Oh then 256GB will do. 8GB should work but not sure how webpages etc. will grow in terms of memory usage in the future. If you plan to keep it for more than 3 years, I would suggest 16GB, assuming to constraint on budget.
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Base Model MacBook Air With M2 Chip Has Slower SSD Speeds in Benchmarks
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Buying a Mac has never been about capabilities. Very few, if any, of the tasks done on a Mac can't be done using Windows, Linux and probably ChromeOS too.
It's about HOW you do those tasks and how you FEEL.
Should've clarified, I store the data locally, media etc. is in the cloud.
I don't do "big" data such that I would need to use a cloud computing service, but big enough that a big reason I'm purchasing is to improve compiling speeds relative to my 2014 MBP ☠️
No, because I have been using cloud storage services since around 2009.
Even if I got an MacBook Air with 2Tb of storage, I would still use iCloud Drive.
Being an Apple customer isn't about saving money, but about exchanging money for convenience.
The 256GB SSDs in the M1 computers were around 20% slower than the 512 and larger and no one seemed to need that called out on their site.
Well this is unfortunate. Why would they do this other than to cut costs for themselves? These are 1300 dollar laptops. This is seriously inexcusable. It's not like Apple is hurting in this economic climate. Even with everything going on, they keep managing record quarters. I love Apple products, but this isn't cool.
I don't agree about ChromeOS at all though. That is a very restricting and terrible OS.
Yeah. It's literally about how you "feel". I "feel" at home on macOS. Whenever I try to go back to Windows, the whole UI and flow and lack of continuity between interface elements and applications makes it awful to use. macOS has a design language that's locked in that makes it a joy to use across any app. Sure, gaming is cool on Windows, but I've since decided to just keep gaming to my PS5 and everything else on my Mac. I've been using Windows for a long time and I can pretty much solve any issue that arises with the OS, but I don't want to get on my computer to diagnose something. I want to get on my computer to use it.
I don't agree about ChromeOS at all though. That is a very restricting and terrible OS.
That's because higher capacity SSDs are always faster than lower capacity SSDs. That's not what's being discussed here. It's same spec hardware being half as slow as same spec hardware.
But the 1.4x number has a footnote to it. Number 3. Look at their main web page: https://www.apple.com/macbook-air-m2/
They increased the performance of the CPU, screen, and charging system without your needing to upgrade to the higher-end model.
Apple doesn't provide performance numbers for SSDs, so you can't know how fast or slow they're are. If the specific performance number for the SSD is important to you, you can't really buy Macs since Apple doesn't provide those numbers.
It's like RAM with iPhones and iPads. You have no idea if they come with less, equal or more RAM than the previous models.
The up to 1.4x faster is for the M2 SoC when you look at Apple's webpage. It's a different component than the SSD storage. The number has nothing to with the SSD.
Would you also assume that your Wifi is up to 1.4x faster?
I’d buy that argument if it weren’t for being in a pandemic with severe parts shortages worldwide. Unless someone can point to evidence this was due to Apple cheapening out, I put it down to the pandemic and that contamination problem in February at two Western Digital factories that destroyed trillions of gigabytes of flash storage. Also two chips are generally cheaper than one, so wasn’t Apple going cheap in the M1 models by using two instead of one?
Where’s the evidence Apple using one chip is actually cheaper than two when historically that isn’t so? I’ve built over 100 PC’s in my time and I find myself always filling four banks of 8GB instead of two 16GB because the two 16GB were outrageously expensive when I was going for 32GB. Or if I were going for 16GB total, I’d buy four 4GB sticks instead of two 8GB sticks because it’s a lot cheaper. Where’s anyone’s evidence that two 128GB are more expensive than one 256GB chip? Having bought a lot of flash and RAM over the years, I’m skeptical this was done as a cost savings, but more likely as a parts shortage problem because historically, it costs more to use one chip than two.
I would be annoyed by this issue if it weren’t for a worldwide shortage on chips. As it is, custom configurations are a month or two out even on older Macs due to shortages. Imagine if Apple said, we’ll move back to two chips, but you’ll have to wait three months to get your machine instead of one month, And we’ll have to raise our prices more because we couldn’t get our hands on enough 128GB chips. It’s far more likely Apple knows they need far more base units than upgraded units, so they had to make do with what storage they could get their hands on. Their 256GB units outsell their 512GB by 3-1. If they couldn’t get enough 128’s, wouldn’t it be natural to use 256’s? Everyone else has suffered similar shortages, so why do people think Apple’s immune?
MaxTech found one source for cheap Chinese parts for $2 and leaped to the conclusion Apple pays $2 for theirs or less because they found one source of crappy parts that nobody would touch with a 10-foot pole except to put in their child’s Science Fair project and not in an actual commercial product. Well, you get what you pay for and I seriously doubt Apple’s paying $2 for flash. That “cheap” 256GB chip still runs faster than most computers at 1500Mbps, so no, Apple’s not going cheap. Going cheap would be using two 128GB chips running at 500Mbps.
Then customers should change their assumptions because clearly they're wrong.
