Terrible performance on M1 Pro 16 inch Macbook Pro

I'm on Monterey 12.2.1 on M1 Max, 64GB RAM, 2TB SSD, with latest Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro. Both have less then advertised performance, spinning beachball, and in LP frequent CPU spikes with accompanying loud crackles that render the product unusable.

I am now on a MBP 14 inch Apple M1 Max with 10-core CPU, 32-core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine, 64 Gigs.

Using no audio interface. Loaded a project with 32 tracks, using all audio (no midi tracks) lots of logic plugins and NI Guitar Rig for FX.

So far no issues. Will try a midi heavy one next.

I do have external drives, HD and SSD but my Logic Pro sessions are all stored on my internal SSD. My Final Cut Pro video content (video, clips, audio) reside on my SSD. In any event this machine with the latest version of the OS, LP, and FCPX should scream. I should not be getting the spinning beachball for 10 seconds when I close FCPX. I should not be getting intermittent CPU spikes and loud crackles in LP (which risk me blowing my studio monitors)!

I also have these issues. 16" M1 64gig ram 4th ssd.

I started out simple with Logic and RME interface all latest drivers and immediately noticed some glitchy playback. In the excitement of a new mac, I persevered and installed all my stuff... 3rd party Soundtoys / waves / Arturia etc. Some native some not. But in any combination of Native / Rosetta / simple sessions / complex sessions I just could not get it to run smoothly. I tried the audio interface on USBc to USBa aapple dongle, and on a caldigit TB3 dock. Same issue... although I think slightly worse when though the dock (?). Strangely it was better at playback than record. So playing back sessions seemed ok sometimes, but as soon as I tried to record anything it just felt really unstable and i had clicks and dropouts in the audio. I tried for 3 days and then concluded that this combo just isnt good right now. Hopefully it will be fixed with an OS update but I dont want to risk having hardware that for some reason wont get fixed so I returned the laptop today. :( Hopefully some people have better luck than me!

Back to the trusty trashcan....

I'm on a MacBook Air M1 with 16 GB ram and a 1TB HD and have had good results in Logic thus far. Some projects I feel like I can just keep adding plugins and it may stutter once in a while but then seems to be OK. ( I mainly use Waves and stock Apple plugins plus a handful of others. )

Besides having just an M1 and not a pro or max, I am still on Big Sur and wondering if that is the main issue? From what I can tell Monterey is not yet fully supported by many of the 3rd party plugin vendors. See this https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/macos-12-monterey-compatibility-guide/#

I am seriously considering upgrading to a bigger MacBook Pro but this thread gives me pause. So am wondering...

Has anybody here tried downgrading to Big Sur?

Interesting, for sure... I'm a bit concerned that there's a hardware issue here, though I'm also wondering about firmware. Not sure how to check that, but I'd be curious to know whether your new machine has the same firmware as the previous one.

I thought at first that only I have this problem but you describe exactly the problem I have. It's a nightmare to open projects with multiple plugins. If the project has a high sample rate, you can forget about it. Hopefully this will be improved soon, because I spent quite a lot of money on my Macbook.

Thanks for your contribution!

Start using Ableton Live :) Thats what I had to do. I am happy that it is not just me having this problems. I also spend a lot of money on this PRO machine. So I want some PRO performance!

Thank you for your contribution, I experience the same thing.

Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

Yes a lot!

Im currently running Logic Pro x version 10.7.2 (on M1Pro 16GB, 1TB SSD) and it crashed quite often.

High CPU peaks for no reason and random crashes. Mostly while using third party plugins (like Arturia, Native Instruments, SSL and Softube), but also with native plugins.

I also had issues while working with a higher sample rate (96kHz).

I personally would wait till its fixed, especially when you use Logic as your main DAW. Otherwise you could also have no problems with it.

ok, so with my initial tests for about 30 mins now running Monterey 12.3 and LPX 10.7.3 on my MBP M1 Max 64Gb everything seems to be running smoothly - no clicks/pops thus far - best Ive had all year.....let's see what everyone else is getting??

Tested newest GarageBand in native mode and latest Monterey: Less CPU load on GB and AUhostingservice - but the latter can still consume up to 70% in a large project. Much less audio spikes and crackles, but still some - although very rarely. Not a 100% reliability in my opinion.

On a sidenote: An older GB error that I reported to Apple at the beginning of february still exists - both on an older Intel MB Pro with the latest Big Sur and on my new M 1 Pro with latest Monterey.

When the preferences (general) are set to "cycle off: Replace" and I play something over an existing region on a midi track it not only replaces the midi on this track but also deletes a corresponding portion of audio on a different audio track that I recorded earlier - sometimes even on multiple audio tracks at the same time. When I revert the midi recording the missing audio parts reappear. The problem doesn't occur when the preferences are set to "cycle off: Merge". The "cycle on" preference OTOH has no influence on this weird and annoying behaviour.

Don't know if that happens in Logic Pro too.

Okay, sadly I spoke too soon. When I tried it last night I wasn't in my studio, and could only test with the built-in audio. On my Audient ID-22 (USB) this morning, playback is about the same disaster it was before.

Switching to built-in audio it's much better, but I still get occasional clicks. Also, watching the Performance Meter, with nothing playing back at all—i.e., the transport stopped—I'm still seeing random CPU spikes on the last thread. Switching from 8 threads to 10, the spikes move to the 10th (i.e., last) thread, but just keep going. Re-launching Logic the spikes go away, but only until I playback once. From that point on, the spikes are continuous, whether I'm playing audio or not.

This is ridiculous. I don't have time to do a thorough plugin debug test right now, but I'll try to do that either tonight or tomorrow morning. I did get notified by Softube that all their plugins are now "officially" compatible, but updating made no difference.

BTW, rolling back to my 10.6.2 backup is fine again, as it was before.

I do notice that the last thread is also "kicking" on idle in 10.6.2, and has a similar weird pattern of jumping occasionally. But in 10.6.2 it idles around 14% and the jumps peak at around 25%, rather than 100% in 10.7.3.

Is there a trend here that maybe its more problematic when a USB audio device is used as the interface? that would be worrying... :( But it seems like people that are running on internal are having less problems?

I have also had issues with Surge XT in Rosetta.... particularly with the FX section for some reason. If I have any Airwindows FX in a patch it will be super glitchy in Rosetta, but totally fine in Native.

It's going to be a challenging time indeed if some plugs work well "only" in Native and some work "only" in Rosetta --eek!