pastrychef's Asus ROG Strix Z370-G Gaming (WI-FI AC) build w/ i9-9900K + AMD 6600 XT

[dclive]

12.4 works fine, folks, with OC.79 and OC.80.

 

[scottkendall]

I just went with M1 Max with 64GB RAM and 2TB SSD. I didn't want to go all out because I anticipate I will be upgrading in shorter intervals in the future.

I have also gone back and forth about upgrading the drive to the 2TB also but the Mac side of my operation has very small files and after about 6 months those files get archived anyways. However, I worry about the memory... Right now I have 64 gigs and I use about 50 when rendering or working on creation in Unreal but I am also killing the GPU memory. Putting me at about 66 gigs of memory usage but it is hard to say if it will work the same way with the M1 Ultra.

Unfortunately, I have not had time to try any games yet... I did, however, try playing the 3DMark Port Royal 8K 60fps video in VLC. It didn't play well and was very choppy. Pretty much the same as it did on my old Vega 56. When I played the same video on my 6600 XT, although still imperfect, it came much closer.

This is what troubles me about the Max Generally my upgrades are needed on the GPU spectrum not the CPU spectrum, and I upgrade the CPU and Motherboard to not create a bottleneck with the GPU. But without the ability to update the GPU I need to go all in. I did that with the Trashcan and never regretted it though I hung onto it for 6 years.

 

[pastrychef]

I have also gone back and forth about upgrading the drive to the 2TB also but the Mac side of my operation has very small files and after about 6 months those files get archived anyways. However, I worry about the memory... Right now I have 64 gigs and I use about 50 when rendering or working on creation in Unreal but I am also killing the GPU memory. Putting me at about 66 gigs of memory usage but it is hard to say if it will work the same way with the M1 Ultra.


This is what troubles me about the Max Generally my upgrades are needed on the GPU spectrum not the CPU spectrum, and I upgrade the CPU and Motherboard to not create a bottleneck with the GPU. But without the ability to update the GPU I need to go all in. I did that with the Trashcan and never regretted it though I hung onto it for 6 years.

Not sure if it's my imagination, but RAM usage for me seems to be a bit lower on Apple Silicon than it was on Intel.

I still haven't had time to test anything that's really GPU intensive, but judging by what I've read and seen first hand, I think the 32 GPU cores performs approx on par with a Vega.

Maybe you can purchase a base M1 Ultra model from a local Apple Store and try it out, then return it within the return period...

 

[UtterDisbelief]

Not sure if it's my imagination, but RAM usage for me seems to be a bit lower on Apple Silicon than it was on Intel.

Could that be because of the nature of AS "Unified" memory? The fast SSD taking some of the strain of "in memory" storage or paging?

 

[pastrychef]

Could that be because of the nature of AS "Unified" memory? The fast SSD taking some of the strain of "in memory" storage or paging?

I have no idea... I just notice that when I check iStat Menus, I have more Free Memory than I did on my hack. I was expecting the reverse because system and GPU draw from the same pool of RAM... Perhaps better optimizations in macOS?

 

[scottkendall]

Not sure if it's my imagination, but RAM usage for me seems to be a bit lower on Apple Silicon than it was on Intel.

I still haven't had time to test anything that's really GPU intensive, but judging by what I've read and seen first hand, I think the 32 GPU cores performs approx on par with a Vega.

Maybe you can purchase a base M1 Ultra model from a local Apple Store and try it out, then return it within the return period...

Honestly the Vega is not enough I smash it into the ground. That said the M1 Ultra is about is somewhere in between 6900 xt and 6800 xt, and that is slightly lower then where I would like to be graphically.

From what I understand the only game I play is optimized for M1 and gets fabulous results. The Rendering software works for some on M1 and others not so much. It would force me to get better with Unreal but once again it is not running native. With Epic pretty much losing their case against apple I am not sure they will bring native compatibility with Apple.

 

[pastrychef]

Honestly the Vega is not enough I smash it into the ground. That said the M1 Ultra is about is somewhere in between 6900 xt and 6800 xt, and that is slightly lower then where I would like to be graphically.

From what I understand the only game I play is optimized for M1 and gets fabulous results. The Rendering software works for some on M1 and others not so much. It would force me to get better with Unreal but once again it is not running native. With Epic pretty much losing their case against apple I am not sure they will bring native compatibility with Apple.

Games are the primary reason why I'll be keeping my 9900K/6600 XT build around at least for a while longer.

 

[UtterDisbelief]

I've got little experience gaming on an M1 but the best part of what I did was the silence of the hardware! I know the 8-core GPU I had is miniscule compared to the latest generation, but it matched my RX560 in use. The advantage was the system never got noisy. I suppose if you play games that are all shouting and explosions and gun-fire then you might not notice so much with a monster rig, but it was a compelling reason to go AS/M1 at the time.

 

[pastrychef]

I've got little experience gaming on an M1 but the best part of what I did was the silence of the hardware! I know the 8-core GPU I had is miniscule compared to the latest generation, but it matched my RX560 in use. The advantage was the system never got noisy. I suppose if you play games that are all shouting and explosions and gun-fire then you might not notice so much with a monster rig, but it was a compelling reason to go AS/M1 at the time.

The fans in the Mac Studio have been completely inaudible to me. I don't think that pushing the GPU cores would add to any noise.

Another great thing about Apple Silicon Macs is that we can install and use iPhone/iPad apps. I've been able to install my favorite app, the Yahoo Finance app and no longer need to prop my iPad next to my monitor anymore.

New Mac Studio discoveries:

• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses ASMedia ASM2142 controller for USB.
• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses Broadcom Wi-Fi/Bluetooth chipset.
• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses Aquantia for 10GBase-T.
• My Mac Studio's Ethernet will refuse to connect after wake from sleep if IP address is set manually. It works fine if I leave it set to DHCP.

 

[UtterDisbelief]

The fans in the Mac Studio have been completely inaudible to me. I don't think that pushing the GPU cores would add to any noise.

Another great thing about Apple Silicon Macs is that we can install and use iPhone/iPad apps. I've been able to install my favorite app, the Yahoo Finance app and no longer need to prop my iPad next to my monitor anymore.

New Mac Studio discoveries:

• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses ASMedia ASM2142 controller for USB.
• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses Broadcom Wi-Fi/Bluetooth chipset.
• It appears that the Mac Studio still uses Aquantia for 10GBase-T.
• My Mac Studio's Ethernet will refuse to connect after wake from sleep if IP address is set manually. It works fine if I leave it set to DHCP.

My m1 Mini used Fresco Logic FL1100 for USB.