Apple M4 Macs: iMac, Mac mini, MacBook Pro

Developing software on Mac is not the same as Windows or Linux where you can run both within a VM. You need actual Mac hardware to do it,
Or renting an Amazon macOS instance in the cloud.... a bit of a pain.

I think the machine is really a good deal for anyone that has an use case that fit on the base ram and external harddrive, developer but a lot of Apple server stuff as well.
 
My base Mini m4 arrived. This thing is fast, in my personal benchmark for single core speed easily beating the 7950x (didn't have an opportunity to run it on a 9xxx yet).

Multi-threading isn't too bad either, a FreeBSD `make world` in a QEMU VM takes 30 minutes. And no noise while doing so, and that is pretty maximum load.

The only problem is that it is too small for my cat to sleep on. I liked the previous form factor with space for USB-A ports better.
 
My base Mini m4 arrived. This thing is fast, in my personal benchmark for single core speed easily beating the 7950x (didn't have an opportunity to run it on a 9xxx yet).

Multi-threading isn't too bad either, a FreeBSD `make world` in a QEMU VM takes 30 minutes. And no noise while doing so, and that is pretty maximum load.

The only problem is that it is too small for my cat to sleep on. I liked the previous form factor with space for USB-A ports better.
nice quick review!
 
My belief is that the base model M4 Mac Mini is meant to help developers develop software for MacOS. I know a lot of Apple apologists will say that the software they use is already ARM, but we're 4 years into Apple's ARM experiment and it's still 50%. Gaming is far worse with 5.9% being native while the 70.7% is through Resotta2 with 19% reported to not work. Developing software on Mac is not the same as Windows or Linux where you can run both within a VM. You need actual Mac hardware to do it, and this is how Apple plans to correct this problem. Tim Cook and other superiors at Apple must have cringed at the idea of selling this machine for $600. Lets not kid ourselves because this machine is a really good deal, but mostly for developers. Anyone else will be better off upgrading the ram and SSD, which will quickly make it into a bad deal. You're still better off buying this machine if you need a small mini PC. I also don't think the M4 Mac Mini is suddenly going to get developers to develop more software on the Mac either. Apple needs to allow MacOS to run legally in a VM. I say this because you can do it, just gotta find workarounds. It's such a taboo thing that even r/Hackintosh won't let anyone talk about VM's.
The base M4 mini is more than a dev machine — it's really the "I just want a computer for the web, media, and occasional game" system. The one you get if you really are a casual user, or gift your parents when you'd rather not spend hours doing unpaid tech support.

And no, it's not "apologists" who are happy with the number of ARM-native apps. Did you look at the list you linked to? Many of those are either deprecated or have never been available on the Mac in the first place, like Jet Set Radio. I also see a lot of effective duplicates where an app or game is listed alongside a "benchmarks" entry for the same title. And the list is simply outdated — it claims even Adobe apps like After Effects are still running in Rosetta 2 when they've supported ARM for a while.

I'd have to disagree on that Beelink system. It's good that you can get more RAM and storage for the money, and that it's easier to upgrade; it's not so hot that you're using outdated CPUs until you get to the $749 model (or if you want the best of the current gen, $1,249). Beelink is mainly catering to corporate buyers who either want cheap compact systems on office desks, performance and noise be damned, or out-of-the-way PCs for industrial tasks. If you're an everyday user, the Mac mini will generally be faster, less intrusive, and more future-proof (since there are more modern ports). Heck, it'll even save you a bit of money in the long run as it doesn't chew as much power.
 
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FWIW I filled up the 256 GB SSD in less than 24 hours and I don't have any music software loaded yet, and no media obviously.
 
