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Apple Mac Studio M5 Max
5/5
From $2,499
The 2026 Mac Studio. Same 128GB unified-memory ceiling as the M4 Max it replaces, so the same models fit — what changed is prompt processing, where Apple claims up to 3.9x the M4 Max on long prompts. Buy it if large contexts are your bottleneck; buy the outgoing M4 Max if raw capacity per dollar is.
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Specifications
| Chip | Apple M5 Max |
| CPU Cores | 18-core |
| GPU Cores | Up to 40-core (32-core base) |
| Unified Memory | Up to 128GB |
| Memory Bandwidth | 614GB/s |
Pros
- Apple-claimed up to 3.9x faster LLM prompt processing than M4 Max
- 128GB holds 70B-class models at Q4 with long-context headroom
- Completely silent desktop operation
Cons
- Memory ceiling unchanged at 128GB — no new models fit vs M4 Max
- Token generation gains only ~12% (bandwidth-bound, 546 to 614GB/s)
- $500 more than the outgoing M4 Max at the same capacity
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