2 weeks of daily use, Base Midnight M2 MBA

[teh_hunterer]

In Canada the M2 MacBook Air is $1499 while the 14in. MacBook Pro is $2499. You need to be doing some seriously intensive work to justify spending another $1000 for the 14 Pro. The 14 and 16 Pros are simply not consumer level products.

The M2 Air base model is poor value for money compared to the M1 Air, and the M2 Air specced up to match the 14" Pro is poor value for money compared to that.

Let's also not pretend 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD are "seriously intensive" specs in 2022. Nor is a 120hz display, which comes in the iPad Pro and iPhone 13 Pro.

It's not like anyone is stupid for buying it the M2 Air, but it isn't an easy recommendation. For the price it should probably have a Pro Motion display.

Were it not for the chip shortage and inflation I expect the M2 Air would have been a bit cheaper, and the M1 Air would have dropped below its original price as well.

 

[Warped9]

Were it not for the chip shortage and inflation I expect the M2 Air would have been a bit cheaper, and the M1 Air would have dropped below its original price as well.

I think this is very likely.

Under ideal circumstances the M2 Air would have simply replaced the M1 Air at the same price point. This could still happen whenever the M1 Air is eventually discontinued. It happened before some years ago.

And ideally there would also have been a redesigned 13in. M2 Pro introduced alongside the M2 Air. What we’re seeing presently are stopgap measures.

What gets me is that when the M1 was introduced the M1 Air made the M1 Pro largely redundant. For most the difference between the two didn’t justify the $400 price gap—the M1 Pro wasn’t really $400 better than the M1 Air. Eventually a redesigned 13in. M2 Pro will really have to step up its game to be worth the price difference over the Air, much more so than presently.

 

[jdb8167]

The M2 Air base model is poor value for money compared to the M1 Air, and the M2 Air specced up to match the 14" Pro is poor value for money compared to that.

Let's also not pretend 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD are "seriously intensive" specs in 2022. Nor is a 120hz display, which comes in the iPad Pro and iPhone 13 Pro.

It's not like anyone is stupid for buying it the M2 Air, but it isn't an easy recommendation. For the price it should probably have a Pro Motion display.

Were it not for the chip shortage and inflation I expect the M2 Air would have been a bit cheaper, and the M1 Air would have dropped below its original price as well.

It's just that some people like me value portability more than you do. I consider the size, weight, and battery life very valuable. Much more valuable in most situations than a few more points on a Geekbench multi-core benchmark or a 120 Hz, HDR display.

I don't consider my up-specced M2 MacBook Air a poor value at all. For most people who have the means, I would recommend the M2 MacBook Air over ether an M1 MBA or a low-specced 14" MacBook Pro. If you need the performance of a 14" MBP you probably know who you are and probably won't be satisfied with an 8-core binned M1 Pro. If you are looking for the cheapest price, then a refurbished M1 MacBook Air is probably the right choice. I can't see recommending a new M1 MBA now unless price is your only criteria and you can't get a refurb.

 

[teh_hunterer]

It's just that some people like me value portability more than you do. I consider the size, weight, and battery life very valuable. Much more valuable in most situations than a few more points on a Geekbench multi-core benchmark or a 120 Hz, HDR display.

The M1 MacBook Air is a better buy for that scenario for most.

If you need the performance of a 14" MBP you probably know who you are and probably won't be satisfied with an 8-core binned M1 Pro.

Weren't you just downplaying the difference between the M1 Pro and M1 as a few Geekbench points? Then why is the difference between the binned and regular M1 Pro suddenly such a big deal? The 14" Pro also comes with 512GB storage and 16GB RAM, which isn't some insane pro amount in 2022. Add to that how you might want to upgrade to 512GB anyway to avoid the single storage chip slowness.

As I said, the M2 isn't a bad buy... it's just that the M1 was one of the easiest to recommend laptops ever. The M2 isn't. The 14" Pro is a pretty good deal too. The M2 isn't a good deal, it's just a good laptop.

 

[WillRRRR]

I prefer to have single MacBook Pro 16" 2021 over single MacBook Pro 16" 2021 and single M2 MacBook Air. It make me save money for tasks needing.

 

[kyjaotkb]

I believe the first one was an i5, the latest was an i7 with everything maxed out. Sadly, the i7 had thermal issues, going fanless for the MBA is the better choice as tiny fans are not ear-friendly.

I have a 13" 2011 i5 MBA and it served me well into mid-2020, but it now runs incredibly hot and is hard to use after a few minutes so much it throttles. It is in perfect cosmetic condition but the battery is shot and the thermal paste on the CPU must have turned to dust. My wife has a 2013 11" i7 MBA with 8GB RAM, original battery, and that thing still screams and has a good 4 hours of battery. Incredible little machines.

