- This is a base model M1 Mac Mini,
and this is a $5,000 M1 Max 14-inch MacBook pro.
And in this video I want to go through the differences
that I've found between these processors
and why I decided to upgrade to such an expensive computer
when the M1 works super well.
So I did a video a little while ago
all around the M1 Mac Mini
and how powerful this computer is.
Working with this computer,
it still is performing just as I need it to.
It works in my editing setup that I have back here.
However, there are some things that are
a little bit limiting around the M1 processor,
and I'm gonna discuss that
when we talk about speed of these computers.
But don't get me wrong,
if you are looking for a fast computer
that is a simple solution,
the M1 Mac Mini and the M1 MacBook Pros
are still super powerful computers.
And I feel like the discussion around the new MacBook Pros
and the M1 Max that came out a little while ago,
it's kind of like the discussion that's going on
between the DJI Mavic 3 and the DJI Air 2S.
They're both very capable drones.
One is definitely more expensive than the other,
and only certain people really need the Mavic 3
over the DJI Air 2S,
they both are gonna get you amazing looking footage.
Both of these computers are super powerful
and they work super well.
So in this video,
I want to go through three different things
that made me move to the M1 Max.
I'm gonna go through speed, functionality and workflow,
and these are the different things
that I'm constantly thinking about
so that I can speed up my workflow,
and just not spend time dealing with computers rendering
or dealing with things like lots of dongles.
So I've had this 14 inch M1 Max for a few weeks now,
and I've edited a few projects on it.
And over the last week,
I shot and edited a complete beginner's guide
to Final Cut Pro,
and working with this computer just made that whole process
so much easier.
And if you're new to Final Cut Pro
or you want a little refresher,
I'll put a link down below in the description
to where you can check out that full course.
And I'm gonna be talking about this
from a creator's perspective.
So if you're someone who's not into video editing,
well, I'm gonna discuss a lot about working in Final Cut Pro
and the video editing side of working on this computer,
versus the M1.
And just keep that in mind
as we're going through this video,
because all of my speed tests,
I have to deal with Final Cut Pro
and working in a video workflow.
So let's just start right there,
let's start with the speed tests.
So I've compared both of these computers side by side
to really see what the difference is,
because the M1 is fast.
I upgraded my entire system to the M1 Mac Mini and
MacBook Pro, and it really works well.
However, there are some situations
where it starts to slow down in Final Cut Pro,
especially working with 10 bit footage
out of my Sony ASMS mark three,
and now my DJI Mavic 3.
So the first thing that I tested out was the export times
between these two computers.
What I did is I did an edit of a four minute clip,
I put graphics on it, some color grades.
The whole point of it was to use a real world scenario
where I'm gonna be editing a project,
putting a lot of different elements into it,
working with 10 bit footage,
and seeing how long it actually takes to export.
So the M1 took around 37 minutes,
and the M1 Max took around 26 minutes.
So a pretty big difference,
especially when you're working on longer timelines.
Now, the second test was around actually editing
and working with multiple camera streams.
So a lot of my workflow revolves around
working with multicam editing.
For my production company
we do multicam editing all the time.
And then for my YouTube channel here,
if I'm working with different cameras,
a lot of times I'll multicam it
and it just makes my workflow much faster.
Now, this is where I really saw a major difference
in these computers.
When trying to do a multicam edit with the Mac Mini,
I couldn't play all four streams of 4K footage
at the same time.
And so you can see here,
I have all four cameras and I hit space bar,
and it just doesn't work.
Now on the new M1 Max, it works no problem.
These are 4K, 10 bit video files,
and they're all playing back super smooth.
This right here is a major difference
between these two computers.
There was no issue playing back four streams of 4K,
10 bit on the M1 Max, it just, it worked.
Like, you hit the space bar,
you can play all the videos at the same time.
Everything is playing, there's no choppiness, no nothing.
And you could actually cut a multicam clip
without having to render any files,
without having to make proxies.
On the M1, you still have to make proxies
to be able to do this kind of a workflow.
And the only time that you can work in a multicam setting
and be able to play back without proxying
is if you're not seeing all four cameras at once.
So if you have the window closed
and you're just looking at the one camera,
you can edit with the M1 on the Mac Mini,
but on the M1 Max, you can have all four of the 4K streams
playing back no problem.
And I know not all of you
are gonna be working in multicam,
but when you're just working on the timeline,
the M1 Max is just smooth.
You never have to make proxies, and when you're editing,
you could be dropping on graphics and color grades
and doing your edits while it's playing back,
and it never stutters and never stops.
There is no downtime when you're editing,
you could just keep going and keep moving
and adding different components, changing your edits,
cutting while it's all playing back,
and you never have to wait for something to render.
That is a huge advantage between these two computers.
Now, I don't need to transcode my footage,
but I did want to test to see what the difference is
if I was transcoding clips.