The base M4 mini is more than a dev machine — it's really the "I just want a computer for the web, media, and occasional game" system. The one you get if you really are a casual user, or gift your parents when you'd rather not spend hours doing unpaid tech support.
That is also a good use of the M4 Mac Mini. Personally, I've just installed Linux Mint as a way to avoid hours of unpaid tech support, plus I can make it look like Windows or even MacOS. At $600 it seems a little unlike Apple personally. My belief is still that the $600 price point is meant to help get more software on MacOS, because it's probably the #1 complaint Mac users have.
And no, it's not "apologists" who are happy with the number of ARM-native apps. Did you look at the list you linked to? Many of those are either deprecated or have never been available on the Mac in the first place, like Jet Set Radio.
How many depreciated applications you see on Windows? Most people expect their favorite application to work, including software never meant for MacOS. Same problem Linux users have.
I also see a lot of effective duplicates where an app or game is listed alongside a "benchmarks" entry for the same title. And the list is simply outdated — it claims even Adobe apps like After Effects are still running in Rosetta 2 when they've supported ARM for a while.
Do you need a new version of After Effects or is the upgrade to native ARM free? I know Adobe has gone a subscription model but I don't know if that still effects paid software?
I'd have to disagree on that Beelink system. It's good that you can get more RAM and storage for the money, and that it's easier to upgrade; it's not so hot that you're using outdated CPUs until you get to the $749 model (or if you want the best of the current gen, $1,249).
I was referencing the $1k model with the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370. As far as I know, you can't buy a machine with a Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 for less than $1k. The M4 Mac Mini with same specs would cost $1,200. The price difference is not the major factor, but software compatibility.
Beelink is mainly catering to corporate buyers who either want cheap compact systems on office desks, performance and noise be damned, or out-of-the-way PCs for industrial tasks. If you're an everyday user, the Mac mini will generally be faster, less intrusive, and more future-proof (since there are more modern ports).
Nobody said you can't buy a Beelink and do whatever you want, just like you can buy an M4 Mac Mini and do whatever you want. The Mac Mini will only be good so long as you stay within the MacOS ecosystem. That ecosystem isn't very large. I'm not sure one could call the Mac Mini future proof just based on ports. The Beelink has a removable PCIE4.0 SSD which makes it greatly future proof. The real future proof comes from software, because again you're limited on Mac.
Heck, it'll even save you a bit of money in the long run as it doesn't chew as much power.
The Ryzen AI 9 370 isn't exactly eating a lot of power. Wendel from Level1techs tested it and show's something like 18watts and the power adapter can go up to 100w. While the M4 Mac Mini is using something like 4watts while idling, which is a world of difference but I got light bulbs that use more power than the Beelink, and they're LED bulbs too. You're talking about dollars difference per year between the two machines, and that really depends how often you use these machines and how often you push them at full tilt, if ever at all. The main appeal of the BeeLink Ryzen setup is again software, because you won't have a software problem on that machine. This may or may not be a problem for some people, but even if I'm buying this for grandma then I'd like the peace of mind knowing that if ever a request for an application is made then I know I can fulfill it with the BeeLink. The M4 Mac Mini is a maybe.
 
So what's the plan? My iphone has more space!
There's always the super useful and fast external usb ports. Just not as fast and convenient as a large internal drive.
funny-meme-about-usb-ports.jpg
 
There's always the super useful and fast external usb ports. Just not as fast and convenient as a large internal drive.

You know... I literally just had somebody tell me that there's no problem with bazillion dollar storage prices at Apple because you just need a Thunderbolt dock.

It's a fucking desktop! A dock on your fucking desktop!?

Between their disdain for software developers and their ridiculous upgrade pricing Apple needs get their collective heads out of their asses. M silicon has them on the verge of something really great, maybe even revolutionary. Even Microsoft is trying to make it as easy as possible for Apple... But Apple's just gotta Apple.
 
You know... I literally just had somebody tell me that there's no problem with bazillion dollar storage prices at Apple because you just need a Thunderbolt dock.

It's a fucking desktop! A dock on your fucking desktop!?

