance difference.
 
The six TB4 ports of the Mac Studio Ultra are worth considering ... and the thermal envelope will be better ... memory bandwidth is much larger .... I had an older Dell 27 inch 5K monitor so the price was not that far from my Mac Pro 11 years later.
 
Bob Moore said:
I recently purchased a Mac Studio Ultra 48 Core GPU / 64 GB memory to replace an 11 year old Mac Pro 5.1 with Dual 3.46 6 Core Xeon Processors and 96 GB Ram and Radeon VII ... the door latch had broken and I had the cover strapped on. Finally gave up when none of my software supported the older machine.
Click to expand...
I have to say, there is kind of a conspiracy to force everybody to upgrade computer hardware, OS's, and software, particularly after 7-8 years. You can always party like it's 1999 forever as long as you never change anything. But god help you if you try to introduce 2022 into that mix.

Big advantage is there is almost no noise ... while rendering ... and the amount of heat produced from the computer is negligible. My office is now 5 - 6 degrees cooler than when I had the older Mac Pro. Most of the heat from my system is from the stacked G Tech drives connected externally ....
Click to expand...
When you say "no noise," do you mean no mechanical noise or no video noise? I have to say the Mac Studio is bone-quiet for us -- I haven't even noticed the fans coming on, but we're not stressing it out too often. The only time I ever notice the big rackmount MacPro making mechanical noise is when the fans kick on and the temp jumps up to 160-170°F for Neat Video renders (particuarly in 4K). But in normal run mode, it's pretty quiet. If I do some complicated Neural Engine-based motion tracking, then it does complain a little bit, but it's still real-time.

Our office used to get pretty hot as well, but we solved that by doubling the room size and getting a 15-foot high ceiling. No heat problems. Power is sometimes a challenge.
 
No fan noise .... when I rendered on the old MP the Radeon VII fans would enter high speed mode .... reminiscent of a kernel-panic. I do use a bit of noise reduction in Resolve
and am fairly tolerant of noise .... the little I see is masked by grain but I almost never shoot underexposed so that the Traffic Lights engage on the Komodo.
 
Marc Wielage said:
When you say "no noise," do you mean no mechanical noise or no video noise? I have to say the Mac Studio is bone-quiet for us -- I haven't even noticed the fans coming on, but we're not stressing it out too often. The only time I ever notice the big rackmount MacPro making mechanical noise is when the fans kick on and the temp jumps up to 160-170°F for Neat Video renders (particuarly in 4K). But in normal run mode, it's pretty quiet. If I do some complicated Neural Engine-based motion tracking, then it does complain a little bit, but it's still real-time.

Our office used to get pretty hot as well, but we solved that by doubling the room size and getting a 15-foot high ceiling. No heat problems. Power is sometimes a challenge.
Click to expand...

This is good to hear. I have two fully spec'd Studios on order and am pretty excited to see how they perform. I have a Monstro, Helium and Komodo as well an old Scarlet MX and we do quite a bit of Multicam. We have 2 M1 Max laptops and they do ok, but I still really pretty heavily on my fully spec'd 2013 so called trash can. It still works pretty well after all these years.
 
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