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15" MacBook Air First Impressions

StoneJack said:
just put a very thin transparent case over it and be done. I do on my Space Gray and it looks awesome neat
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Any recommendations of makes/brands?

My husband's work laptop came equipped with a thin transparent case. I thought I wouldn't like it, but I kinda did like it.
 
IJBrekke said:
I had to return or sell both the 14” MBP and the M2 13” Air because of eye fatigue in using the screens. They have a harshness to them that makes it difficult to focus on over long periods of time. Some people have equated it to the feeling of looking into a flashlight, or a pinching feeling behind your eyeballs. It’s exhausting.

The issue is well-documented on this forum with some searching. It appears to have started with the m-based processors. No one is absolutely certain what it is - PWM, dithering, refresh rates, etc. Going back to my 2017 is instant relief, zero issues.

And yes, I have tried every fix offered under the sun for the problem, spent way too many hours researching solutions the first go-around. Ordering this new 15” was based in hope that they may have subtly addressed it, but it’s the same as the 13” was. I’m continuing to see if I can adjust to it.

Edit: if you don’t experience any fatigue with these screens, definitely don’t overthink it. It’s just one of those “yes, I have that” or “what the hell are you talking about?” situations.
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Nah I totally understand

I'm just saying, it can't be PWM since the M2 (the 13 at least) is completely flicker free

I do have issues with M1 air btw
 
IJBrekke said:
I had to return or sell both the 14” MBP and the M2 13” Air because of eye fatigue in using the screens. They have a harshness to them that makes it difficult to focus on over long periods of time. Some people have equated it to the feeling of looking into a flashlight, or a pinching feeling behind your eyeballs. It’s exhausting.

The issue is well-documented on this forum with some searching. It appears to have started with the m-based processors. No one is absolutely certain what it is - PWM, dithering, refresh rates, etc. Going back to my 2017 is instant relief, zero issues.

And yes, I have tried every fix offered under the sun for the problem, spent way too many hours researching solutions the first go-around. Ordering this new 15” was based in hope that they may have subtly addressed it, but it’s the same as the 13” was. I’m continuing to see if I can adjust to it.

Edit: if you don’t experience any fatigue with these screens, definitely don’t overthink it. It’s just one of those “yes, I have that” or “what the hell are you talking about?” situations.
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Since Apple stoped (5-6y ago?) using the “perfect retina” scaling as the default setting in favour of the “more space” they’re not as easy on the eyes anymore.

I’m guessing you’ve tried to set it back to the the “perfect scaling” and it didn’t help?
 
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Wahlstrm said:
Since Apple stoped (5-6y ago?) using the “perfect retina” scaling as the default setting in favour of the “more space” they’re not as easy on the eyes anymore.

I’m guessing you’ve tried to set it back to the the “perfect scaling” and it didn’t help?
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I wondered that also..

At 15”, I still use and vastly prefer the 1440x900 range
(Not sure what it would be on notch screen)

The defaults Apple tends to choose now make everything on screen a touch smaller than my eyes enjoy
 
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zapmymac said:
However, nothing will help if you don’t let your eyes rest and recover at regular intervals.
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Our optometrist recommends the 20-20-20 rule. Every 20 minutes, stare at something 20 feet or more away, for 20 seconds. It helps a lot.

Indeed, getting up and walking around for a minute as well is good for the body. Sitting for hours is hard on the frame. Wish the Apple Watch had an adjustable stand reminder — every hour is much too long.

15” Palm Rest

Brekke, and others, how are you finding that HUGE palm rest on the new 15”? It *looks* excessively large.

I like the idea of a good sized palm rest (have larger hands), but not if means wrists at funny angles and inadvertent cursor motions caused by stray contact with the trackpad. I understand that Apple has “palm rejection”, or whatever it's called, but it would be good to hear how well it works on the new model, especially with the MUCH LARGER trackpad!
 
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Saturn007 said:
Brekke, and others, how are you finding that HUGE palm rest on the new 15”? It *looks* excessively large.
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It's the same trackpad size that I have seen in the past recent 15" MacBooks. It may not look like it but palm rejection is very well-implemented here. I don't see the cursor jump at all even when I'm resting my palms directly on the trackpad. Basically, it's not an issue.
 
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Like you, just got my 15" MBA, but I'm coming from the 2016 MBP.

I have the midnight and the other half has the Starlight, so easy to compare. (I was going to go 16" MBP, but glad I waited for the Air, as I could buy 2 MBA's for a little over what I was going to pay for one new MBP)

Impressions:

  1. Love both colours, but they Starlight is better in my opinion, those finger prints don't annoy me, but do look unsightly
  2. The speed is incredible. Yeah yeah, I know....coming from a 2016 model, even a high spec one, this is to be expected, but Affinity Phone / Excel used to take ages to load and now it's probably 10% of that time. Love it.
  3. The weight saving is less that I was expecting. You can tell, but it's not hugely different
  4. Screen is nicely familiar. Would be nice to have 120Hz refresh, but I'd rather save the money. Unlike the OP, I can't really say it gives me headaches or anything.
  5. Battery life is also super noticeable, it seems to last forever
  6. Speakers are excellent, an unexpected surprise
I have no regrets not going for the MBP and I'm glad I waited for this to come out.

