topic Re: Apple Silicon - M3 in Fusion Support Forum

Apple Silicon - M3

Lonnie.Cady — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 13:45:55 GMT

Now that the native OSX version of Fusion has been released for a bit what are peoples feelings about it and the apple silicon chips?

I have been needing a new laptop and really like apple products but concerned about performance. I would be considering an M3 Max. I know they are just released and there is likely not real world evidence yet but how are the M2's working with Fusion?

Re: Apple Silicon - M3

tomae — Fri, 10 Nov 2023 22:06:46 GMT

Well I don't have any objective tests before and after, and I haven't used it extensively yet, but I just received my MBP with the M3 Max chip. I got the 16" lower spec version (14 Core CPU, 30 Core GPU, 36GB Memory, 1TB Storage). This is my first M-series laptop. My previous laptop was a 2019 Intel 8-Core i9 with 16GB Memory, 1TB SSD, and Radeon Pro Vega 20 GPU.

Fusion 360 launches much faster, my parts and assemblies load very quickly was well. Overall it's just a more responsive experience. I haven't run many cpu intensive tasks yet, but building a couple small assemblies and also posting some G-Code for a few parts and all has been very smooth and quick. I haven't noticed any issues at all compared with using it on my previous laptop.

So far so good.

-Tom

Re: Apple Silicon - M3

Lonnie.Cady — Fri, 10 Nov 2023 23:07:05 GMT

@tomae

Thank you very much. Exactly the info I was looking for. I don't do intense fusion work. Some small assemblies and post some simple gcode.

I just wanted so real world experience on it.

Re: Apple Silicon - M3

joeykelley — Thu, 30 May 2024 21:43:19 GMT

How were you able to download the program? I Have the same Macbook, M3; 36G ram, and it keeps telling me I need to download the Rosetta app. But It wont let me download it..

Re: Apple Silicon - M3

MAS.DPL — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 17:37:35 GMT

I borrowed a Macbook air M3 (16GB) and installed Standard Fusion, using evaluation download link and then logging into my Fusion account. The Macbook was a week old but fully set up with office etc. it didn't ask for rosetta. I then ran back to back rebuilds on a fairly complex assembly. I was just astounded by the speed - 10 seconds for full rebuild !!!

vs 20 seconds on Dell 5750 !! (32GB Intel® Core™ i7-10875H Processor 2.8 to 5.10 GHz Nvidia RTX 3000).

That's a massive 2x speed improvement !

Can anyone else using an Apple M3 tell me - what's the downside ?

Reliability ? (My Fusion Windows 11 setup, above is ROCK solid like under 1 crash per month )
As fusion is NOT (yet) fully native on apple M3, is there a reliability hit ?
Will it drive a 4K screen OK ? (the mac air had just under 4K native screen rez and I didn't hook it up to my 4K screen)
Mac OS - after years on Windows ?

Re: Apple Silicon - M3

TrippyLighting — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 17:32:26 GMT

@MAS.DPL wrote:

Will it drive a 4K screen OK ? (the mac air had just under 4K native screen rez and I didn't hook it up to my 4K screen)

Yes, according to this Apple support page.

@MAS.DPL wrote:

Mac OS - after years on Windows ?

I use both, Windows and MacOS machines. At work I use a dell precision notebook. At home I use a 2017 MacBook Pro and I built a Windows machine (AMD Ryzen 5950X, 64GB, RTN 3070ti) a few years ago.

I don't see any problems changing between the two OS. I prefer macOS, but don't have problems with Windows either.