[HN Gopher] Onboarding with an M1
___________________________________________________________________
Onboarding with an M1
Author : ingve
Score : 139 points
Date : 2021-04-17 10:48 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (authzed.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (authzed.com)
| qwertox wrote:
| I wonder how much extra work Apple is generating audio companies
| like Native Instruments.
|
| I've been hoping for years that they would start supporting
| Linux, but I've settled with the fact that this won't happen.
|
| If one year ago one would have asked NI if they plan to support
| ARM chips, they would probably have laughed at you, but I'm sure
| that they now have already started working on this, now that
| Apple has forced them to.
| tshaddox wrote:
| I know there's already a decent amount of pro or at least "pro-
| sumer" audio production software on iPad. I don't know if those
| are totally separate products and codebases from Intel PC, or
| if some of these companies have already done the work to make
| their stuff portable.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _I wonder how much extra work Apple is generating audio
| companies like Native Instruments._
|
| Proportional to the business they expect to get from M1/Arm.
|
| > _I 've been hoping for years that they would start supporting
| Linux, but I've settled with the fact that this won't happen._
|
| They'd have to have their codebase already compatible by a huge
| percentage (like BitWig, which was a fresh start from ex-
| Ableton folks) for that to happen (that is, it would have to
| require minimal effort to do it as a good will gesture that
| costs them nothing to just build and offer for the ocassional
| buyer).
|
| Else, it would be lots of effort not really justified by
| expected sales (as only a tiny share of musicians use Linux,
| and they're generally not the "buying commercial DAWs/VSTs
| types").
| syntaxing wrote:
| Honestly, the Mac M1 should support two screens via USB-C. But
| for those having issues like I did, an ultrawide screen is the
| "best" solution. A 35" + Rectangle (or any tiling window manager
| of your choice) has been a killer combo.
| waheoo wrote:
| Once I moved to dual screen tiling I don't think I could ever
| go back.
|
| Same level of productivity boost as dual screen windowed was
| back in the day.
| clashmoore wrote:
| As mentioned in the epilogue regarding single monitors, I feel
| that Apple was a little too silent regarding that limitation.
|
| It also caught me off guard especially as I purchased the LG 4K
| thunderbolt/usb-c monitors from the Apple website with the hope
| of connecting everything via daisy chain.
|
| I haven't yet definitively found a DisplayLink hub that can
| output its video via thunderbolt and/or USB-C so whenever I see
| articles about M1's and developer setups I happily check in to
| see if anybody has found a setup.
| Stratoscope wrote:
| I wonder if the single monitor limitation is a hardware or
| software issue?
|
| The reason I ask is that my ThinkPad X1 Extreme can only handle
| a single external monitor running any recent version of Ubuntu,
| but on Windows 10 I run it with two or three external monitors
| with different scaling factors. I've used either a ThinkPad
| Thunderbolt dock or currently a Cable Matters mini-dock with
| two DisplayPorts and one HDMI.
|
| So I gave up on Linux on the hardware and run it in a VMware VM
| under the Windows 10 host, or under WSL2 depending on what I'm
| doing.
| [deleted]
| Nextgrid wrote:
| If your objective is to use two monitors side by side, couldn't
| you find a device that presents itself as an ultra-wide monitor
| (combined width of both monitors) and allows you to connect two
| monitors on the other end?
| MertsA wrote:
| No, that'd be a problem with the dock and menu bar straddling
| the two monitors. Not to mention maximizing a window would
| split it between monitors.
| hpoe wrote:
| Couldn't the newest generation of a device not remove what
| are considered standard features from their device especially
| when it costs more than anything on the market and it's big
| selling point is that it "just works"?
| rvz wrote:
| > I feel that Apple was a little too silent regarding that
| limitation.
|
| That's the whole point. It's about what Apple doesn't tell you
| that matters, which I have said before [0]. Especially for a
| new product announcement and release, which is why I don't
| immediately buy their products because everyone else is hyping
| it everywhere.
|
| Now they are discovering the pitfalls and foot-guns later on
| after purchasing it, whilst I enjoy my trusty old Intel Macbook
| that can connect to more than one monitor.
|
| I guess when Apple announces a M1X / M2 Macbook, the reviewers
| will be telling you that _' It's not worth buying if you
| already bought into M1'_. If that's the case, they are right,
| since you're now at a sunk cost _IF_ you wanted multi-monitors
| on your M1 Macbook Air.
|
| What's better is that you wait for the next generation so that
| you don't fall for buying into Apple's limitations in their new
| products.
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26327064
| rgbrenner wrote:
| They did tell us though. It's listed on the tech specs: one
| monitor on the m1 laptops; 2 on the mini. That's why I bought
| a mini.
| Closi wrote:
| Agreed, as an M1 user and usual multi monitor user this is a
| big limitation!
|
| Realistically I'll look at investing in an ultra wide soon to
| offer similar screen real estate.
|
| We also have a Lenovo laptop that we bought two of for our
| admin staff in our office to only find out afterwards multi
| monitor support was missing (despite having enough ports for
| it)... it's a shame that this isn't considered standard.
| wslh wrote:
| That is why I think Dell XPS 13 is top: three external
| monitors via a Thunderbolt TB16 and a desktop experience only
| plugging a single cable.
|
| This is not to say that the XPS 13 is perfect (need to change
| battery every two years in all the notebooks at the office
| and the notebook gets hot) but the notebook is great in many
| other factors.
