All of these new M2 videos have me feeling even better about my decision

[luy]

How’s the weight compared to the MacBook Pro 14“?

Does it feel lighter and sleeker?

Yes it does. You can feel the difference.
But unfortunately you can also see the difference. The 120hz Mini Led Display of the MBP14 is so much better, can hardly go back to 60hz lcd panel. But don't want to blame the MBA, its a great device, specially if you care about weight a lot.

 

[leman]

I really don’t understand the outrage. Extreme multitasking on 8GB RAM uses SWAP. And that slows down if the SSD speeds slow down. Surprise pikachu faces going around here. If you are that worried about swap SSD performance, you need more than 8GB of RAM.

Swapping and most other real-world tasks are dominated by SSD latency rather than bandwidth. If you are swapping 16GB pages or saving a word file, you don't really care about the peak bandwidth of your SSD.

I'm sorry, but 1400 - 1500 MBs is not a "super slow" SSD. Compared to the average computer that's still a pretty speedy drive.

Pretty much. And as I wrote above, this etchings only really matter when you are bulk copying large amount of data or streaming huge files in this or other capacity (e.g. in heavy-duty video editing). None of these speedy SSDs are fast when you only need to read/write few MB here or there

Is anyone able to provide a summary of what the throttling is like to save me the pain of having to watch 15 minutes of bro-chat pseudo-techno-nonsense?

[...]

This is a machine targeted at light workloads and portability.

I suspect the only area where throttling is going to be somewhat noticeable is gaming, because at least it's one of the intended use scenarios for an everyday personal laptop. All this "it's throttling when I try to do a production export of my professional 8K video" is utter nonsense for a passively cooled home/business/study computer.

 

[kingjames1970]

In a sense Apple made these Airs too good. They never used to get compared with Pro machines and now their performance is being measured for tasks that would have seemed ludicrous for an entry level Mac less than two years ago.

Within days of getting an M1 Air (16GB RAM, 1 TB) I stopped using my 10 core iMac Pro as my daily driver, that's something I never expected. I ended up replacing it for the multicore performance of the 14 Max MBP that has completely blown me away – it feels like 'peak' laptop. But the Air could easily be my fave Mac since I started using them over thirty years ago.

But Apple does scrimp on base model SSD and/or RAM on every single product they make and has done for years. That kind of enforced upgrade does leave a bitter taste for people who know better (like in this forum). But I guess for many consumers, they don't even realise.

 

[ADGrant]

Full Stack Web Developer here.

I am reading all the reports of the M2 throttling after a few minutes of heavy work and I am sitting here and thinking "OK, cool, I don't care. If I type 'npm run dev' and that's taking 3 seconds instead of 10 I am actually in heaven". Having that power combined with portability, fanless design, better screen, magsafe and all day battery... oh boy, let's gooo!

I am also baffled why the vast majority is just talking about media editing and not coding. On the M2 MBP I think I only saw two videos that bothered to mention XCode at all.

When the new M1 Max/Pro MBPs came out I was amazed but also thinking "well but these are a bit overkill for a webdev maybe, I am gonna wait for the next Air!" and now that these are out I gotta say it was worth it. Can't wait to receive my BTO in two weeks hopefully.

What did you upgrade with your BTO and what did you pay.

 

[dgdosen]

I suspect the only area where throttling is going to be somewhat noticeable is gaming, because at least it's one of the intended use scenarios for an everyday personal laptop. All this "it's throttling when I try to do a production export of my professional 8K video" is utter nonsense for a passively cooled home/business/study computer.

On an M1 Air, and I'm assuming on an M2 Air, I've never noticed throttling of:

- any code compilation in any language that never takes more than a minute
- any terabyte-plus database backup/restore that never takes more than 2 minutes
- the most complex database ETL process that usually takes no more than 30 seconds...
- any nightly homebrew update
- any container building that usually takes less than a minute
- any container deploy/fetch that usually takes (wait - must get gigabit internet)

But gaming - gaming is where it hurts non-pros

 

[ADGrant]

I understand wanting to push the limit of the Air cooling system to see where the boundary really is-- especially after the M1 MBA made the M1 MBP look rather redundant. Pushing it hard and seeing it slow down is a valid test.

