Dear Community and Mac-Users. Please read this if you own a new Apple M-System.
Since around 12 years I work as a professional visualization artist. I have been using CoronaRender for years on Mac computers and with the latest upgrade to Apple M-chipsets I would like to share my experience, as the issue I am having could be very much relevant and critical for every Apple ARM user.
1 Introduction
I work in the field of architectural visualization. In the past 3 years all my renders were based on a setup using my Apple iMac i9 and Corona v9. It has been a great, reliable setup, but I wanted to upgrade. I skipped the first batch of Apple M-systems, but with a fully maxed out Mac Studio M2 Ultra I stepped into the game. So once bought, I updated all my systems to C4D 2023 and Corona V10 to test speed and have a comparison. Using the latest Corona Benchmark and running Cinebench it turned out the new system everywhere speeds up 2.2x compared to my previous setup. So the numbers were as I expected and I got excited.
2 Reality
The reality is very much different and it took me quite a while to notice it. When opening existing scenes, I sensed that the new Mac Ultra somehow did not feel as fast as expected. So I tested both computers with a basic scene, including some models, a few textures and a simple light setup. Of course all systems are updated, run the same software and have the scene saved as project-file with assets. It turns out that the Mac Studio easily gets beaten by a three year old Apple Intel system in real conditions.
Depending on many different scenes I tested, the new Mac Studio was not twice as fast, but instead up to 3 times slower than my old Intel iMac ! So in fact it is up to 5 times slower as it should perform. Same is true for parsing times, which are not significantly lower than on the i9. I also noticed the same results using C4D 26 and/or trying Corona V9. Also a friend of mine had similar results on his Apple M1 Ultra. That is beyond imagination, a disaster and I have not found any explanation yet.
3 Issue
So I would like to address this issue to the community. Attached you will find my simple test-scene (DropBox link below) and also a screenshot of the VFB of my Apple iMac i9 and my Mac Studio M2 Ultra. I would be interested if you face the same troubles rendering that scene and hopefully detect something that dramatically slows down the M-chips. If this turns out to be a general issue, using CoronaRender with Apple M-Chipsets does not make any sense at all. It is a failed investment.
Hopefully we can find a solution, as my prediction is, that users who bought a new Apple M system might not even be aware that their computers are not performing to the fullest. You might have paid a lot of money for limited power and not even noticing it.
All best – ASIMO
_
DropBox Link to file :
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/rv6cwapzmy7qfvhbf31x4/h?rlkey=elghyfyv4lqzmw4o49ex3haqg&dl=0