Mac Support Main Overview Thread

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    • Official Post

    Dear Forum Community,


    We're happy to announce that we'll be offering official Mac support in the first half of 2022!


    There is no information we can give out when it comes to the pricing and exact release date. For further upcoming information about either please check out our official Enscape for Mac page here, and feel free to also try it out for yourself using our Enscape for Mac Beta (Same page) (Sketchup 2021 only).


    For any other questions, discussions or general feedback you wish to share please use this thread or create a new one in this specific subforum only.


    We're looking forward to all of your input. :)

  • Rick Marx

    Approved the thread.
  • I was very happy to hear that you finally remembered the MAC users,

    I've been a VRAY user since version 2.0, sketchup 2021 and twinmotion

    I was never able to test Enscape as I don't use Windows.


    I would love to participate as a beta tester and make suggestions.

    my setup:

    Imac Pro Xeon 18core

    256mb Ram

    Radeon Pro Vega 64X 16 GB

    4tb HD

    Big SUr 16

  • Curious to see benchmarks of the new M1 Max and M1 Pro systems in the MacBook Pros that were announced yesterday. Supposedly, graphics performance is superior to a Playstation 5 console, and comparable to the current mobile RTX cards at 100 less watts. That's some serious power in a portable device.


    There are Vulkan drivers optimized for M1 Macs, and it seems as though both AMD and NVIDIA support Vulkan. I wonder how much effort is involved for Enscape and other rendering softwares to update beyond OpenGL and DirectX to more modern APIs.


    I'd definitely be willing to test it, but only have access to SketchUp as far as programs to run Enscape in.


    With Apple only showcasing their entry level and portable machines so far, they still need to move their desktop and pro desktops to their own silicon.


    Something to keep an eye on.

  • If we are to believe the released marketing material from Apple, M1 max is comparable to RTX 3080, while using much less energy. It also maintains the same level of graphic processing on battery unlike Nvidia.


    Even if it is a little bit of exaggeration, and it "only" matches RTX 3070 or 3060, it is still incredible and dreamy. As eeblack suggested, I hope that Enscape for Mac is written in the way in which it's completely efficient and optimized with M1 Max/Pro.

  • Those figures will be excluding the RTX type features which make raytracing type operations significantly faster and DLSS which also improves performance.


    A PS5 is equivalent to something like a 2060 or 2070 excluding RTX.


    Great to have options for Mac however.

  • I mean, does raytracing even matter with Enscape? If anything goes wrong, one of Enscape team’s first suggestions is to turn off raytracing as there isn’t much difference in final render quality.


    Yes, getting even 2060/2070 equivalent graphics on such thin laptop on battery power and without fans going crazy is just so surprisingly amazing.

  • This is one of many videos on the new MBP but there’s a nice little bit on the end about the upcoming M SOC for the Mac Pro (and maybe IMac Pro if there is one)

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  • I mean, does raytracing even matter with Enscape? If anything goes wrong, one of Enscape team’s first suggestions is to turn off raytracing as there isn’t much difference in final render quality.


    Yes, getting even 2060/2070 equivalent graphics on such thin laptop on battery power and without fans going crazy is just so surprisingly amazing.

    The GI and reflections are all driven by raytracing, so if you are interested in realtime performance, whether when creating your model or for realtime output, then yes.

    The dedicated hardware that those RTX cards have act like a multiplier for certain types of workload, so over in the gaming world where we do come across situations maybe even less demanding than what an Archiviz user will place on an environment we see as much as a 4x improvement in performance with DLSS and hardware accelerated raytracing.


    That becomes even more compound when you are running at higher resolutions - DLSS increases performance further. Something to bear in mind as those Mac's have 4x the number of pixels to drive on screen than a 1080p monitor (close to a 4K display) - itself being one of the primary reasons those models will have even moderately powerful GPUs as the GPU overhead needed to run at 4K in itself is significant.


    Anyways, I don't mean to be a negative Nancy, it's fantastic there are more options for people who choose to use Mac - they are quality products all round.


    I do strongly feel that people need to look past the marketing and look at the evidence we have in front of us about the hardware how that compares to other known quantities.

    In regards to the GPU we know suspiciously little, they've only talked about "relative" performance. They've used a $400 PS5 as a comparison for their $3000 laptop and we have no benchmarks of indication of actual GPU performance.