| dijit wrote:
| FWIW (and, anecdotally); my company just started rolling
| out XPS 13's and had to stop as they are overheating
| constantly.
|
| Instead, people are going to be getting latitudes.
| tinco wrote:
| Our product has a webgl component, and the XPS13 would
| constantly crash Ubuntu when the webgl view was open. It
| was so unworkable the developer switched to windows with
| WSL2 just to have a stable environment.
|
| Which is annoying because the whole reason I was buying
| XPS laptops for our devs was supposedly good Linux
| support. Maybe the laptop was overheating?
| andrewmackrodt wrote:
| I have the XPS 13 2-in-1 and the thermals under Windows
| leave a lot to be desired. It's possible to apply a small
| undervolt and increase the Intel turbo limits which
| significantly improves performance while being able to
| run with the balanced fan profile. If anyone wants my
| ThrottleStop config I can upload it to pastebin.
|
| I run Ubuntu day to day and it has much better
| performance and less fan noise (presumed better thermals)
| than Windows.
| MobileVet wrote:
| This was such a pain... we tried several combos and dongles.
| In the end we found this to work for driving the 2nd monitor.
|
| Startech Dual Display Port adapter
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07C69HG33/
|
| We have noticed that the refresh rate on the second monitor
| isn't great... but it works and isn't horrible for
| developers.
|
| Edit: and we also have this due to the lack of ports (Thanks
| Jony)
|
| HyeperDrive USB C Hub https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MUAEI7J/
| waheoo wrote:
| +1 for startech. Thunderbolt should be able to drive dual
| 4k at 60. Haven't used with the M1 but have with ThinkPads.
| rainbowzootsuit wrote:
| Perhaps a EGPU via thunderbolt would work? (Not that GPUs are
| so readily available right now, but just to get N monitor
| ports as needed offloaded) Have you investigated that at all?
|
| I recently ran into something somewhat similar of needing
| "active" displayport adapters to connect more than two
| monitors at a time to a video card.
| FroshKiller wrote:
| M1 Macs do not support eGPUs.
| rainbowzootsuit wrote:
| Ah ok. Would be functional for the Lenovo presumably.
|
| Another possibility is a device that merges monitors' and
| then presents as one to the computer intended for video
| walls.. I know of the ones that Matrox makes but might
| need windows to setup.
|
| https://www.matrox.com/en/video/products/video-
| walls/quadhea...
| aulin wrote:
| I suffered more about having to trash my perfectly fine fullhd
| monitor(s) that worked great with linux until the day before,
| just because they decided to drop subpixel hinting with latest
| macos versions. Now I need 5-6 times more pixels to get
| comparable font rendering
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| I'm also still mourning the loss of subpixel AA with my
| primary display being 4k@1x. For several versions of macOS it
| was removed from the System Preferences UI but still
| available with a defaults command, but I'm pretty sure that's
| gone now too.
| mistersquid wrote:
| I understand the lack of multi-monitor support in the M1s is an
| issue. But just after the launch of the M1, I came across a
| video that demonstrated an M1 Mac mini driving six monitors.
| [0] There is also a short write up about that workaround, for
| those who don't want the video. [1]
|
| There are similar workarounds for the M1 MacBoooks. [2]
|
| Is this a reasonable workaround until Apple provides M1
| hardware that can run more than 1 monitor out of the box?
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jLAwSvs7vE
|
| [1] https://www.slashgear.com/m1-macs-can-run-up-to-six-
| displays...
|
| [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzPKfn746Zs
| runjake wrote:
| #2 is using a DisplayLink device to run multiple monitors. I
| presume the other videos do too.
|
| There's no trick or way around this on an M1-equipped Mac.
| Something else will be handling the graphics.
|
| DisplayLink generally works excellent for running most apps.
| It does not work well where you're pushing a bunch of bits at
| the screen rapidly, eg. First person shooters or high
| definition video.
|
| That said, one of my DisplayLink monitors is used for IP
| camera feeds, and while the little traffic light on the USB
| dongle is blinking incredibly fast, I don't notice any
| stutters.
|
| Everyone already knows about this and the author mentions
| this in their post.
| n42 wrote:
| DisplayLink is a software encoded and compressed video stream
| that the hardware dongle decompresses on display. The
| experience is not great on my M1 MacBook Air. Sometimes it
| doesn't work and I have to plug/unplug, DisplayLink doesn't
| support refresh rates higher than 60hz, and you have to keep
| their software running in my task bar for it to work, and
| there are occasional visual artifacts. If you're planning to
| use your M1 in a multi-monitor setup, I suggest waiting for
| Apple to support it natively, especially if you're doing any
| kind of design work.
|
| If you occassionally just want to plug in to multiple
| displays, it can bridge the gap. It's no substitute for a
| dedicated workstation.
| hedgehog wrote:
| There are also compatibility issues with ultrawide monitors and
| DDC support is missing (so there's no way to do brightness or
| volume for external displays). The new machines are still
| better for most people but as always evaluate before upgrading.
| misnome wrote:
| Yes, very silent. We ordered a replacement for my old work
| machine and only realised that limitation after - too slow to
| stop the purchase order. We've ordered an ultrawide monitor to
| compensate.
|
| I feel the "Pro" label is somewhat misleading, and has
| definitely damaged my trust further.
