I wish to.. but price jump is too big. Of course not comparing spec to spec ya. If im buying prob the second spec 10c gpu and 512gb ssd. Price diff vs base 14 pro about 2k already.

I guess most of us probably think from Windows machine, and today, windows machine we likely need 16GB. But, M1/M2 is a different story and it seems like they handle stuff pretty well with 8GB, but not on Windows OS.

Actually for my usage (Lightroom and minimal video editing), both will be fine.
Just that i would really prefer 512. The price diff. for 512 for M2 not really justifiable.
Also, the "slower" SSD on the M2 (base 256) really not helping much.
Probably will hang on to this M1, until the next iteration comes along... or until the 3 years apple care runs out... then can relook at the future models.

Yeah thats quite true, 8gb on MacOS is quite usable and smooth. In Windows 16gb for smoother experience.

I am still considering... because I don't think I need a pro

btw, I am upgrading from mbp 2014, so any of this air or pro is a huge jump

Simple answer for you, I don't know how YOU use chrome. I love to open ~30 tabs on my laptop, not only that, I use BOTH Safari & Chrome. Safari for personal, Chrome for work accessing Google Drive, Docs etc. I got 60 tabs on my iPhone now. Don't listen to idiots who tell you there's folders and what not. How they use their computer is none of your business. Ask YOURSELF how YOU USE YOUR COMPUTER. At the same time I have WhatsApp, Slack, Outlook, Calendar open.

It is not heavy load, but it uses a lot of memory.

For MY USAGE, confirm I need to rely on swap even if its 16GB RAM. My 5600x + 32GB RAM uses swap too with my usage pattern. The MBA M2 base model, that slower SSD will definitely affect the performance. I was so ready to buy the MBA M2 in midnight base model, but the price hike AND the slower base model SSD basically turned me away from it completely. So now I am just waiting for my MBA M1 base model to arrive.

You do you, but facts remain as facts, that base SSD is slow and if you ever use swap memory, it'll slow the machine down.

Someone once told me that, with a lot of tabs opened on chrome, 8GB of memory might not be enough. So Safari is the way to go.

what spec of M1 you getting? 16GB/512GB?

From personal experience, Yes, Safari seems to work better than Chrome on MacOS. I use both for reasons outlined above.

Base spec. Best bang for bucks. Multitasking with many apps open != multicore. A faster CPU won't help WITHOUT the memory & swap keeping up.
The things I do are not heavy load, but uses a lot of memory to keep them "open".

For people who are heavy users, I recommend just get the MBP 14, you get the better screen, 2x external output.. rather than upgrading the MBA M2.

I've used the first unibody MacBook back in 2008, and after that I had the MBA 11, MBA 13, MBP 13 2015, MBP 13 2017, MBP 13 M1. MBA 11 was awesome for the portability, I used that laptop the most (now using iPad base spec).

This post has been edited by Jason: Jul 19 2022, 03:57 PM

the base spec can be used to open so many chrome tabs?

Can. Even the new M2 can. Just when swap is used, it will be a bit slower - in terms of responsiveness.

You can watch the video I shared earlier and see.

This post has been edited by Jason: Jul 19 2022, 04:09 PM

The swap will be automatically applied by the unit?

From what I read and watch on youtube, only when the RAM is filled up then swap memory will be triggered, else by default everything goes to RAM only.

This is like my usage. I don’t do serious video/photo editing. But my normal usage tends to use a lot of RAM.

I need about 10 tabs of chrome at one time. Btw, have to use chrome because that’s where my work flow is. It makes it easier when going from windows laptop at work to my iphone and then mac at home.

I also leave my torrent running in the background with spotify, g-drive etc. Also use word and heavy excel files constantly. 16GB is a must for this. I agree that there are ways to not need 16GB RAM but I’m not willing to change the way I use my laptop just for that.

hope so my macbook air is otw now~shb b delivered today

Hnnghhh give us a user review please 🤣

Wow.. since you’re a long term user, i think just get the MBP14, should last you many years with good performance.

Beautiful machine. Congrats!!!

Did you get the Space Grey or Midnight colour? Looks like Space Grey from your pictures.

wooooohooooo congratulation

**Oh it's a space grey.

This post has been edited by submergedx: Jul 20 2022, 01:24 PM