Are you happy with your 2020 MBA?

[supernet33]

Are you happy with your 2020 MBA? It seems like there are a ton of complaints about the heat or fan sound.

if you are happy, what are your specs? Does it over heat or do you have fan sound?

 

[twintin]

I have the base model and could not be happier. With my light usage (VS Code remote development, Safari browsing, Slack/MS Teams chatting, e-mail, Jira projekt planning, libreoffice documentation etc.) the machine stays cool and fanless as far as I can tell.

Occationally I have used it for shorter conference calls (maby 15 to 30 min) with MS Teams with no heat or fan issues that I have noticed.

And the battery life is excelent too (can use it a whole working day with plenty of juice left at the end of the day).

 

[throAU]

i7-1tb-16gb

Mostly happy. Keyboard is great, trackpad is great, screen is good (mostly the same, except for truetone) coming from a 13" Pro 2015.

it isn't blisteringly fast and the fan cranks up when pressed, but every MacBook I have ever owned (including 2 Pros) has done that. Noisiest machine I've had was a 2011 15" Pro. Not this one.

It's mostly silent. But it will depend what you do with it.

If your use is mostly web, email, office apps, occasional video conferencing, etc. you will be fine.

It will do more than that but the fan might spin up when it is processing something for a long time (e.g., rendering video, compiling code, running something graphically intensive like a game). I'd say that the fan complaints are valid from some but totally overblown in context for what this device's role is.

If you're doing heavy CPU usage stuff most of the time this is not the machine for you. But then any Apple laptop will be hot and loud for that anyway. The Pros will just be faster at it.

 

[deeddawg]

Happy with my i5

It's cool and quiet most of the time. When I push it, I do hear the fan. Low volume for short cpu intensive tasks such as exporting a dozen RAW photo images, a bit louder for longer tasks like building previews for 1000 images. Then it goes quiet again.

Hasn't ever been uncomfortable on my lap, though I tend to use it on my desk when doing the above tasks.

My usage is general light-office stuff - safari, mail, numbers, messages, etc. along with hobbiest photography stuff in Lightroom, Luminar, and PhotoMechanic. I've done a 40 minute seven participant Zoom meeting and it remained silent and cool. I seldom use Chrome and don't use MS Office products on my Air.

 

[edubfromktown]

Quite happy with an Air i7/16/512.

Battery life, keyboard design and portability/weight are all excellent. Performance is better than I expected running non-subscription/cloud based apps like Office 2016 and Lightroom 6.14 and driving a UHD 31.5" display.

I do more than basic web, office apps and video calls and the fans have rarely kicked on and when they did it was only for brief periods of time.

If you want raw performance, fork out the bucks for a new 13" MBP 4-port model. If you don't need that sort of horsepower, and Air should be just fine.

 

[Iammetaldave]

I just posted this in the user reviews thread, i have been adding little bits as I use / push it.. I love it..

I finally got the fans on my MBA 2020 (i5/16) to siiiiiinnnnngg (8000+ rpm)🙂 all it took was a Windows 10 VM in Virtual Box. The temps hit 101! but it didn't even slow OSX.. not even a bit... I even had another VM of Kali Linux open running a network scan of my network... and my iTunes didn't falter... It's frikkin beast...(the windows machine was sluggish... but it was grand once all the updates and Windooohs crap was done...). Fan noise was there, but Metallica drowned it out nicely.

Once again, don't listen to the noise out there. The machine is a pig of a worker! 😀

 

[oilers780]

I have the base model and could not be happier. With my light usage (VS Code remote development, Safari browsing, Slack/MS Teams chatting, e-mail, Jira projekt planning, libreoffice documentation etc.) the machine stays cool and fanless as far as I can tell.

Occationally I have used it for shorter conference calls (maby 15 to 30 min) with MS Teams with no heat or fan issues that I have noticed.

And the battery life is excelent too (can use it a whole working day with plenty of juice left at the end of the day).

Does the performance surprise you for the base i3 Apple includes? I've seen a lot of YouTuber reviews recommending the nominal $ to upgrade to the i5 quad core.

 

[twintin]

Does the performance surprise you for the base i3 Apple includes? I've seen a lot of YouTuber reviews recommending the nominal $ to upgrade to the i5 quad core.

Considering my previous model was an Air 2012, any modern CPU will run circles around it, so the performance increase is hardly a “surprise” so to speak, but expected.

For my workload an i5 would be an overkill, so I rather save 150$ (upgrade prices outside US are higher) and use them for a future iPhone instead. 😊

 

[throAU]

It's cool and quiet most of the time. When I push it, I do hear the fan. Low volume for short cpu intensive tasks such as exporting a dozen RAW photo images, a bit louder for longer tasks like building previews for 1000 images. Then it goes quiet again.