| Tagbert wrote:
| If you get the ultra wide and have trouble getting the
| resolution setup you might need SwitchResX. It let's you
| override the default resolutions with custom ones. Some of
| the ultra wide monitors support resolutions that are not
| expected in the default setup.
| FroshKiller wrote:
| The specs page for the Pro on Apple's site was up front about
| this and still is. Check it out here:
| https://www.apple.com/macbook-pro-13/specs/
|
| Scroll down to Video Support and see: "One external display
| with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz."
|
| When I was making a buying decision back in November, the
| limited external display support came up in every analysis &
| review I read. I'm not trying to give you a hard time here,
| but I genuinely don't know how you missed this.
| nsxwolf wrote:
| A lot of people missed it. No one expects features to be
| removed from the latest and greatest model.
| tasogare wrote:
| Looking at the number and type of ports is a pretty good
| indication that features are being removed. I love the
| 2015 form factor: retina, good keyboard, thin enough, 2
| USB-A, 2 Mini-DisplayPort, 1 HDMI, jack, SD card port,
| MagSafe. I wish a M1 model with an equivalent enclosure
| would be produced.
| barkingcat wrote:
| It's called wishful thinking with blinders.
|
| What? The M1 MacBook Pro is not the magical device with
| no compromises???
|
| People were way too enthusiastic and purposely skipped
| over any weaknesses of the form factor.
|
| People were claiming that it was capped at 16G ram
| because there were no purpose for having 32G ram (it was
| amazing to see the hacker news technical set reclaim Bill
| Gate's "640K ought to be enough for anybody" and "1
| monitor is enough for every use case").
|
| There are no perfect computers. Even Apple has to
| compromise. They were clearly stated but people just
| didn't want to accept that the M1 isn't a perfect
| computer that could do everything.
| NetOpWibby wrote:
| Thank you
| hobs wrote:
| Apple didnt have to compromise here, but did - they've
| definitely sold customers on the "everything just works"
| approach, and so updating those details and then
| expecting all the customers who were literally sold on
| the concept of not having to check on all the details to
| check them... interesting approach.
|
| My mother bought a new macbook m1 with me telling her
| about the monitor stuff and she cant even get her 1080p
| normal external to work with the dock that the apple
| store sold her.
| barkingcat wrote:
| This is an extremely entitled viewpoint. I'm not sure
| which "Apple" you are talking about, but as far as my
| experience has been for the last 20 years of Apple
| computers, Apple is the _king_ of forcing consumers to
| compromise.
|
| Do you want 256G ssd size or do you want the upgraded
| processor or memory size? Do you want 2 usb-c ports or 4
| usb-c ports? do you want touchbar or no touchbar?
|
| Apple has market segmentation and compromise down to a
| science. Apple computers have been forcing people into a
| compromise for their entire history. Want more features?
| Give more money. need that money for rent? ok buy the
| 256G version instead that you can't upgrade because
| everything is soldered in.... you have more money? pay
| for 512G version.
|
| And in the dock's case - that's always been the case
| where apple will happily charge you more money to get
| certain accessories to work properly. (want this
| accessory to work? you gotta get the right adapter! oh
| that old adapter won't work, you gotta get a new one for
| 80$! oh sorry even with an adapter that old dock won't
| work anymore, you gotta get the right interface! usb-c vs
| thunderbolt vs firewire vs usb-c 4!)
| supermatt wrote:
| Take the dock back. I've tried 4 or 5 different ones, and
| the only one that was any good is the caldigit ts3+. If
| it's not DisplayPort/usb-c video output then the dock is
| using some converter internally that messes everything
| up.
|
| It's definitely an Apple issue, but the specific problem
| can be worked around by basically not using hdmi (I
| appreciate we don't all have that luxury :/)
| supermatt wrote:
| I'm not aware of anyone (except those using VMs) who are
| complaining about the memory. I personally went from 16gb
| to 8 and don't miss it. Do you actually own/use an m1
| Mac?
| dijit wrote:
| I am not using VMs (unless you count the JVM or
| something) and I regularly exceed 16GiB of ram. I
| offloaded my docker VM to another machine because it was
| so bad.
|
| For context I regularly have open (what I consider to be
| standard apps):
|
| * IntelliJ IDEA (Pycharm or Clion, never both)
|
| * Slack
|
| * Chrome
|
| * kitty (20 or so terminals)
|
| * Outlook
|
| * yabai & bartender
|
| * littlesnitch & adguard
| superchink wrote:
| Have you gotten yabai to work on the M1?
| smoldesu wrote:
| I have an M1 Macbook Air with 8 gigs of memory, and it's
| definitely a bottleneck for me. I haven't even thought
| about trying a VM on it...
| barkingcat wrote:
| Yes I am using one.
|
| There are workloads that don't fit into 16G ram. Even
| with paging, there are legitimate needs for 32G and
| beyond memory sizes.
| supermatt wrote:
| What specific workloads? If you bought a 16GB machine to
| keep 32GB of data in RAM then clearly you bought the
| wrong machine. But I am able to run WAY more applications
| in 8GB than the 16GB intel Mac I had previously.
| rovr138 wrote:
| > But I am able to run WAY more applications in 8GB than
| the 16GB intel Mac I had previously.
|
| Then your limitation clearly wasn't RAM.
| supermatt wrote:
| Memory management is different on the M1. This has been
| widely discussed.
| rovr138 wrote:
| "management" is important.
