Correct number of CPU cores settings for M1 Mac

[Dansh]

Hi All, the new M1 silicon on my Mac mini has 8 cores, but being an apple silicon system, those cores don’t work as normal cpu cores (at least according to Apple marketing)… Who know what should be the correct setting under “performance” tab with regard to cpu cores?

Also, I’m using the Motu M4 and it works great, but I want to play with sample rate setting, but I only see buffer size options, anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks!

Operating system: macOS Big Sur (11)

Topic

[pumpkinking]

The M1 chips appear to have 8 cores, but they are not all the same: there are 4 “big” cores and 4 “little” cores.  The big cores are for compute-intensive workloads and the little cores are for smaller workloads (and are much more power efficient).  How these cores all work together is controlled by the hardware/software architecture, and very likely has different modes depending on the workloads.  I am guessing these modes include configurations that use just the 4 little cores and just the 4 big cores, and possibly all 8 together, although the throughput will be different between big and little cores, so I’m not certain of that.

My guess is that these processors work best when running applications that require 4 or fewer threads, although I have no data to back that up.  That said, I have a mini with an M1 chip and I have SD3 set to 4 cores.

Superior Drummer 3 version: 3.2.4
Operating system: macOS Big Sur (11)

[Dansh]

Thanks! that was kind of my thought process too. I tried 8 and then 1 core, both settings worked fine for me actually. I’ll try 4, and I’m sure it’ll work. Will probably keep it at 4 as a compromise.

Still curious what is the “official” answer though, I didn’t see it published anywhere.

Operating system: macOS Big Sur (11)

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