For anyone thinking about coming from the older Pro machines, I'd really say consider the 15" MBA. If you already know you need ports, or that the extra horsepower of a MBP will give you minutes of savings in your tasks (rather than sub-second time savings), then go Pro. Otherwise, this MBA covers a lot of use cases with ease.
 
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StoneJack said:
just put a very thin transparent case over it and be done. I do on my Space Gray and it looks awesome neat
Click to expand...

This is my plan for my Midnight 15" Air but right now nobody seems to sell them. Right now I'd even take a non-transparent hardshell case but everyone seems to list them as being available mid-July.
 
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Saturn007 said:
Brekke, and others, how are you finding that HUGE palm rest on the new 15”? It *looks* excessively large.
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I like it but I'm a big dude with giant Shrek-sized ogre hands so for me the added space is welcome and comfortable

It might feel a little awkward if you have smaller hands
 
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Bcn said:
The new Air feels so last year to me. One year old “model”, just with a bigger screen. I’m not impressed. Also the non promotion makes my head hurt slightly every time I fast scroll. I compared it next to the pro 14 in the shop and the scrolling was so peaceful for my brain. Huge difference between the two Macs.
I still run Intel, so I hope I’m not getting eye strain, when I upgrade to the m models.
I use glasses of yellow, orange and at night red filter, that could be an idea for the problem.
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Doesn't your head hurt now when you fast scroll on your intel Mac? There is no ProMotion on those models.
 
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Sami13496 said:
Wait, what? Is there a common eye fatigue issue with Apple laptops now? I've heard about problems with iPhone OLED displays only...
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I think beyond PWM and dithering, people are just not used to the displays looking super high contrast. I know my wife and I also get headache looking at our super contrasty and vibrant OLED TVs without calibration. I always have to calibrate our screens to just around the right amount of contrast and saturation to reduce eye strain.

The same thing may apply here. The new displays are actually very good and super high contrast despite being just regular IPS displays. If it's just SDR content, I honestly cannot see a difference between my MacBook Air 15 and the XDR displays of the 14" and 16". That's just how high the contrast ratio is now. But it comes at the cost of eye strain, and not everyone understands how to create a color profile to reduce contrast. I could have done the same thing to the 14" and 16" too... had Apple not made it extra hard to deal with color calibration in XDR displays.

Going "back down" to a regular display in the 15" Air actually has been a blessing for me. Color calibration is again super easy... and I can tune True Tone to look exactly like how I would like it to look. The machine is thus perfect to me.
 
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I would have picked midnight despite the fingerprint issue. I wish apple would stop being stubborn and release any future mbp with the same color scheme or at least something much closer to matte black.
 
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Is there a red tint or yellow tint to the screen? Doesn't seem to be an issue on MBPs but I recall tons of people saying they have a slight red or yellow tint to their M1s.

Also how's the contrast? After budding up my relatives MBP to my M1 MBA the contrast is definitely making me jealous, is it about the same as the M1s or is there even a slight increase? I almost don't even wanna get the midnight black cuz it probably makes it stand out even more lol
 
lJoSquaredl said:
Is there a red tint or yellow tint to the screen? Doesn't seem to be an issue on MBPs but I recall tons of people saying they have a slight red or yellow tint to their M1s.

Also how's the contrast? After budding up my relatives MBP to my M1 MBA the contrast is definitely making me jealous, is it about the same as the M1s or is there even a slight increase? I almost don't even wanna get the midnight black cuz it probably makes it stand out even more lol
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you can easily calibrate the contrast if you want so.
 
IJBrekke said:
I had to return or sell both the 14” MBP and the M2 13” Air because of eye fatigue in using the screens. They have a harshness to them that makes it difficult to focus on over long periods of time. Some people have equated it to the feeling of looking into a flashlight, or a pinching feeling behind your eyeballs. It’s exhausting.
Click to expand...
I had the same issue with iPhone 11 Pro Max (OLED). The screen was harsh, hard to focus on and I got a feeling like someone is waving a flashlight into my eyes. But, the flashlights immediately disappeared when I turned off the "eye tracking" function in iPhone's accessibility settings - turns out the iPhone beams IR lights (part of Face ID) into your eyes to track if you're looking at the screen for some UI smartness. Looks like I was sensitive to these IR lights.

After that, the screen was still harsher than the IPS screen of a regular iPhone 11 (not sure if it's because of PWM or higher brightness/contrast), but it was MUCH easier to look at and focus on after the IR beams were disabled. Eventually my eyes fully adapted to the iPhone's OLED screen and I no longer have this eye fatigue.

I wonder if this IR "eye tracking" is also turned on by default on these new laptops? At least that's what made me see "flashlights" on the iPhone. Looking to upgrade my old 15" MBP and this eye fatigue issue from you got me worried.

P.S. I'm checking with my optometrist regularly. The eyes and the glasses are fine.
 
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artemf said:
After that, the screen was still harsher than the IPS screen of a regular iPhone 11 (not sure if it's because of PWM or higher brightness/contrast), but it was MUCH easier to look at and focus on after the IR beams were disabled. Eventually my eyes fully adapted to the iPhone's OLED screen and I no longer have this eye fatigue.

I wonder if this IR "eye tracking" is also turned on by default on these new laptops? At least that's what made me see "flashlights" on the iPhone. Looking to upgrade my old 15" MBP and this eye fatigue issue from you got me worried.

P.S. I'm checking with my optometrist regularly. The eyes and the glasses are fine.
Click to expand...

Macbooks have no such feature.
 
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