|
| It can't make it appear out of thin air. If you _need_
| 16GB of ram and only have 8GB, you will run out of
| memory.
| eertami wrote:
| If it works for you, it works for you.
|
| However in 2021 I am not interested in a computer with
| less than 32GB ram. Sure, I could work around the
| limitations and close not in use programs/tabs to avoid
| going OOM, or using swap, but life is short and memory is
| cheap. I'd rather not have to worry about it.
| fiddlerwoaroof wrote:
| I was similarly skeptical, but my old laptop died on me
| so I had to replace it. My M1 MacBook Pro is a better
| laptop for me as developer: my 16" 2019 MBP with 32GB of
| RAM I got from work has performance and memory issues
| (mostly too many open browser tabs) more frequently than
| my personal M1 laptop.
| [deleted]
| supermatt wrote:
| So why did you buy one?
| FroshKiller wrote:
| No one expects a brand-new hardware platform to have
| different capabilities from other devices in its class?
| numpad0 wrote:
| A lot of people weren't aware that multiple displays
| through single DisplayPort connector is hardware, not
| software, capability
| e-clinton wrote:
| It's not "brand new hardware", it's just another MacBook
| Pro. Being a MacBook Pro, I expect a keyboard, trackpad,
| screen... and the ability to plug-in monitors, just like
| every other MacBook Pros has for however many years.
|
| They shouldn't have called it a pro.
| Tagbert wrote:
| These first M1 models replace the very low end of the
| MacBook Pro line, not the full line. They replace the
| versions with the slowest processor and only two USCB-C
| ports. That is why the rest of the MacBook Pro line still
| exists waiting for the next performance version of the
| M-series chips.
| [deleted]
| themolecularman wrote:
| Same here. Even right now as a type this I have my 2nd
| external monitor sitting next to the one I'm staring it, it's
| just off though.
|
| Another commenter mentioned finding a video showing that it
| could in fact be "hacked" to use more than one external
| monitor. I tried purchasing the specific DisplayLink products
| in the video and still wasn't able to have success :(
| random5634 wrote:
| Also commenting on single monitor support - a key note I missed
| from original reviews and maybe a reason to wait till more pro
| models come out?
| chipotle_coyote wrote:
| If it's important to you, I'd say wait.
|
| Something that's been missed a lot, I think, is that the Intel-
| based 13" MacBook Pro actually came in two versions -- a two-
| port one with a less-capable, low-power processor and a lot of
| limitations that made it more like a juiced-up Air, and a four-
| port one which was much more like the 15" MBP. The current
| M1-based MBP is direct replacement for that two-port model, and
| is now _absolutely_ just a juiced-up Air; there 's very little
| that the M1 MBP does that the M1 Air doesn't.
|
| And, yes, the Intel version of the MacBook Pro But Really
| Juiced-Up Air, or MBPBRUJUA for short, could run two external
| 4K displays or one external 5K display, while the M1 MBPBRUJUA
| can only run one external display (although for the ones and
| ones of you out there with 6K displays, good news!). I would
| _presume_ Apple knows this is a regression and plans to address
| it, at least when they update the four-port MBPs.
|
| Personally, I'm not convinced the MBPBRUJUA is going to stay
| around past this product cycle; it's always struck me as a
| laptop in sort of a weird middle space, too big to make people
| who really want an Air happy but not "pro" enough to make,
| well, actual pros happy, and the shift to Apple Silicon brings
| the Air and the MBPBRUJUA so close together the only material
| difference is the case design. I can't help but suspect that
| the only reason we have an M1-based MBPBRUJUA is so Apple could
| tick off the "shipped an ARM-based laptop with a MacBook Pro
| nameplate in 2020" box.
| tyingq wrote:
| I wonder how well the litany of terrible apps that you typically
| have to run in a corporate environment are doing on M1s.
|
| Things like Cisco's Anyconnect VPN, MS Teams, Active Directory
| Auth, and so on.
| auslegung wrote:
| From the article, https://doesitarm.com and
| https://isapplesiliconready.com
| tyingq wrote:
| Both of those seem pretty binary, like "rosetta yes/no" or
| "works yes/no", and don't seem to have a way to say something
| like "works, other than split tunneling", etc. Or, as pointed
| out in another comment, "disrupting Sidecar".
| rovr138 wrote:
| Some do on doesitarm.com.
|
| Example,
|
| https://doesitarm.com/app/photoshop/
|
| > Known Issues
|
| links to https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/photoshop-
| for-apple-sil...
| w0de0 wrote:
| "Active Directory Auth" is a native part of macOS, though there
| are third party directory services auth mechanisms like Nomad.
| tyingq wrote:
| Yes, and it already acts odd with password resets, etc. I
| wouldn't be surprised to see new issues with a native M1
| port.
| w0de0 wrote:
| No, I can say it's gone pretty well. Both the Kerberos SSO
| and directory services bind/network accounts work exactly
| as expected. As you say particularly mobile accounts have
| always sucked for managing passwords especially for a
| mobile workforce, but that problem has gotten no worse!
|
| Source: am macadmin for startup
| Telemakhos wrote:
| MS Teams runs beautifully on my M1. Cisco Anyconnect now
| installs a bunch of network filters instead of a single kext,
| but it works. The only programs that run poorly are Apple's own
| Mail app (often hangs on quit) and Safari (has crashed the
| whole Mac a few times).
