Timeline for Massive X Compatibility with M1 Macs

Funny thing is, it's really hard to buy a decent affordable PC right now. I've got this 3d app that is also not easily portable to m1, so I've been looking into getting a cheapo pc to be able to continue my work. And because of bitcoin mining and other things, GPUs are wildly expensive and mostly out-of-stock, not available.
The main reason I'd buy a PC is for brute computing power, affordability and because they are widely and readily available, with a great selection of options. But at the moment, none of these hold true. It's a funny moment on both sides of this great digital computing divide.

Sorry

Taking the quote out of context just to rag is kind of mean, dude. I'm discussing why apple never switched to AMD, which isn't something they publicly commented on. Because it seems insane that they didn't switch their upper-range to AMD Ryzen chips when they overtook intel by such a large margine. That is the context. So if that something you can shed a light on, please go ahead.

 

The reason Apple has not switched to AMD is IMHO development cycle. Apple most probably has decided to quit x86 platform before Ryzen came. Or around the time Ryzen came....

I gave you link to two affordable (cheaper than M1) PCs, that are pretty small, fit in a bigger pocket, have decent integrated graphical card, up to 64 GB memory. Pretty poverful "toys". More than M1, but it depends, what processor one chooses. But for sure more RAM than M1, if one desires, an more SSD stotage than M1 if one desires.

Small form factor, more CPU power than M1, more RAM, more SSD space, lover price. But also, probably, more problems.... One has to decide, what he prefers.

Anyway, I hope, Massive X on Apple Silicon comes soon.

 

I went looking for them. No dice in iceland. Shelves seem bare on pc stores’ sites. Any decent pc costs the same or more than mac mini.

ryzen dropped in 2017. The first apple silicon chip was the A4, in 2007. I’m certain after the powerPC debacle, in house chips were always in the cards. Intel is rumored to have shut down a lot of their a&r after AMD’s implosion in 2006. The end of moore’s law was becoming palpable in 2012, I remember. Always the same Core processors, and new macs barely felt new.

The A6 is apple’s first custom cpu, in 2012, a4 was a licensed ARM design with bits on top. Here they started trying to race ahead in the mobile sector. They crush the competition there, but the power isn’t really needed, so its not much of a thing. I hear apple’s smartwatches are the only good ones, chip-wise, but the market prefers Garmin because, again, computing isn’t the priority. Garmin does gps best, so apple has to market to us hypocindriacs.

I suspect that the goalpost was always making ipads as good as laptops. I think that M1 is a byproduct, an act of desperation and of corporate trauma. Apple was just saved in the early 00s, barely escaped, and then they got ghosted by ibm for two years, and then saved by that stubborn engineer that single-handedly ported macos from risc to x86 in his spare time.

So yeah, they must have been working on that tight m1 board for years and years.

I’m still very sceptical that the amd unit could match M1.
I know what design magic makes it work, one of which is that on mine, the memory does feel like cache and the ssd does feel like memory. I just have not once felt that laggy “oh dear we’re using scratch files now” vibe. When you hit that bottleneck, hard. It isn’t there. I work with biiiiig files, in graphics.
But I still hope that you are right. So I’d love to hear if I’m wrong here. The end of moore’s law sucks for all of us. And I just checked my ban acvount, I con’t think I can spring for a quantum computer this year or the next.
So some of this is just the only optimism I can muster.
A friend had to buy a gpu on a parking lot for like 5000 usd the other day, he needed a bit more computing power and that was the only decent chip on offer in the country. Strange times.

 

AMD APU matches M1 in many aspects. It gives comparable CPU force. Even higher. But to be honest, AMD consumes more power. But to be honest M1 is produced on more advanced chip process, so most of lower comsumption comes from better process, not better CPU design.

Apple has advantage of chip and OS tight integration. It is not possible/easy in x86 Win world. Win world has advantage of "stability", drivers often (but not always) work for many Win versions. It is important if one has pricey HW.....

