Apple M1 compared to 4GHZ i7 iMac

General
1

Hi Everyone,

I know a few people have posted their experiences of using an M1 compared to their old machines. I didn’t expect much as I had a pretty high spec 4Ghz i7 iMac with 32gb of ram. A friend gave me a M1 Mac mini with 16gb ram and 1tb disk and I’m shocked at the speed difference.

I ran some of my assembly code on the iMac to generate a Mandelbrot and it took just over 30 seconds on the M1 it took exactly 16 seconds and I have to say everything about Xojo seems snappier…

A good upgrade IMO

TC

2 Likes
2

Indeed I switched from a 27" iMac to an M1 Mac Mini, it is was twice as fast.

I can only suppose M2 is even better.

3

Yes… I was going to wait until a M2 Mini was out, but still… :slight_smile:

TC

4

I have been using the Mac Mini for over a year, now. I don’t plan on upgrading to M2. It is fast enough for what I do.

5

do you have 8 or 16GB? Would 8GB be enough? Thinking of upgrading from my 2015 mbp…

6

I am fine with 8GB.

7

I make the upgrade from imac 27 to mac mini m1 8/256 and is perfect…
I make only 1 upgrade and i buyed the Satechi hub with 1TB and now i have everything organized…

1 Like
8

I think the only thing I need is a set of speakers, the Mini’s one is not the best… :slight_smile:

9

I wanted some real small speakers for my Mac Mini.

10

Good to hear :grin:

11

How does that hub work for you, looks like something I would like to have

12

Work perfect,i have put 1tb disk and i have additional space.
The hub is mounted from back and i use the usb ports without problem\s.if you need photos or anything else just ask i send to you.
video

13

nice, thanks, might have to get me one of them when I get me a M1 or M2

14

mmmm i hope you don’t expect to listen to music with these :wink:
there is no miracles concerning sound, still best speakers will come from known brands

or you could use bluetooth and connect other devices

15

I did not want huge speakers, and no, I did not plan to listen to music.

16

I ordered some basic Creative Pebble USB speakers, don’t need much, just something to make some noise… If I want to listen to some music or a movie I’ll use my Apple Beats sound cancelling headphones…

Pebble Speakers

Don’t know what I’m going to do with my old 2012 Retina Mac Book Pro and 2013 27" iMac…

TC

17

I keep my 2015 MacBook, let alone because it can run Intel Linux and Windows in VMWare Fusion if it needs to. Quite convenient on the road.

Sure, I could have Parallels and Windows for Arm, but I could not use previous virtual drives.

The 27" iMac I gave to a nephew.

18

10% CPU improvement, 40% GPU improvement and -50% storage performance if you only get the 256GB version.

1 Like
19

These little speakers are great… I also replaced the HDMI cable with a Thunderbolt 4 to DisplayPort and the screen is so much crisper and rock solid…

1 Like
20

Go for 16GB.
I’ve seen too many people on Reddit and in real life who purchased the 8GB, then months down the road ran into problems caused by not having enough RAM. This irritates people as the only way to upgrade RAM is to buy a new Mac.

On my M1, simply booting the machine takes 6.5GB of RAM. Last time I checked, my Xojo made applications also appear to use almost twice the RAM on M1 as they do on Intel.

1 Like