| varjag wrote:
| Cisco Anyconnect has a nasty habit disrupting Sidecar.
| Jcowell wrote:
| Yeah I was lucky enough to just use a RD gateway instead of
| the Cisco VPN so that Sidecar wasn't disrupted.
| edgan wrote:
| I just got a new System76 laptop for work. I have used to Lenovo
| P Series in the past. The System76 laptop has a Nvidia GPU. For
| ports it has HDMI and Mini DisplayPort. I was expecting dual
| 4k@60hz to work, but instead got 4k@60hz via the Mini DisplayPort
| and 40@30hz via the HDMI. The reason is the HDMI is tied to the
| Intel GPU, not the Nvidia GPU.
|
| The laptop also lacks Thunderbolt, which would provide more port
| options.
| f6v wrote:
| M1 is such a smooth ride. I didn't expect everything would just
| work. I use R and Python for computational biology and didn't
| have a single issue with installing packages.
| vetinari wrote:
| Did you try pandas? Anything that requires cffi?
| f6v wrote:
| Pandas works fine for me. But it's a moderately sized data,
| below 100k rows. Dask works as well, though I can't judge the
| speed.
| Jcowell wrote:
| How did you install pandas without any work around? (Mini
| forge, building from source, making a Rosetta terminal)
| f6v wrote:
| I just used conda and it sort of get installed? I don't
| remember any issues around it. My only observation was
| that conda resolved dependencies lightning fast compared
| to MBP 2019.
| stu2b50 wrote:
| (Not OP btw)
|
| While I'm not sure if it's building from source or
| pulling a binary, just pip3 install pandas seems to work
| just fine. Not a Rosetta terminal.
|
| Just ran a fresh install from a new poetry venv, seemed
| to work fine. This was the poetry output
|
| Using version ^1.2.4 for pandas
|
| Package operations: 3 installs, 0 updates, 0 removals
| * Installing numpy (1.20.2) * Installing pytz
| (2021.1) * Installing pandas (1.2.4)
| vetinari wrote:
| Since there's no arm64 binary on pypi, it downloads
| source and builds locally.
|
| For some reason, the pip building is failing for me
| (python@3.9 from homebrew, all non-brew packages in
| --user). However, if I download the source and do the
| bdist_wheel manually, it succeeds and produces
| installable wheel.
|
| Cffi is unbuildable without a patch, it is failing on
| symbol ffi_prep_closure being non-existant.
| stu2b50 wrote:
| Huh. I haven't had any issues with libraries that use
| CFFI.
|
| I've had issues with pip and building from source being
| incredibly fragile before (in general, not an M1 specific
| thing), so I'm not that surprised, but unfortunately I
| don't really have any answers here.
|
| The scientific calc package + cffi have installed
| normally since I got the M1 (mid February).
|
| I did have an issue with PyQt5, where I had to link qmake
| in my .zshrc before it would build properly (and it had
| an incredibly unhelpful wheels error message), but that's
| been it so far.
| ttul wrote:
| I am looking forward to the hopefully near term arrival of an
| "M2" based iMac. I use an M1 Air and it has been a dream to use,
| but fundamentally I prefer the power that you can tap from a
| properly ventilated desktop.
| otterley wrote:
| The M1 Macbook Pro has active ventilation, FWIW.
| probotect0r wrote:
| Is everyone using the 16GB version of the M1? Or is the 8GB
| sufficient?
| Nextgrid wrote:
| 8GB is fine for me but I do all my development natively - no
| Docker nor VMs.
| eknkc wrote:
| Only issue I have is that dotnet does not support m1. The beta of
| version 6 does but I had several issues with it and dotnet 5 runs
| slow as hell on rosetta.
|
| Otherwise everything works just fine.
| cjblomqvist wrote:
| Good to know! Thanks for commenting!
| bhouston wrote:
| I am using a MacMini M1 as my main development machine
| specifically to get around the single monitor limitation of the
| first gen M1 laptops. It is cheaper than a MacBook Pro as well,
| so it is a win all around.
|
| Edit: I do use one HDMI and one display port (from a USB c
| connector.) I drive both 4K monitors at a full 60hz. It is
| beautiful.
| throw14082020 wrote:
| Its not a real win because you're using 1 HDMI, 1 usb-c
| display. The HDMI display is limited (low framerate, bad
| integration with the display). At best i call it a workaround
| vetinari wrote:
| It is HDMI 2.0, so no problem for 4k@60.
| TwoNineA wrote:
| I got 2 LG 4k monitors plugged into my Mac Mini M1, one USB-C
| (43 inch), and one HDMI (27 inch rotated). In both cases the
| Mac runs them at 60 hz, the 43 inch slightly scaled and the
| 27 inch around 1440p scaling. If I put them at full
| resolution (unscaled) they still run at 60hz.
| edgan wrote:
| I think you mean Thunderbolt not USB-C. Thunderbolt ties
| into the GPU, but USB-C doesn't.
| kelchm wrote:
| USB-C is simply the connector format -- which can then be
| used as either USB 4 or Thunderbolt 3. The highest speed
| USB 4 devices are effectively the same as Thunderbolt 3
| from what I understand.
|
| I really do sympathize with any consumer who has to try
| to make sense of what a given port is actually capable of
| these days.
| B1FF_PSUVM wrote:
| The Chuwi Hi10x is a nice enough Windows tablet - sort of
| a cheap and cheerful Surface, but really a grandkid of
| the Asus T100.
