So the last time I bought a Mac was January 2011. That laptop lasted nearly ten years, but it was time for an upgrade. I saw the hype/ads around the new M1 chip and decided to give it a try. But me being me... I tried it in the cheapest way possible. For context, my Romany computer for the last few years has been a $35 raspberry pi 4.Having said that, I hooked this box up, restored my laptop’s backup, and let it rip. Turns out, some of my favorite software packages are no longer supported by Mac OS. But some are, and though they are still compiled for intel CPUs, they still ran fine. I don’t really miss the unsupported apps.Long story short; I do have a fairly extensive media library. This low-cost box can convert a two hour movie in three hours; my other aforementioned box took over a week for the same task. The UI in Big Sur is awesome, my kids love it, and all said, it’s super fast. Like, you’ve never seen it before fast. Totally worth giving it a try.