 

[kyjaotkb]

Question to the OP and to anyone with the M2 MBA: have you tried using Microsoft Teams on it? I have an M1 Pro 14" and I went from a full battery to shutdown in exactly 70 minutes on a video Teams call with the sound coming out of the speakers. I know it's an Intel app but the lack of optimization is insane. My colleagues who use M1 Airs / MBP need to take chargers in huddle rooms when they are taking calls.

 

[kyjaotkb]

It's crazy how the price of these computers is wacky and inconsistent around the world. In the UK it costs literally just £150 more to buy a base-model 14" MBP than to spec-up an M2 Air with the same memory and SSD-size (16/512). An M2 13" spec'd up to 16/512 is only £50 cheaper than the base 14" Pro. Virtually no one in the UK who has decided they need a 16/512 Macbook will by a 13" when for the price of four large pizzas they can buy the 14".

Completely agree with you. And the base and 1TB 14" M1 Pro are regularly on sale in places like Amazon UK.
Plus, apart from a few exceptions, British pizzas (pizze?) are nothing exceptional.

 

[jostermacedo]

Question to the OP and to anyone with the M2 MBA: have you tried using Microsoft Teams on it? I have an M1 Pro 14" and I went from a full battery to shutdown in exactly 70 minutes on a video Teams call with the sound coming out of the speakers. I know it's an Intel app but the lack of optimization is insane. My colleagues who use M1 Airs / MBP need to take chargers in huddle rooms when they are taking calls.

Try the Apple Silicon version:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ms-teams-very-depressing.2338966/

Check post #393.

Joster

 

[Timpetus]

The M2 Air base model is poor value for money compared to the M1 Air, and the M2 Air specced up to match the 14" Pro is poor value for money compared to that.

Let's also not pretend 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD are "seriously intensive" specs in 2022. Nor is a 120hz display, which comes in the iPad Pro and iPhone 13 Pro.

It's not like anyone is stupid for buying it the M2 Air, but it isn't an easy recommendation. For the price it should probably have a Pro Motion display.

Were it not for the chip shortage and inflation I expect the M2 Air would have been a bit cheaper, and the M1 Air would have dropped below its original price as well.

My guess is Apple had two options, each with their downsides:
1. Keep the base price the same at first, then end up raising it a few months after launch because of rising costs (bad optics and not how Apple usually operates).
2. Set the price at a level where they were sure they could make an acceptable profit margin for as long as they continue to sell this model (hurts initial sales a bit but future discounts will seem like an actual discount).

I think it makes sense to choose option 2. Apple isn't using the kickstarter model, they don't depend on FOMO to make sales on new products.

 

[jdb8167]

Weren't you just downplaying the difference between the M1 Pro and M1 as a few Geekbench points? Then why is the difference between the binned and regular M1 Pro suddenly such a big deal? The 14" Pro also comes with 512GB storage and 16GB RAM, which isn't some insane pro amount in 2022. Add to that how you might want to upgrade to 512GB anyway to avoid the single storage chip slowness.

Yes. That is exactly the problem. I get 1941 SC/8935 MC with the M2. The binned 8 core M1 Pro gets 1731 SC/9521 MC. Hardly much of a performance difference with the binned Pro. On the other hand, there is quite multi-core boost with the 10 core Pro at 12158. But now you are talking $1699 vs $2199 for 16 GB/512 GB on each respectively. Not exactly comparably priced to get the better multi-core results. If you don't need the multi-core boost and the other amenities aren't really important to you, I'm not sure why you would pay for the binned M1 Pro. If you need the multi-core boost then you are going to need to pay an additional $500.

 

[kyjaotkb]

Try the Apple Silicon version:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ms-teams-very-depressing.2338966/

Check post #393.

Joster

thanks but I am on a company-managed computer… i can’t wait to try it though. I appreciate the tip!

 

[teh_hunterer]

Yes. That is exactly the problem. I get 1941 SC/8935 MC with the M2. The binned 8 core M1 Pro gets 1731 SC/9521 MC. Hardly much of a performance difference with the binned Pro. On the other hand, there is quite multi-core boost with the 10 core Pro at 12158. But now you are talking $1699 vs $2199 for 16 GB/512 GB on each respectively. Not exactly comparably priced to get the better multi-core results. If you don't need the multi-core boost and the other amenities aren't really important to you, I'm not sure why you would pay for the binned M1 Pro. If you need the multi-core boost then you are going to need to pay an additional $500.

