m3, i have an m1 and ableton beats logic on m1 processor, i can manage 15 tracks of diva in logic, in ableton i can manage 28. its a 8 core m1 with 16gb of ram.
UPDATE ON HIGH BUFFER TEST 48kHz (I only tested low 32 buffer in this video. Please watch the ENTIRE video for context) Logic Pro: 1024 Buffer, Process Buffer Range: Large - 340 Tracks (Latency: 44.5ms Roundtrip, 22.2 ms output.). CPU Load: 100% on performance cores, efficiency cores chillin. Adding more tracks gives a System Overload message and playback stops. Fan noise gets loud after looping this for a while. Due to Max CPU load I assume. Ableton Live: 2048 Buffer, 263 Tracks (No initial CPU overload when pressing play). 272 Tracks (CPU overload when pressing play, does not reappear after clearing it). (Latency: 43.7ms Input, 43.5 ms Output.). CPU Load: Approx 90-93% on performance cores, efficiency cores chillin. Less fan noise compared to Logic . Due to less CPU load I assume. Again, seems like Logic is able to push / use the system resources better.
I’ve tried my heavy mixing & mastering projects as well as some extreme productions of mine on an iMac i9 and MacBook Air M1, and both machines could handle it without ANY issues. I’m still using Live 10 and think 11 & 12 are not optimised and buggy af. Thank you for all those tests, it’s amazing to see Audio Only performance.
Hope this helps someone. I tried testing my M1 Max with the M3 Max results for Ableton. It's pretty substantial however I do use this computer heavy so I'll wait for an M4 and might just keep my M1. M1 Max 55 Tracks vs M3 Max 105 tracks @ 128 samples = 90% Increase M1 Max 15 Tracks vs M3 Max 50 tracks @ 32 samples = 233% Increase
Here is a thought. I noticed you're running a bunch of other apps along side the testing scenarios in respective DAWs. I know for a fact for example that Chrome interferes with Pro Tools and certain plugins. I noticed this with Logic too. Now I don't know if it's a plugin thing or a DAW thing but I've had it happen to me on more than one occasion. Kill Chrome and start over. It might explain your Ableton and Bitwig numbers. Actually kill all the apps and try re-running the tests with just the DAWs open. (and screen recording of course)
@@donkinshaun Apple silicon is 3 years old now, hopefully they've been working on coding improvements for 12. I wonder if Ableton just used the standard Apple feature of standard recompiling of code to bring the easiest way to support Apple M chips - which offered lesser performance. The benchmarks for Logic have really outperformed Ableton in Bjørnar's testing.
I'm a little surprised - Reaper normally outperforms other DAWs in a lot of things. Then again, when you make the application, the operating system, AND the hardware, there are going to be some advantages to that. I'm a Logic Pro user, but every DAW has its pros and cons.
For sure, you need to go with what suits you the best and where you are most productive of course. Its not like I am trying to "bash" a DAW or something. I just show you what is happening through my eyes. Hopefully without bias towards anything. Thats all. :)
😱😱😱 Apple Laptop are defintly back in the game cause no matter what M chip you choose you still a winner !!! ... Thank you for taking time to show us how those Apple chips are powerfull.
Hello there, sorry but I think the comparisons are a bit flawed, especially with logic. Thing is, that Process Range setting is basically the playback buffer. in Logic and the I/O buffer is what the description says, for I/O. The PBR of Small means 512 samples. So basically you are comparing logic 512 buffer with the rest at 32 buffer, a bit simplified but roughly the case. It explains the huge differences you are seeing.
Ok trying to understand this, setting it to 32 in Logic and 32 in Ableton is not the same? Do you have documentation somewhere so I can potentially talk about it in an update. Where does it say that PBR small means 512 samples?
@@bjornark yes this is what I was trying to warn about on the other video! This is not a fair comparison since the internal processing buffer sizes aren't the same. I wish Apple was documenting what PBR small / medium / large are
THANK YOU! I have only one (IMPORTANT!) question: is it possible to use input monitoring with fx on inserts (pro-q, la-2a and not heavy reverb or guitar rig) inside daw with these settings??? (32 or 64 samples buffer) i mean for real life situation when there are 70-130 tracks in project session (some amount of audio tracks with not so heavy plugins and kontakts omnispheres, 5-10 divas and so on, just regular mid-to-high difficulty pop project). i mean possibility to RECORD VOCAL or PLAY VST in such medium\big project using input monitoring real-time in daw without any noticeable latency or dropouts (and not using hardware zero-direct monitoring). and all that with 32-64 samples buffer in daw. is it real?
Can't help wondering if the differences in track counts, and playability at low (32) buffer size is down to Apple, (of course as the creators of the entire system) have simply optimised Logic for the M series much better than the other software companies. Could be that although (I presume) Ableton, Reaper and Bitwig are M series compliant, there isn't some old code in there that has yet to be fully optimised for Apple Silicon. Would be interesting to do the same comparison in maybe 6/12 months time to see if these differences are less noticable. Alos nice for me, as it has confirmed that my replacement for my aging 2014 iMac i7 will be an M3 Mac Studio as and when they are released.
I am wondering this myself, and I am speculating on the same reasons for why Logic seems to be better in this aspect. Ableton 12 is coming, so I will take a look at that to see if there are any differences.
i have a company assigned M1 Max and i really like the performance of the MB. i am really considering finally buying my own MB for ableton, traktor and reloop, push 2.
