Apple’s March event has come and gone, and in its wake, the new Mac Studio and Studio Display were left for us to talk about. I like to think of the Mac Studio as the chubby Mac mini with more ports, but I digress. It’s evident that Apple is targeting creatives who like the idea of the mini but want more ports and horsepower.
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The new Studio lineup will be using Apple’s M1 Max and M1 Ultra chips giving this chub a leg up over the mini. Apple claims the new Mac Studio can perform incredible feats such as rendering massive 3D environments and playing back 18 streams of ProRes video.
Of course, the Studio Display was made to pair with the Mac Studio. It features a 27-inch 5K Retina display, a 12MP Ultra-Wide camera with Center Stage, and a high-fidelity six-speaker sound system with spatial audio. As with all of their presentations, this combo will change the world, which remains to be seen.
Mac Studio and Studio Display
With the power and efficiency of Apple silicon, Mac Studio completely reimagines what a high-performance desktop looks like. Every element inside Mac Studio was designed to optimize the performance of M1 Max and M1 Ultra, producing an unprecedented amount of power and capability in a form factor that can live right on a desk.
Built from a single aluminum extrusion with a square footprint of just 7.7 inches and a height of only 3.7 inches, Mac Studio takes up very little space and fits perfectly under most displays. Mac Studio also features an innovative thermal design that enables an extraordinary amount of performance. The unique system of double-sided blowers, precisely placed airflow channels, and over 4,000 perforations on the back and bottom of the enclosure guide air through the internal components and help cool the high-performance chips. And because of the efficiency of Apple silicon, Mac Studio remains incredibly quiet, even under the heaviest workloads.
Powered by either M1 Max or M1 Ultra, Mac Studio delivers extraordinary CPU and GPU performance, more unified memory than any other Mac, and new capabilities that no other desktop can achieve. With M1 Max, users can take their creative workflows to new levels, and for those requiring even more computing power, M1 Ultra is the next giant leap for Apple silicon, delivering breathtaking performance to Mac Studio. M1 Ultra builds on M1 Max and features the all-new UltraFusion architecture that interconnects the die of two M1 Max chips, creating a system on a chip (SoC) with unprecedented levels of performance and capabilities, and consisting of 114 billion transistors, the most ever in a personal computer chip.
Apple
With its ultra-powerful media engine, Mac Studio with M1 Ultra can play back 18 streams of 8K ProRes 422 video, which no other computer in the world can do. Mac Studio also shatters the limits of graphics memory on a desktop, featuring up to 64GB of unified memory on systems with M1 Max and up to 128GB of unified memory on systems with M1 Ultra. Since the most powerful workstation graphics card available today only offers 48GB of video memory, having this massive amount of memory is game changing for pro workloads. And the SSD in Mac Studio delivers up to 7.4GB/s of performance and a capacity of up to 8TB, allowing users to work on massive projects with incredible speed and performance.
The compact design of Mac Studio puts an extensive array of essential connectivity within easy reach. On the back, Mac Studio includes four Thunderbolt 4 ports to connect displays and high-performance devices, a 10Gb Ethernet port, two USB-A ports, an HDMI port, and a pro audio jack for high-impedance headphones or external amplified speakers. Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0 are built in as well.
And because users frequently connect and disconnect devices, like portable storage, Mac Studio includes ports on the front for more convenient access. There are two USB-C ports, which on M1 Max supports 10Gb/s USB 3, and on M1 Ultra supports 40Gb/s Thunderbolt 4. There is also an SD card slot on the front to easily import photos and video. And Mac Studio provides extensive display support — up to four Pro Display XDRs, plus a 4K TV — driving nearly 90 million pixels.
Apple
Studio Display brings a stunning all-screen design with narrow borders and a refined, all-aluminum enclosure that houses an advanced set of features in a slim profile. Its built-in stand allows the user to tilt the display up to 30 degrees. To meet the needs of a variety of workspaces, Studio Display also offers a tilt- and height-adjustable stand option with a counterbalancing arm that makes the display feel weightless as it is adjusted. A VESA mount adapter option is also available, and supports landscape or portrait orientation for even more flexibility.
Studio Display features a 27-inch 5K Retina screen with over 14.7 million pixels. With 600 nits of brightness, P3 wide color, and support for over one billion colors, images come to life with spectacular detail. True Tone technology automatically adjusts the display’s color temperature as the environment changes for a more natural viewing experience. An industry-leading anti-reflective coating enables incredibly low reflectivity for better comfort and readability. And for workspaces with bright light sources, including sunlight, Studio Display offers an innovative nano-texture glass option. Nano-texture glass, first introduced on Pro Display XDR, scatters light to further minimize glare while delivering outstanding image quality.
Featuring the A13 Bionic chip, Studio Display delivers amazing experiences with its highly advanced camera and audio system. The ultimate video conferencing display, it includes a 12MP Ultra Wide camera with Center Stage, a feature that automatically keeps users centered in the frame as they move around for even more engaging video calls.
Studio Display also includes a studio-quality, three-microphone array with an especially low noise floor for crystal-clear calls and voice recordings. It also features a high-fidelity six-speaker sound system, the best ever created for Mac, delivering an unbelievable listening experience. Four force-cancelling woofers minimize distortion and produce bold, articulate bass, and two high-performance tweeters create accurate mids and crisp highs. The speakers also support spatial audio for music and video with Dolby Atmos, creating a truly cinematic viewing experience. Altogether, Studio Display has the best combination of camera and audio ever in a desktop display.
Apple
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