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New MacBook Air with M2

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331–340 of 796 posts

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not just inflation, the Euro has been getting crushed as decades of negligence by the ECB show up. the stream of anti ECB drones is frankly ridiculous the price has gone up in pounds as well. Does the ECB controls them too? Prices in Europe are taxes included, in US are before taxes. In Europe you have to add VAT, not only sales taxes, which are much lower in US anyway. Last but not least, custom duties are a…

You just listed a bunch of things which have not changed between the last model and this one, to brush off the new model being much more expensive. The parsimonious explanation is that the Euro went from 120¢ to 98¢ in the intervening time. I have no opinion on why that happened, I will pretend I don't even know what the ECB is.

> to brush off the new model being much more expensive

I'm never going to buy an Apple M* at actual price points.

I was merely pointing out that ECB has nothing to do with the prices of Apple products, compared to equivalent in the US.

Apple raised the prices outside the USA and kept the same prices in the US.

That's all.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#332
post #268

This thing is going to sell like hotcakes. The combination of single core CPU and graphics performance, device thinness, battery life in this laptop is unmatched. It’s funny how Apple came back from the worst the Mac has ever been to the best in a span of few years. Johnny I’ve doesn’t dictate things around Apple anymore but the silicone chips team now does.

> the worst the Mac has ever been No. No no no. The worst was the Amelio era.

Amelio did do three good things: * replaced Spindler * failed to buy BeOS * bought NeXT

Spindler's Apple is responsible for the Performa sub-brand (although Amelio didn't kill it).

> After releasing a total of sixty-four different models [in five years], Apple retired the Performa brand in early 1997, shortly after release of the Power Macintosh 5500, 6500, 8600 and 9600, as well as the return of Steve Jobs to the company.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_Performa

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#333
post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are not ram sticks, these are difference in the M2 chip itself. I'm not a chip designer, but I imagine there are more manufacturing quality challenges with the ones that have more RAM.

Don't they bin the chips? The lower spec chips have the same layout as higher spec ones but they have defects.

I would imagine so, and I would think that out of 100% of their chips, they would have more which passed the lower RAM standards than the higher ones. So the higher RAM chips (which passed) would be more rare, so to speak.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are you a new mac user or something?

2-3 years ago the price was less than 1000€. 1500 for the base model is ridiculous

Inflation, and also the dollar is basically at par with the Euro now. Throw in VAT and there you have it.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

M2 is not a single core CPU, albeit it does have stellar single threaded performance. As for having the worst Mac, it's quite probable they were nerfing their last x86 models on purpose to make the jump to Apple Silicon even more impressive. Remember the models that had inadequate thermals? Now magsafe is making a comeback?

I find it very hard to believe that Apple deliberately sabotaged a multi-billion dollar product line for ~5 years in order to (possibly?) boost sales when their incredibly risky and expensive investment into their own silicon came to market. People have been shitting on MacBooks since they removed MagSafe and brought in the butterfly keyboard in 2016. The i9 Pros with massive thermal issues came out in 2018. That's a…

The point isn't even lost revenue. That Apple can swallow. That's not going to sink them. But they had sufficiently many really _bad_ generations (like 4 or so) that people _had to_ start thinking about how to move out of the Mac-universe. And that requires significant amounts of investment that you cannot easily recover. And that means that once Apple comes up with a non-sucking Mac, it's by no means clear that they get _back_ that business.

If they did that intentionally, then they took a very risky bet that paid off. But I really don't think anyone would make that kind of bet.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#336
Although I'm not a Macintosh fan, I got the original macbook m1 air for everybody in my family and it's been an absolute dream for all of them. They definitely engineered the whole device to make a superior product.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#337

I want it, but I'm not getting it until all the hardware works under Linux. MacOS is great, but someday they will stop updating MacOS for this. I see it as a device with incredible longevity because of the fanless thermals and how it sips energy. I could see myself using it 10 years later. I want to run MacOS or Fedora Silverblue, with Silverblue being my true love. Immutable OS images HAH, downvoted in seconds. Woul…

> Please don't post insinuations about astroturfing, shilling, bots, brigading, foreign agents and the like. It degrades discussion and is usually mistaken. If you're worried about abuse, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll look at the data.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What annoys me about MKBHD's video is that he complains about an ageing design like it's a bad thing for the general case. I laud any manufacturer that's come up with a time tested design that doesn't change, which is why the IBM Thinkpads of the day were so popular. But in this specific case, MKBHD is right, this is an Apple being lazy about design and probably reusing their existing parts and tooling just to slap o…

At the same time he did seem to suggest that it was a design that is aging quite well. Personally, when I look back at some of the original MacBook Pros with the milled chassis, I think they still look better than any recent Windows or Chromebook laptop. It really is quite a timeless design.

Timeless design and incredible engineering.

I recently handled a ca. MacBook Pro from 2004, and it feels awful, like a collection of parts barely holding together. My 2008 unibody MacBook still feels nice to the touch and rock solid, even though it has been dead for many years now.

Unibody was a huge investment for the company and my understanding is that this was in part one of Ive’s highest career points.

If I remember correctly, before unibody laptops the chassis was a separate component inside, with everything including the case attached on the outside.

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#339
post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This image illustrates the differences: https://appuals.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/1-11.jpg The difference is that one keyboard is made for humans who touch type, and the other keyboard is made for people who like to lift up their hand and move it every time they want to hit return... or left shift. The ones with the shorter left shift and narrower/taller return key are just bad designs. They make keys you use fr…

I'm not in the US, so I'm kinda alone in this, and forgot to tell my work I wanted an international one, so I got an M1 pro from work with the international lay-out. I've been using US layout since I was ~8. And all my other systems have the US layout. I am having such a hard time to get used to it. I keep hitting ± when I mean ~ (why would I even need a ±/§ key on my keyboard?). I keep hitting \ when I want to hit R…

I had this as well with a previous company work laptop, so I had to use a wireless external keyboard always. Using the built-in keyboard was so frustrating that it made me angry enough to almost destroy the laptop a few times.

It should be noted that on older Macbooks, the aluminum case has actual cutouts for keys. So it's not possible to change the layout of keyboard without also changing the case. I discovered this when I had my personal laptop repaired, and it came back with the wrong keyboard! The shop just instinctively ordered keyboard+case of their usual layout, so I had to have the whole thing redone again (at no extra charge, just a loss of time).

Re: New MacBook Air with M2

#340
post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What annoys me about MKBHD's video is that he complains about an ageing design like it's a bad thing for the general case. I laud any manufacturer that's come up with a time tested design that doesn't change, which is why the IBM Thinkpads of the day were so popular. But in this specific case, MKBHD is right, this is an Apple being lazy about design and probably reusing their existing parts and tooling just to slap o…

> he complains about an ageing design like it's a bad thing for the general case I don't think that statement is true. He speaks to the specific pros/cons of each. It isn't that the design is old--the problem is that that specific design was hobbled from the start, a condition that is especially apparent in comparison to the Air.

In the same video he compares a hypothetical with another laptop vendor deciding to stick to the same design (ASUS). That's why I said general case.
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