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MacBook Air M4

apple.com

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Re: MacBook Air M4

#731

Post by teaearlgraycold »

hypercube33 wrote: post #588
teaearlgraycold wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can easily take my M3 MBA on trips, using in on the plane both ways and a couple hours there for a few days, and not charge it once. I honestly looked for alternatives when I bought it last summer but there weren’t any competitive options.

I mean my AMD T14 G4 gets like 12 hours of battery running windows, 150 browser tabs and a virtual environment. Not sure how the newer ones are and no they aren't as sleek or probably durable as a metal apple or dell XPS but I haven't got any complaints for the price.

Looks like they’re decent laptops. Although surprisingly the newest models are hundreds of dollars more than similarly spec’d MBAs. Not sure on how the CPU/GPU performance compares.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#732

Post by teaearlgraycold »

energy123 wrote: post #611

What is the memory bandwidth to the main CPU cores (not the "neural engine")? Is it really 120GB/s like they say in the spec sheet[0]? That's 20GB/s faster than the top dual-channel DDR5 desktops, which makes me think there might be some fine print I'm missing. [0] https://www.apple.com/au/macbook-air/specs/

It uses HBM. It’s faster because it’s millimeters from the CPU/GPU and has a wide bus. If you think 120GB/s is high you should look up the Max/Ultra chips’ specs.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#733

Post by teaearlgraycold »

chippiewill wrote: post #297
dabbz wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I need them to get rid of the notch. It's so obnoxious. I'll run my M1 Air into the ground until they get rid of the notch.

I don't get it. I don't even notice the notch, I'm not even sure how it's possible to see the notch considering it's in the middle of a black bar?

You need to carefully select your wallpaper to get the menu bar to be black.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#734

Post by justincormack »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #620
ruuda wrote: post #247

My 4-year old Dell XPS 15 is up for replacement, but somehow no manufacturer aside from Apple is making laptop with decent specs nowadays? I want 2TB storage, a 4k (or close) HiDPI display, good build quality, and not a bulky gaming laptop. The XPS 15 was perfect, it had those specs, except it only had 1TB storage which is now full. I was expecting that to not be an issue 4 years later ... But now Dell discontinued X…

> Why is the gap so large? Good question and probably worth an article or two. My thinking is that Apple is designing silicon that makes for great laptops (M4 in this case) and then building around that. You will be hard pressed to find an x86-64 chipset that does what the Apple chipset does, and without that no matter what laptop you build around it is not going to be competitive. Nimbler companies like Framework ar…

Dell is shipping an AI max mini pc https://www.hp.com/us-en/workstations/z2-mini-a.html at some point. Presumably laptops too.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#735

Post by freehorse »

lillecarl wrote: post #637
hypercube33 wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean my AMD T14 G4 gets like 12 hours of battery running windows, 150 browser tabs and a virtual environment. Not sure how the newer ones are and no they aren't as sleek or probably durable as a metal apple or dell XPS but I haven't got any complaints for the price.

Yeah everyone that went from "old shitty Intel" to M1 or above somehow gaslit themselves into believing nobody could catch up. AMD did catch up quickly, it's too bad they had to solder RAM to match but it is what it is...

I had never really used a mac (or anything from apple) before M1, and since I got an M1 air I never looked back. Not all people who are hyped about apple silicon were previously apple users.

It is true though that in terms of laptops my only experience to compare it with was with intel chips, but that's because it used to be hard to find an AMD laptop back then.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#736

Post by meindnoch »

volemo wrote: post #665
meindnoch wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going 60hz → 120hz: "Meh, I guess it's smoother? Whatever..." Going 120hz → 60hz: "WTF? Why is it so choppy? Am I accidentally in low battery mode?" It's similar to going back to non-retina displays after getting used to retina resolution.

What conclusion do I draw from this? “Stay away from high refresh rate screens not to spoil myself” :D

The key takeaway is: it hurts more to lose something, than it made you happy when you received it.

From this you may reach enlightenment.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#738

Post by justincormack »

electrograv wrote: post #314
webdever wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As others have said, they do this on purpose. It's the same with memory. I'd probably switch from a Pro to an Air if I could get 64gig ram (for LLM work) but they'd rather charge me $4800 instead of ~$3200 (guessing the price given the top end 32gig Air is $2800) It's frustrating because I'd prefer a lighter device. In fact, even the Air isn't that light compared to its competition. I'd happily pay +$500 ($5300) for…

I have absolutely no problem paying a premium for an upgraded display. The problem is that Apple does not offer that option for the MacBook Air. The MacBook Pro has an amazing screen, which is why I bought the MBP. But the MBP compromises increased weight (which I don’t want) in exchange for more performance (that I simply don’t need). And we know this compromise is not needed to host a better display, as evidenced b…

With the iPads the Pro models are lighter than the Air. So maybe the laptops will end up like that eventually.

Re: MacBook Air M4

#739

Post by metta2uall »

ruuda wrote: post #247

My 4-year old Dell XPS 15 is up for replacement, but somehow no manufacturer aside from Apple is making laptop with decent specs nowadays? I want 2TB storage, a 4k (or close) HiDPI display, good build quality, and not a bulky gaming laptop. The XPS 15 was perfect, it had those specs, except it only had 1TB storage which is now full. I was expecting that to not be an issue 4 years later ... But now Dell discontinued X…

In my experience Clevo (sold by e.g. Metabox) are really good

Re: MacBook Air M4

#740

Post by brulard »

Aeolun wrote: post #470
buildfocus wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the performance gap so huge? Power efficiency yes, absolutely, but for peak performance last I saw the last AMD vs M3 benchmarks were a slightly slower single core, and a little faster in multicore. Doesn't seem as world changing as described.

My $2000 linux desktop is still faster and snappier than the $4000 macbook, but it’s the only thing laptop sized that feels even close.

Noone would expect it to be slower.
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