How much memory should I get on a new m4 mini

Give that you're running two complete operating systems in parallel, I'd recommend you get as much RAM as budget allows. You can't upgrade it later, so best to buy what you can. 48GB certainly and 64GB in my opinion would not be excessive, though expensive.

Regards.

Note that running Windows with Parallels desktop on the new Minis will only support the ARM64 version of Windows 11 which means most likely there will be no drivers available for any specialized devices.

The other thing is that unless the apps you use on Windows have ARM64 build versions they will be running in emulation mode in Windows11. The result is that you will be running an emulator within a virtualizer and performance would be significantly hampered.

With that aside, my general rule of thumb has always been to buy a machine with as much RAM as you can afford because as the past has taught us, applications and OSes will just increase in size over time.

skfrost wrote:

Thanks for the response! Would you recommend waiting for the Studio upgrade then and spec up more than what is offered with the mini? I don't really need a laptop for this computer, so would rater spend the money on additional computing power.

That's difficult to judge since none of us know anything about what a future version of the Studio might include. If you can wait, there's certainly no harm I can see by doing so. Then you can compare models and see if the software you run or plan to run will take good advantage of any improved features and capabilities a Studio would provide and then decide.

Regards.

Yes, I second what’s been posted here- get as much as your current/proposed budget for that allows…,if you want more computing power, take a hard look at the Apple Mac Studio, do your research and homework… then when you sure you’ve found what makes and will make you happy , then bite the bullet… custom order it, buy it, and go get it..then treat yourself

just my opinion though….

John B

As with so many things, then answer to that boils down to "it depends". X64 apps are going to be running in emulation and that's never truly speedy, and when running an emulation in a "guest" operating system, that's going to take even more of a performance hit. How much isn't something I'd be able to speculate on - it may be signficant or it may not be a problem. But unless someone else here has experience running the apps you're concerned about, it's all going to be guesswork. The other issue that can arise in running X64 apps in the ARM version of Windows is that of drivers, should your apps require specific drivers. If they're not built into Windows 11 or the developer hasn't compiled them for ARM, your apps may not work, or only work partially. I'd suggest contacting the developers of the apps and see if they can provide any guidance.

Regards.

Given all of the constraints with regards to running Windows on an Apple Silicon Mac – e.g., only the ARM version, only in a virtual machine – it might make more sense to get a M4 Mini and an Intel or AMD-based Windows PC.

Many third-party monitors have multiple video inputs – so if you were talking about one of those, you could share the monitor between the Mac and the PC.

skfrost wrote:

Thanks for this info! The two main programs I need to run are x86/x64, there are no ARM64 versions. What are my options for running these virtually with decent performance? Will the performance be worse than it currently is running it on my i7 Macbook Pro (16GB memory)?

Currently I have only used GUI builders which were Intel based for embedded processor displays which are basically C and C++ source file generators which are really not all that taxing and really didn't see that much difference from a late 2013 iMac running Windows 10 natively via Bootcamp. But for large scale data crunching, it could quite easily be a significant issue.

You also didn't say which version of Windows you were running so there may be a possibility that the apps may not be Win11 compatible to start with as Win11 has shed a lot of legacy support.