Upgrade to M4Pro or M4 with more RAM

Hi everyone, I am upgrading my system to a new Mac Mini and I have a question whether to get the M4 or M4Pro. I know the answer seems obvoius, but please consider the following:

My actual work flow:

Lightroom and On1 Photo Raw editing large amount of 60+ megapixels photos.

4K video editing in Davinci Resolve with basic color correction.

My actual system (I struggle mainly with photo editing, video is fine)

Mac Mini M1, 16GB Ram, 1TB HD

My buying options have to be within a certain budget, unfortunately, so I cannot max out an M4Pro model.

My two options are at the moment the following:

Mac Mini M4, 32GB Ram, 1TB HD - € 1.619

Mac Mini M4Pro, 24GB Ram, 1TB HD - € 1.819

What would you reccommend in terms of high megapixel photo editing performance?

Thanks!

Posted on Nov 5, 2024 2:11 AM

Top-ranking reply

kaz-k

Level 9

50,232 points

Posted on Nov 5, 2024 2:18 AM

Hi,

IF I were you, I would choose Mac Mini M4, 32GB Ram, 1TB HD since Lightroom and 4K editor eat up RAM.

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20 replies

Nov 8, 2024 1:20 AM in response to j0hnerz

My point is that too many people are preoccupied by specifications.

When I bought my 2017 iMac I "knew" that the 8 GB RAM was inadequate and was ready to order another 8 GB from Crucial.

However, I hung back and Surprise! Surprise! I discovered that the machine was perfectly happy editing 1080p and 4K videos in Final Cut Pro and DaVinci Resolve and it still flies along to this day.

A big argument for getting the highest spec you can is to "future-proof" your Mac.

This might have made sense 20 years ago when progress was rapid and computers were doubling their speed every year or so but now improvements come more slowly and if a machine is fine today it probably will be for the next decade. In any case, you will probably want a newer Mac long before then.

Rheex Author

Level 1

14 points

Nov 7, 2024 7:38 AM in response to Ian R. Brown

So, based on what you are saying, then CPU is more important than RAM and one is better off buying an M4Pro than an M4 with more Ram. Fair enough, although many people think the opposite... :-/