Any know issues with 2013 MBA 11"

[The Mercurian]

I'm thinking aobut buying am i7 8GB 2013 MBA 11".

Any known issues with this model that I should ask about ?
143 cycles on the battery

 

[Boyd01]

My 2013 11" I7/8GB/512GB MBA will have its 4th "birthday" on July 1. It is still my primary computer and I have no plans to upgrade, very happy with it. Not aware of any "issues" with this model.

Would I buy a used one today? Probably not, a four year old laptop may not have that many good years left in it. But that is just me, and of course it depends of the asking price.

 

[MultiFinder17]

If you can get it fairly inexoensively, go for it! There aren't any glaring issues that I'm aware of with these notebooks, and they are the first year that man you here would recommend based on their battery life. I have both a 2011 and 2015 11" Air, and love both of them. Enjoy!

 

[RealityM]

If you can get it fairly inexoensively, go for it! There aren't any glaring issues that I'm aware of with these notebooks, and they are the first year that man you here would recommend based on their battery life. I have both a 2011 and 2015 11" Air, and love both of them. Enjoy!

I'm curious if you do any heavy duty video editing and rendering on your MBAs. Any significant differences between the two years? Do you have i7 or i5 processors? Thanks.

 

[Boyd01]

Don't know how you define "heavy duty video editing" but I used my 2011 i5 MBA to edit 480i60 DV, 1080i60 HDV and 1080p24 XDCAM footage fairly extensively with FCP 6 and it worked fine. It was significantly faster than the 2008 15" MBP that it replaced at the time (not surprising since the geekbench score was about twice as high). Have done the same things on my 2013 i7 MBA and it is a bit faster, but not dramatically. The 2015 MBA is only slightly faster than the 2013 model.

I would not recommend the 2011 MBA for video today, it only has USB2.0 so if you want fast disks you have to use the thunderbolt port, which limits you to more expensive drives and they must also have a pass-through port if you want to use an external monitor. 4gb was also the maximum amount of RAM available on the MBA in 2011.

Last year I started working on some larger video projects and the 2013 MBA just didn't have all the ports I needed, so I got a thunderbolt2 dock from OWC. Could not get that working properly, so I returned it and got a 2012 quad i7 Mac Mini Server for my video work. It has all the ports I need, and renders twice as fast as the i7 MBA.

I still like my 11" MBA for its portability when working with video away from home, and can make do with its limitations for that. But it really isn't ideal for "heavy duty video editing" IMO.

 

[MultiFinder17]

I'm curious if you do any heavy duty video editing and rendering on your MBAs. Any significant differences between the two years? Do you have i7 or i5 processors? Thanks.

I haven't on the 2011, modtly because it only has 2GB of RAM. The 2015, though, I e edited a few home videos in iMovie, and it handled them perfectly fine. They're both i5 machines, and the 2015 has 4GB.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

I'm thinking aobut buying am i7 8GB 2013 MBA 11".

Any known issues with this model that I should ask about ?
143 cycles on the battery

That is a terrific computer - 2013 was the first year when both the 13" MBA and the 11" MBA finally became the computers that they had long held the promise of becoming.

I have an 11" MBA I ordered in 2013, and still use it as my primary computer (i7/8 GB RAM/512 GB SSD) and it has travelled the world - quite literally - with me. A stunning, powerful, portable, fast, reliable computer, easily the best I have ever had.

 

[The Mercurian]

Cheers all. This is as a 2nd machine for travel so I'm looking for bargains. I actually had a base spec 11" MBA 2013 that I regret selling and this one caught my eye as it has i7 and 8GB - but I am wary of a machine that old. I'm torn now in fact I might try to get a 2nd hand retina macbook if I can get a good deal on one. (I can get one of those for about the same asking price)

 

[Boyd01]

There are a couple refurb 11" MBA's on Apple's site right now, an i5/4/256 for $929 and a i5/8/256 for $1019. Those strike me as a bit pricey, although at least you get the full Apple warranty. A couple months ago B&H photo was blowing out brand new 11" 17/8/512 MBA's for about $1000, several people on this forum grabbed them while they lasted. That was a hell of a deal but they are long gone now.

 

[Scepticalscribe]

There are a couple refurb 11" MBA's on Apple's site right now, an i5/4/256 for $929 and a i5/8/256 for $1019. Those strike me as a bit pricey, although at least you get the full Apple warranty. A couple months ago B&H photo was blowing out brand new 11" 17/8/512 MBA's for about $1000, several people on this forum grabbed them while they lasted. That was a hell of a deal but they are long gone now.

Well, the full Apple warranty (plus Apple Care) will give a three year warranty.

My only concern with my superb 11" MBA is that the Applecare expired in February; I will admit that I am seriously thinking of replacing it with another similarly 11" MBA of similar specifications - and will add all the necessary warranties to it.

As of now, the rMB is not sufficiently powerful - it reminds me of the iterations of the MBA form around 2010, great computers (I had one) but nothing like what they could become (and did - eventually, become - once the battery was seriously improved in 2013).

 

[The Mercurian]

There are a couple refurb 11" MBA's on Apple's site right now, an i5/4/256 for $929 and a i5/8/256 for $1019. Those strike me as a bit pricey, although at least you get the full Apple warranty. A couple months ago B&H photo was blowing out brand new 11" 17/8/512 MBA's for about $1000, several people on this forum grabbed them while they lasted. That was a hell of a deal but they are long gone now.

I'm not in the US and there are no 11" MBA in the Apple store where I am - plus when there were they were starting at €1079 for base spec which is bonkers (when I bought one new in 2013 I paid less that that - Apples € prices are gone insane last couple of years). 2nd hand on buy and sell websites I'll get one for 30-50% less than that.