|
| It is powered with a 12V, 2A charger via one USB C port
| (and just one of the existing two). But try to use a
| standard USB-C PD charger, and nothing happens. However
| it does charge with a plain 12V charger, sporting a USB C
| jack, that does not require PD negotiation ...
|
| I'm coming to think that having one connector for
| everything may not be easy ...
| bhouston wrote:
| I am confused generally. My old Dell xps 13 didn't have
| thunderbolt but I could still use the exact same USB c to
| display port cable that I used on my Mac mini.
|
| I am unsure if you need thunderbolt specifically to use
| USB c to display port cables. It seems you do not need
| thunderbolt but I am not an expert.
| ryukafalz wrote:
| > I am unsure if you need thunderbolt specifically to use
| USB c to display port cables. It seems you do not need
| thunderbolt but I am not an expert.
|
| Correct, you do not need Thunderbolt for this. Most
| laptops with USB-C support something called DisplayPort
| Alt Mode, which is essentially DisplayPort over the
| type-C connector; I'd imagine that's what those cables
| are doing.
|
| Now, if you have a Thunderbolt display specifically, like
| the ones Apple used to sell? Your type-C port would need
| to support Thunderbolt to use that.
| vetinari wrote:
| If you are using USB-C in alternate mode, it means that
| you forego everything else: with USB-C cable, you can
| basically use USB2, power delivery and (USB3 or alternate
| mode) at the same time.
|
| Funny things happen when the alternate mode is
| Thunderbolt. It allows to tunnel DisplayPort and USB3
| traffic, so when you are using TB alt mode, you still
| have usable DP and USB3, not USB-C natively, but
| packetized inside TB3 traffic.
|
| For 2x20 GBit TB3 traffic, you need much better cable
| than what the average USB3/USB-C cable can handle (that's
| the reason why they are sold as TB cables); if it is
| anything above 0.5m, it is usually active one. And to
| make things even more interesting, there are USB-C cables
| than cannot handle even USB3/alt modes... so it is
| important to check the specs, not only price tag.
| danieldk wrote:
| _If you are using USB-C in alternate mode, it means that
| you forego everything else: with USB-C cable, you can
| basically use USB2, power delivery and (USB3 or alternate
| mode) at the same time._
|
| Incorrect. Perhaps with a low-end adapter, but with a
| higher end dock (and sufficiently modern hardware that
| supports DP1.3) you can drive 4k@60Hz [1], USB 3.2 Gen 2
| 10Gbit/s, USB 2, and PD at the same time over a single
| USB-C cable. For example, the Lenovo USB-C Dock Gen 2
| that I use does this without any issues.
|
| The configuration is that two superspeed lanes are used
| for USB 3.2. The other two superspeed lanes are used for
| DP-Alt, which have 8.1Gbit/s bandwidth per lane with HBR3
| for a total of 16.2, which is perfectly fine for 4k@60Hz.
| You can even do higher resolutions with DSC (though I am
| not sure which, if any, docks support this).
|
| [1] Or lower resolutions/refresh rates with HBR2.
| aulin wrote:
| how deep is your desk to be able to use all that screen
| real estate? I already suffer eye strain with my 34 4k as
| it's already too high
| FpUser wrote:
| Not Mac user but here is my experience with multi-
| monitor. I used to have 2 32" 4K monitors at full
| resolution. One was pivoted to vertical specifically for
| coding. My main desk resembles an airfield so space wise
| it was ok. However recently I found myself tired to turn
| my head and body when shifting attention between two. I
| am back to just a single 32" 4K. The other monitor went
| to a different computer.
| jsjohnst wrote:
| I'm using standard office sized standing desks (40"x60").
| On my "work" desk I have two 27" LG5K displays side by
| side with the laptop off to the side. My second
| "personal" desk has two 27" Apple Thunderbolt monitors
| stacked vertically with two 34" LG ultrawides turned
| vertically on either side of the stacked 27". No eye
| strain or neck issues with either setup.
| waheoo wrote:
| Why is the HDMI limited? Old version? Latest HDMI can run 4k
| 60 no problem.
| throw14082020 wrote:
| Sorry, my M1 mac mini doesn't push out the 165Hz, it maxes
| out at 60Hz. Sure this is the average refresh rate most
| people ask for, but this is also the max the mac mini go.
|
| My display is a Qhd (2560 x 1440)
| tqkxzugoaupvwqr wrote:
| HDMI, at least in the Mac mini 2018, is lossy compressed
| which shows itself in bleeding colors / slightly blurry 4K.
| bhouston wrote:
| I believe HDMI can only send uncompressed video data. It
| can support compressed audio but not compressed video.
| wayneftw wrote:
| Every time I read one of these reviews it makes me so glad to be
| using a desktop PC with Manjaro. Things I need to do just all
| work for me, no surprise limitations, no worrying about how long
| an irreplaceable battery or SSD will last and no constant battle
| with some corporation over who controls my computer.
|
| I don't get people who would want to optimize for working on a
| train or a plane or in a meeting either. My desktop is in a quiet
| room where I do work stuff and I easily get more compute per
| dollar too.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| > worrying about how long an irreplaceable battery or SSD will
| last and no constant battle with some corporation over who
| controls my computer
|
| You really need to understand that this is nothing but a
| strawman.
