M3 8Gb worth £100 more?

[MrMister111]

Looking to get a laptop for normal day to say stuff nothing too taxing, may have to put Windows on via normal methods for certain stuff.

MBA M2 8Gb 256Gb SSD £749 new

MBA M2 8Gb 256Gb SSD £759 Apple refurb

MBA M2 8Gb 256Gb SSD £699 new

MBA M3 8Gb 256Gb SSD £849 new

MBA M2 (2024?) 16Gb 256Gb SSD £829 new.

Is there much difference between M2 and M3. I know more RAM is obviously better, and at last Apple starting with 16Gb in 2024, but is 8Gn decent for normal day to day use with the M series.

 

[raythompsontn]

but is 8Gn decent for normal day to day use with the M series.

Yes. It has worked for most users for a couple of years.

 

[HDFan]

may have to put Windows on via normal methods for certain stuff.

If running Windows 11 in a VM you will probably need at least 16 GB of memory. Just ran via Parallels and the minimum recommended configuration is 8 GB of RAM. That would be in addition to what you need for MacOS.

 

[acorntoy]

but is 8Gn decent for normal day to day use with the M series

For normal day to day use? Absolutely. Running a VM is absolutely not normal day to day use however, and will struggle with 8GB.

Considering the M2 Macbook Air is already known to thermal throttle relatively hard, the upgrade to the M3 will be much less beneficial than the 16GB of ram.

 

[Shirasaki]

Also 8GB is on the assumption that you don’t use or care about AI beyond occasional tinkering and playing with it. 16GB makes so much more sense for AI applications.

 

[HDFan]

Running a VM is absolutely not normal day to day use

It is for people needing apps that are not available on the Mac.

 

[geta]

Depends on how long you plan to keep it and if your basic usage changes down the road.

In any case, for the long run more RAM is more important than M2 vs M3.

 

[FreakinEurekan]

Looking to get a laptop for normal day to say stuff nothing too taxing,

Okay, no worries

may have to put Windows on via normal methods for certain stuff.

Well.... you're no longer on normal day-to-day 😬 once you start dealing with VMs, you're DEFINITELY gonna benefit from 16GB RAM

 

[krspkbl]

M2 vs M3 doesn't matter. RAM is way more important.

there's a reason apple bumped RAM up to 16GB. even Apple don't think it's enough anymore lol.

i wouldn't buy ANY computer in 2024 (almost 2025) with anything less than 16GB. i don't care if people are happy with 8GB. i wouldn't waste my money on it and neither would i recommend anyone else to.

also M series macs can't run Windows natively. I know Microsoft has an ARM version but i don't know how easy that is to install. If you want to run it in a VM then you NEED 16GB. If you can install it natively with the ARM version then if 8GB sucks for Mac then it's gonna be even worse on Windows 10/11.

 

[geta]

M2 vs M3 doesn't matter. RAM is way more important.

there's a reason apple bumped RAM up to 16GB. even Apple don't think it's enough anymore lol.

i wouldn't buy ANY computer in 2024 (almost 2025) with anything less than 16GB. i don't care if people are happy with 8GB. i wouldn't waste my money on it and neither would i recommend anyone else to.

also M series macs can't run Windows natively. I know Microsoft has an ARM version but i don't know how easy that is to install. If you want to run it in a VM then you NEED 16GB. If you can install it natively with the ARM version then if 8GB sucks for Mac then it's gonna be even worse on Windows 10/11.

Although it's on the lower side, for €300 max I'd consider having an M2/3 MBA with 8GB/512GB for basic use.

 

[agregson]

If your usage is light then 8/256 is fine. I have MBA M1 8/256 and use connected to ASD with no issues. A few safari tabs, mail, messages, terminal, development (admittedly in VIM) and a few other apps and no issues at all. Also have Mini M2 8/256 connected to Dell UHD and again no issues with similar workflow. Finally have M4 16/256 which was intended to replace the M1. While a super computer it feels similar to others for my usage.
So if you think your use is light buy as cheap as you can get at 8/256. Bonus is you will lose less if/when you sell/upgrade.

 

[RumorChaser]

More RAM is not necessarily better. There is a sweetspot where if you don't hit it you will suffer and if you have too much it doesn't give you anything more.

For you the perfect spot is 16GB. You can survive with 8 but you might suffer a bit when the processor is held back by having to load data from the slow SSD. We call that a bottleneck.

Also Windows on ARM is not and probably will never be supported natively on the Mac. You have to use it through a VM.