It's not just minor geekbench scores separating the M2 Air from the 14" Pro. It's sustained performance because of the active cooling, the extra 6 GPU cores, the faster 512GB storage split into two chips, the 16GB of RAM, the memory bandwidth, the encode/decode cores. Add to that the excellent display both in terms of framerate and image quality, the excellent speakers, larger screen, more ports.

That is a huge difference between the M2 Air and base model 14" Pro. If you then upgrade the 14" Pro to the non-binned model, you're getting some more performance, but the $500 only gets you a couple extra GPU and CPU cores and less battery life, and the exact same design - not $500 worth of difference.

Again, nobody is stupid for buying the non-binned 14" Pro, it's just not the best value for money buy, in the same way the M2 Air is not the best value for money buy.

 

[ogawa]

value goes beyond specifications. for some people the qualitative value of an ultraportable device with the amount of power and fully reconsidered design of the mba m2 is far more valuable than a technically superior mbp

 

[average22]

some people also value design over specs. Between the 14" Pro, the M1 Air and the M2 Air, the M2 Air IMO is so much more beautiful compared to the others and that is something that makes me happy every time I use it. Very irrational but buying tech and other things for me has always had a emotional component

 

[kyjaotkb]

value goes beyond specifications. for some people the qualitative value of an ultraportable device with the amount of power and fully reconsidered design of the mba m2 is far more valuable than a technically superior mbp

Agree, I commuted to work this morning in the summer heat and the 14" MBP is a tank. I miss the weight of the (otherwise horrible) 12.5" HP EliteBook it replaces.

 

[torbjornhb]

Great post and review! Thanks a lot 🙂
I've had my M2 16GB/512GB 8 GHz CPU/10 GHZ GPU for a week. Absolutely love it. Got the starlight and the midnight color, but never opened the latter one and are sending it back.

Thing is though, that I wonder if I should return this one as well and opt for the base version. I buy a new MacBook every year, and I have a feeling that the base model will do the work and maybe be a better deal for both be and the buyer when I sell it.

I run a website and have lots of tabs open when I write in WordPress. Editing i is just simple photo editing in the standard Photo app. I use my iPhone 13 Pro and iPad Mini 6 for video editing. And not to mention, I work a lot outdoors and bring with me that Mac absolutely everywhere. The thought of a cheaper model that I don't have to be loco worried about, is absolutely tempting.

 

[StoneJack]

Question to the OP and to anyone with the M2 MBA: have you tried using Microsoft Teams on it? I have an M1 Pro 14" and I went from a full battery to shutdown in exactly 70 minutes on a video Teams call with the sound coming out of the speakers. I know it's an Intel app but the lack of optimization is insane. My colleagues who use M1 Airs / MBP need to take chargers in huddle rooms when they are taking calls.

There is a link to M builds of Teams in other thread, search will help you. Generally, a M chip optimized Teams build, rather than Intel one. Having said that 1 hour Teams session is not long at all and your battery seems to have weak charge.

 

[Jackpaultechnab]

Wow! sounds good, Thanks for sharing your experience!

 

[orl2222]

I think the base is good enough for most people. As a old boomer, I wish I had all these tech toys when I was in college. I ruined my hand writing taking notes as fast as I could. Tape recorders were available, but 95 percent of the professors would not allow them. A word processor was 2500.00 back then! My most precious gift was when my parents bought me a new type writer! Your tools were white out, a dictionary, and a thesaurus. A computer programing course consisted of punch cards! Cobol was a popular operating system. I am ordering a MacBook Air base silver.

 

[Mcdevidr]

I didn't expect the base to run as well as it does after seeing everything that was reported on it. It actually runs fine for everything I was using the 14 for but the big surprise is that it actually runs the games I play faster. The single core improvements and the fact that the games I play (strategy titles from paradox) don't fully stress gpu or cpu means I am getting near alder lake i5 12400 speed on these specific games now which is insane. For sure you can see its not as perfectly smooth as windows but I'm willing to forgive minor occasional stutters or slow downs for no noise on a laptop.

 

[jdb8167]

It's not just minor geekbench scores separating the M2 Air from the 14" Pro. It's sustained performance because of the active cooling, the extra 6 GPU cores, the faster 512GB storage split into two chips, the 16GB of RAM, the memory bandwidth, the encode/decode cores. Add to that the excellent display both in terms of framerate and image quality, the excellent speakers, larger screen, more ports.

That is a huge difference between the M2 Air and base model 14" Pro. If you then upgrade the 14" Pro to the non-binned model, you're getting some more performance, but the $500 only gets you a couple extra GPU and CPU cores and less battery life, and the exact same design - not $500 worth of difference.