Between their disdain for software developers and their ridiculous upgrade pricing Apple needs get their collective heads out of their asses. M silicon has them on the verge of something really great, maybe even revolutionary. Even Microsoft is trying to make it as easy as possible for Apple... But Apple's just gotta Apple.
Apple seems to have really great engineers. They seem so focused on user experience that everything else gets sidelined.
 
You know... I literally just had somebody tell me that there's no problem with bazillion dollar storage prices at Apple because you just need a Thunderbolt dock.

It's a fucking desktop! A dock on your fucking desktop!?
Ask me if I've ever used an external drive. There's really no point when you can always just buy bigger internal storage. Just bought a 2TB MSI NVME 4.0 SSD as an upgrade and a way to switch to CachyOS without erasing my 1TB Linux Mint installation. It's not like I only have one drive either as I have another SSD for my Windows 10 installation that I haven't touched in three years and a couple of mechanic drives for data backup. That's just my main PC, where my HTPC has even greater storage. You don't really need fast external ports on a PC with proper removable storage. If I really need to move around data then my home has Ethernet running through it and I can easily transfer files effortless. As a PC user the Thunderbolt ports are a nice bonus but not something I'd actually use.
M silicon has them on the verge of something really great, maybe even revolutionary. Even Microsoft is trying to make it as easy as possible for Apple... But Apple's just gotta Apple.
I wouldn't call M silicon on the verge of anything other than reminding Apple why they dumped PowerPC for x86. If you plan to go Linux then Macs are terrible as Apple has never donated any code so that Linux support for M-series silicon is good. As much as people may like their MacOS, but the industry is slowly moving towards Linux. Asahi Linux is already proving to be able to do more than what MacOS could do, and it's still not mature. Same goes for gaming as despite the single threaded performance and amazing graphics results in Geekbench or Cinebench, that these machines still perform like a dog when it comes to gaming. Apple apologists can claim that Mac isn't for gaming, but even Apple themselves recognized that people do play games on Mac and started to make tools and promote the development of games on Mac. What's interesting is that this is a recent development, even though MacOS has been a thing for many years. This is because an Intel based Mac user can just use bootcamp to switch to Windows and run games just fine, or Parallels is sometimes good enough to play them within MacOS. That's not the case with M-series silicon. Every generation of x86 is closing the gap in efficiency, and while Apple is still keeping a good distance, it isn't as big of a selling point as it used to. It doesn't look good for Intel right now, but Intel is trying. AMD has already proven they can make power efficient x86 chips, but they are still behind Apple. A lot of what's making M4 fast is it's 10 wide decode. For comparison, AMD's Zen5 is 2 x 4-wide decode.
 
How many depreciated applications you see on Windows? Most people expect their favorite application to work, including software never meant for MacOS. Same problem Linux users have.
Keep in mind that “deprecated” doesn’t mean there’s no replacement; it often means that it’s either no longer needed or that there’s a modern substitute.


Do you need a new version of After Effects or is the upgrade to native ARM free? I know Adobe has gone a subscription model but I don't know if that still effects paid software?
It’s a universal binary at last check, so you don’t even have to download another copy if you’re up to date.


Nobody said you can't buy a Beelink and do whatever you want, just like you can buy an M4 Mac Mini and do whatever you want. The Mac Mini will only be good so long as you stay within the MacOS ecosystem. That ecosystem isn't very large. I'm not sure one could call the Mac Mini future proof just based on ports. The Beelink has a removable PCIE4.0 SSD which makes it greatly future proof. The real future proof comes from software, because again you're limited on Mac.
It’s more how that prioritization affects the design. Apple clearly designed the Mac mini for an everyday user first and foremost, although there are nods to pros (like the 10Gbps Ethernet option).

The internal SSD is only a mild advantage given that the Mac has at least Thunderbolt 4. It does occupy a slot and might cost more, but not so much more that it’d rule the Mac out.

And software… while it is true that Windows will give you a safety net of sorts, compatibility really isn’t the issue it used to be, especially for the mainstream.
 