I took a two minute clip and transcoded it
on my M1 Mac Mini.
It took around 10 minutes to transcode this clip.
The M1 Max, it took 20 seconds.
And that right there shows the biggest speed difference
when it comes to working in a video workflow.
That it will take any footage thrown at it,
you can play it back in real time.
You can edit in real time.
You don't have to worry about things loading
or transcoding or anything like that.
It just moves fast.
Now, do you really need the M1 Max versus the M1 Pro?
Well, I don't know
because I have the M1 Max and the reason I did that
is I want a computer that's gonna last me a long time.
I don't want to be switching out in a year from now.
So this is gonna be my editing computer,
my one computer system for a while.
And that brings me into the next section,
which is the functionality.
So the new MacBook Pros have changed their design.
And if you haven't gone through
and taken a look at the design changes,
well, you now have three Thunderbolt 4 ports.
You have a mag safe,
which for working in a filmmaking kind of setting
is super useful because whenever I have my laptop on set,
a cable always ends up getting kicked.
And I always see my computer almost go down,
which is a huge problem with the USB-C power ports
versus having a mag safe.
Having a dedicated magnetic power mount just,
it simplifies everything.
And it's just gonna be super helpful.
Also around my daughter,
she's gonna pull on that cable
and the computer's on my lap,
and it's just gonna pop right off
rather than pulling my whole computer off my lap.
Now you also have a full-size HDMI port and an SD card slot.
This is huge for a few reasons.
The main things that I used on my MacBook pro
when I was traveling was dongles for SD cards
and dongles to expand the use of the two USB-C ports.
So on the 13 inch MacBook Pro
you have two Thunderbolt 3,
and that really isn't enough to work
in a video creator setting,
because most of the time I have two hard drives plugged in,
but when I have two Thunderbolt 3 SSDs plugged in, well,
there's nowhere to plug in power.
And so I was always playing this game of figuring out
dongles to use, cables to bring,
and also being able to power the computer
while having everything plugged in and being able to edit.
It became a major mess,
and I would be on these big projects
where I would have multiple hard drives
that I need to plug in,
and it would just be super frustrating
working with a two port system.
So with the added ports that they've put on the MacBook Pro,
it does expand the ability to use this
in a variety of settings.
And it's also given me the ability to put this
into my editing workflow here in my office.
So the reason I used to use a Mac Mini and a MacBook pro
is one, they were cheap.
So getting both computers together still is cheaper
than this computer.
However, the Mac Mini has all of these ports,
so I could hook up my dual monitor setup.
I could hook up all my hard drives
and I didn't have to use a bunch of dongles.
Whereas my MacBook Pro, I would have like dongle city,
just like dongles everywhere to hook up the two USB-C ports
and also power it, trying to use it here in my office.
So I never actually used my MacBook Pro in my office.
It was just mainly a travel computer.
But with the added ports on the MacBook Pro,
I can now integrate this seamlessly into my setup
here in my office.
So that gets into my third section, which is workflow.
Originally, I used to have a MacBook Pro workflow.
Back on the Intel MacBook Pros,
I used one computer for everything,
and I like having a one computer setup.
It just makes my life so much easier
because everything is on the one computer,
all of my plugins for Final Cut Pro,
all of the different graphics that I use.
Everything just lives on one computer.
Whereas when I moved to a two computer system,
it was frustrating because I would have some things
synced on one computer,
and then I would forget to put them on the second computer.
And then, so when I'd be editing a project
starting here in my office and then traveling somewhere,
I would end up missing something.
And it just became a big pain point
when I was working with the two computer setup.
So going back to a one computer system is super helpful.
And the reason I ended up adding more onto this MacBook pro
rather than just the base model
is because of all the issues that I had working on
the base model of the other two computers.
So in this computer,
I'm working with the M1 Max,
and then I upgraded the internal memory to four terabytes.
On the 13 inch MacBook Pro,
the most you can do is two terabytes.
I had a 512 in mine,
and it definitely wasn't enough.
It basically was a shell of a computer
and I always had to use external hard drives.
So I got the four terabyte MacBook Pro,
which gives me more than enough to have a few projects
on the hard drive at once,
and be able to have all of my assets,
all of my footage and everything just live
on the computer itself.
Now, when I'm working, I always have a backup.
So I don't just rely on my internal hard drive,
but I only need to plug in an SSD if I'm actually
needing to back something up.
So when I'm working, basically it's just this, that's it.
And having just a laptop that I can bring anywhere
and work off of has made my life just so much easier.
So, I recently released a new editing course.
It's a two hour course on Final Cut Pro,
step-by-step how to edit,
basically a complete beginner's guide.
And I edited that entire project
off of the new MacBook Pro M1 Max.
And I was able to take this computer
basically everywhere last week and work on that course.
And I never had any issues with the footage slowing down.
I would finish a video, I would export it,
upload it right there,
and I would just kind of keep working.
