Apple Mac Studio (M4 Max, 2025) Review: Small but Mighty Leave a comment

In her evaluate of the 2023 version of the Apple Mac Studio, Brenda Stolyar known as the pint-sized powerhouse “the Goldilocks Mac”—suggesting its mixture of efficiency and value was nearly excellent for energy customers, at the very least people who don’t want the hemorrhage-level bleeding-edge efficiency of the Mac Professional tower.

As we speak Apple goals to keep up that verdict, upgrading the machine to maintain up with the occasions and once more releasing the Studio in two variations, one in every of which ought to be preferrred for any artistic.

The 2025 Mac Studio could be configured both with the brand new M4 Max CPU or with the M3 Extremely. It could sound counterintuitive, however the M3 Extremely model is the extra premium of the 2 SKUs, by a major margin; the Extremely design household has been described as merging two Max CPUs that the pc addresses as a single chip. There’s no M4 Extremely CPU but, so extremely energy customers get the equal of a pair of M3 Max CPUs as an alternative. This isn’t a comfort prize. Most head-to-head benchmarks place the M4 Max as solely barely quicker than the 2023-released M2 Extremely, with the M3 Extremely considerably forward from there. For the second, Apple payments the brand new Mac Studio as “probably the most highly effective Mac ever made.”

Petite Powerhouse

Like its predecessors, the Mac Studio is a lunchbox-sized machine that doesn’t take a look at all prefer it ought to be probably the most highly effective Mac ever made however moderately like one thing that ought to be working a very nice stereo system. However appears to be like are after all deceiving, and contained in the sealed field you’ll discover loads of oomph, designed with creators firmly in thoughts. I examined the entry-level M4 Max model, which features a 14-core CPU, 32-core GPU, and 16-core Neural Engine, plus 36 GB of unified reminiscence and a 512-GB SSD for $1,999. That lattermost spec feels a bit stingy in at present’s clime, however it may be upgraded (solely at buy) on the M4 Max mannequin all the way in which as much as 8 TB of SSD storage.

For comparability, the $3,999 M3 Extremely model begins with a 28-core CPU, 60-core GPU, and 32-core Neural Engine, plus 96 GB of unified reminiscence and a 1-TB SSD. Maxed out with an 80-core GPU, 512 GB of RAM, and a 16-TB SSD, your price ticket will hit a cool $14,099. Essentially the most highly effective Mac ever made could nicely equate to the costliest Mac ever offered as nicely.

It maybe goes with out saying that the machine is meltingly quick, to the purpose the place it’s onerous to precisely convey its energy in textual content. The M4 Professional-based Apple MacBook Professional I reviewed final fall in all probability gives the perfect comparability I can supply, contemplating it’s just one step down on the CPU ladder from the M4 Max.