Hasn't ever been uncomfortable on my lap, though I tend to use it on my desk when doing the above tasks.

I think this is key...

Both of my MacBook Pros have managed to get uncomfortably warm when used on my lap and doing something CPU intensive. The Air has not.

In the case of the 2011 15" Pro.... well, let's just say that if you were wearing shorts and pushing the thing you would be sweating profusely and borderline getting burned by it. No matter how good the cooling system, the higher power CPUs generate a lot more heat and it has go go somewhere! If it radiates out from the case or is exhausted from the machine, guess where it is dumped to when using as a laptop?

It's not just the CPU/GPU either - batteries get warm when they charge/discharge and the batteries in the more powerful machines are also larger and generate more heat as well.

The 13" Pro wasn't quite that bad, but still gets far warmer when used like that, than the 13" Air does.

So I think that a big factor some may overlook when choosing between the machines is this:

• do you have a laptop simply to transfer from desk to desk (i.e., you use it as more of a portable desktop, even if that "Desktop" might be something like a tray table on a plane)?
• or do you plan to use the thing on your lap a lot?

The Air is MUCH better at being a laptop, but there are tradeoffs for that.

All other factors (i.e., performance) excluded:

• MBA best for lap use
• MBP 13" best for portable use in transit between desks (e.g., occasionally on lap on buses, trains, whatever until you get to your destination (and then put on a desk). works way better on aircraft trays than 15" plus due to physical size vs. space on plane)
• MBP 15-16" best for use only when you get to where you're traveling to (e.g., tote between work and home). These suck trying to use on planes in economy. You simply don't have space to open the screen properly (you can do it, just but its awkward; I traveled Europe for 6 weeks with the 15, it was annoying. You need to have the front 2 inches of the thing hanging over the front of the tray towards you, and type elbows out because it is too close).

 

[esphil]

I got my 16" mbp base after returning my i5/16gb air this week, so I have some comparisons. The first being about heat and fans. Yes the Air can get hot if you actually look at temps. The first few hours of using it I was thinking this laptop is extremely quiet and didn't hear any fans. After installing some of the apps to monitor I was suprised at the temp when running certain things, I thought it was much cooler because the case barely felt warm. Which is a good thing because even at 100c, the heat dissipation is very good and you wont really feel it. Even if fans are at 4-5k I can barely hear it. I think fan noise is greatly overblown in general, I guess most people have never had a loud windows laptop or desktop. I was using my pro last night doing some pretty heavy stuff with downloads going and ableton, and I felt the bottom get extremly hot in comparision, even though they may have been the same temps as a air was getting. I'm much happier with the screen size on the 16", the Air just felt too small for me, also the screen brightness is better. I felt like I had to have the Air screen on max brightness during the day which would effect the battery more. A few clicks down just wasn't bright enough for me. I feel like I can push the Pro way harder, and I can throw everything at it. I'd say for most people the Air is fine. The one big thing I prefer over the pro is the wedge design though, its much more comfortable to type on, and the keyboard isn't as far back.

 

[IngerMan]

I am still in see saw mode for what I am going to get. I been spending hours on reviews for the MBA Gen 10 and MBP Gen 10.

One thing I think is true. They all get hot when you push them, very hot. Thats not new news and that has been true on all my previous laptops. It just seems the reviewers (not all only a handful) expect the MBA not to get that hot doing compiling tasks. But the MBP (13"&16") gets as hot as well its just the output is more than the MBA so that's ok.

I placed my 4th order today but I will keep it to myself until it ships just incase I cancel like the last 3 times before 🙄

 

[deeddawg]

One thing I think is true. They all get hot when you push them, very hot. Thats not new news and that has been true on all my previous laptops. It just seems the reviewers (not all only a handful) expect the MBA not to get that hot doing compiling tasks. But the MBP (13"&16") gets as hot as well its just the output is more than the MBA so that's ok.

You also need to look at what "they" mean when they say it "gets hot".

Most (if not all) of the reviews I've seen referenced focus on the CPU temperature reported by whatever software is being used.

Rarely is there any mention of case temperature.

When I'm using the system, I'm not touching the CPU. I'm touching the case. That's what's important IMHO

 

[joeybuckets]

No, mine is so hot i can fry an egg on it. We make bacon on it also.

 

[TorontoSS]

When I'm using the system, I'm not touching the CPU. I'm touching the case. That's what's important IMHO

Exactly - when you use your computer, you use your computer. You don't have to stare at the temperature counter the way people have been doing. If it burns you, that's a different issue but the computers haven't been burning people, people have been staring at the temperature. I think that's part of the problem.
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I am still in see saw mode for what I am going to get. I been spending hours on reviews for the MBA Gen 10 and MBP Gen 10.