Moore still works, despite folks keeping saying about ending soon. I remember times when 64 kB RAM was a lot. 30 years ago 64 MB RAM was huge. Moore still works. In past 40 years computers became 10 000 times more powerfull, tenfold every decade.

 

Yeah you have the "theoretical" vs how we experience it. I suspect pc gamers are closer to "theoretical", the pace has been much more steady on their side. 3D artists don't really consider macs, gaming rigs have consistently been cheaper and much better for years and years.
Apple's only overture to that field have been the mac pros, that use components that'd build an equally expensive pc (at least at time of release), but the premium you paid for the server-grade stability hardware rarely warranted the price difference between gaming class hardware, probably 3x or so.

Thanks for sharing that. Hope the tech works.

 

Well, 1000 times more over 30 years (what may be observed in PC world) is the both theoretical and real world.

Double every three years equals aproximately 10 times every 10 years. 9 years corresponds to 8x, 12 years to 16x. 10 years might be a bit over 10x. And in that case 30 years makes 1000x. ("exact" Moore's value would be 1024x).

Silicon technology will go on for a decade or so. And meanwhile other technologies will hit the road....

And that is good. It allows to make better and better synth plugins. In 10 years they will have 10 times more CPU power at hand.

 

I find it ironic that a thread which was created regarding massive x compatibility on m1 macs has disappeared so far up it’s own backside, that it simply ignored the announcement that a release is imminent.


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I saw it. Not here though.

It's always interesting that Apple's M1 is mentioned when the talk is about how powerful PC's have become though. I mean, it's great what Apple did there in terms of performance to energy consumption ratio, but, if I want performance, I'd surely not buy a M1 Mac. It's a mobile CPU, built for low energy consumption. Any mid to high tier desktop CPU runs circles around it. Typical Apple megalomania, I'm afraid.

 

Yes, but not native Apple Silicon, just Rosetta 2. And in a month or so. If things go well.
Still good news for M1 owners. But it shows, that it is not so easy to port it to AS....

 

Looks like it. I would have expected a straight port, not a detour via Rosetta compatibility. But, I guess it's more of a "hotfix" in that regard, until a native solution is coming. Definitely looks like it's not an easy task, if it takes that long.

Did I mention that I'm glad that I don't have these problems?

 

Windows 11 are on the way. Will see.

 

It's just gonna be like Windows 10 really. Backwards compatibility is actually a very important thing for MS.

 

Exactly. Even NI plugins declared "only W10" work on W7 without any problems or hacks.

 

Hi,

quick question to NI. Apple M1 will celebrate their first birthday in 3 months. Is there any rough timeline for Massive X?I
I'd love to make use of it again.
Cheers

 

They have said earlier in this thread and another one that they are working on it. Last update was that a Rosetta compatible version is hoped to be ready within 3-4 weeks, that was a couple of weeks ago, so hopefully not long to wait now.
They have also explained the unique reasons why porting Massive X is not straightforward.

 

This is fantastic news! For sure I understood that redevelopment / redesign for M1 is tim expensive but a Rosetta version would help a lot.

 

Just found the thread: https://www.native-instruments.com/...onna-be-compatible-with-apple-silicon.455473/

TBH, I'm not in a rush for M1 native right now, as I use Ableton Live which itself only runs in Rosetta. The way I understand it is that the daw needs to be native for the plugin to run natively.

 

In case no one has noticed yet, the latest version of Massive X out now seems to work on M1. I just downloaded and installed it (via Native Access app) and seems to be running flawlessly on my Macbook Air M1 in Rosetta mode.

 

I suppose it's bound to happen but all I ever wanted was to be able to keep using Massive X and not have all my tracks broken. I can happily say that it works now! I forgot how much I love MX and am super happy that it's all working again. I will say that it would have been nice if NI would have sent an email update or something. It's been such a long time that I stopped periodically checking so the only way I found out was from a reply to this thread.