Choice of RAM for Mac mini pro

[Tony_P]

I’ve been very happily using my 2020 Mac Mini for work and at home for the last three years, but had to work in a big enough Excel file this week that it was struggling, badly.
It was a 36Mb data file, with 800,000 rows and about twenty columns, and despite trying to be as efficient as I could at losing the town and columns that I didn’t immediately need, it still ran out of memory quite quickly, and having to re-start with different rows for each bit of work was a pain. As soon as I had a calculation on every row it slowed to a crawl, and any second one that referenced multiple rows pushed it over the edge.

I’ve only 8Gb RAM, which is very likely the problem, and a faster processor wouldn’t hurt either, so am going to buy a new M2 Pro mini.

The question is, do I go for 16Gb or 32Gb of Ram? Is the limitation on large Excel sheets purely the RAM, or is the limitation based on how many calculations it’s trying to do while also working out which order to do them in?

 

[pigoo3]

The question is, do I go for 16Gb or 32Gb of Ram?

If you bump the RAM up to 32GB on a M2 Pro Mac-Mini...then you start getting close to the price of the base model Mac Studio.

In fact depending on your location...I recently purchased a base model M1 Mac Studio for $1499 ($500 off the Apple Store price)...and just $200 more than the $1299 base model 16GB M2 Pro Mac Mini price.

Also...this upcoming week (June 5th-9th)...is the Apple 2023 WWDC event. There are strong rumors Apple may announce an updated M2 Mac Studio.

If a new base model M2 Mac Studio remains the same price as the current base model M1 Mac Studio ($1999 in the US)...then again...bumping the RAM to 32GB on the M2 Pro Mac-Mini gets things kinda close to the price of a base model Mac Studio.

I would say wait at least 7-10 days to see what Apple announces next week...before pulling the trigger on a new computer.

- Nick

p.s. FYI...refurbished base model M1 Mac Studio's from Apple are currently $1799

 

[Tony_P]

Thanks, that does make sense. I'm still not sure whether for my use the Sudio is the better choice, as it's aimed so squarely at image processing, which I don't do, but it's possibly going to be the better choice.

I should wait, as you say, and see what comes out next week.

 

[pm-r]

I’ve only 8Gb RAM, which is very likely the problem, and a faster processor wouldn’t hurt either, so am going to buy a new M2 Pro mini.

Unless you have some type of unlimited bank account, you may want to check out and see if there is something else amiss or if you can make some other improvements and overcome the problem.

Here's an example of something that you might be interested in and it might affect such Excel files on your Mac as well:
How to clean up an Excel workbook so that it uses less memory

Clean up an Excel workbook so that it uses less memory - Microsoft 365 Apps

Identifies areas in Excel workbooks that use lots of memory and describes how you can make your workbook files work more efficiently.

learn.microsoft.com

Also, I wonder if it matters how full your hard drive is???

Does Activity Monitor actually say MS Excel is trying to use more memory than you actually have???




- Patrick
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[Tony_P]

Excel’s definitely filling up the RAM, but yes, I should go over the sensible checks again to see if I’m missing anything in my process and use if Excel.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

I’ve been very happily using my 2020 Mac Mini for work and at home for the last three years, but had to work in a big enough Excel file this week that it was struggling, badly.
It was a 36Mb data file, with 800,000 rows and about twenty columns, and despite trying to be as efficient as I could at losing the town and columns that I didn’t immediately need, it still ran out of memory quite quickly,

No Mac in good working order should be giving you an out-of-memory error message under the circumstances you describe. If anything, it should automatically use your hard drive as virtual memory. This might slow performance down a bit, but there should be no error messages.

My experience is that when a Mac gives you an out-of-memory error message, what it's usually telling you isn't that you are out of real RAM, what it is telling you is that your hard drive is too full (or too fragmented in the case of a rotating disk hard drive) for it to use as virtual memory. Usually you start seeing such an error message when a rotating disk hard drive is approaching 80% full, or when an SSD is around 70% full.

A 2020 Mac mini would be an M1 Mac. Apple Silicon Macs all have SSD's and are extremely good with memory. Though some folks purchased mini's with too small an SSD, which led to them filling it up too quickly. Once your SSD has hit about 70% full, your Apple Silicon Mac has reached the end of its life.

https://pureinfotech.com/why-solid-state-drive-ssd-performance-slows-down/

I’ve only 8Gb RAM, which is very likely the problem,

No, it isn't. Apple Silicon Macs with 8GB of RAM should be good for just about anything. See:

Opinion: Is the base MacBook Air M1/8GB powerful enough for you?
https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/18/opinion-is-the-base-macbook-air-m1-8gb-powerful-enough-for-you/

8GB vs 16GB M1 MacBook Pro - How much RAM do you NEED?!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP1_4wek4nI

The question is, do I go for 16Gb or 32Gb of Ram? Is the limitation on large Excel sheets purely the RAM, or is the limitation based on how many calculations it’s trying to do while also working out which order to do them in?