Ask me if I've ever used an external drive. There's really no point when you can always just buy bigger internal storage. Just bought a 2TB MSI NVME 4.0 SSD as an upgrade and a way to switch to CachyOS without erasing my 1TB Linux Mint installation. It's not like I only have one drive either as I have another SSD for my Windows 10 installation that I haven't touched in three years and a couple of mechanic drives for data backup. That's just my main PC, where my HTPC has even greater storage. You don't really need fast external ports on a PC with proper removable storage. If I really need to move around data then my home has Ethernet running through it and I can easily transfer files effortless. As a PC user the Thunderbolt ports are a nice bonus but not something I'd actually use.

I wouldn't call M silicon on the verge of anything other than reminding Apple why they dumped PowerPC for x86. If you plan to go Linux then Macs are terrible as Apple has never donated any code so that Linux support for M-series silicon is good. As much as people may like their MacOS, but the industry is slowly moving towards Linux. Asahi Linux is already proving to be able to do more than what MacOS could do, and it's still not mature. Same goes for gaming as despite the single threaded performance and amazing graphics results in Geekbench or Cinebench, that these machines still perform like a dog when it comes to gaming. Apple apologists can claim that Mac isn't for gaming, but even Apple themselves recognized that people do play games on Mac and started to make tools and promote the development of games on Mac. What's interesting is that this is a recent development, even though MacOS has been a thing for many years. This is because an Intel based Mac user can just use bootcamp to switch to Windows and run games just fine, or Parallels is sometimes good enough to play them within MacOS. That's not the case with M-series silicon. Every generation of x86 is closing the gap in efficiency, and while Apple is still keeping a good distance, it isn't as big of a selling point as it used to. It doesn't look good for Intel right now, but Intel is trying. AMD has already proven they can make power efficient x86 chips, but they are still behind Apple. A lot of what's making M4 fast is it's 10 wide decode. For comparison, AMD's Zen5 is 2 x 4-wide decode.
Our htpcs only have nvme and the media comes over the lan.
 
Ask me if I've ever used an external drive. There's really no point when you can always just buy bigger internal storage. Just bought a 2TB MSI NVME 4.0 SSD as an upgrade and a way to switch to CachyOS without erasing my 1TB Linux Mint installation. It's not like I only have one drive either as I have another SSD for my Windows 10 installation that I haven't touched in three years and a couple of mechanic drives for data backup. That's just my main PC, where my HTPC has even greater storage. You don't really need fast external ports on a PC with proper removable storage. If I really need to move around data then my home has Ethernet running through it and I can easily transfer files effortless. As a PC user the Thunderbolt ports are a nice bonus but not something I'd actually use.

I wouldn't call M silicon on the verge of anything other than reminding Apple why they dumped PowerPC for x86. If you plan to go Linux then Macs are terrible as Apple has never donated any code so that Linux support for M-series silicon is good. As much as people may like their MacOS, but the industry is slowly moving towards Linux. Asahi Linux is already proving to be able to do more than what MacOS could do, and it's still not mature. Same goes for gaming as despite the single threaded performance and amazing graphics results in Geekbench or Cinebench, that these machines still perform like a dog when it comes to gaming. Apple apologists can claim that Mac isn't for gaming, but even Apple themselves recognized that people do play games on Mac and started to make tools and promote the development of games on Mac. What's interesting is that this is a recent development, even though MacOS has been a thing for many years. This is because an Intel based Mac user can just use bootcamp to switch to Windows and run games just fine, or Parallels is sometimes good enough to play them within MacOS. That's not the case with M-series silicon. Every generation of x86 is closing the gap in efficiency, and while Apple is still keeping a good distance, it isn't as big of a selling point as it used to. It doesn't look good for Intel right now, but Intel is trying. AMD has already proven they can make power efficient x86 chips, but they are still behind Apple. A lot of what's making M4 fast is it's 10 wide decode. For comparison, AMD's Zen5 is 2 x 4-wide decode.
Not to necro-res this thread, but you might enjoy this upgrade, which is only $259 USD, compared to Apple's $800, each being 2TB:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLtE2kMTVOQ
 
