$599 M2 Mac Mini vs $13,000 Mac Pro | DaVinci Resolve Battle

hi this little machine this one right here that   I could hold in my hands has  more power than a base Mac Pro let's see if that's true last year when the M1 version of the Mac Mini came  out I picked one up because I wanted to see how   a 699 computer compared to my thirteen thousand  dollar Mac Pro now as Marquez suggests the base   model Mac Pro which actually is this one from a  CPU standard I just added a GPU bunch of RAM and   some storage but this is the 8 core Mac Pro and in  this video I want to test out the new cheaper 5.99   M2 Mac Mini let's see how depressed I can get in  this video shall we I've also owned the M1 MacBook   Pro again base model 8 gig so I thought it'd be  fun to compare all three of these computers from   a video editor's perspective the size of this  computer is just ridiculously small there we go   I solved my problem I now have a M2 Mac Pro but  in all seriousness this this is what I'm hoping   for Apple can come out with something like this  that has a PCI slot in the back plug it in right   there turns off the Intel chip and activates  the M chip of Engineers figure it out I don't   know already I got all of my computers set up so  as you can see we have the Mac Pro back here I   have my M1 MacBook Pro right here and then on this  we have the M2 Mac Mini hooked up so basically I   just want to run a handful of real world tests  comparing all three of these computers to see   where they stand in terms of video editing  and the first test I think is fair is before   we even jump into DaVinci Resolve so just run a  disk speed test so first let's test the MacBook   Pro we're just gonna select the desktop and start  reeds are reeds are uh they they were they were   solid and one Macbook Pro not that impressive  now I actually want to test the M2 Mac Mini wow much better than the M1 MacBook Pro pretty  consistent speeds running both times there I   don't know if it's consistent where it's an  M1 and M2 thing or a Mac Mini verse MacBook   Pro thing but whatever SSD they're using in the  Mac Mini is definitely a lot better performing   than last year's MacBook Pro again the base  model 13. all right so then there's my Mac   Pro which actually the internal drives that  it came with the 256 gigs from Apple are some   of the slowest ssds in any Apple computer  honestly they were probably on par with the   M1 MacBook Pros but I can't even test those  right now because I don't use that drive as   a startup disk I don't use that drive at all  I actually installed a two terabyte nvme SSD   and so that's what we'll test as my desktop but  then I'm also going to show you what I edit off   of which is a 16 terabyte OWC Excelsior 8m2 well  that's a mouthful alright so first we're going to   to select just the desktop here  so this is that two terabyte nvme and we can see it is already kicking butt of  both the other base model M1 and M2 machines   rocking over 2 000 megabytes per second and  this was an extremely cheap nvme SSD this was   not an expensive one uh double line Samsung  or something I don't even remember the brand   I'll try to show the Amazon listing but  I think I got it for like 150 maybe 200   bucks for a two terabyte but now let's check  out the Excelsior Drive so I call my initial   public is active this is where I have all of my  YouTube projects and everything I edit off of boom that's what I'm talking about over 5 000  rights and almost 7 000 read so definitely hard   drive performance we can start this video off  strong it goes to the much more expensive Mac   Pro so something that I don't think really matters  but it kind of gets on my nerves each time and why   I hate Adobe products is like I want to see how  long it takes to open DaVinci Resolve and get   the project open on each computer because when  I was setting up the M2 Mac Mini I was like this   feels really fast open up resolve all right  so first the M1 MacBook Pro three two one go foreign all of our media isn't linked but I  just want to get the project open so   32 seconds for the M1 MacBook Pro  not terrible now for my Mac Pro three two one click it's all been 38 seconds so six seconds  slower than the base M1 MacBook Pro again   am I actually gonna be really mad about a  six second difference for opening a program   not really but still a little depressing and  finally the M2 Mac Mini I actually have to   put it over here on the table three two one 25 seconds a whole seven seconds faster than the  M1 Macbook Pro 13 seconds faster than the Mac Pro   for 5.99 so now that we have the actual project  open let's talk about the experience of editing on   each computer but just for reference this is a 48  Hour film festival project that I did actually won   best editing for it like six and a half minutes  or so pretty much every clip has noise