|
| I'm a M1 Air user. I'm currently worrying about how I'm gonna
| express some business logic in my app, not about some imaginary
| "irreplaceable" battery or an SSD. If anything breaks in the
| first two years (which probably won't happen), I'll have the
| machine or the part replaced for free. If anything breaks after
| the second year, well, I can either have it repaired or just
| get a newer Mac with the total cost of ownership of the old one
| being firmly below $50/month, which is laughably low for a tool
| that puts food on the table. And that's in an ex eastern bloc
| country where the average monthly wage is around $1300 net.
|
| > My desktop is in a quiet room where I do work stuff
|
| Mine too, in my bedroom, where I have a desk with a 43" screen
| on it. With the laptop connected in clamshell mode. Or on the
| couch. Sometimes I go to the office. Sometimes I go to
| meetings. And a laptop allows me to use a single machine for
| all that, ain't that great?
| rovr138 wrote:
| > And a laptop allows me to use a single machine for all
| that, ain't that great?
|
| It's AMAZING.
|
| I have servers, raspberry pi's. I work locally and push to
| wherever I need.
|
| I work from home, sometimes from my office, sometimes from
| the couch. Sometimes I went out to coffee shops or the
| library. I sometimes gotta hop on a plane and go to the
| office where I switch between desks, conference rooms,
| offices. I travel to visit family.
|
| A single device allows me to just close the lid and keep
| going. It's amazing.
| jbluepolarbear wrote:
| Has anyone tried using a Wavlink 4K USB-C docking station with
| the M1? I use it on my intel Mac Pro and windows desktop and it
| works like a champ.
| jamesgeck0 wrote:
| Nope, but I do use the Wavlink USB 3.0 to HDMI 2K Adapter with
| a USB-C adapter in one port and a Hgore HG-HB007 adapter hub in
| the second port. It's a mess of cables, but it works great with
| two external monitors hooked up. Quite a bit cheaper than a
| full docking station.
| tastyminerals2 wrote:
| I always wonder why ppl do not use MacPorts? There was a great
| article on HN which basically drew a pretty clear picture how
| brew can easily mess your system up. Yet, being a new Mac user,
| wherever I go, I only see a reference to brew installs. I am
| using M1 for a over a month and it's been a very smooth ride so
| far. Installing everything via MacPorts where I only had an issue
| with rabbitmqd which failed to build because of erlang.
| novok wrote:
| I was using macports before brew really existed and switched
| over the brew because you didn't have to waste time compiling
| everything all the time and dealing with breakage. The CLI was
| also much nicer to use with little bits of whimsy.
|
| Brew was a big timesaver back then (maybe now too if macports
| is still in 'compile everything' mode) and that is the key
| reason why it became the dominant package manager. Nobody has
| 'moved back' because macports isn't 'better enough' to induce
| people to switch over like they did with brew originally.
| atkbrah wrote:
| I've always considered macports/brews as last possible solution
| for problems on macos because you eventually end up with broken
| system. Luckily you can run most of the stuff on a remote linux
| with containers.
| havernator wrote:
| I switched to Brew back in... oh, 2012 or 2013, I think,
| because I was sick of MacPorts breaking itself horribly during
| normal operations (installing/uninstalling) every 3-6 months.
| Brew's huge package selection, rare breakage (sometimes on OS
| upgrades, usually easy to fix), decent UI, and ability to also
| manage nearly all the closed-source software I install, have
| kept me from bothering to look at MacPorts again.
| kitsunesoba wrote:
| Similar here. I'm sure MacPorts has improved since then and I
| should probably give it a spin next time I have a fresh macOS
| install, but back in the late 00s and early 10s not only did
| I have issues with it breaking itself, but also constant
| issues with packages not compiling/installing, or if they did
| crashing due to some dependency issue.
|
| At that point in time I was a lot less technically capable,
| so on the rare occasion googling the issue would turn up a
| relevant mailing list archive, I usually wasn't able to act
| on it and I'd wind up procuring the package in question
| through some other method or just doing without.
|
| So when Homebrew came along and most things installed and ran
| fine with the rare issue that cropped up getting fixed fairly
| quickly, it easily stuck.
| rcthompson wrote:
| I had a similar experience. I started out with macports,
| which seemed more familiar to me as a user of Linux package
| managers. But macports kept breaking in weird ways, until I
| finally tried homebrew, which didn't break. That was years
| ago, so maybe macports is better now, but homebrew has never
| given me a reason to switch away from it.
| anaerobicover wrote:
| I have completely the opposite experience; brew would screw
| something up every other time I upgraded a package, and
| didn't cross OS updates very well at all. MacPorts has been
| rock-solid, possibly because it is more careful about making
| sure that ports have exactly the right deps.
| havernator wrote:
| Weird. Macports is the one I was always having to edit
| packages for to un-break them, with a totally normal
| installation. Seemed like their packages were poorly-
| maintained. Must have gotten better I guess.
| kergonath wrote:
| I think this might have changed a bit over the years. I
| can't remember last time I had to tinker to build a port.
| But you're right, it wasn't uncommon around 2010.
| asimpletune wrote:
| Or for that matter I'm looking forward to learning more about
| nix which promises sort of the holy grail in these matters
| samatman wrote:
| I tried using nix on a Mac, because I really respect what
| they're trying to do and it seems like a "right thing" kind
| of platform which I want to support.
|
| I wasn't able to get it to work, and it left a bunch of users
| (like ten??) and other various junk which was a pain to clean
| up. This was in 2017 I think.