I would. I use the original M1 MacBook Pro, Ableton Live and Push and under real world production, mixing and mastering tracks all in one session from beginning to end, give me no issues.
Bjørnar Kibsgaard, you are my man, i need to see the tracking performance in logic with this plugins from fabfilter. You just did everything i need to see on this m3 max. I'm sold, you make me buy my first mac ever. congratulation, and thank you very, very much.
In some heavy workloads the 14 Inch M2 MAX would throttle more compared to the same spec in 16 Inch. Not sure if it would affect music production that much really. It seems like music production wont push it to its limits unless you are really going for it.
Greetings Bjornar, great videos, thank you! Would you recommend Macbook pro M3 for recording a classical guitar in Pro Tools? My condenser mic would be around 1,5m far from laptop so I was debating is this a good choice or to purchase Macbook Air because it has no fans. I am also mixing in Pro Tools and DaVinci but not to the extreme. Thank you.
Bjørnar , thank you so much for this in depth investigation and exactly the kind of information we need. I was wondering, when you are adding the tracks, what kind of memory usage are you observing? Do you have the base (48gb) model? I'm going to buy and M3 Max and I am considering whether to upgrade to 64gb ram or not. What kind of memory usage do you see in the VST benchmark? Thanks for any insight from you!!!
Nice test. For mixing a macbook pro max is more than enough. Would be amazing if you could test it with some Orchestral libraries inclusive some reverbs, mixing and mastering settings. But also with random plugins in Logic Pro. like modulation and expressions. Thats a real Case scenario. I have a macbook max m1, 64 Gb. I need way more RAM and CPU Power. it has unfortunately not enough power in my case. would love to see a test with the M3. maybe also compared to a M1 if available? all the best
I’m running that computer and I do big orchestral arrangements. I do use Cubase and I seem to be fine. Although yes it can bet bogged down a bit when the template gets pretty full. There is always VEpro to take it to the next level.
@@tb6265 im not sure, but it just helps the whole system I think..the other thing it lets you do is run a seperate computer for samples, thats a whole different leap
@@Doty6String ah yes with a slave machine, for sure. But with these new macs, finally one machine is enough, at least a Mac Studio, looking really forward to the Mac Studio m3 Ultra! using VEPro on the same machine, it shouldn’t make a difference RAM wise. I really like it when i can just duplicate tracks in my project, Thats always a bit annoying with VEPro….
Thanks for this. Can you test the max buffer performance, for mixing it's fine to have latency and I am almost always at 2048 buffer near the end of a project. Thank you!
@bjornark could you please compare Logic and Ableton to FL Studio? Here's what I got from the same test on a MBP M2 Pro.. CPU TEST with Pro Q 3 (natural phase), Pro MB (4x), Pro C2 (4x), Saturn 2 (Linear Phase, Good Quality): MBP M2 Pro FL Studio: - 32 buffer, 48 sample rate - 19 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is around 50% - 128 buffer, 48 sample rate - 62 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is around 80-90% And yours... MBP M3 Max Logic: - 32 buffer, 48 sample rate - 225 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is around 100% Logic: - 128 buffer, 48 sample rate - 232 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is around 100% Ableton: - 32 buffer, 48 sample rate - 50 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is around 50% Ableton: - 128 buffer, 48 sample rate - 105 tracks Utilisation of CPU cores is near 100%
It makes absolutely no sense to me to use a low buffer size in either Live or Logic when you're studying a *mixing* workflow, where people use routinely plugins which add a lot of latency. The point to use low buffer size is to achieve low latency.. Which is useful for performing, recording keyboard input and the like. For mixing it makes more sense to give the DAW higher buffer sizes so they can absorb peaks in the workloads
I mainly did this video because getting requests to do it. It is one of many ways of showing performance. What do you suggest the video should be called?
@@bjornark by the way apologies if my comment felt harsh, I just was immediately surprised by the 32 buffer size because it's such a low size one! Especially in combination with the uncertainty around the process buffer range in logic. As for this benchmark's name unfortunately I don't know how I'd call it
Thanks for the good quality of video. This is a very interesting result. It seems M3’s performance is too good in music making. But I wonder how the fan noise works in real music production.
Fan noise depends on CPU load, are you going to push the CPU to 90-100% as I do in these unrealistic tests? Probably not, and you will probably not experience fan noise.
Depends on your budget. You need to see tests on the M2 Pro as well. You might get a better price/performance for audio production going the used route.
Hello, very helpful video. Just wanted to know if you think 1TB SSD is enough for music production? And also whether you think 48GB ram will be good for running some sample sound libraries? Thanks
@@bjornark thanks for the response and they are not so big at the moment, but just trying to gauge what size I should opt for in terms of future proofing I guess.
@@bjornark thanks again that’s the same dilemma I am facing! The 2TB is so expensive but I think I might have to go for 1TB like you and use an external SSD to save some pennies😄👍🏾.
I'd be curious too see how bitwig performs when plugin host mode is set to "individually" instead of together. I have heard it utilizes the multicore performance a lot better.
@@bjornark Gottcha. Looks like the M3 Max - Logic 10.8 combination makes much better use of the efficiency cores than M2 Pro & Logic 10.7, and about equal to M1 Pro & Logic 10.7. Not sure if that's thanks to the chip or the Logic upgrade
Nice video. I’m also glad you even adjusted the buffer sizes so we could actually see what would it take to run smoothly after a buffer size adjustment (which someone would do in real life). I hate watching videos when people don’t make these simple changes to give the viewer an actual idea of what it would take to get good results. Nicely done!🫡
