Late 2019 MacBook Pro Specs for Logic Pro X

[jancivil]

I did the opposite of recommend a mechanical drive, I stated that a system on a mechanical drive is a known, gigantic bottleneck as far as ever hoping to stream samples, while an SSD is not that problem at all. In no sense was I even talking about buying a mechanical drive.

AFAIK the internal connection is your faster connection, so how much cheaper is the external USB3 drive.

Yeah! Don't know what I was trying to say with that first line. It doesn't really make sense. I know you weren't suggesting buying mechanical drives.

[jancivil]

2TB, I would probably be not trying to pay 600 extra, that's for sure. I remember this decision, no, and I'm always managing space...

I priced what I'd get today for $3399, significantly less than what it cost me last year for about the same but 2 more cores; because 32GB is standard, "-400" for 16.

[haskins02]

Thanks for the further suggestions.

[Michael L]

To manage space, I put big libraries on the internal 1TB SSD. I used a disk space analyzer (Disk Expert) to find big, individual instruments I use less often and put them on an external HDD to load into 32GB ram as needed. I made the same folder structure on the SSD and HDD

[simonbostock]

I've been looking at this and reading some of the other mac forum websites as I'm also a Logic user and I'm tempted:

2.3 8-core i9 CPU with the 1TB SSD to me seems to be the sweet spot, I can't justify paying £180 for an additional approx 5/10% CPU and I think the 1TB SSD as a starter is good enough and external SSD drives are cheap compared to adding additional internal storage. A lot of people sweat about the extra .2 Ghz CPU but does that really make a massive difference? Plus your forking out £180 for something you might not necessary need.

I'm still using an Early 2013 15" MBP which kinda starts to struggle with Logic and plugins but to me that's about CPU and its a quad-i7 2.7ghz CPU, although I tend to over-egg (overdo) with unnecessary plugins (my fault).

The question I keep asking myself is can I justify paying £360 for the extra 16GB of RAM? Is 32GB going to be the norm in 6 years time? I guess it depends on our habits, what new software is going to come out etc.

I see it as an investment over a period of time, normally for me 6 years.. It's £3169 + £400 Applecare = £3569 / 6 years = £594 a year.

Oh Applecare. hmm. Did that go up in price? Still a pain to purchase though.

Oh, another thing (sorry, it's not a rant), but as these 16" only allow Catalina to be installed, I guess we loose ability to use certain audio plugins (Virus TI for example). Might actually be worth waiting to see what happens over the next 6 months if our plugins get upgraded to work on Catalina and by then they'll be rumours of a Gen2 16" with updated CPUs. It's never ending.

[Michael L]

IMHO don’t decide based on $-per-feature, but on your workflow & ergonomic needs.

[jancivil]

quad 2.7 struggling with Logic looks like a realtime problem, a bottleneck in your system rather than CPU as culprit.

32GB is the new normal, it's not a lot and the future will bite you if you cheap out now. It's the default for the 2019 mbp. They are prob'ly about to quit making 16GB boxes.
I saw somebody today with 256GB on their slave.

[teilo]

It really comes down to sample library sizes. I use Hauptwerk, and some of those sample sets are huge. My old laptop had 32Gb, and every once in a while a large sample set would not load, and I had to reboot. That was rare, but it happened. So consider the amount of disk space your sample sets require, and how many of them will be loaded simultaneously, and purchase accordingly.

CPU and GPU are irrelevant in this case. You'll be getting a 6 or an 8 core, and 6 is probably more than you will ever need unless you are loading up many instances of CPU-heavy synths simultaneously.

If you are worried about future proofing, I would not consider anything less than 32G and 1TB. That will put you at $3,000 US if you low-ball the rest.

BUT, if your sample sets are not huge, then you should still skip the 13" and get a 16". Here's why.

A 2.4Ghz i5 quad-core 13" with 16G, and 512G is $2,200. You can drive a single 4K external monitor with it.

A 2.6Ghz i7 six-core 16" with 16G and 512G is $2,300. You can drive two 4K external displays with it @ 60Hz. $100 more for a heck of a lot more machine.