My 2013 15" MBP will reach the end of its life at some point and I'm looking to replace it with a 16" ARM MBP when they're released.
I do full stack web dev with PHP, and JS/Vue/static site generators on the front end. I also do some visual design, and occasional lightweight video editing (iMovie only).
I'll use the new machine for at least 3 years, and maybe even 5 or 6 years. I'd like to get 32GB of RAM, but it is an expensive upgrade, it's not something I'll add just for the sake of it.
How useful do you think the extra 16GB of RAM will be for this sort of work?
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For me, I like doing my work using remote desktop. Just bought a Thinkcentre Tiny with 32GB RAM and 6 Core CPU and use Google Remote Desktop to do work on it. Using it for PHP, MySQL and Flutter development on Windows slong with Go + AWS CLI on Ubuntu VM, I don't have to worry about power anymore on my laptop. Just to have to use a laptop that has a nice keyboard, battery life and a nice internet connection.
16Gb is generally good, but in my case running a bunch of docker containers, two browsers with tons of tabs, slack, terminal, zoom, and a hungry ide starts to take a toll on my ram and the computer, so I'd expend as much as possible on that.
I also want to get M1 16 in and I am thinking to go for 32 gb. Here's why I had 16 gb hackintosh and it was working all fine until i got a project which has multple internal projects and all dockerized.. When i had to run more than 2 projects the docker alone would take up to 14 gb so I had to add another stick of 8gb.
This was hackintosh .. upgradable .. M1 wont be upgradable and you don't know in 2-3 years what kind of projects you will be working and some time multiple memory eating things running at a same times ! so better go with 32 gb! Hope this helps
yeah, the non-upgradability is a thing. I went for 16GB for various reasons, but would err towards 32GB for my next generation.
The Apple Silicon chips are interesting as I believe they are more memory efficient due to their architecture. Having the memory integrated with the chip reduces churn and the need for RAM. Still, VMs and Docker aren't light!
Being honest, I use 4 gigs of RAM, 16 gigs of eMMC storage, and Intel Celeron 😓 and I have little problems running Microsoft Edge, Zoom, and VSCode, (and I am developing an electron app) all at once. Except for when the computer just crashes and I have to replace the operating system and wipe my storage. :)
You probably already decided on that, but for everyone stumbling upon this post, here you can find my comparison between MBP 16" i9/64G and i7/16G for development that includes docker, some npm scripts and occasional Xcode.
nowicki.io/macbook-pro-16-64g-i9-v...
tldr;
I feel no difference.
When the 16G is idling after start it takes 8GB of RAM (compared to 20GB on the higher version).
When I'm fully in the working mode (IntelliJ open, docker containers running, npm frontend bundlers + chrome tabs with devtools) I always have little spare RAM. Looks like MacOS is just being awesome in the memory management aspects.
Thanks for this – interesting read.
I wonder too if the fast SSD MBPs have mean that a bit less RAM is even less of an issue?
I'm hoping to hold out until the ARM based 16" are available and maybe the memory offering will be different then. If not 16GB might be enough.
128 GB of RAM
There's no pressing reason to upgrade to 32GB based on your usecase, but there no reason not to either other than expense.
I still do some development on a thinkpad from 2011 with 8GB and an i5. Mostly with .NET or node.
I recently changed job, and they dropped a new Mac on me with 32gb. I never paid much attention before, but it seems I am often using around 16-17gb without trying. I think 16 does the trick and 32 is perhaps a luxury or for running a lot of electron apps lol.
16 Gb is more than you'll ever need for web development unless you start dockerizing the hell out of an application, in my opinion. I work on a 8 Gb and it's perfectly fine too for a similar stack. Also, consider that 16 Gb is double than 8 Gb, it's not a little more.
As previously stated by some people I would also go with "it depends" and right away on "Do you use virtualisation?". Reason is that when I want to build something in Java like simple monolithic service with some web interface, let's say you go ahead and generate JHipster app, you really don't need more than 16GB to run it including IntelliJ, VS Code for front, maybe a simple DB running inside Mongo or PostgreSQL. You can even have DB running in Docker with this kind of setup.
Now I have 48GB, it's funny but I had 16 and added 32 more. Thing is I'm running 1 REST API which is a bit bigger than standard microservice, 2 more APIs, and Mongo, Neo4j, and Apache in docker. Now imagine running 3 APIs written on JVM (Kotlin, Groovy, Java) 2 DBs and 1 messaging system, 3x IntelliJ for that, VS Code, Postman, couple of Notepads and Sublimes, Opera with couple of tabs and Brave also couple of tabs, Slack, sometimes tools like Azure Storage Explorer, MS Teams, node.js apps for administration of these tools running in docker... Yeah, even GNU/Linux would give up at some point and ask for more RAM because you still need GUI running, maybe Spotify, and such. Now you might go with less RAM for all of this but I like my IntelliJ and I like not closing stuff all the time.
ha, fair enough!
I don't use VMs that heavily now, but I possibly will more in the future. I think I will go with 32GB because of the longevity it'll add to the machine. Being non-upgradable I think 16GB will shorten its useful life.
Did anyone say I got a PC with 8GB ram?
I got mine with 8gb but later upgraded to 16 and it feels heaven now.
I think time came when we should invest in 16gb
As RAM is soldered in MacBooks, I'd definitely opt for the 32GB, or more if available.
You never know when your workflow might change, and dishing out another 3 grand for a new MacBook with that upgrade if/when that happens will likely feel orders of magnitude worse.
web dev ! not ios developer so dont buy a mac
buy somthing like thinkpad x1 carbon and switch to linux you ll feel the change in your mind ! 🧠
from a Vim user .
It makes me feel sick thinking about it. I use mac because that what I was provided with at work but if I were to get my own laptop I would get an xps or carbon x1 and run Linux\win10 hands down. My macbook has 16gb and when running 6 containers at once it sounds like a aeroplane. Honestly I wish I could use my desktop pc. I get macs are reliable but I just hate using them. If you use containers and want to run a bunch of browsers tabs as well then it's worth the upgrade even if they charge stupid prices for the crappy specs they offer.
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