Hello!
Firstly a big thank you to the creators and contributors of this awesome platform! Currently an active browser but putting on my big boy pants on and upgrading to queries.
I’ve been looking into upgrading to a Mac Pro and was curious as to why Autodesk mention specifically 96GB or 192GB? I assume 96 is a minimum but are these really my only two options?
Maybe I’m taking the “or” too seriously?
Thanks
Welcome!
It’s probably the amount of ram they had. I started with 32 for the first few weeks, settled on 128, which will be fine. But 96 should also be fine. Start small, upgrade slowly, use iStat Pro to see what you are actually using and no need to overspend.
Like this at 33 minutes in.
Bought mine with the basic 32gb but had the dealer install a further 196gb of third party ram, and i saved over £1000 on apples price.
228gb of ram is way more than i have ever needed, but its there if i do!
The only time I’ve maxed out 160GB of ram is when I was testing @talosh 's ML with using all the available RAM.
Thanks for the tips! I also hear that the two configs occupy 6 slots of the 12 so maybe that’s part of their minimum allocation. I’ll aim for 192
Randy I’m also keen on your NVME (Framestore) config too. Was thinking 3 x 4TB of Sabrent. Oz prices hurt the wallet more here!
For me, 192 is way too much to start out with. Seriously. Buy the 32gb minimum from Apple. Set it up and get running. Use it for a week running iStat Pro. Then, buy x2 32gb sticks of RAM. And wait a week or two. You CAN mix and match RAM sizes. Now you have 96gb of RAM. Use THAT for a week or two. And you can see historical use of RAM via iStat for the last 30 days and see how often your machine needs RAM.
Use the money you save to buy a Highpoint NVME raid card. If you can swing it, go for the 8 slot version that just came out. And fill that with minimum of 4. And, every few months, add a stick or two.
Sage advice
I’ve been using iStat Menus on my new iMac (thanks to Randy’s tip) and it’s really nice to see what’s doing the work.
I have 64gb with a 10core i9 and generally hover around 50-60% ram usage, but I’m mainly working in Hd res.