2026-10-09 APP 2.0.0-beta48 has been released !
This is mainly a bug fix release for the reported bugs in beta47. In addition it has a significant User Interface performance improvement noticable when you need to process 1000s of images in APP.
2026-10-03 APP 2.0.0-beta47 has been released !
This is a very big release... many code optimizations/rewrites, many parts of APP are much faster and more precise, especially star analysis and registration are much faster ! Big mosaics will go much faster 🙂
And we introduce a new preview filter, which includes the new Adaptive Deep Sky Stretch and a General Levels Stretch, this has been long over due. The old preview filter (the panel on the right side to stretch and preview your data) has not been updated for a couple of years and it is a critical part of any APP session.
Adaptive Deep Sky Stretch or ADSS is a much more intuitive stretch algorithm. It is also color preserving (which is a great new addition in itself ! ) which means that the highlights are no longer bleached, color is maintained from the linear data while stretching. You can simply stretch your data using the sky background level and signal width sliders which work much easier and more intuitive. You no longer need to fiddle with the old complicated sliders with zoom buttons. All the zoom buttons for the sliders are made redundant. And you can enter slider values in the slider value fields yourself. I will make a youtube video in the coming days to explain and fully introduce ADSS. Once the video is ready, it will be highlighted on the forum.
RGB Combine upgrade !. The RGB Combine Tool has been rewritten mostly. The tool is faster and easier to use and most importantly, the Luminance slider to inject a luminance channel or channels into the RGB composite is now working correctly. It no longer bleaches the RGB colors. Combined with the new ADSS preview, you will get much better and easier great composites with great color! I will also explain this in a new youtube video.
I'm finding mixed results using the MAX with APP. Analyze Stars is faster by maybe 10%. But Registration of panels for large mosaics is quite a bit slower. I have allocated 56 gb memory to APP and 9 of 10 cores vs 15 gb memory of the original M1's 16gb and 8 of 8 cores. My test case is the same for both machines.Â
So I understand correctly that both are using the new M1 chip, right?
Do you know the clockspeed of the both cpu's per cpu core? I do not have a Mac MAX at my disposal at the moment, so I can't test or directly compare myself.
What kind of difference where you expecting based on Apple's advertised specifications? Maybe the MAX has more cores, but with lower clocks? Do you know if there is difference in bus speed?
Mabula
Hi Mabula,
Yes, they both use M1 chips but different varieties.
The original M1 with 16gb RAM, 2TB SSD, 8 cores has the same 3.2ghz clock speed as the new M1 Max versions, and it has 4 high performance cores and 4 high efficiency cores. Â
The new MacBook Pro M1 MAX with 64gb RAM, 2TB SSD, 10 cores CPU, 32 cores GPU, with 400 GBps memory bandwidth. It has has 8 high performance cores and 2 high efficiency CPU cores.Â
I'm not sure how OpenGL translates to Apple's metal graphics GPU usage and thus don't know if the 32 cores of GPU are being used at all by APP. Could you shed some light on that?Â
Also, is there a formula to use when figuring how much RAM is necessary so that large mosaics don't downsize during integration?Â
Thanks!
I have that exact machine coming in one week and will do similar tests. I only have the 2020 i9 MBP so no M1 to compare it to only the intel machine. I hope they can get support for the M1 pro/max soon as im sure it would be a massive performance improvement. I believe the cpu core speed on the Max is 3.0ghz but not sure
Okay, I've tested the 2020 M1 16gb 8 core vs the 2021 M1 Pro 16 gb 10 core and the 2021 M1 MAX 10 core, 64 gb and have found some surprising results in doing a simple stack of 16 subs, RGB.Â
My 2020 M1 and 2021 M1 MAX are similar in speed while the 2021 Pro is slower by 10%.Â
Interesting results, I guess that will have to do with the technology being so new and different and the Java we're using, many apps are still making that transition. If we upgrade and especially when GPU processing is possible (future project still) it should work much faster.
I see that Ryzen Threadripper 32 core and 64 core are the top processors in Pixinsight's benchmarks. Ryzen 9 16 core 5950 is not far behind. Big price difference between the Threadripper and the 5950. What are your thoughts? Which are you using to develop APP on? Thanks! Rixon
I tested my "old" Intel I9 16" MPB 16GB Ram against the new M1 Max 64GB Ram 32 Core GPU.
Unfortunately my old Intel is around 10-20% faster than the new M1 Max.
I hope Native support will come soon, then it will be different.
And with support for the GPU it will be a Racecar.
Yes indeed, we're currently switching to Java 17 and we hope it's relatively easy to then move to a native build.
@vincent-mod I will be anxiously watching the forum for any beta testing of the M1 Max opportunities. Â I'm a retired software guy so will have plentyÂ
of time and data to run through any alpha/beta releases. I have the 24GPU variant.Â
Thanks!