I almost never care about sustained performance. Again, that is the point. I only care about peak performance in bursty situations. The sustained performance of the 14" MacBook Pro has almost no value for me.

The 512 GB is faster on the MBP but not because it is split into 2 chips, it is just a higher specced SSD. The M2 MacBook Air 512 GB also has 2 flash chips. Only the 256 is limited to one. The M2 1 TB seems quite fast. I can run the Xcode benchmark in 112 seconds compared to my 1 TB M1 MacBook Air of 135 seconds and a 10 core M1 Pro MacBook Pro that gets 102 seconds. The peak temperature was about 81°C so the M2 wasn't throttling though my estimated time remaining on my battery went from over 15 hours down to 1 hour 45 minutes while it was running. While I don't do a lot of Xcode it does represent my normal workflow pretty accurately. Bursty non-throttling performance while reading and writing lots of relatively small files is very much my workflow.

The M2 has the media engine so the encode/decode should be fast but that really isn't my normal use. I use Handbrake occasionally but I don't create a lot of video. Again, for me, the memory bandwidth is only useful in context of performance. I get great performance from the M2 so the bandwidth of 100 GB/s compares well enough with the M1 Pro at 200 GB/s that I doubt I'd see the difference. Usually most of the extra bandwidth is used up by graphics which I'm not a heavy user of.

The display on the Pro is better but I don't really care. My normal use is software development. It's mostly just text. HDR and 120 fps is nice but not worth the added cost of both money and battery life for me. I watch movies on my 4K TV in my living room. The 2 USB-C ports on the M2 MBA are adequate. I don't need HDMI or a memory card slot.

This is the problem talking about value. It is subjective. What I value, you don't. What you value, I don't. Trying to make it sound like objectively the 14" or 16" MacBook Pro is a better value than the M2 MacBook Air can't be done. It's all subjective based on what the purchaser wants and needs.

 

[teh_hunterer]

I almost never care about sustained performance. Again, that is the point. I only care about peak performance in bursty situations. The sustained performance of the 14" MacBook Pro has almost no value for me.

That's fine for you, but I don't see how you can say "that is the point". Just before you were trying to make general value claims about the Geekbench scores between the M2 Air and 14" Pro, and between the binned and non-binned pro. But when I do, all of a sudden it's not about that and just about your subjective needs.

The 512 GB is faster on the MBP but not because it is split into 2 chips, it is just a higher specced SSD. The M2 MacBook Air 512 GB also has 2 flash chips. Only the 256 is limited to one.

We all know this - not sure what you think you're clarifying here.

The M2 has the media engine so the encode/decode should be fast but that really isn't my normal use.

It has a media engine, not the media engine.

This is the problem talking about value. It is subjective. What I value, you don't. What you value, I don't. Trying to make it sound like objectively the 14" or 16" MacBook Pro is a better value than the M2 MacBook Air can't be done. It's all subjective based on what the purchaser wants and needs.

It seems like you were initially trying to make out that the M2 wasn't generally a lower value buy compared to the M1 MacBook Air and base model 14" Pro, but once we start to get into the reasons why those other two devices are generally better value buys, all of a sudden the goalposts change and it's just this big subjective soup where no points really matter anymore. I do get that argument, but it seems like that should have been your argument from the start.

As I said many times, if someone likes the M2 Air better, all the power to them. It's a good computer, but in every Apple lineup over the years there are generally some devices in the lineup that are considered better value for money, and some devices in the lineup that aren't. The M2 isn't very easy to recommend, and it sits in an unfortunate sandwich between two of the better value for money buys.

It's not impossible to recommend, it's just not easy to recommend. And if you look around you'll find most people share the same sentiment.

 

[Moonlight]

Thank you! Awesome review. It is amazing how perspectives are different when you are not flapping your arms around like a flightless bird, desperate for views and subscribers.

 

[fisherking]

As I said many times, if someone likes the M2 Air better, all the power to them. It's a good computer, but in every Apple lineup over the years there are generally some devices in the lineup that are considered better value for money, and some devices in the lineup that aren't. The M2 isn't very easy to recommend, and it sits in an unfortunate sandwich between two of the better value for money buys.

It's not impossible to recommend, it's just not easy to recommend. And if you look around you'll find most people share the same sentiment.

"And if you look around you'll find most people share the same sentiment." look around... where? on this forum? on the planet?

many people buy macs because it's what they want, they're not weighing the 'value for money' over another laptop, or even another mac.

the M1 air is a great mac. the M2 air has some good improvements over the M1. both work, both are great. and people can buy what they want, without having to justify anything.