12-16gb RAM minimum on a Mac (even Neo) is nonnegotiable in 2026 going on 2027. I remember people saying 8gb of apple ram was “magic RAM” in 2020... yeah, no thanks, that MacBook Pro started sucking very quickly for me.
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Apple Working on New MacBook Neo With Two Upgrades
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jabbawok
macrumors 6502
With luck they will keep everything exactly the same mechanically so all the parts remain interchangeable.
This is what I'm hoping for. Being able to upgrade the SOC without replacing the entire machine would be ideal.
EugW
macrumors P6
The thermals in the Air are better than in the Neo. Even though the A18 Pro is faster for CPU than the M1, in extended workloads the M1 MacBook Air is significantly faster than the Neo, because the Neo throttles immediately. The MB Air also throttles, but much, much less. The reason is the Neo doesn't even have a heatsink. It seems ridiculous but maybe they do this intentionally so that it will throttle... and conserve battery life.
Hopefully they improve this with the Neo 2. They did add a reasonable thermal design to the iPhone 17 Pro, so hopefully something similar gets adopted for the Neo 2 which should have the same SoC (albeit binned in the Neo).
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bodonnell202
macrumors 68030
Shaking my head my head at this comment. I don't think the Neo is for you and that's ok. Not everyone needs a Pro level device and it's a good thing that Apple is making a more affordable device for those people.
EugW
macrumors P6
I think your sarcasm detector is broken. 😀
Leobreaker
macrumors member
turbineseaplane
macrumors Penryn
The limitations on storage, ram, and the screen size were the three things for me.
Awesome little device just not for me
EugW
macrumors P6
All joking aside, I wonder when it would be realistic to include USB 4 instead of USB 3 in an Ax Pro chip. TSMC A10 node, with actual Apple products by 2030? USB 4 would be a huge leap forward. Maybe by that time they can make the base Ax non-Pro chips USB 3 too.
1st-alex
macrumors newbie
Agreed. Hopefully the refreshed Neos will include a starter model with similar specs as the original. A great entry point into the Mac ecosystem for students and those with basic computing needs.
snipr125
macrumors 68030
Air has larger colour accurate displays, significantly better performance with proper desktop grade M chips, more base RAM, faster SSD’s, backlit keyboards, thunderbolt 4 ports etc. The Neo 2 looks good (assuming it does get 12 GB ram) but there are many people who are prepared to pay more for something better like the MBA and base MBP.
EugW
macrumors P6
Nitpick but MacBook Neos are top tier in terms of colour accuracy. They aren’t wide colour gamut but that’s a different argument.
I would like to see MacSafe so I don't need to worry about my kids tripping over cables and ripping something apart. Common Apple, build that into the Neo. Thanks.
snipr125
macrumors 68030
That's what I mean, the full P3 Colour gamut which is important to me as it provides greater colour volume and accuracy for my photography. For me its very noticeable. My 2015 MBP has the same SRGB screen as the Neo and its fine, but cannot compare in colour to my newer MBA M5 or iPP OLED displays (unfair comparison I admit).
1st-alex
macrumors newbie
You're definitely not the target market for the Neo, as your message signature would suggest.
As I have stated several times, Apple is *better* positioned to withstand Ramageddon than competition. Microsoft Surface now starts at 950USD, with 8GB of RAM and a less efficient OS. Neo is *more* competitive now than at launch, not less.
If - but that is a big if - Apple can launch the next version at the same price but 12 GB of RAM, competition will be panicking. Even at another 100USD up, competition will be in trouble.
Just saw a video where someone compared low end and high end Mac vs Windows, at same prices. The most telling test was the “everyday multitasking” test, where the MacBook Pro smoked everything, and the Neo, a 600USD Windows and a 4500USD Windows Pc were essentially identical speed (something like open 20 tabs, start a zoom call, then clock opening a huge Excel file). I expected the Neo to be on par with a budget 16GB Windows PC, I did not expect it to match a 64GB powerhouse. (I’ll find the link and edit it in)
throAU
Suspended
Nah, this is an ideal platform for accumulated previous year iPhone Pro chips that needed a bit too high voltage to fit in the phone power/thermal envelope.
Instead of being trashed due to not meeting iPhone spec, they can run quite happily in the Neo (or future AppleTV, HomePod, whatever).
I don't say that to dump on the Neo, it's a genius move by Apple really - the Neo has far better cooling, far larger battery, etc. Even an iPhone Pro chip that doesn't quite meet the iPhone requirements will be way lower power draw and comparable performance to competitor parts in this device.
In these times we should consider ourselves lucky if it isn’t slower. People need to readjust expectations. Look at Surface - price up, RAM cut in half.
throAU
Suspended
Yeah, the days of upgradable portables are (mostly) over.
And realistically - we aren't in the 1990s-early 2000s any more.
RAM requirements for most people are not doubling every 3 years now and people have far better internet connectivity.
Higher end workload will be offloaded to the cloud or for those who need it, a more powerful, more expensive machine. Fact is, for most of the population, this is enough.
Neo, base model iPad, even base iPhone is plenty of compute for a huge percentage of the market who just want a machine for banking, browsing, social media and communication. Some people need more and that's fine - but there's a huge segment of the population who don't want much more than the above.