What isn't valid is making that the story. It's one technical detail. If video editing is the only way to bog it down, then that's also an important thing to know. I keep hearing people say "massive throttling", but nobody has put a qualitative measure on that that I can see. And one workflow doesn't describe the system either-- what workflows throttle it and by how much?

Likewise I don't see the fact that the base model has slower SSD speeds, but still as fast or faster than I'm getting on my external drives as anything more than a detail. It's the base model, expect base specs.

Technical details are important. They are why many of us read reviews.

The cheaper base M1 MBA has much faster SSD speeds and probably doesn't throttle quite as quickly.

How quickly the M2 MBP throttles could be quite relevant if you have any kind of workload that maxes out the CPU for more than a few seconds. It's the price you pay for a fanless design but if it is too high of a price, Apple sells two alternative slightly larger laptops with fans .

 

[apocalyarts]

What did you upgrade with your BTO and what did you pay.

Went for 10/16/512, wanted to treat myself 😀

 

[ADGrant]

Went for 10/16/512, wanted to treat myself 😀

So that retails at $1700?

 

[Imory]

I find this to be concerning. Why is the 512 GB version slower than the M1 in read and write?

The fact that the export in Final Cut is slower on the fully specced out 24 GB/2 TB is very concerning as well.

 

[Analog Kid]

Technical details are important. They are why many of us read reviews.

The cheaper base M1 MBA has much faster SSD speeds and probably doesn't throttle quite as quickly.

How quickly the M2 MBP throttles could be quite relevant if you have any kind of workload that maxes out the CPU for more than a few seconds. It's the price you pay for a fanless design but if it is too high of a price, Apple sells two alternative slightly larger laptops with fans .

Forests vs Trees. My point is that the details aren’t individually important, what matters is the whole package. People fixate on individual details like the SSD speed or throttling on a particular task they may never do and blow it out of proportion relative to the overall product.

 

[Analog Kid]

If you are swapping 16GB pages

kB?

Pretty much. And as I wrote above, this etchings only really matter when you are bulk copying large amount of data or streaming huge files in this or other capacity (e.g. in heavy-duty video editing). None of these speedy SSDs are fast when you only need to read/write few MB here or there

And bulk copies are instant with APFS when on the same device and more likely limited by the external drive or connection if transferring from an external drive.

Not to say the difference in speed will never be seen, but it’s not going to have the broad implications people seem to think it will, especially on such a small drive where you can’t do much in the way of large transfers.

 

[FattKingHugeman]

All these videos of the MBA throttling and stuffs by driving them with crazy video renderings and stuffs. its kindly overboard. The MBA M2 is not built for such purpose. It is designed for thin and light carry around with great battery life aiming for normal users such as students etc.

Apple has MBP 14 and 16 built for those above media professionals use.

 

[Ethosik]

Swapping and most other real-world tasks are dominated by SSD latency rather than bandwidth. If you are swapping 16GB pages or saving a word file, you don't really care about the peak bandwidth of your SSD.

I said extreme multi tasking. You know, what all these YouTube channels are doing to "prove" the SSD speed is the most horrible thing Apple has ever done in existence. If I push my 2010 Mac Pro with 8GB of RAM and SATA 2 speeds SATA SSDs too far, I experience slowness when things swap.

 

[neinjohn]

The starkest performance difference I can see between the M2 Air, MBP M2 and their M1 counterparts is the terrible "throttle" on review performance as Andrei from Anandtech went to work for the industry as he understands something about what he is talking meanwhile taking away from us his proper reviews...

 

[andeify]

The problem with a fanboys opinion is they focus on the positives and may overlook or disregard a negative. The problem with click-bait YouTubers is they will find something noteworthy and blow it out of proportion to reel in the views.

Real world performance depends on use case. If your a video editor working with 4k video then you will likely be pushing the CPU hard for extended periods quite often. If your a gamer then you will likely be maxing out the GPU and possibly CPU for as long as you play for. If you don’t do any of those you will likely never come across any issues.

