M2 or M3 MBA and 8 vs 16 gig ram

[throAU]

Of primary importance is the fact that the user is the greatest risk to the security of their own systems and data. Whilst the entire business of hacking and exploiting systems has moved inexorably from teenagers in their bedrooms to organized crime and state sponsored actors, the risks have changed greatly. Today, the primary aim is to exploit holes in corporates, and particularly those systems which contain user data. There's far more profit to be made from social engineering vectors than direct attacks, and users are far more vulnerable to phishing and scamming.

Not entirely.

The aim is to spray everywhere and you get what you get.

If you're a corporate, sure you're going to be phished, or otherwise explicitly targeted via higher effort, customized attacks.

If you're a nobody you're still liable to getting owned via a browser exploit of a hacked site you visit. A site that was likely compromised via worm launched from a botnet. Or an SMS exploit, mail exploit, etc.

Nobody is safe from attack, because it costs so little to basically target everybody via website compromising worms, etc.. The effort required to target YOU is basically zero. Prepare appropriately.

Assuming you aren't a target is the biggest security mistake you can make.

 

[Saturn007]

Currently own a 2018 Intel i7 MBP 13" 512GB with 16GB RAM (the highest offered back then)
Nowadays, when I'm on website like X for example, I always get a warning that "this page is consuming too much memory". And Im thinking...huh....why is this happening?

My main Mac is a 2015 13" MacBook Air with only 8 GB RAM and I don't think I've seen such a message in years. Stopped getting them after installing ad blockers -- and helped by turning off auto-play of videos.

So, that's the first thing I would do. Most any page with lots of video ads will bog down otherwise.

My 2015 MBA remains a responsive laptop -- so much so that it has meant that my brand new 15" M2 MBA sits under the coffee table not being used.

The biggest plus of the new MBA is its great battery life, but for Internet surfing, I find little difference. Word and Excel are even another striking use case. In fact, Office 2011 under Mojave launched faster and was more responsive than Office 2016 under Monterey on the old MBA or under Sonoma on the new 15" M2.

 

[Dopestdude2]

With the news today on the iPad pros I’m gonna have to bite the bullet and get a MBA now (was gonna do that later this year and iPad now).

It would primarily be used for basic web browsing and watching videos with the occasional remote game play. Is there any noticeable issues watching 4k content on the m2 or m3, like stuttering or color issues that anybody has seen? I know the screen itself isn’t 4k but I have a ton of 4k videos.

Don’t want to go down to an M1 MBA even tho the pricing is tempting as I usually get nearly a decade out of a laptop so the extra year or two of software updates would be nicer on a M2 or M3.

For reference, I’m currently on a late 2015 MBP and it’s finally nearly end of life with constant crashes even after refreshing the OS.

 

[profH]

In principle the RAM and Mx decisions seem unrelated. For 100 bucks more m3 vs m2 seems worth it for longevity and modest performance issues.

re: ram, I was one of those base-model fetishists that came to regret it. I bought an M1 8gb that served me fine as a secondary machine for a little while, but fell flat on its face when I tried to retire a desktop-replacement intel MBP and do real work (including a VM) with it docked to an external monitor. it just became very laggy and unpleasant to use. Despite being a fine machine it essentially collects dust now, having been superseded by an M1 Max and a 15in M2 air with 16gb of ram. Honestly, the M1 Max was sort of made redundant by the 16gb M2 air as well - the latter is plenty capable in all of my use scenarios, although there are some mild convenience reasons that I like having both on hand.

 

[raythompsontn]

Is there any noticeable issues watching 4k content on the m2 or m3, like stuttering or color issues that anybody has seen?

Nope, should work just fine. I watch many 4K videos on my machine.

 

[McMack]

My two penn'orth on this topic: I've just this past week upgraded to a couple of M-class machines after many years on Intel Macs.

I got a 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB RAM. I got a 2022 M2 Macbook Air with 8GB RAM.

I was interested to see how they would compare at similar tasks in software development.

The 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB has a noticeable edge on the M2 MBA with 8GB. I was surprised and a little disappointed.

It's not much of a difference. E.g. loading an iPhone simulator is staggeringly great on the M1 Mac Mini -- about 8 seconds from a cold start to it being ready for use. On my old Intel Mini I used to start the loading process, go to wash the dishes or something and the machine would just about be usable when I got back.

On the M2 MBA with 8GB RAM the same operation takes about 14 seconds. I know, this is a First World problem if ever there was one. Geekbench scores support the M2 choice. But RAM does matter a lot even in the M-chip era.

 

[Torty]

My two penn'orth on this topic: I've just this past week upgraded to a couple of M-class machines after many years on Intel Macs.

I got a 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB RAM. I got a 2022 M2 Macbook Air with 8GB RAM.

I was interested to see how they would compare at similar tasks in software development.

The 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB has a noticeable edge on the M2 MBA with 8GB. I was surprised and a little disappointed.

It's not much of a difference. E.g. loading an iPhone simulator is staggeringly great on the M1 Mac Mini -- about 8 seconds from a cold start to it being ready for use. On my old Intel Mini I used to start the loading process, go to wash the dishes or something and the machine would just about be usable when I got back.

On the M2 MBA with 8GB RAM the same operation takes about 14 seconds. I know, this is a First World problem if ever there was one. Geekbench scores support the M2 choice. But RAM does matter a lot even in the M-chip era.

Thanks for sharing but you compare two different machines with different configurations. Doesn’t have the M2 MBA a slow SSD? Etc

 

[neo_cs193p]

Thanks for sharing but you compare two different machines with different configurations. Doesn’t have the M2 MBA a slow SSD? Etc

+1 on this. Was thinking even a 16GB M2 with 256GB SSD (that should not need to touch the swap) might be slower than the M1 at this task, because it still has to load the iOS simulator from storage, which is about 2 times slower.

 

[Jay Tee]

I ordered the 16GB just in case the AI stuff, that’s coming down the pipeline fairly soon, could use the extra space.

 

[StoneJack]

My two penn'orth on this topic: I've just this past week upgraded to a couple of M-class machines after many years on Intel Macs.

I got a 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB RAM. I got a 2022 M2 Macbook Air with 8GB RAM.

I was interested to see how they would compare at similar tasks in software development.

The 2020 M1 Mac Mini with 16GB has a noticeable edge on the M2 MBA with 8GB. I was surprised and a little disappointed.

It's not much of a difference. E.g. loading an iPhone simulator is staggeringly great on the M1 Mac Mini -- about 8 seconds from a cold start to it being ready for use. On my old Intel Mini I used to start the loading process, go to wash the dishes or something and the machine would just about be usable when I got back.

On the M2 MBA with 8GB RAM the same operation takes about 14 seconds. I know, this is a First World problem if ever there was one. Geekbench scores support the M2 choice. But RAM does matter a lot even in the M-chip era.

there is no need for cold start on m2 MBA. Just close and open the lid. I know, we all learn something new each day