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Make sure the SSD isn't more than about 80-90% full. If it is, unload some files on to an external hard drive.
Make sure to turn the Mac off and on every day. Otherwise the RAM will fill up, and you'll have lots of SWAP being used too. Turning it off and on again resets this and clears the SWAP.
Use Edge browser. Do not use Chrome. Uses less RAM. Set the idle tabs to "sleep" in the Edge settings. The privacy settings on Edge are much better too.
Do not buy M2 with 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM. Will be slower than M1. Get at least 512GB and 16GB, and M1 instead of M2.
Chris.-
This is mostly nonsense I’m afraid…
Turning off and on ‘to clear RAM’ is not only unnecessary, but completely negates the sophisticated OS-level caching mechanisms that are designed to use and manage all available RAM to speed up app launching, document opening etc, resulting in a slower experience until the cache is re-populated. Free RAM is wasted RAM.
Safari is the most lightweight browser on MacOS, with superior hardware acceleration leading to lower battery usage.
While it’s true that the single NAND chip on the base-spec M2 results in half the sequential SSD speed of the base M1, unless your workload depends on peak sequential R/W performance, the M2 pisses all over the M1 in most real-world usage metrics. Especially if you do any kind of video work; the M2 has a media engine which accelerates multiple channels of ProRes/HEVC/H.264 in hardware… the M1 does not. M2 over M1 is a no-brainer.
Agreed that it’s best practice to allow for ~20% free storage space to allow SSD garbage collection/wear-levelling algos to do their thing.
ectoplasmosis
Hey apple fans, got a question. I want to get a standalone computer for photo editing and music production, because my early 2015 MBP has been through heavy use and is very full and now struggles with these kind of tasks. So, thinking about trying to hunt down an older iMac that I can use just for these purposes – can't spring for a new gen one but I see older second hand ones about a lot, so I was wondering, is there any era of iMac that might not be the flashiest in the world anymore but would be particularly good for these sort of tasks compared to others? Thanks.