It IS important to know that the MacBook Air base model SSD can be slower than the other models, and that it will throttle after 10 mins of maxing out the CPU/GPU, but it doesn’t make the computer shirt, it’s just not ideal for someone who edits videos for a living.

Like someone pointed out, 256 GB of storage is not a lot by todays standards and it’s not going to be enough for todays video editors so it shouldn’t be a big deal, these people are more likely to go for a 14” or 16” Pro.

The limitations are not likely to affect the casual user. Likewise if your coming from a machine that is more than a couple of years old then this will still be a fantastic improvement. If your editing videos on a 2018 MBP then the new M2 Air will be a big improvement, even with throttling. Not ideal, but an improvement.

But yes, Apple decided to save money by only buying 256gb nand chips and above which made the M2 base model SSD slower than the previous M1 model, the majority of everything else looks to be an improvement.

 

[inglishmayjur]

The problem with a fanboys opinion is they focus on the positives and may overlook or disregard a negative. The problem with click-bait YouTubers is they will find something noteworthy and blow it out of proportion to reel in the views.

Real world performance depends on use case. If your a video editor working with 4k video then you will likely be pushing the CPU hard for extended periods quite often. If your a gamer then you will likely be maxing out the GPU and possibly CPU for as long as you play for. If you don’t do any of those you will likely never come across any issues.

It IS important to know that the MacBook Air base model SSD can be slower than the other models, and that it will throttle after 10 mins of maxing out the CPU/GPU, but it doesn’t make the computer shirt, it’s just not ideal for someone who edits videos for a living.

Like someone pointed out, 256 GB of storage is not a lot by todays standards and it’s not going to be enough for todays video editors so it shouldn’t be a big deal, these people are more likely to go for a 14” or 16” Pro.

The limitations are not likely to affect the casual user. Likewise if your coming from a machine that is more than a couple of years old then this will still be a fantastic improvement. If your editing videos on a 2018 MBP then the new M2 Air will be a big improvement, even with throttling. Not ideal, but an improvement.

But yes, Apple decided to save money by only buying 256gb nand chips and above which made the M2 base model SSD slower than the previous M1 model, the majority of everything else looks to be an improvement.

I think this is a good point, the truth is likely between the two extremes. I think it's best to consider how you use a computer and make the most informed decision you can. 90% of the time, my MBA is plugged into 1 34" 120hz 3440x1440 monitor and studio monitor speaker setup so I don't care about the screen or the speaker differences with the MBP. I don't have a desire to use another monitor. I use a mouse and keyboard nearly all of the time and most of the time I don't even use the MBA screen. With the real estate of the monitor I just don't end up needing it.

I value the portability when I am traveling and want something small and light with a long battery life. I have never once edited a video on it and I never intend to. I will be running development servers (not computationally intensive), the very, very occasional virtual machine instance (this is exceedingly rare), a lot of Chrome tabs and editing text documents. I don't need the fastest machine they produce.

 

[bluecoast]

Some great comments on this thread.

Agree with those who are tired of YTubers (and the Verge) assuming that everyone is in content creation and hitting the MBA M2 with 8k video editing.

The first world problem nit-picky click-bait nature of these reviews - where the reviewer has to have an angle - is getting annoying.

It makes me long for the days when Macworld had a proper benchmarking lab for their reviews.

I mean, if you buy the new MBA for either high end video / audio production and want to play triple A games on it, you really shouldn’t get MBA - of any config. And the reviewers know that.

The original MBA created and defined the ultrabook category ie a thin light ultra portable notebook that’s great for consumer & business light productivity with good all day battery life.

The new MBA is obviously firmly in that camp.

I’m not in the market for a new MBA but if I was I’d go for the base model (maybe I’d get the 16GB though).

 

[andeify]

The original MBA created and defined the ultrabook category ie a thin light ultra portable notebook that’s great for consumer & business light productivity with good all day battery life.

The new MBA is obviously firmly in that camp.

Your bang on, and I think the M2 MacBook Air is number one for this spot!