One thing I think is true. They all get hot when you push them, very hot. Thats not new news and that has been true on all my previous laptops. It just seems the reviewers (not all only a handful) expect the MBA not to get that hot doing compiling tasks. But the MBP (13"&16") gets as hot as well its just the output is more than the MBA so that's ok.

I placed my 4th order today but I will keep it to myself until it ships just incase I cancel like the last 3 times before 🙄

I think what you have to do is think about what you'll be using it for. Don't let other people (i.e. reviewers and randos on forums) tell you what you should get. If you think you'll be pushing it more, even on a semi regular basis, get a MacBook pro otherwise the Air seems like a great machine.

I have a 13 inch MacBook pro from late 2013. Works amazing for me still. What do I do? surf the web, write on word and watch youtube. I have never edited photos or edited videos. Did I need a pro? not at all. An air would have done a great job to be frank. But I didn't carry it around and I got it for the screen quality. I figured the screen is one of the most important parts of the computer. The screen now is not so different on the Air as it was back in those days.

That being said, obsessing about which one to buy is part of the whole apple buying experience! I hope you make your choice soon and hope you're happy with it.

 

[ElementOfStyle]

I've had my MBA for just over a week. Does it get warm? Yes. Is it hot? Not really. It's cooler than my work issued HP. It's about what I would expect from a laptop.

 

[Scarpad]

Considering my previous model was an Air 2012, any modern CPU will run circles around it, so the performance increase is hardly a “surprise” so to speak, but expected.

For my workload an i5 would be an overkill, so I rather save 150$ (upgrade prices outside US are higher) and use them for a future iPhone instead. 😊

I agree I got my base model tonight , coming from the 12" MacBook with that m3 chip, this runs better, a a much better keyboard, the MacBooks keyboard had zero travel.

 

[allisonk1989]

I purchased the base model and it is more than meeting my needs. I am a teacher and I’ve been working on it daily for the past almost three weeks - I had previously been working on my 2014 Air (11 inch). I regularly work in Office (mostly Word and PowerPoint), Outlook and I keep Microsoft Teams running throughout the day to be available to my students and post assignments.

I have also been using Zoom quite a bit, as well as creating videos with Screencast-o-matic (special educational inclusion English teacher, using this to record read alouds of modified text) and I think my fans have on,y come on once in three weeks, and they turned off very quickly. I have not noticed the laptop getting hot, and the battery life is pretty good, as well. It runs circles around my work laptop, a Dell Latitude, which I brought home with me the Friday before we closed (I never bring my work laptop home... and when we left, we hadn’t even announced closing, but I grabbed my computer anyway.)

 

[Billiejoe87]

The heat issues with this Macbook Air are totally overblown. Max Tech started a panic and unfortunately it has stuck.

I almost always use my 2020 i5 8GB Ram, 512GB SSD Macbook Air on my lap or lying down and am on it all the time. Only time I hear the fan or feel heat is if I play a game or try and watch 4K 60 FPS Youtube video's in Chrome which stutter and don't play properly due to Apple and Google having a codec war.

The fan did come on a bit more during the first few days of owning this laptop, however I believe it was due to indexing etc. Yesterday I stress tested by using Safari, Watching a 1080p Youtube video in Chrome, and running Mail and Microsoft Word all at once and there wasn't one hint of a problem.

Max Tech seems like a well meaning guy, but the fact he recommends everyone upgrade to 16GB Ram shows what his use case is like. He does not represent the typical person who would buy a Macbook Air. Note that Youtube reviewers tend to do a lot of video editing due to their work which would not be a typical use case for a Macbook Air.

 

[spacegreybook]

Sent my 2020 MacBook Air i5/16/512 back. I found it to stutter/hang too often for my liking. I didn't even get too intense with it. Web browsing, productivity software (Microsoft 365), Spotify, email, video conferencing/screen sharing, and messaging were what I used it for. I thought it would be good enough for these tasks, but it just wasn't a smooth experience.

I saw many reports of high temperatures. A heated keyboard is actually a great feature because my hands get cold easily, so I was willing to overlook the temperatures as long as it performed acceptably! For me, it did not perform well enough.

Now typing from a 2020 MacBook Pro 10th gen i5/16/512. I'm much happier now.

 

[RiaKoobcam]

Yes the Air can get hot if you actually look at temps. The first few hours of using it I was thinking this laptop is extremely quiet and didn't hear any fans. After installing some of the apps to monitor I was suprised at the temp when running certain things, I thought it was much cooler because the case barely felt warm. Which is a good thing because even at 100c, the heat dissipation is very good and you wont really feel it. Even if fans are at 4-5k I can barely hear it. I think fan noise is greatly overblown in general, I guess most people have never had a loud windows laptop or desktop.