|
| I keep hoping someone will chime in and say "I use nix on my
| Mac, and it's dreamy, everything Just Works you should try
| it!" because until that happens I'm going to stick with brew.
|
| While I'm on the subject, I was also a macports user until
| hmm, 2013 I think. Don't recall exactly why I switched, just
| that I was having some kind of intractable problem, messaged
| a friend who knows what he's talking about, and he said "just
| use brew dude". So I did.
| rubyn00bie wrote:
| > failed to build because of erlang.
|
| That specific issue sounds like a MacPorts problem where it
| (MacPorts) is using an outdated version of Erlang; because
| Erlang works just fine on the M1.
| lucideer wrote:
| I switched from brew to macports recently, so here are my
| thoughts:
|
| - before, I had generally heard of homebrew a lot, and macports
| very little. Brew's marketing is better. I think this is
| intentional (as in Macports doesn't really do any)
|
| - The docs for macports are very poor. They are comprehensive,
| but barely navigable. Keyword search doesn't work well. They're
| obtuse.
|
| Further context: I also find brew docs poor, but they're much
| more user-focused (how to install packages), whereas macports'
| seem more packager-focused.
|
| - Requiring sudo is a security feature, but Macports doesn't
| advertise this well, so brew "seems" more secure on first
| impression
|
| - Most software with cli install instructions recommend brew up
| top (even when there's a macports option). i.e. there's no
| evangelization of macports by maintainers who package for it. I
| don't really know why this is, but it's something macports
| maintainers could/should look into.
| SkyMarshal wrote:
| Interesting observations. Why does Brew seem more secure on
| first impression?
| lucideer wrote:
| As the sibling mentioned, using sudo gives the process
| root, with the implication being it has full access to your
| system and can potentially do a lot more damage. Extend
| this to any arbitrary installer you're running and it
| becomes scary. So brew's sudo-less model seems more secure
| in this context.
|
| In reality however, macports uses "privilege separation"
| which drops privileges for each individual install to a
| separate "macports" user. This is more secure than brews
| sudoless approach because not only does the installer not
| have root access, it doesn't have full access to your own
| user either (e.g. your HOME). Privilege separation isn't
| possible without initially having root privileges.
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| Because not using sudo implies you're not giving anything
| escalated privileges. I'm aware there's a contrary view
| (which I can't recall, but will dutifully refresh my memory
| after I post this answer) but this reasoning still feels
| more intuitive to me.
| kergonath wrote:
| I've been using Macports for years, trying Homebrew every now
| and then without finding a good reason to jump. From my point
| of view Homebrew would need a serious advantage to overlook the
| issues caused by its architecture. I also like the fact that
| Macports builds are (mostly) deterministic because they depend
| on as many tools from Macports as possible, and not moving
| target frameworks from the OS itself.
|
| Homebrew was the cool new kid at the right time, when Macs
| popularity amongst webdevs was growing exponentially. OTOH,
| Macports is still working fine; there is room for two package
| managers on macOS.
| fiddlerwoaroof wrote:
| I switched to brew because it goes out of its way to avoid
| breaking your system. I recently gave macports another try and
| the experience involved editing Portfiles over and over again
| to try to get applications to work.
|
| The most common complaint (changing permissions on /usr/local)
| isn't a problem with the arm64 version which now uses /opt/brew
| but, also, as far as my trust model goes, it isn't a problem
| for me: I already have $HOME/bin on my path and, so, any local
| exploit that relies on overwriting system executables has
| multiple ways of tricking me into running a malicious program.
| otterley wrote:
| I think the reason is simply that Homebrew works fine for most
| people, including myself. I too have an M1 Mac and had no
| problems with it, although this may be a reflection of
| significant improvements made in Homebrew related to Apple
| Silicon in the past few months. That's the thing about
| software: things that break today can be fixed the next (or,
| worse, vice versa).
| Toutouxc wrote:
| For me it was that I heard about Homebrew first, installed it,
| never had any problem with it. So, marketing?
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| Not necessarily even marketing. It's also just the de facto
| Mac package manager most commonly mentioned in docs/READMEs
| for Mac install instructions. This is probably more a matter
| of convenience than anything, and anyone using other package
| managers can easily mentally map the instructions to their
| own usage.
| jdonaldson wrote:
| Homebrew starts from the MacOS CLI apps provided through XCode.
| It's a usermode package manager built on top of XCode
| components. MacPorts builds everything from scratch, which
| grants more power and optimization opportunities, but comes
| with many, many more rough configuration edges to deal with.
|
| The optimization opportunities for some packages are typically
| on the order of 2x-5x faster, which isn't enough to deal with
| the headache of extra config for a personal dev box. So, my
| rule of thumb is, unless I know exactly the performance trade
| off I am trying to take advantage of by going with MacPorts, I
| will be better served by using Homebrew. I will wind up
| spending more time fixing config then I will have saved on
| execution processing time.
| anaerobicover wrote:
| > Homebrew starts from the MacOS CLI apps provided through
| XCode
|
| As does MacPorts.
| https://guide.macports.org/#installing.xcode
|
| > MacPorts builds everything from scratch
|
| This has not been true for many years:
| https://trac.macports.org/wiki/FAQ#fromsource
| st3fan wrote:
| I'm surprised about the Python issue. All I had to do was a 'brew
| install python' - and that was months ago I think.
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