DaVinci Resolve now works up to five times faster on new MacBook Pro

Blackmagic Design announces the availability of DaVinci Resolve 17.4, making the software significantly faster on the new MacBook Pro models that feature Apple's M1 Pro and M1 Max chips.

DaVinci says that overall, the Resolve 17.4 update improves the decoding speed of 12K Blackmagic RAW files by a factor of three, and rendering H.265 files is 1.5 times faster. This combined with the hardware speed improvements of the M1 Pro and M1 Max makes the overall speed up to five times faster for most uses of the application.

Also included in the update is added support for ProMotion 120Hz displays, making smoother UI and playback experiences. HDR viewers are supported on the new MacBook HDR displays.

Facial recognition, object detection, and smart reframing are now up to four times faster thanks to increased Neural Engine performance on the M1 Pro and M1 Max.

DaVinci Resolve 17.4 has also added Dropbox Replay integration. Users can now upload their videos straight from DaVinci Resolve Studio to Dropbox Replay. Dropbox Replay comments and annotations will instantly sync with the DaVinci Resolve timeline, too.

There have been improvements made to the subtitling features, such as automatic resizing of backgrounds and cursor placement when creating captions.

Expanded support for automatic color management makes it easier to set up projects, while support for ACES 1.3 allows editors to more accurately display wide gamut images.

Other key updates include new Resolve FX including film halation, an improved 3D keyed and matte finesse controls, and the ability to export timeline marker titles as YouTube video or Quicktime chapters.

DaVinci Resolve 17.4 is available for download from the Blackmagic Design website.

4 Comments

mknelson 1146 comments · 9 Years

About 3 years ago

I don't recall which site it was off of (read on Flipboard) but I read an article over breakfast where they were benchmarking Premiere Pro and comparing to various PC configurations with discrete GPUs. They seemed impressed by the CPU performance, but underwhelmed by the GPU performance - although if you read it closely it wasn't far off the PC discrete GPU performance.

DaVinci seems to have done a better job of optimizing for the M1/Metal combo.

ppietra 288 comments · 14 Years

mknelson said:

I don't recall which site it was off of (read on Flipboard) but I read an article over breakfast where they were benchmarking Premiere Pro and comparing to various PC configurations with discrete GPUs. They seemed impressed by the CPU performance, but underwhelmed by the GPU performance - although if you read it closely it wasn't far off the PC discrete GPU performance.

DaVinci seems to have done a better job of optimizing for the M1/Metal combo.

That was from tomshardware.
I still don’t understand why they were disappointed about the GPU when it was able to almost match the performance of some of the most powerful Nvidia laptop graphics cards. And Apple didn’t even say that its GPU was the best one for a laptop, so they couldn’t exactly expect it to surpass everything out there.
And another thing is that Premiere Pro is not exactly the most optimised application for the Mac. For years it has worked better on Windows.

dewme 5738 comments · 10 Years

ppietra said:

mknelson said:

I don't recall which site it was off of (read on Flipboard) but I read an article over breakfast where they were benchmarking Premiere Pro and comparing to various PC configurations with discrete GPUs. They seemed impressed by the CPU performance, but underwhelmed by the GPU performance - although if you read it closely it wasn't far off the PC discrete GPU performance.

DaVinci seems to have done a better job of optimizing for the M1/Metal combo.

That was from tomshardware.
I still don’t understand why they were disappointed about the GPU when it was able to almost match the performance of some of the most powerful Nvidia laptop graphics cards. And Apple didn’t even say that its GPU was the best one for a laptop, so they couldn’t exactly expect it to surpass everything out there.
And another thing is that Premiere Pro is not exactly the most optimised application for the Mac. For years it has worked better on Windows.

Yeah, read the article. I'm sure we'll see many more reviews once the systems get into the hands of more folks who do benchmarking stuff. I too was a little puzzled that the reviewers felt that it was necessary to mention the M1 Max's performance against desktop workstations with discrete graphics cards when Apple's product is a fairly lightweight notebook computer with amazing battery life. It's like comparing the trunk space between various sedans and then mentioning that the best sedan doesn't have nearly the same cargo space as a 3/4 ton pickup truck. Really?

Oh well, Apple's new MacBook Pro's will have to prove themselves in the real world in the hands of people who are trying to get real work done where and when they need to, in the shortest amount of time, and without having to be frequently tethered to the power mains. I think this new pair of MacBook Pros will fare extremely well and impress their owners in the same way that the first generation M1 MacBook Air and M1 MacBook Pro have done. I've yet to find anyone who's not been impressed with the power and longevity of the "lowly" fanless M1 MacBook Air.

melgross 33607 comments · 20 Years

dewme said:

ppietra said:

mknelson said:

I don't recall which site it was off of (read on Flipboard) but I read an article over breakfast where they were benchmarking Premiere Pro and comparing to various PC configurations with discrete GPUs. They seemed impressed by the CPU performance, but underwhelmed by the GPU performance - although if you read it closely it wasn't far off the PC discrete GPU performance.

DaVinci seems to have done a better job of optimizing for the M1/Metal combo.

That was from tomshardware.
I still don’t understand why they were disappointed about the GPU when it was able to almost match the performance of some of the most powerful Nvidia laptop graphics cards. And Apple didn’t even say that its GPU was the best one for a laptop, so they couldn’t exactly expect it to surpass everything out there.
And another thing is that Premiere Pro is not exactly the most optimised application for the Mac. For years it has worked better on Windows.

Yeah, read the article. I'm sure we'll see many more reviews once the systems get into the hands of more folks who do benchmarking stuff. I too was a little puzzled that the reviewers felt that it was necessary to mention the M1 Max's performance against desktop workstations with discrete graphics cards when Apple's product is a fairly lightweight notebook computer with amazing battery life. It's like comparing the trunk space between various sedans and then mentioning that the best sedan doesn't have nearly the same cargo space as a 3/4 ton pickup truck. Really?

Oh well, Apple's new MacBook Pro's will have to prove themselves in the real world in the hands of people who are trying to get real work done where and when they need to, in the shortest amount of time, and without having to be frequently tethered to the power mains. I think this new pair of MacBook Pros will fare extremely well and impress their owners in the same way that the first generation M1 MacBook Air and M1 MacBook Pro have done. I've yet to find anyone who's not been impressed with the power and longevity of the "lowly" fanless M1 MacBook Air.

They compared it to those workstations for the same reason they did it with the original M1 Macbook Pro and Mac Mini, because why not? Unfortunately, Apple coming out with its own chips seems to have had some people think that Apple is stating that these chips are more powerful than anything else, no matter what. We know that’s not true, but it’s fun to think. Also some want to show that Apple’s product isn’t as good as many people think (and actually is), so they do something outlandish to prove otherwise.

remember that there are still, and will always be, people who hate the fact that Apple is successful, and feel that they have to do something to knock it down. I’m surprised someone hasn’t yet compared it to a supercomputer and declared that Apple’s chips aren’t that good after all.