M1 Apple Silicon for Chess?

[AlexChess]

Be very careful with CPU temperature. The fan makes no noises so you are not warned about motherboard becoming incredibly hot especially running chess engines. I have experienced that with iMac 2013 Intel and Mac mini M1 with unrecoverable damages to the logic board. Now I've switched to a Tower PC with Linux and big fans. Sorry to say that to you, but Apple isn't good for chess engines and I will not use a Mac for that anymore.

[cpeters]

I bought this thing not because of 'computer-chess'* or engine-tournaments for that matter. The use case is a different one. Sonoma works well for me and brew does the rest. Alas, an alternative (snapdragon) which runs Linux with all things attached, is simply non-existant. Not with that speed, the built-quality (lol) and the price. Vaporware ("next year...").

But virtualization is fast in case of my Debian.

In case of the air, It doesn't make sense to aqcuire/look for a quiet and discreet (form factor) unit which runs on a battery with intent to put it under permanent (days) and heavy load. There're bigger, cheaper and better machines for that. One can ssh into them.

Did the mini melt? Has it died completely?

*I'm more interested in self play, solving puzzles and old dedicated machines (emulated) nowadays..; for that, I won't need 16 cores and 32gb of ram.

[smatovic]

Be very careful with CPU temperature. The fan makes no noises so you are not warned about motherboard becoming incredibly hot especially running chess engines. I have experienced that with iMac 2013 Intel and Mac mini M1 with unrecoverable damages to the logic board. Now I've switched to a Tower PC with Linux and big fans. Sorry to say that to you, but Apple isn't good for chess engines and I will not use a Mac for that anymore.

Hear hear

I will link this one to upcoming "Just buy a MacBook" posts in future

I myself fried a laptop fan with computer chess, I won't use laptops anymore for pro computer chess...just as a terminal to workstations.

How many of you have fried your laptop with computer chess?
viewtopic.php?p=917820

^^ not many people answered to that post, but if you read this forum over t, there are quite some issues with frying consumer laptops with pro computer chess.

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Srdja

[towforce]

I myself fried a laptop fan with computer chess, I won't use laptops anymore for pro computer chess...just as a terminal to workstations.

How many of you have fried your laptop with computer chess?
viewtopic.php?p=917820

For the overwhelming majority of users (and, of course, assuming the absence of negative emotions towards Google), the best choice of device is a Chromebook.

* long battery life

* touch screen

* 360 degree folding screen in many cases

* fast start-up

* automatic backup

Although the CPUs tend to be at the low end, you've got plenty enough power for what most people do - including video editing (if you do video editing professionally, it's probably not a good choice).

For me personally, a Chromebook would also meet my chess needs more than well enough (by a very wide margin if I'm honest!).

However, if you are doing a large amount of CPU intensive activity, then, unless you've got some way of cooling your device on the move, a laptop might not be the best choice. Maybe you could use it to remote into your kickass device - and maybe it's possible to do that with a Chromebook!

[cpeters]

[...]would[...]

Do/did you use one? Is it any good? Things relying on cloud-services are not comfortly usuable here in Germany - especially while on the move/traveling in trains (with their "wifi") - it's bad beyond imagination...

Maybe you could use it to remote into your kickass device - and maybe it's possible to do that with a Chromebook!

I can do ssh from an android mobile phone..

Greetings!

[smatovic]

[...]Maybe you could use it to remote into your kickass device - and maybe it's possible to do that with a Chromebook!

Yes, basically what I need is just a thin client with web-browser and ssh terminal to connect to other machines, and I can imagine that a web-browser with PlayChess, Chess.com, LiChess already does a good job for chess as a hobby...

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Srdja

[AlexChess]

[...]Maybe you could use it to remote into your kickass device - and maybe it's possible to do that with a Chromebook!

Yes, basically what I need is just a thin client with web-browser and ssh terminal to connect to other machines, and I can imagine that a web-browser with PlayChess, Chess.com, LiChess already does a good job for chess as a hobby...

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Srdja

521€ asked by Apple (but not given!) to repair a 2020 Mac mini M1 8-256GB for a broken logic card to test my SF derivative against other engines
Mac mini M2 now costs 579€.

Apple is crazy! With this money I will buy a Super PC 3 times faster and with 16-32 GB RAM, all components NOT SOLDERED to the board to upgrade and repair it easily.

Switched to Linux, and I'll not play computer engines tests even with it. Since now I will only mod SF, compile and play against it for my exclusive pleasure on occasional games.

[towforce]

Do/did you use [a Chromebook]? Is it any good?

I bought one for my son, and it served him very well for many years (he was later required to have a Windows laptop for schoolwork during lockdown ). As well as all the browser functionality, he also used to run many Android apps on it from the Google Play Store as well.

There are plenty of things you can do on a Chromebook offline (including downloaded Google Docs - which I use on my (Android) phone to record my lifts at the gym).

btw, I've looked it up: one can use a Chromebook to remote into another device.

[JohnWoe]

Chromebooks are just landfill. They are basically just browser launchers. Weak i3 CPUs. 4GB RAM. etc. Plastic chassis, no terminal to be found like in Android phones.

I bought a slightly used ThinkPad T480 w/ i5-8th gen ( 4c / 8t ) / 16GB RAM / 256GB for 110€. From Inrego. A Swedish company.
Installed a Pop!_OS a perfect backup laptop. I didn't need that laptop for anything but 110€ in discount was too good deal to pass. Even better it didn't contain any OS.
If I'm selling it, it would be 500€. My main Ryzen 7 laptop cost a few years ago 8 times that and it isn't much better.

[cpeters]

JonWoe,

Termux or something like that is not available on a Chromebook?

greetings!