Earlier quoted context omitted.
For what it's worth--when I had an 8GB Air, decoding video in a browser didn't seem to really impact performance. Plugging in an external monitor, though, was not a fun time.
I have a 32Gb M1 Pro as a work laptop and connecting a retina 4K external display is not a fun experience for me either. It was very surprising to see it fail to maintain 60fps in the OS’ own animations.
New MacBook Air with M2
571–580 of 796 posts
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#572At 500 nits of brightness, it is also 25 percent brighter than before Still not enought for a reflective screen. If the screen has no anti-glare coating, it needs to be crazy bright to be usable outside. My favorite for a new laptop would be the Thinkpad X1 Carbon. It is lighter, has a matte screen and can run Linux.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#573Earlier quoted context omitted.
>I think 8gb is borderline criminally low in the circumstances. I think Apple has a far better understanding, backed by actual data, of the circumstances than you, or indeed anyone here. My wife is still using her 2015 Air and has yet to plug it into anything, let alone 4k or 5k monitors that appears to be the "end game scenario" for posters here. If you are posting on HN, then 8GB is not enough for you. I bought a 1…
I think you’re overstating the technical weight going into this decision. I think it’s almost all marketing. Remember the 16gb iPhone? It really just existed to make the 32/64gb models look more reasonable and so Apple could say “From $lower_price_point”.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#574Earlier quoted context omitted.
> allying with US and Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Germany, France, UK, Spain, Slovakia, Georgia, and everyone else who understands what a bloody nightmare Russia has been the last 100 years. Ask any closest neighbor: Pole, Slovak, or Georgian 10 years ago how much they trust anything Russia says. > They picked the wrong horse to follow. If they stuck with Russia, they wouldn't be in this situation (would US h…
>how stupid trying to Nord Stream 2 No. In fact, soon they will see how stupid cancelling it was and reopen it willingly. Look around at all the industrial heads telling you their production will collapse soon without oil and gas imports. This was self inflicted from sanctions and confiscating Russian reserves. >because the other would invade and murder them Russia is incapable of invading the rest of Europe. They do…
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#575Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which typical Air buyer needs 16gb ram, the college student with 50 tabs open and Spotify in the background? People complaining about low ram sound like the bros asking how many cylinders a car has. Doesn't matter for most people. Just complain about price, yeah, it is expensive! --- This is coming from someone who does light gaming on an 8gb m1 MacBook Air and has plenty of tabs open. I don't see lag. Then again, I…
Remember it's not 8gb of dedicated RAM. It's 8gb shared with the video subsystem. Let's see how far that goes when you plug it into a 4K monitor and/or do anything that requires GPU acceleration (which can include simply decoding video). I think 8gb is borderline criminally low in the circumstances. At least this thing has the option for 24gb though. I just wish that was a stocked model so you could just walk into a…
Just as it was before, with the Intel chips. Sure you had 64MB of eDRAM or whatever they called it as a cache but you were still using system memory for video.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#576> Additional technical specifications and details on Apple accessories — including the 30W USB-C Power Adapter for $39 (US), 35W Dual USB-C Port Compact Power Adapter for $59 (US), 35W Dual USB-C Port Power Adapter for $59 (US) compatible with the World Travel Adapter Kit for $29 (US), and the 67W USB-C Power Adapter for $59 (US) — are available at apple.com/mac. The 35W Dual USB-C Port Compact Power Adapter is avail…
I kind of liked having everything run through usb c, including power. Charging from either side was nice, and being able to charge literally everything I own with a single charger was great.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#577Earlier quoted context omitted.
The dual power adapter is in addition to, rather than instead of, MagSafe. The cable has the magnetic connector on one end and usb-c on the other. Dual ports just lets you charge your iPhone/iPad etc. at the same time.
I can't see the value in getting the 2-port adapter over the 67w fast charge one. You could always charge your phone through your laptop if you really don't have a second power brick.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#578edit: the very last picture in the article also shows the wrong bezel. So strange...
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#579Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm still stuck on a 2019 MBP from work. What garbage hardware. Up for a refresh in December.
Just to put things into perspective, the 2019 MBP might be worse than M1 Macs, but it's still way better than anything I've seen in the PC world (which is why Macs have been able to coast through bad decisions regarding keyboard, ports, and touchbar for so many years). That said, I'm very excited for these new ARM devices.
Re: New MacBook Air with M2
#580Earlier quoted context omitted.
The base model Macbook Air in 2010 was $1299 which means that you get compute and product improvements following Moore's law at deflationary prices. Humans have a hard time understanding the value of power laws. What Apple has done has given us something nothing short of superpowers and we've gotten complacent and feeling entitled to these continuous improvements despite the unbelievable amount of human ingenuity req…
The base MacBook Air had its price dropped to $999 in 2013 and battery life improved to 12 hours. That's what got me onto the Apple bandwagon.
I still use the 2013 MBA almost daily—mostly as an external keyboard and screen for my iPhone notes, but it really slowed down with Mojave, so I’m trying to decide whether to pick up a cheap replacement M1 model now, or wait for sales on the M2. I think I can hold out a little, but won’t quite make the 10 year mark.
BTW, the c. 1993 Mac Centris was able to boot up last year (at 28 years old!), and thanks to an Ethernet adapter I dumpster-dived from work in the early 2000s, I was even able to get online with it without any extra configuration. Netscape Navigator doesn’t do too well with modern websites (and probably made for a baffling entry in some server logs), but I could at least load the Dole/Kemp ‘96 site.