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New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

apple.com

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Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#81

Post by pixelbath »

elthran wrote: post #19
zuhsetaqi wrote: post #6

Most interesting change: > Support for up to two external displays: MacBook Air with M3 now supports up to two external displays when the laptop lid is closed …

Apple Cynic/Windows user here with a genuine question - why is this interesting? I'm currently looking at my wife's old corporate-issued windows laptop, which is running 2 external monitors as well as it's own display - am I missing something here, or is this just a case of Apple being held to different standards to other manufacturers in terms of feature parity?

It's not interesting in a "wow, Macbooks can finally support two external displays" as much as "this does make this intentionally-small form factor slightly more tolerable."

Comparing the port count/capabilities of the two isn't a fully fair comparison though. The Apple Silicon Macbook Air models are likely 1) much faster than that corporate-issued laptop (even if it's workstation class), and 2) much smaller and quieter (no fan noise even under load).

Though I'm not sure why all the griping about how many monitors an Air can support; users can buy a Macbook Pro if they want more monitors? I don't understand the logic behind buying a tiny, thin laptop only to dock it as a workstation.

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#82

Post by vultour »

ketzo wrote: post #49

The degree to which Apple has kinda just “won” laptops is nuts to me. $999 for an 13-inch M2 Air is just bonkers. You can easily pay $1500, even $2000 for Windows laptops that are hotter, heavier, AND slower.

And they have Linux integrated into the system. I'm amazed how many developers get a Macbook just to install Docker Desktop right after.

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#83

Post by microtonal »

sys_64738 wrote: post #80
microtonal wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It comes with a bunch of downsides though. It is lossy, requires a third-party driver (and you become dependent on them to provide timely updates for new macOS releases), protected content from iTunes and other players is not visible on the laptop display when DisplayLink adapters are connected, a bunch of HiDPI resolutions are missing on Apple Silicon Macs, etc. USB-C Alt-Mode and Thunderbolt always trump DisplayLin…

DisplayLink can get an LCD to re-engage from sleep which Apple's built in ports often can't. Try switching off your Dell LCD attached directly to an M2 Mini.

Works fine for me across a bunch of LG and Dell displays hooked up with DisplayPort (DP-Alt over Type-C). I only had this issue with a StarTech Thunderbolt hub (used to work fine until it didn’t).

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#84

Post by dbbk »

snizovtsev wrote: post #64
ketzo wrote: post #49

The degree to which Apple has kinda just “won” laptops is nuts to me. $999 for an 13-inch M2 Air is just bonkers. You can easily pay $1500, even $2000 for Windows laptops that are hotter, heavier, AND slower.

$999 is for soldered 8GB/256GB crap. Add $400 for 16GB/512GB models.

I can guarantee you that most people buying the $999 laptop have 5 Chrome tabs open and don't store files on their computer. 8GB/256GB is fine.

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#85

Post by samatman »

sempron64 wrote: post #69
ketzo wrote: post #49

The degree to which Apple has kinda just “won” laptops is nuts to me. $999 for an 13-inch M2 Air is just bonkers. You can easily pay $1500, even $2000 for Windows laptops that are hotter, heavier, AND slower.

But you can also pay $400 for a number of acceptable alternatives, and about $600-$700 for a machine with a discrete GPU. It is probably the best laptop in the $1K price range for laptops that don't have a GPU, but that's basically it. The main problem with the non-Apple laptop market is that there is a mind-boggling number of confusing models, SKUs, processor/gpu variants, etc., and wildly variable physical quality…

> But you can also pay $400 for a number of acceptable alternatives, and about $600-$700 for a machine with a discrete GPU.

People love to say this without linking to a model. That's because the models in this price range are obviously not in the same weight class as a MacBook.

Edit: Weight class and weight-of-laptop are not the same thing. I don't know how to explain the idiom "weight class" so that the more... literal-minded Hacker News commenters will understand what I mean, but let's start there.

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#86

Post by kylehotchkiss »

blah-yeah wrote: post #74

I love my m2 mbp 14" Frankly, Apple is an amazing organization and I am extremely thankful that they've empowered product designers to bring us these amazing creations. Apple is one reason that I love existing in this era. Sure, there are others. But having Apple... enables me to bring a laptop + a backup battery (anker 737) practically anywhere and work all day without needing a direct electricity connection. Laptop…

I agree; actually being able to work outside again was something I lost with my old 16in intel pro, it couldn’t keep itself awake more than 2 hours

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#87

Post by bigfudge »

bombcar wrote: post #36
fh9302 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is really obvious during code compilation or other tasks that can take advantage of all cores.

Someone should sell a little app for Mac that glows red when an upgrade would have been useful (e.g, when you maxed out your max Mac). I suspect mine would be green almost all the time, even on this almost three year old M1 Max.

This is a cool idea, although presumably m3 would be faster even for single thread apps? Also, are there cases where memory bandwidth could leave cpu at less than 100% on m1 but still be faster on m3?

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#88

Post by postalrat »

vultour wrote: post #82
ketzo wrote: post #49

The degree to which Apple has kinda just “won” laptops is nuts to me. $999 for an 13-inch M2 Air is just bonkers. You can easily pay $1500, even $2000 for Windows laptops that are hotter, heavier, AND slower.

And they have Linux integrated into the system. I'm amazed how many developers get a Macbook just to install Docker Desktop right after.

Isn't docker's filesystem performance still terrible in macox compared to linux?

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#89

Post by moralestapia »

sempron64 wrote: post #69
ketzo wrote: post #49

The degree to which Apple has kinda just “won” laptops is nuts to me. $999 for an 13-inch M2 Air is just bonkers. You can easily pay $1500, even $2000 for Windows laptops that are hotter, heavier, AND slower.

But you can also pay $400 for a number of acceptable alternatives, and about $600-$700 for a machine with a discrete GPU. It is probably the best laptop in the $1K price range for laptops that don't have a GPU, but that's basically it. The main problem with the non-Apple laptop market is that there is a mind-boggling number of confusing models, SKUs, processor/gpu variants, etc., and wildly variable physical quality…

>But you can also pay $400 for a number of acceptable alternatives

Can you show me just one of those, please?

I would buy it today.

Re: New 13- and 15‑inch MacBook Air with M3 chip

#90

Post by dbbk »

dangoodmanUT wrote: post #9

it's so clear that they limit it to 24GB to prevent cannibalization of the macbook pro. I personally could go for a M3 base chip with 64GB or 128GB of memory.

I mean, yeah, that's market segmentation. If you need more than 24GB you are certainly a Pro, not an Air customer.
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