 

[pika2000]

It boils down to the price. As a hardware, the 2013 model is awesome thanks to Haswell. Excellent battery life, and quite a multitasker (mine was the base model with 4GB of RAM, and I was surprised how I can multi-task multiple excel spreadsheets while and how it can drive the Apple cinema display without hiccups). The only catch buying a 2013 laptop today is the age of its battery. Regardless of cycles, LiIon batteries do have reduced performance (although sometimes not by much) through age. Not a super deal breaker, but something to think about.

Of course, look also how much the newer ones are. If the price is not that much different, the newer ones have newer battery and faster components (ie. SSD, GPU, etc). I do think 2013 is the minimum model year to get.

 

[The Mercurian]

It boils down to the price. As a hardware, the 2013 model is awesome thanks to Haswell. Excellent battery life, and quite a multitasker (mine was the base model with 4GB of RAM, and I was surprised how I can multi-task multiple excel spreadsheets while and how it can drive the Apple cinema display without hiccups). The only catch buying a 2013 laptop today is the age of its battery. Regardless of cycles, LiIon batteries do have reduced performance (although sometimes not by much) through age. Not a super deal breaker, but something to think about.

Of course, look also how much the newer ones are. If the price is not that much different, the newer ones have newer battery and faster components (ie. SSD, GPU, etc). I do think 2013 is the minimum model year to get.

The thing is second hand 8GB i7 models are rare. This one is asking the same price that folks are selling 2nd hand 2016/2017 rMB's for. So given that comparison I think I would be better buying a the rMB

 

[Scepticalscribe]

The thing is second hand 8GB i7 models are rare. This one is asking the same price that folks are selling 2nd hand 2016/2017 rMB's for. So given that comparison I think I would be better buying a the rMB

To my mind, the rMB - while an absolutely gorgeous computer - is underpowered the way the MBA was until 2013; it may take a further iteration or two to get it right.

 

[The Mercurian]

To my mind, the rMB - while an absolutely gorgeous computer - is underpowered the way the MBA was until 2013; it may take a further iteration or two to get it right.

Ah yeah but I'm not waiting 2 years! Anyway trying hard to get a bargain. There are plenty for sale so eventually I'll get a good price I think

 

[Scepticalscribe]

Ah yeah but I'm not waiting 2 years! Anyway trying hard to get a bargain. There are plenty for sale so eventually I'll get a good price I think

My advice would be to buy a MBA in the meantime, while waiting for the rMB to become the superlative computer the MBA had long held the promise of becoming.

I was bowled over by the MBA when it appeared in 2008, and resolved to get one at some stage. Initially, - while it looked gorgeous - the form factor was stunning - was the first computer Apple made that used SSD for memory, and was exceptionally portable - it was massively underpowered, and the specifications were limited.

My first MBA was the so-called "Rev C" which I bought in 2010 - and it was a terrific computer. But the MBAs I bought in 2013, and 2014, (a 13" and an 11") blew it away - they are astonishingly good machines, and my only quibble - and it is a minor one, as the rest of what the computer has to offer is so good - is that the screen is not as good as that of the rMB.

But, I'll not buy a rMB until it is a bit better - and more powerful - than the machine currently on offer.

 

[The Mercurian]

My advice would be to buy a MBA in the meantime, while waiting for the rMB to become the superlative computer the MBA had long held the promise of becoming.

I was bowled over by the MBA when it appeared in 2008, and resolved to get one at some stage. Initially, - while it looked gorgeous - the form factor was stunning - was the first computer Apple made that used SSD for memory, and was exceptionally portable - it was massively underpowered, and the specifications were limited.

My first MBA was the so-called "Rev C" which I bought in 2010 - and it was a terrific computer. But the MBAs I bought in 2013, and 2014, (a 13" and an 11") blew it away - they are astonishingly good machines, and my only quibble - and it is a minor one, as the rest of what the computer has to offer is so good - is that the screen is not as good as that of the rMB.

But, I'll not buy a rMB until it is a bit better - and more powerful - than the machine currently on offer.

Oh yes I hear you. But the only 8GB i7 11" MBA I've seen is this 4 year old one and the screen is an issue. I don't really care about computing power beyond having 8GB since I have a max spec 2014 MBP for that. This is for a cheap travel machine that I can simply write on. The other point is the rMB's I'm seeing all have 256GB SSD and even this i7 MBA only has 128GB.

I'm flexible though... I'm basically jsut firing out lo-ball offers on anything I see MBA or rMB that fits my purposes....eventually something will stick

**....hopes sellers are not also on macrumours**

 

[Boyd01]

This is for a cheap travel machine that I can simply write on.

In that case, why do you need an i7 or even 8gb?

I had a 2011 i5/4gb/256gb MBA and it was a surprisingly powerful little machine. I ran Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Photoshop and other powerful software without any problem.

 

[The Mercurian]

In that case, why do you need an i7 or even 8gb?

I had a 2011 i5/4gb/256gb MBA and it was a surprisingly powerful little machine. I ran Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Photoshop and other powerful software without any problem.

Don't need i7 but do want 8Gb. I might occasionally do some light stats on it, and also I'm thinking about future OS's. I might use it to run betas on etc. But simply - this is the only 8GB 11inch I've seen on the site I use!!

 

[piperbarb]

I have a 2013 MBA w/ i7/8GB RAM/256 GB SSD I picked up last year. The battery had been replaced and had only 32 cycles on it. It works perfectly and there are no marks on the screen. I love it for it's portability, plus i do use it for some video editing. It's not my main laptop but if you can find one in good condition and low battery cycles for a reasonable price, get it.

found mine on eBay. It was on the 3rd or 4th page of MBAs on eBay. The seller had 100% feedback. They are out there but it may take a bit of time to find a good one.