Buying new Mac and trying to work out whats the most important GPU's/CPU's or Memory.

[rob.fusion360]

I'm, getting a new Mac to replace my 16GB Mac Mini M1 and am trying to work out what I need for the best Fusion 360 performance.

I'm finding the M1 Mac Mini taking quite some time to do calculations, especially around fillets and embossed text. The Parametric text plugin is great, but that really slows things down 🙂

I've read the minimum specs and that's really not helped me, most of the posts I've read indicate that Fusion 360 doesn't really take advantage of the GPU's on a Mac Silcon except for rendering. It appears to be single threaded cores that give greatest benefit. All the calculations appear to be done in the CPU.

No one seems to talk a great deal about memory, would 24GB be massively better than 16GB, or should 32GB or even 36GB help?

Would a fast single core speed be the best and the fact that it has 10 CPU cores vs 12 CPU cores or even 14 CPU cores make no difference? (apart from rendering, which I don't do a great deal of).

A refurbished M2 Max is significantly cheaper than a new M3 Max.

With the new Apple silcon range, you can't spec a large amount of memory on a small CPU count, so the price goes up quickly.

Any thoughts and tops welcomed.

many thanjks

Rob

[g-andresen · Accepted solution]

Hi,

1. CPU speed first, second, third...
2. with 24 GB memory you are well on your way
3. the number of cores plays no role
4. a mid-range product is sufficient for the graphics

G[nther

[rob.fusion360]

Thanks for the simple answer. I like simple.

I'll look for a mid range refurbished Macbook Pro, either M2 or M3, now. Probably 32GB and 2TB but won't get excited over the number of CPU's or GPU's.

Best wishes

Rob

[TrippyLighting]

Little correction, the GPU is only used for viewport display. Rendering in the ender environment is entirely CPU based and uses every available CPU core to the max.

[rob.fusion360]

I  ended up buying a refurbished M2 Max Macbook Pro with 32GB from Apple. This will see me through for the next 10 years (I hope).

I've not really pushed Fusion 360 hard on it as I'm still trying to work out how to use the trackpad in Fusion 360. I know how to use a trackpad in normal use, struggling with the Fusion 360 on it. I'll work that out though.

Thanks

Rob