Recommendation for MAC Studio Configuration

[William Schutt]

Hi everyone,

I currently use a MACBOOK PRO (Apple M2 Chip with 24GB Memory). My panoramic work includes using a Gigapan head to create very large panoramic images. The bottleneck in my workflow is render time (both PTGUI and Photoshop). It is not uncommon to work with 5 to 7 GB sized files. I am looking to upgrade to a MAC Studio.

Any recommendations for optimizing performance on a MAC Studio would be greatly appreciated?

MAC Chip set?
M4 Max
vs.
M3 Ultra

Processing Power?
28-core CPU
60-core GPU 
vs.
32-core CPU
80-core GPU

Memory?
96GB
vs.
256GB

Trying to make the best economical decisions, most bang for the buck. Not just maxing each option, but trying to make the best decision to speed up render time when working with large files.

Thanks for your time and assistance,
William Schutt

[Lionel Drew]

Hi William, my panos also tend to be very large multi GB files.  I have an M3 MBP (latest published OS), no problems with the processing speed of PTGui.  I am also transitioning to LR Classic (from Bridge), no discernible processing speed with LR either managing more than 20,000 files or widely varying sizes.  However, loading and saving files from external spinning disk is slow, and writing metadata from LR catalog into files on external disk is very tedious.  When I work on files that are on the MB itself there are no performance problem, so the speed of storage is a big factor in my case..

In your circumstances I would try fast external SSD before buying a Studio - perhaps a large USB4 type C SSD with transfer rates of 3,000MB/sec or more.  Corsair and other manufacturers have products with specs that match or beat that.  

Regards

Lionel

[William Schutt]

Hi Lionel,

Thanks for sharing your advice and experiences. Much appreciated!

[canyonlight]

I have a 2019 Mac Pro (with an Intel processor) and am considering upgrading to a Mac Studio for various reasons, including what William has outlined above.

As a matter of interest I use external drives that use Thunderbolt connectivity. Good read/write speeds with that hardware.

Would appreciate any Mac Studio recommendations, including waiting for the next upgrade.

Best regards,

Stan

[PTGui Support]

Hi William and Stan,

Upgrading to a faster computer will obviously reduce stitching time. But
by how much, and whether it's worth the investment, is very difficult to
say. The speed depends on the combination of hardware and also on the
kind of panoramas you are stitching.

If you are stitching large multi gigapixel panoramas, or large HDR
panoramas, adding more RAM will probably have the most effect.

Adding more GPU cores will probably have limited effect. PTGui does
benefit from a GPU but the processing is not very demanding on the GPU.

Kind regards,

Joost Nieuwenhuijse
www.ptgui.com

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[William Schutt]

Thanks Joost for your recommendations. Appreciate your time and assistance.