Rpi-imager: Apple Silicon M1 Mac Native Release?

[danielktdoranie]

Hi, will a Apple Silicon M1 Mac Native Release of Raspberry Pi Imager be forth coming? The current Mac release is not a "Universal" binary, doesn't have Apple Silicon M1 Mac native support and requires Rosetta 2 to run (Rosetta 2 is the Intel binary translator and will eventually be discontinued by Apple, as it isa only meant to provide developers with a period of time to transition to releasing a Universal binary with Apple Silicon support.)

I don't run Rosetta 2 on my Apple Silicon Mac as it is a battery and resource hog.

Thanks!

[maxnet]

Main problem is that if we switch to universal build releases that would require dropping support for the older Mac OS X 10.13 edition.
And there may still be users using that.
Not everybody can shelve out $ 2000 for the latest MacBook Pro.

I don't run Rosetta 2 on my Apple Silicon Mac as it is a battery and resource hog.

Do you have figures to back that up?

I do not have a M1, but the task manager screenshot in the other thread suggests a CPU usage of just 4,2% when Imager is run under Rosetta 2: https://github.com/raspberrypi/rpi-imager/issues/235#issuecomment-986082510

[danielktdoranie]

Main problem is that if we switch to universal build releases that would require dropping support for the older Mac OS X 10.13 edition.

So the easy solution have separate builds and post them in the release section, that is what other devs do.

And there may still be users using that. Not everybody can shelve out $ 2000 for the latest MacBook Pro.

My M1 MacBook cost about half that, not that it’s at all germane to my original post: Raspberry Pi Imager should work on every available platform feasible. There also may be many users who want an Apple Silicon native build as well.

I don't run Rosetta 2 on my Apple Silicon Mac as it is a battery and resource hog.

Do you have figures to back that up?

I would suggest doing a search on Google for reviews on Rosetta 2. I no longer have it installed on my Apple Silicon Macs as if I wanted to run Intel/x86 code I’d own a computer with an x86 chip. Given that the Raspberry Pi ALSO uses an arm chip this shouldn’t be considered a radical position I wouldn’t think.

Instead of running native arm code on our Raspberry Pis let’s just emulate Intel code instead.

I do not have a M1, but the task manager screenshot in the other thread suggests a CPU usage of just 4,2% when Imager is run under Rosetta 2: #235 (comment)

[maxnet]

So the easy solution have separate builds and post them in the release section, that is what other devs do.

You can grab an UNTESTED (beyond compiling) universal build from the other thread linked if you really want it.
I don't envision it becoming an official build any time soon though.

[tkircher]

I do not have a M1, but the task manager screenshot in the other thread suggests a CPU usage of just 4,2% when Imager is run under Rosetta 2: #235 (comment)

I have an M1 Max and my own testing confirms that Rosetta 2 imposes a significant performance penalty beyond the ideological issue of running anything in emulation.

It's fine if the RPi project doesn't want to support the M1. Since it's open source, I'm sure there are plenty of other people who will, and will remember the animosity.

[danielktdoranie]

So the easy solution have separate builds and post them in the release section, that is what other devs do.

You can grab an UNTESTED (beyond compiling) universal build from the other thread linked if you really want it. I don't envision it becoming an official build any time soon though.

The “untested” imager for M1 works perfectly well.

[danielktdoranie]

I have an M1 Max and my own testing confirms that Rosetta 2 imposes a significant performance penalty beyond the ideological issue of running anything in emulation.

It's fine if the RPi project doesn't want to support the M1. Since it's open source, I'm sure there are plenty of other people who will, and will remember the animosity.

I sure will remember. Ever since Apple Silicon came out haters in the FOSS community have just acted ridiculously, like toddlers throwing tantrums. These people go on and on about how evil Apple is but more than happy to buy products from companies like Pine64, the break if you look at them.

I can say Rosetta 2 SIGNIFICANTLY impacts battery life. Let’s remember it’s not gonna be supported or even available forever: is a temporary solution.

[tkircher]

I sure will remember. Ever since Apple Silicon came out haters in the FOSS community have just acted ridiculously, like toddlers throwing tantrums. These people go on and on about how evil Apple is but more than happy to buy products from companies like Pine64, the break if you look at them.

I do find it deeply ironic that RPi came out with an ARM64 module with 8GB RAM more than a year ago and it isn't even officially supported yet. (In the sense that there isn't an official Raspbian release that supports 64-bit)

[maxnet]

I have an M1 Max and my own testing confirms that Rosetta 2 imposes a significant performance penalty

Measured what way?

Can you share task manager screenshots of the CPU usage of the official Imager release, and the M1 build posted in the other thread?

[tkircher]

I have an M1 Max and my own testing confirms that Rosetta 2 imposes a significant performance penalty

Measured what way?

Can you share task manager screenshots of the CPU usage of the official Imager release, and the universal M1 build posted in the other thread?

First, there is no Task Manager on Mac or Linux. That's Windows only. The Activity Monitor is also not a reliable way of gauging system performance. Applications and system performance must be profiled.

I'd be happy to share all my profiling data, including CPU, memory, SSD, and network penalties, and the overall performance difference, as soon as I have assurances that an official native M1 build will be released and supported.