Beating a dead horse, lots of people will disagree with my subjective experience, but I returned my i5 because it was way hotter and louder than the 2019 version (externally and internally) for no noticeable performance gain day-to-day.

The reason I switched to the Macbook Air line in 2013 is because I was sick of hot, loud Windows laptops. I haven't seen too many reviews of people who've transitioned from previous gen Macbook Airs - it's mostly Pros.

Compared to a Windows laptop, the 2020 MBA may well be cool and quiet. For an older Macbook Pro, the same might be the true. But for a Macbook Air, it's demonstrably hotter and louder than what came before it, with pretty marginal performance gains. As everybody says, if you're doing sustained CPU loads, the Air will scale back power - you're better off with a Pro.

The 2020 i3 I replaced it with isn't too bad so we've kept it in the house - the only reason I'm not using it is because the power draw on Bootcamp is twice that of the MBA 2019 (bad drivers?).

I dunno, people buy computers for all sorts of different reasons. I buy Macbook Airs because I can take them anywhere, they're not lap roasters, and they don't annoy me with fan noise. I hope a 2021 MBA brings these factors back with more consistency, but who knows.

 

[ipos]

Does the performance surprise you for the base i3 Apple includes? I've seen a lot of YouTuber reviews recommending the nominal $ to upgrade to the i5 quad core.

depending on your usage, if it's for web surfing , watching movie and ms office. i3 will suffice.
an deciding whether to up the ram to 16gb
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I've had my MBA for just over a week. Does it get warm? Yes. Is it hot? Not really. It's cooler than my work issued HP. It's about what I would expect from a laptop.

did u used it on your lap?

 

[ElementOfStyle]

depending on your usage, if it's for web surfing , watching movie and ms office. i3 will suffice.
an deciding whether to up the ram to 16gb
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did u used it on your lap?

I do use it on my lap. I don't currently have a desk at home so most of my work is done from a big comfy chair in my living room. It was not uncomfortable or capable of physically hurting me. I do software development for a living and I've loaded my MBA to be a test bed for learning new technologies. While not going power user crazy with it by having two dozen things running at once, I do stretch its legs a bit. It does get warm. It is not warmer than my work issued HP. I will admit that this is my first Mac. So my experience with previous versions is nonexistant.

 

[joeybuckets]

I am still in see saw mode for what I am going to get. I been spending hours on reviews for the MBA Gen 10 and MBP Gen 10.

One thing I think is true. They all get hot when you push them, very hot. Thats not new news and that has been true on all my previous laptops. It just seems the reviewers (not all only a handful) expect the MBA not to get that hot doing compiling tasks. But the MBP (13"&16") gets as hot as well its just the output is more than the MBA so that's ok.

I placed my 4th order today but I will keep it to myself until it ships just incase I cancel like the last 3 times before 🙄

You should spend more then hours, maybe weeks or months. Make sure u make the right choice. And make sure u let us know what u choose. Pretty soon we will all be using AC as summer is shortly coming. The heat factor won't be an issue.

 

[IngerMan]

Make sure u make the right choice. And make sure u let us know what u choose. Pretty soon we will all be using AC as summer is shortly coming. The heat factor won't be an issue.

I placed an order yesterday with Apple for the MBA i7/16/512. It is at least 3 weeks out.

I spent $170 less then the new 13" MBP i5 Gen 10. The laptop is not my main machine, I have a nice setup with a Mac Mini and eGPU.

I have had a MBP since 2012 , 2011 refurb 15" then new 2016 TB 13" then back to refurb 2017 15".

I more so want a change then the same style of the last 5 years with Touch Bar.

I am familiar with MBA I had 2 of them before my first MBP and after my first White MB.

I think this will be a splendid machine for me.

 

[oilers780]

I placed an order yesterday with Apple for the MBA i7/16/512. It is at least 3 weeks out.

I spent $170 less then the new 13" MBP i5 Gen 10. The laptop is not my main machine, I have a nice setup with a Mac Mini and eGPU.

I have had a MBP since 2012 , 2011 refurb 15" then new 2016 TB 13" then back to refurb 2017 15".

I more so want a change then the same style of the last 5 years with Touch Bar.

I am familiar with MBA I had 2 of them before my first MBP and after my first White MB.

I think this will be a splendid machine for me.

The wait times are pretty lengthy right now for custom built MBAs. I think it's probably because of the virus hurting supply chains, especially since the Air is still so new too.