Not to necro-res this thread, but you might enjoy this upgrade, which is only $259 USD, compared to Apple's $800, each being 2TB:

These modules are only good on the base m4 mini, not the m4 pro mini. I almost ordered one until I checked the fine print. m4 pro modules are still being designed but are "coming soon" and should be up to 8TB since 2TB is the max for the base m4 chip but 8TB for the m4 pro. Well I'm hoping anyway since 8TB would solve all of my external storage headaches.
 
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Not to necro-res this thread, but you might enjoy this upgrade, which is only $259 USD, compared to Apple's $800, each being 2TB:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLtE2kMTVOQ

What's also interesting is that Intel is now pushing for modular designs, to probably compete with Apple since most PC laptops have started to solder components, including Intel themselves. Probably going to be key in competing with Apple.
https://community.intel.com/t5/Blog...ustainable-Approach-for-Enhanced/post/1657681
 
What's also interesting is that Intel is now pushing for modular designs, to probably compete with Apple since most PC laptops have started to solder components, including Intel themselves. Probably going to be key in competing with Apple.
https://community.intel.com/t5/Blog...ustainable-Approach-for-Enhanced/post/1657681

Can really get slimmer designs with soldered components. Look at z-height reductions from soldering CPU and RAM on motherboard compared to having a socket. Same goes to storage and other items.
 
We can have doubt obviously, but:
https://www.tweaktown.com/news/1014...s-on-package-memory-moving-forward/index.html
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-com...-future-cpus-due-to-margin-impact?form=MG0AV3
On package memory seem to cost them a fortune so that easy to stop... will that mean much longer platform too and not constant change of socket...

Those reasons make it possible:
  • Enable cost-optimized products by streamlining manufacturing design processes (module reuse)
  • Easier product SKU management and faster time to market
But when Apple goes for the more expensive but way better result, can force you back to the spent more road.
 
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I know I linked this before many times, but this video proves that you can still put in removable components and still keep it slim.

View: https://youtu.be/E3N-z-Y8cuw?si=WhJ8eVul7vdvmy_L

That makes it harder for apple to make all the money. Every aftermarket component is a pile of dollars that didn't go to buying Steve Jobs a new car every six months because he thought he was too special for license plates.
 
That makes it harder for apple to make all the money. Every aftermarket component is a pile of dollars that didn't go to buying Steve Jobs a new car every six months because he thought he was too special for license plates.
Steve Jobs died in 2011.
Up until then, not wrong.
 
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He also refused treatment for a very treatable form of cancer and instead ate fruit to cure it. This is a man that people aspire to.

Pretty sure (completely sure) he had neuroendocrine pancreatic cancer that is quite deadly. It's just about as close to 100% fatal in five years as cancers tend to get, I think high 90s. He lived eight because he had money, enormous amounts of money. Pancreatic cancer never checks your bank balance though. Pretty sure he had every single medical, experimental, and hippy dippy treatment that existed. I think he even had a liver transplant when it was spreading as well. Think of what would happen if you or I tried to get on a transplant list when we had an aggressive, universally terminal form of cancer... Nothing is what would happen.

Just imagine a world where trillions of dollars being horded by a hand-full of people, people like Steve Jobs, for no other reason than having more was poured that into medical research instead.
 
He also refused treatment for a very treatable form of cancer and instead ate fruit to cure it. This is a man that people aspire to.
He was brilliant in some ways, but also the classic Type A who insisted on doing things his way and had trouble relating to others. And yes, that included latching on to projects that didn’t go very far, like iPod HiFi and the Power Mac G4 Cube.

His main quality was his ability to recognize where things were going and act on it, even if it meant revamping the company or cannibalizing an existing product. Modern Apple is safer, but also tends to struggle with predicting the future (see: Vision Pro).
 