reduction   uh the project file is 49.60 by 2160 so it's 4K  project all right so currently on the MacBook Pro   scrubbing through everything is quite laggy every  time I scrub the playhead it's a solid probably   five or six seconds before it jumps to the next  clip and if I were to play back anything with all   my effects on or playing back at literally like  between one and five frames it's pretty rough   now if I turn off all of my effects it actually  plays at real time and this has o always impress   me about these base model M chips they're just so  ridiculously powerful I wouldn't expect a computer   of this price point to be able to play back  a project like this with files like this with   full color grades on now if I turn all my effects  back on what happens if I just change my playback   to quarter resolution instead of full it actually   plays back pretty well let me go to  a little bit more complex scene here   again the lag in between stuff you never let me  finish as an editing experience it's a little   frustrating this is where definitely that 16 gigs  of RAM version or going up to like the M1 Pro and   M2 Pro the the bigger uh 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editing on the Mac Pro so  obviously this has been my primary machine for the   past two and a half three years or so again the  same exact project file 4K currently our playback   is set to full and scrubbing around the project  there's really no lag going between Clips I can   scrub and it keeps up with me I can click around  to different scenes and there's essentially no lag   no matter what type of clip I go to it basically  immediately plays back at full frame rates   full effects on no issues no real lag whatsoever a  lot of times if I'm working with 6K project files   that's where I'll have to go into my playback  settings and go to like quarter resolution but   honestly this project like I edit it in a 4K  timeline and add points and at no point was   I having any issues even if I go to this scene  which we accidentally shot at a really high ISO   and so it was ridiculously noisy has a ton of  noise reduction on it yeah no no issues playing   back that whatsoever so the editing experience  on here has always been just really fun again   we have to realize like yes newer stuff is  probably going to be better and it's probably   going to be better for cheaper but the thing  that I currently have does what I needed to do   with flying colors and so that's what's really  important to me all right so now we're finally   on the M2 Mac Mini once again same project file  open clicking around it's definitely way faster   than the M1 MacBook Pro but it still is lagging  behind a little bit from my click so you can see   me click on a scene and then it kind of takes a  couple seconds to catch up sometimes faster than   others I'm guessing depending on the complexity  of the clip if I go to play back anything it's struggling seemingly about the same as  the uh the M1 MacBook Pro may be marginally   better by the way the reason I'm not like screen  capturing any of the screens is because I find   that hinders performance so much and sometimes  the screen capture causes things to be even   more laggy and so I know you can't perfectly see  what's going on on the screen it's a more real   world representation of how the computer is  going to perform when you're actually editing   seems kind of Frozen now to be honest the  first just like the M1 let me turn off   all the effects all right  kind of caught up with us here instantly becomes way more responsive  jumping around to different clips no   more lag and when I go to playback it just  immediately plays uh at full frame rate you can get some graphics going yeah no no issue  whatsoever if I turn back on effects quarter res how's life changing honestly it's been great but  playing pretty much smoothly once it got to that   lower third graphic there's kind of some issues  there and again there's no cache files there's   no proxy files this is all just working with the  raw be raw files so again going with the 16 gigs   of rammer the M2 actually has the option for the  M2 Pro chip I believe I expect those to perform   significantly better but for a 5.99 machine I  mean edit with the effects turned off edit in   quarter resolution before you export and this  machine is killer for anyone getting started in   video editing and even intermediate but speaking  of finalizing the final test I want to run through   is how fast can each machine export the final  output because that is something that used to   annoy the heck out of me on my old trash can Mac  Pro because exports took forever and when you're   not very busy that doesn't sound like a big deal  you just hit export and who cares if it takes a   couple hours you can just go do other stuff come  back and it's