And the flow was much better
than working on a two computer system.
I didn't have to like pull a hard drive from here
and then plug it into my MacBook pro.
Having that internal storage just allowed me to be fluid,
and if I wanted to go work somewhere else,
I just pulled the cables out
and then went and worked somewhere else.
And now also going from a 13 inch to a 14 inch
doesn't sound like a huge difference
in terms of screen size,
but there is a noticeable difference.
Like, working on this 14 inch is actually doable.
Whereas the 13 inch,
I felt like it was a little too tight
when I was working in Final Cut Pro,
and I prefer to get the 14 over the 16,
because when I'm traveling,
when I'm somewhere not here in home,
I don't want to have this massive computer screen.
Back when I was working on Intel computers,
I used to get the biggest screen always.
But then the issue was when I'd be sitting on a plane
or sitting somewhere in a tight situation,
I'd be like this because the computer itself is so big,
and then your tight space, you know,
you can't really edit 'cause your arms
are up against your body.
So I started switching to smaller computers
and with the M1 MacBook Pro, I got the 13 inch,
which was great.
It was easy to work on a smaller computer,
but the screen size was a little bit too small.
So going in the middle to the 14 inch
definitely does make sense.
And I think that the screen is big enough.
If you're someone who's gonna be constantly on the move,
having the 14 inch is kind of a nice advantage
over the 16 inch, because the 16 is just so big.
The other big thing that comes to workflow
is the SD card slot.
That just makes my life so much easier.
There's so many times where I forgot a card reader
and I completely work in an SD card workflow at the moment.
So having that on the computer, it's just easy.
I just plug in my SD card and I can transfer all my footage.
So let me give you a quick rundown
of how I have this computer integrated
into my editing setup here in my office.
I run a dual monitor setup, and with that,
I've stripped down all my components
to basically just hard drive enclosures
and this Black Jet tower.
So my hard drive enclosures,
I use two OWC eight-drive hard drive enclosures,
and I use these as individual drives.
So if I had a drive in each one of these slots,
16 hard drives would pop up on my computer.
You might think that's crazy.
Why not just run them as a raid system
or something like that?
Well, the way that I work with my computer
is that I have one working copy and two backup drives.
And I've found that the simplest solution for me
is just using these internal hard drives
to do all of my backups.
Now, these hard drive bays are hot-swappable.
So I could just dismount one of these hard drives
from the computer and pop a new one in.
It allows me to change out hard drives when I need to,
because I have a lot of data when it comes to both
my production company and my YouTube channel.
And so working in this way has given me the ability
to access a lot of my archive
while also being able to swap drives when I need to.
Now both of these eight drive bays are Thunderbolt 3.
And so I've just Daisy chained them together.
Now, the Black Jet tower is a really cool system
that I found and allows me to swap different cartridges.
And right now you can see
I have three cartridges as SD card readers.
For my production company,
I'm usually working in multicam environments,
so I'll actually use all six of these at once.
I can plug in all six cameras, I can use Hedge,
set up all my data transfers and then walk away.
And then the Hedge app on my phone will tell me
when a card is transferred and if it's been verified
and make sure that all the data's there.
It's just a super streamlined process
so I'm not sitting there swapping cards in and out.
And with this Black Jet system,
each one of these cartridges is two SD card slots.
Now the last one down here, this is actually an SSD drive.
And so you can get these cartridges
that are basically enclosures for SSD drives.
So if I wanted to on the system,
I could have four SSD drives plugged in
which allows me to have a lot more data
and a lot more data at fast speeds.
And with the Black Jet system,
I can get different cartridges for any type of card
that I might come across in my workflow.
So if I upgrade the way I shoot
and I need different cards, well,
I could just get a different cartridge
and it integrates seamlessly with my computer.
Now this is a Thunderbolt 3 system.
So I have another Thunderbolt 3 going here.
And then out of this,
I have my USB-C going to one of my monitors.
Now, on the MacBook Pro you have an HDMI out,
so that goes to my other monitor,
and that frees up one additional Thunderbolt 3
for whatever I need to plug in directly to this computer.
And also, I just have my headphone out
going to my big studio monitors.
So it's a super simple setup,
but with a lot of power
and basically optimized for what I do.
So do you need to upgrade to a $5,000 MacBook pro?
No. The M1 Mac still works super well.
You might need to transcode some of the footage
to edit off the M1, but the majority of the time,
this computer will still work great.
And the reason I upgraded to the M1 Max
and put so much money into a computer,
is because I make videos every day
and this tool is able to speed up my workflow.
And if you want to see more about this computer,
then I highly suggest you check out this video right here.
It goes through all the reasons
I upgraded from the Intel MacBook Pro
to the M1 Mac Mini
and why the base model is still a super capable computer.
And you don't really need to spend that much money
to get fast speeds.
I'll see you over there.