Mac for 2024 - iMac, Mac Mini, Mac Studio?

[lesnicole]

My 2019 iMac seems to have bitten the dust. I’ve been reading / watching tons of reviews of what to buy next. Of course, if budget were no concern, I would get the Mac Studio set up as first choice no brainer, but alas, at the moment budget is a big consideration. However there are also considerations of “wasted” money if I buy something that doesn’t suit my needs, longevity, and resale value.

Nearly every review I’ve found concentrates on video rendering and export. While I do create videos, I don’t really care if my machine takes 3 minutes or 10 minutes to render, so those reviews have limited value to me.

What I care about is Photoshop (and Lightroom). More and more, my layered composites are 1 - 3 TB. My iMac 2019 had 48 GB RAM, a 512 internal SSD, and several Thunderbolt external drives. My setup was starting to struggle with those larger PSD files. Especially when using the pattern preview filter. It was really struggling with the pattern preview on large files.

I’m not sure what specs I need to concentrate on in evaluating if I should get the iMac M3, Mac Mini, or Mac Studio. Ive read that maybe you don’t need as much RAM with the new M3 chip? I went down to the Apple Store and they were no help. Of course they just said to buy the Mac Studio with the new Display.

I'm rather confused by the wildly conflicting reviews of what I need to get for Photoshop today. iMac M3 is great for creatives, no it's not. Get a Mac Mini instead of Mac Studio. Plus conflicting advice on how much RAM and SSD to get.

I would really appreciate your thoughts on what configuration I can get by with and what specs are important to Photoshop. Also, with a limited budget, would it make sense to buy an iMac M3 until I can afford a Mac Studio set up down the road? I’ve read some reviews that say by the time you get the specs you need with the iMac M3 (more RAM, SSD, etc.) that you may as well get a Mac Studio. 

What specs are the most important for Photoshop usage? The chip? The RAM? The Core? The internal SSD? (with externals for file storage.) and anything else I need to know like graphics card. Thank you!

[Conrad_C · Accepted solution]

When they say “creatives” it can be a blanket term for everybody. Video editors, web designers, digital painters, etc. If you’re using Pattern Preview, it sounds like you often do graphic design, so the following comments are based on that.

By the way, you might want to hold off on buying anything until the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference on June 10, in case new Macs are announced then.

Today the main components of a Mac that affect performance are:

• Number of CPU cores 
• Speed of one CPU core 
• Number of GPU cores (Graphics accelerator) 
• NPU (Apple Neural Engine accelerator for AI features, might not used by Photoshop yet) 
• Amount of Unified Memory (unified memory serving both system and graphics) 
• Storage speed and amount of free space on it (to allow for large Photoshop temporary scratch files)

Photoshop currently depends the most on the speed of one CPU core, the amount of unified memory, and the amount of free storage space. To a lesser degree, it depends on the number of CPU and GPU cores. All desktop Macs have about the same internal SSD storage, which is very fast.

For the Macs you mentioned:

M3 iMac and M2 Mac mini. Should be OK for general use, but limited to 24GB of unified memory, which may not be enough for large documents. Also, unlike Intel iMacs, the M3 iMac is limited to a 24-inch screen. And, these models use the base levels of the M2 and M3 processors.

M2 Pro Mac mini. The Pro level is better than the M2 Mac mini because you can order it with up to 32GB of unified memory, which is a good current level for Photoshop unless documents are very large. And the M2 Pro processor is more powerful than the base M2.

M2 Mac Studio. For Photoshop use, the base Mac Studio is a good deal. That’s because it comes with 32GB unified memory and 512GB storage, and can be configured with more unified memory than the Mac mini. There’s no 48GB unified memory option to match your current iMac, so if you wanted more than 32GB you would have to throw in another $400 to get to 64GB.

On that last point: There is one thing you should do before you buy anything. When you notice Photoshop getting slow on your current Mac, open the Utilities folder and open Activity Monitor, and look at what it shows in these tabs:

Memory tab. What does the Memory Pressure graph look like? Is it always green, or does it spend a lot of time being orange or red? If it’s usually green, then maybe 32GB unified memory is enough for your tasks. If it’s orange or red much of the time, you must order your next Mac with more than the 48GB you have now.

CPU tab. What is the CPU % used by Photoshop when it gets slow? The way to read it is that 100% equals one CPU core. So if it says 200% and the iMac has 4 CPU cores, then only half of the cores are being used and you don’t really need more. But if it was close to 400% on the same 4-core iMac, then more cores could help.

Also, how much free space is on your current iMac?

[lesnicole]

Thanks so much for this detailed answer @Conrad_C . Very helpful. By the way, I found a great YouTube video comparing the Mac Mini Pro to the Mac Studio Base model and the one up. It determined that the Mac Mini Pro is very good for Photoshop and Lightroom, but I think the 32 Mac Studio sounds like the best bet all around. I'm going to wait until after the Apple conference to see if they come out with anything new, but I'm aiming for the Mac Studio. 

[D Fosse]

Don't skimp on disk space! Get as much as you possibly can. An internal hard-wired drive is always faster, safer and more convenient than external drives.

Photoshop eats disk space for breakfast. The terabytes disappear quickly.

[Conrad_C]

For PCs, I agree.

For Macs, however, buying more internal storage is so expensive that I’m quite comfortable recommending enough internal storage just for the apps and temp files that cannot be moved off of it, and extending that with much cheaper external SSDs. My primary Photoshop scratch volume is a 1TB external SSD, and all my photos are on a completely different external SSD.

[Lumigraphics]

What is your budget? And how long before you replace the new machine?

If a well-spec'd Intel iMac was struggling, you'll want a higher-end machine. I have an M1 mini and its enough but none extra.

By the time you build out a mini with higher-end processor and RAM, you might as well just get a Studio. I would not recommend the iMac for your needs.

As for displays, you can spend a thousand dollars easily on a good monitor, although you don't have to.

Finally, Apple has its annual developer conference in two weeks. If at all possible, wait to see what they announce. This is literally the worst possible time to buy a new Mac.

[lesnicole]

@Lumigraphics I agree with everything you say. I'm going to at least wait until the Apple conference to see what they come out with. I'm trying to figure out how I can get by without buying until it's a better time to get the most computing power for the money.