    They have mostly focussed on the CPU, which is actually pretty amazing. SketchUp will fly on one of those. (as it does on my Mac Mini)


    I get it though, if you are Mac user already, then this is a huge upgrade. I'd be excited too :)


    Just as I was when I bought my iPhone 13 pro a few weeks ago - which of course I'm sure many Android users would tell me was overpriced and underspecced too :D (talk about a hypocrite )

  • Very, very excited to see what the M1 Max can do graphics-wise! Enscape would be a true test for this SOC setup compared to discreet GPUs. The only remaining question mark for me to go all Mac for our architectural workflow is VR. Really need this capability for in-house design checks and presentations to clients. Demian Gutberlet I hope you do set up a beta testing group as I'd load SketchUp or ArchiCAD just to test out Enscape performance with this chip! I guess you need to update your Mac intake form for M1 Max Macbook Pros now!

  • Unlike M1, we can see that m1pro and mimax maybe have the really powerful graphics capabilities for GPU rendering, is something worth looking forward to in the future.

    However, I am curious that ,a large number of Apple users still have the Mac with amd independent graphics cards, which will exist in the next three years or more.


    Is there any more work to do for Enscape to adapt m1max and AMD independent graphics cards at the same time? :thumbsup:

  • Whilst the Enscape team haven't said so I'd expect Enscape for Mac to only work on the Apple Mx SOC's and not on Intel.

    I'm probably (and hopefully) wrong but don't be disappointed if I'm right .... Just a warning.

    • Official Post

    Whilst the Enscape team haven't said so I'd expect Enscape for Mac to only work on the Apple Mx SOC's and not on Intel.

    I'm probably (and hopefully) wrong but don't be disappointed if I'm right .... Just a warning.

    At least for now the plan is to also develop Enscape Mac with Intel CPU's in mind - Since we're still early in development here that may be subject to change. I don't want to get any hopes up too much either in case we should decide differently, but that is the current status.

  • At least for now the plan is to also develop Enscape Mac with Intel CPU's in mind - Since we're still early in development here that may be subject to change. I don't want to get any hopes up too much either in case we should decide differently, but that is the current status.

    As someone who has the latest Intel Mac myself, that is an absolutely wrong direction to take. Apple has officially abandoned Intel chips. They are now making surprising chipset that has comparable graphics power baked, using significantly less power.


    Why develop something that is now officially (perhaps practically is the correct term at this moment) obsolete on Apple's side?

  • As someone who has the latest Intel Mac myself, that is an absolutely wrong direction to take. Apple has officially abandoned Intel chips. They are now making surprising chipset that has comparable graphics power baked, using significantly less power.


    Why develop something that is now officially (perhaps practically is the correct term at this moment) obsolete on Apple's side?

    To be fair, Demian did say that their plan was to also (my emphasis added) continue developing for intel Macs. We shall see, but as you say, I see little chance of a) Intel actually surpassing Apple's SOC performance metrics, and b) Apple going back to intel even if they somehow did.


    Apple becoming a sponsor of Blender is interesting as perhaps it signals better integration with modern graphics APIs either through Apple's Metal tools, or directly.


    Keep in mind that the M1 chips were solely for their entry-level products. The M1 Pro and M1 Max are for mid-level portables. M2 will be for pro-level desktop and workstation classes of computers with performance in line with those expectations. My favorite reviewers of M1/M1 Pro/M1 Max relative to other players is anandtech.com


    Perhaps we will know more early next year.

    • Official Post

    As someone who has the latest Intel Mac myself, that is an absolutely wrong direction to take. Apple has officially abandoned Intel chips. They are now making surprising chipset that has comparable graphics power baked, using significantly less power.


    Why develop something that is now officially (perhaps practically is the correct term at this moment) obsolete on Apple's side?

    A tricky subject to be honest - We are also well aware the M1 chip is a game-changer basically since the performance of those chips is honestly pretty crazy. But, as a colleague of mine noted (who is rather involved in everything Apple) Intel chips may still play a role in their systems which in turn means it would make sense to offer support for those as well.


    In any case, we do not have any plans not fully utilizing the power of M1 / M2 Pro chips, so I don't think there is really a cause to worry all too much.

  • A tricky subject to be honest - We are also well aware the M1 chip is a game-changer basically since the performance of those chips is honestly pretty crazy. But, as a colleague of mine noted (who is rather involved in everything Apple) Intel chips may still play a role in their systems which in turn means it would make sense to offer support for those as well.


    In any case, we do not have any plans not fully utilizing the power of M1 / M2 Pro chips, so I don't think there is really a cause to worry all too much.

    Thank you for clarifying again. Great to hear that you guys are planning to fully utilize the new tech. I completely missed "also" part. My bad.