Neither. 8GB of RAM is plenty to open any size Excel spreadsheet you'd like as long as your Mac is in good working order. The only folks who really need more are those folks who work on astronomically large files, such as folks who do video editing. It's much more important that you invest in a much larger SSD than you might suspect that you would ever need, so that your Mac will last longer.

 

[krs]

It's much more important that you invest in a much larger SSD than you might suspect that you would ever need, so that your Mac will last longer.

So an immediate way to address the OPs problem with that Excel spreadsheet is to get an external drive, move enough of the files on the Mini SSD to the external until the Mini SSD is only about 50% or so full, and then work on the spreadsheet again.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

So an immediate way to address the OPs problem with that Excel spreadsheet is to get an external drive, move enough of the files on the Mini SSD to the external until the Mini SSD is only about 50% or so full, and then work on the spreadsheet again.

No, I'm afraid that won't work. It would have been the way to go BEFORE the internal SSD got filled up.

The problem is that the "free space" in an SSD that is more or less done isn't really free. It's been used by the OS for meta data and is full of data.

It's all explained at the link that I gave. Unfortunately, there is no way to securely erase or erase the free space on a Mac SSD, so there is no way to restore the performance of an SSD that is too full.

https://pureinfotech.com/why-solid-state-drive-ssd-performance-slows-down/

 

[pm-r]

No, it isn't. Apple Silicon Macs with 8GB of RAM should be good for just about anything.

This is a really long shot, and I really don't know if it could be one of the problems or not, but I'm wondering if that Mac has got a huge number of fonts installed that is adding to the application memory use, or if there are some corrupt fonts lurking on that Mac???

Front Book.app should be able to ease up and check each problem I would think.

As I say, a really long shot... that used to happen many years ago with some users...

Or how many different fonts is that Excel file actually using???

Would either one makes a difference in memory use???



- Patrick
=======

 

[Randy B. Singer]

This is a really long shot, and I really don't know if it could be one of the problems or not, but I'm wondering if that Mac has got a huge number of fonts ...

I'd guess that the chances of that being the problem are very close to zero. To have that many fonts, the OP would almost certainly be in the business of typography or something very similar. If the OP was in the business of typography, he would almost certainly know how to manage his fonts and not have them all loaded at once.

My bet would be on the OP having too full a boot drive. Or too small a boot drive. Or too fragmented a rotating disk boot drive. Or some combination of these.

 

[newbutter]

The amount of RAM does matter when it comes to handling large data files, but it's not the only factor. Given the size of the datasets you're working with, 32GB would probably provide a smoother experience. However, it's also worth noting the new M1/M2 architecture leverages unified memory, which allows the GPU and CPU to access the same memory pool, providing more efficiency.

However, if you're considering the price difference between a 16GB and 32GB Mac mini, you might want to also look at the newly released Mac Studio models which offer more power and may have future-proofing benefits. As others have mentioned, it might also be worth checking for other issues that could be causing your current Mac Mini to struggle.

 

[Tony_P]

Thanks. I’m OK waiting to see what comes out, this current piece of work is finished now, and I’m not expecting the next one in for a couple of weeks.

I’m finding it a bit hard to understand whether the Studio will be higher performance for me than the M2 Mini Pro, as much of the difference seems to be around

No, I'm afraid that won't work. It would have been the way to go BEFORE the internal SSD got filled up.

The problem is that the "free space" in an SSD that is more or less done isn't really free. It's been used by the OS for meta data and is full of data.

It's all explained at the link that I gave. Unfortunately, there is no way to securely erase or erase the free space on a Mac SSD, so there is no way to restore the performance of an SSD that is too full.

Why solid-state drive (SSD) performance slows down as it becomes full - Pureinfotech

How so? You can return the drive to the state it was in when it left the factory in terms of what’s stored in it. The link you gave doesn’t seem to say otherwise.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

How so? You can return the drive to the state it was in when it left the factory in terms of what’s stored in it. The link you gave doesn’t seem to say otherwise.

As I explained earlier, there are no Macintosh tools to securely erase (i.e. completely wipe) an SSD or to securely erase just the free space on an SSD.

While this feature used to exist in Disk Utility for rotating disk hard drives, Apple has removed this feature completely because all new Macs now have SSD's.

 

[pigoo3]

Thanks. I’m OK waiting to see what comes out...

Apple announced new stuff yesterday. Pertinent to this conversation...an upgraded M2 Mac Studio.

Not sure where you are located (country)...but refurbished M1 Mac Studio's are $1529 on the Apple US Refurb store.

These won't last long (normal refurb price was $1799). With the introduction of the M2 Mac Studio...Apple is clearing their system of the older/M1 Mac Studio models:





Nick