exporting but when you have clients   and deadlines and Brands and all these different  things and you're trying to Output multiple pieces   of content a day you need things to export very  quickly so I am fascinated to know what the export   time difference for all the same project in the  same settings will be so since we're already here   let's start with the M2 Mac Mini so we're  simply just going to go to the deliver page   I'm just going to call this M2 Mac Mini just a  nice h264 file although some people are going   to debate me saying I should have done h.265 so  I'll see what both is for for all three computers   so all right and we're gonna hit render on both  of those so it'll do them sequentially and it's   already chugging along so let's go ahead and do  the same thing on the other two computers here so   deliver page and one all right Pro and render for  MacBook Pro and finally my beloved Mac Pro we got   both h264 and h265 set up we will hit render now  we have all three machines going and we'll check   back in a few minutes to see where everything is  at one eternity later holy good night this is what   I was talking about before of like I don't have  time to wait all day for rendered all right first   the MacBook Pro uh it's actually still going on  the h265 but we can see that the h.264 render took   55 minutes basically almost an hour to export the  six and a half minute film all right what about   the M2 Mac Mini again this actually aired out a  bunch because of some weird Fusion clip I don't   fully blame the computer because I've had that  issue every once in a while on my Mac Pro and   every type of computers but I had to restart it  like three times before finally would export the   whole thing again still going on the h.265 but  the h.264 completed in 30 minutes 29 30 to be   exact so definitely a big improvement over the M1  but still a decent amount of time and it's still   got quite a bit of ways to go on the h.265 version  so if you're exporting a video in multiple formats   multiple different parts of videos uh you're gonna  be waiting a while for exports on these base model   machines and finally how did the Mac Pro do yeah  it did the h.264 in five and a half minutes and   the h.265 in just under five minutes yeah so I  think it's safe to say that I am pretty happy with   my Mac Pro okay so here's the thing like a year  ago I made the Mac Mini M1 versus my Mac Pro video   and they were kind of close and I think one of the  reasons is because I used just a handful of sample   Clips I only did some basic editing and moving  around I've been very guilty of this in the past   where I review a product and I get really excited  because you know I'll drop in like a single 6K or   12K clip and I'm like oh my gosh look at what it  can do that's amazing and that's and that's fine   for playing around and stuff like that but when it  comes to recommending something to really buy to   use day in and out these base level machines are  incredible don't get me wrong and if you have the   budget to go a couple steps up your experience  is just going to get better and so it's still   true that you can get probably better performance  or equal performance to my Mac Pro or higher spec   Mac Pros with like the Mac Studio which costs  half or a third of the price but what a lot of   people test with geekbench scores and single like  video export modes they don't really speak to the   use case of content creators and professionals  who need to export multiple multiple multiple   pieces of content almost every single day  and even this was just kind of one project   in one kind of use case but I hope that I was  able to shed light on what it's really like to   work with all these computers again for 5.99 it's  incredible it it's value I don't want to downplay   what it can accomplish the fact that I do run  these tests alongside computers that are like   20 times its price very fun very cool to see I  can feel the optimizations in DaVinci Resolve   with how fast it boots up on the M2 the fact that  you can play around on 4K timelines with a bunch   of effects with not too much lag and set it to  half or third playback resolution and you can have   a great editing experience incredible well done  DaVinci Resolve well done Apple but I'm very happy   with my Mac Pro and I don't feel as that as I was  worried about at the beginning of this video so

Channel: michael tobin

Views: 229,404

Keywords: m2 pro, mac mini, m2 pro mac mini, mac mini m2, mac mini 2023, mac mini m2 review, mac mini 2023 review, m2 mac mini, new mac mini, mac mini m2 pro review, mac mini m2 pro hdmi 2.1, mac mini m2 2023, mac mini m2 pro, 2023 mac mini, m2 pro macbook pro, magic stand, m2 max macbook pro, casekoo magic stand

Id: 4hdGc9Vs-BU

Length: 18min 12sec (1092 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 25 2023