Pretty sure (completely sure) he had neuroendocrine pancreatic cancer that is quite deadly. It's just about as close to 100% fatal in five years as cancers tend to get, I think high 90s.
He had the rare form that could have been operable (pnet), which he did after a while and survive a long time with the operation. Not sure if people know for sure it had an impact to wait for the operation for the cancer to have came back later on, but probably did not help.

This is a strange things to judge someone on imo, fear of operation... does not sound like something hurting that much others or anything bizarre.

His main quality was his ability to recognize where things were going and act on it

The acting/execution part is really important, a lot of people had the idea/tried to sales song for $1 (winamp and others) on the internet, he completely out executed them and ate them all alive completely, from the deals with the music industry to the ads campaign.
 
FLOP requires a target to be logged in to a site such as Gmail or iCloud in one tab and the attacker site in another for a duration of five to 10 minutes. When the target uses Safari, FLOP sends the browser “training data” in the form of JavaScript to determine the computations needed. With those computations in hand, the attacker can then run code reserved for one data structure on another data structure. The result is a means to read chosen 64-bit addresses.

SLAP abuses the LAP feature found in newer Apple silicon to perform a similar data-theft attack. By forcing LAP to predict the wrong memory address, SLAP can perform attacker-chosen computations on data stored in separate Safari processes. The researchers demonstrate how an unprivileged remote attacker can then recover secrets stored in Gmail, Amazon, and Reddit when the target is authenticated.

They both exploit a combination of issues between Safari and the hardware protections.
A software update should handle closing that hole.
 
FLOP requires a target to be logged in to a site such as Gmail or iCloud in one tab and the attacker site in another for a duration of five to 10 minutes. When the target uses Safari, FLOP sends the browser “training data” in the form of JavaScript to determine the computations needed. With those computations in hand, the attacker can then run code reserved for one data structure on another data structure. The result is a means to read chosen 64-bit addresses.

SLAP abuses the LAP feature found in newer Apple silicon to perform a similar data-theft attack. By forcing LAP to predict the wrong memory address, SLAP can perform attacker-chosen computations on data stored in separate Safari processes. The researchers demonstrate how an unprivileged remote attacker can then recover secrets stored in Gmail, Amazon, and Reddit when the target is authenticated.

They both exploit a combination of issues between Safari and the hardware protections.
A software update should handle closing that hole.

They say "Safari" but surely this affects other browsers, too? Do you know more about that?
 
They say "Safari" but surely this affects other browsers, too? Do you know more about that?
The report only mentions Safari, so no clue.
I would assume that it affects the whole browser ecosystem as they all just reskin WebKit, but nothing I’ve read mentions WebKit, just Safari. But to update Safari they would update WebKit, so a fix to one would be a fix to all if that is the case.
 
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I'm not sure. The article is written for idio^H^H the general population. They might have avoided precise terminology so that they don't "confuse" the reader.
i guess both of us are blind....

" two newly discovered vulnerabilities that leak credit card information, locations, and other sensitive data from the Chrome and Safari browsers as they visit sites such as iCloud Calendar, Google Maps, and Proton Mail."
 
The article seem to distinguish enough:

There are two reasons FLOP is more powerful than SLAP. The first is that it can read any memory address in the browser process's address space. Second, it works against both Safari and Chrome. SLAP, by contrast, is limited to reading strings belonging to another webpage that are allocated adjacently to the attacker's own strings. Further, it works only against Safari. The following Apple devices are affected by one or both of the attacks:


The word Chrome appear 8 times in the article. Was it edited since the comments were made ?
 
i guess both of us are blind....

" two newly discovered vulnerabilities that leak credit card information, locations, and other sensitive data from the Chrome and Safari browsers as they visit sites such as iCloud Calendar, Google Maps, and Proton Mail."

That's not much better since they don't say all browsers or not. What about Firefox? Is this a general attack on browsers?
 
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