While GPUs are still the kings of speed, if you are worried about VRAM I do recommend a maxed out Mac Studio.
Llama.cpp + quantized models on Apple Silicon is an incredible experience, and having 192 GB of unified memory to work with means you can run models that just aren't feasible on a home GPU setup.
It really boils down to what type of local development you want to do. I'm mostly experimenting with things where the time to response isn't that big of a deal, and not fine-tuning the models locally (which I also believe GPUs are still superior for). But if your concern is "how big of a model can I run" vs "Can I have close to real time chat", the unified memory approach is superior.
Llama.cpp + quantized models on Apple Silicon is an incredible experience, and having 192 GB of unified memory to work with means you can run models that just aren't feasible on a home GPU setup.
It really boils down to what type of local development you want to do. I'm mostly experimenting with things where the time to response isn't that big of a deal, and not fine-tuning the models locally (which I also believe GPUs are still superior for). But if your concern is "how big of a model can I run" vs "Can I have close to real time chat", the unified memory approach is superior.