Which spectrometers (and which software) will currently run natively on arm64 (M1, M2 etc) Macs?
I’m on OS X Ventura / M1 Mac (but likely to upgrade to M4 and newest OS X soon).
Alas I can no longer use my trusty ColorMunki Photo. I had been running a VirtualBox hosting OS X Mojave but now even that won’t run on my recently acquired M1 due to the arm64 architecture not playing ball with Mojave’s X86 code.
Are the following spectros all viable? And if so are there any real differences when using strictly for PPEv2 (other than price)?
i1 Eye-One Pro UVCut ES-1000
i1 Pro version 2
i1 Pro rev E - ES-2000
What software would I use to measure test charts and how would I get the readings into PPEv2 spreadsheet?
The new i1Studio will run on my M1, and even recognises ColorMunki, but i1Studio does not seem to have the ability to spot read, as ColorPicker used to.
With my ColorMunki I used to spot read using ColorPicker in my Mojave VM, export readings as CSV, then copy paste luminance values into PPEv2 sheet.
My recommendation to you is to purchase a $50-$75 mac mini on eBay running Monterey or earlier… and to use it as both a printer server so that you can enjoy all the features QTR was intended to employ as well as OS X printer saved settings and to use i1 Pro or ColorPort or even employ Adobe Color Utility if you ever want to make ICC color profiles. You can still download legacy software from x-Rite but that will not last much longer. i1Profiler is still available… you can get your data from there.
Jon’s approach of keeping a Mac mini around with Monterey is the easiest way to use multiple spectro options via ColorPort. I keep a MacPro Tower 2012 running until last year with multiple hacks of firmware, duct tape and bailing wire and some pixie dust until I just got tired of chasing it. The Mac mini approach is definitely the easiest way to go.
That said, I have an M2 MacStudio running Sequoia 15.1.1 and using i1Profiler v3.8.4 with no issues. PPVEv2 with Excel and Print Tool as well. All running without issue. For spectros I hae an i1Pro3, and eye-one ISis.
Thanks both, for your considered replies. that does give me some options.
As it is possible to run an i1 Pro natively on the new M# Macs with recent i1Profiler I think I’m more inclined to go that route. I’m running everything from a laptop and haven’t gotten on great with splitting tasks over multiple machines when I’ve tried it in the past, more for ease of my creative flow than anything else.
From what I can gather the only i1 Pros which are compatible with i1Profiler 3.8.4 are the following:
i1 Pro 2
i1 Pro 3
i1 Pro 3 Plus
The software also shows a little thumbnail of the Spectro as so
I have found a “EFI ES-2000 X-rite i1 PRO Rev E Spectrophotometer” for sale (£295). It looks just like the thumbnail in i1Profiler. But is it compatible?
Finding it very hard to discern the versioning of the hardware! Any tips appreciated.
The EIS-2000 will NOT work with i1Profiler to create new profiles. After lots of research, I found one person who said it works just enough to read charts but not to create a profile, and several people said it works fine with the Argyll CMS software. But if you want a device that “just works” with the i1Profiler software including all of its features, get an “i1Pro 2” rather than an EIS-2000. From various internet posts it seems these two devices have equivalent hardware, but the licensing info that is bound to the devices is different, so i1Profiler treats them differently.
I went through this a few months ago while looking to find an “i1Pro 2” on eBay after X-Rite dropped support for the “i1Pro 1” from all available versions of i1Profiler. Many listings will try to pass off an EIS-2000 as an “i1Pro 2” – unclear if this is intentionally misleading or just a misunderstanding by the seller. The best listings include the text output (the log file) generated by the free “i1Diagnostics” app, which lists all of the licenses included with the device. For Piezography, you probably want licenses for both i1Profiler “Monitor Profiling” and “RGB Printer Profiling”. The i1Diagnostics output clearly states whether each license is included or not.
The “i1Pro 1” and “i1Pro 2” look very different, but the product labels attached to the devices are quite similar, the only difference there is the “i1Pro 2” says “Rev E” rather than “Rev D” or earlier.