Exactly this. My M1 Max with 1TB SSD is slower than my friend’s with 8TB.
Apple is marketing the Air and the Pro to different people, and Apple thinks that MBA buyers prioritize those first four things over raw performance. It might the be fourth thing on the M2BA's page, but it's the second thing on the M2BP's page with the first thing being an intro blurb. To be frank, people who value raw performance first really shouldn't be getting a base Air anyways.
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People have been buying iMacs with 5400rpm drives all the way until 2019... And I'm not even making this up. That was the apotheosis of absurd.
I remember fanboys defending those on Macrumors as well
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If I see a performance claim with "up to" I'm already sceptical. If it has a footnote I will read the footnote. When the footnote mentions a configuration I'm not buying I'm getting even more sceptical and I'll take a look at the technical specification.
MacBook Air 13- and 15-inch with M4 Chip - Tech Specs
See all technical specifications for the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Air with M4 chip.
www.apple.com
And there Apple doesn't mention anything about performance for SSD at all.
If such performance is important to me, then I would inquire further and if I can't the information I need, I won't buy the machine.
Every other customers should do the same if not more.
That's crazy. It's been forever since I had my first SSD. And there would be a 0% chance I'd ever go back to magnetic.
The source is my own direct experience. I have an M1 Air with 8GB of RAM and I'm able to do all kinds of things on it, and very smoothly. I also had the last Intel i5 Air, pretty much an identical machine also with 8GB RAM. The i5 Air was dog slow by comparison. I also rather doubt, given all the heat and general sweatiness of the Intel machine, that it would've been a competitor to the M1 even with 16 GB of RAM.
Who cares? The basic question is whether an M1 MacBook provides a good user experience with 8GB of RAM, and it most definitely does. If a user has a burning need for a lot more RAM, it's available to spec, but the machine is quite zippy with the base config.
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If that's not acceptable for a customer then it becomes a requirement. They should then check before they buy and then don't buy if the requirement isn't fulfilled.
The problem I have is they shouldn't assume this is the case since it is clearly wrong and has been many times in the real world.
To be pedantic, although the overall capacity is the same, it’s not the same spec hardware. One is 2 x 128gb and the other is 1 x 256gb. The only ’solution’ to this is to continue to use 2 x 128gb or make the base storage 2 x 256gb.
I get “up to 1 Gbps” from my ISP. Realistically I only get max 750. It’s just marketing. Some workflow will be 1.4x. Some will be 0.5x. Some will be slower. It’s UP…..UP to 1.4x.
Not really. They’re exploiting the issue for clicks. They’ve made FOURTEEN videos on the MacBook Pro 13” M2 and in the video two days ago, Vadim ”apologized” for over-emphasizing the negatives and utterly ignoring the positives, yet in the video immediately following up that apology, they start their video with a clip of Steve Jobs saying Apple doesn’t ship junk and they wish Jobs were still in charge. Essentially they reversed their apology by outright calling a machine that overall is faster than the M1 version junk. Now today, yet ANOTHER video with the 13” MBP. They had one video trying to push positives but then went right back to trashing it.
Normally, I like MaxTech’s thoroughness and like their videos, but on this issue they’ve jumped the shark in the interest of clicks. They come up with severe edge cases that 99% of people would never do and create an overheating and throttling problem that doesn’t exist and they overhype the storage issue with over a dozen videos on the machine. Seriously, how many people do 8K Red Raw editing on an entry-level machine? If they’d mentioned it a couple of times, I’d consider it to be decent information, but in multiple forums, I’ve seen normal users who do nothing more than web browse or run MS Word panic about buying a base unit because they’ve heard it’s incapable of handling their work flow and might overheat in the process. That’s the damage MaxTech has done to the product with their overhyping. Apple doesn’t care. They’re laughing all the way to the bank with people upgrading their RAM and storage unnecessarily or buying M1 Pro 14” MBP’s. Maybe Max and Vadim will get a bonus check from Apple for services rendered.
We have a hyperbole flood happening in the thread.
Benchmark testing is not really equitable to real world daily usage. So what if the tests shows the speed slightly slower under clinical testing conditions. I seriously doubt the majority of people will even notice in day to day usage. The Air line is made for your average consumer that is not tryin to make a living editing videos or making YouTube videos etc. People need to stop treating benchmarks as the totality of the Mac. It is far from it.
Apple never promised x speed in every situation with their drives. That rhetoric comes from forums like this, far too many people inject their own logical fallacy argument and then act as if Apple has let them down for not living up to the logical fallacy argument.
Benchmark testing is not really equitable to real world daily usage. So what if the tests shows the speed slightly slower under clinical testing conditions. I seriously doubt the majority of people will even notice in day to day usage. The Air line is made for your average consumer that is not tryin to make a living editing videos or making YouTube videos etc. People need to stop treating benchmarks as the totality of the Mac. It is far from it.
Apple never promised x speed in every situation with their drives. That rhetoric comes from forums like this, far too many people inject their own logical fallacy argument and then act as if Apple has let them down for not living up to the logical fallacy argument.