The new 2018 Macbook Air

[lowkey]

Who promised you one for $800?

1200$ for a rMBA is pretty steep when we were promised one for 800$. I just picked up a 2017 MBA for 650$ less than 6 months ago so at 1200$ I am thrilled with my 650$ purchase. It's amazing.

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I need to purchase a new laptop for my high school senior to take to college and was waiting until this event to see what Apple would offer. Assuming we have decided to go Mac, am I better off getting him the new Air or the 12" MacBook. The MB is $100 more but comes with a 256GB SSD vs the MBA's 128GB.

Is the 8GB of memory sufficient (on both the MB and MBA) or do I need to upgrade to 16GB?

How much storage space does the base OS take up? Is 128GB of storage enough?

Apple's upgrade prices for SSD are ridiculous, if he needs more space can I get him an external SSD (like the Samsung T3-- 500Gb for $100)?

What does he want? A bigger screen on the Air, or a super lightweight laptop in the MacBook.
Ive got an original bottom of the range Mackbook from 2015. The 256SSD is less than half full and I've never had any performance issues. Its really so light that it makes up for the slightly smaller screen imo.
[doublepost=1540977275][/doublepost]Adding a Retina display and leaving it as that would likely have crippled battery life. Thats why they have gone to 5w chips. Its generally aimed at college/general computing tasks. Most of the time 128GB is enough for that purpose.

All apple had to do was add a retina display and put this under $1,000 and I would've been happy. I knew that wasn't going to happen and they had to make this more in line with their current offerings. $1,300 plus for a 256 GB SSD configuration is way more then I would consider. I love my Air and honestly at this point I plan to keep this until it passes or maybe I'll consider a new laptop when Apple moves things over to it's own chips and away from Intel.

 

[RegularGuy09]

As for why they chose Amberlake? No idea, many Window laptops exist in that form factor with 15w CPU’s and they run great so it’s not to do with thermals. Window laptops have managed to get more battery life than Apple’s 12 hour on 15w CPU’s too so that isn’t the reason either.

I think there are a few things to consider here.

-Most Windows laptops provide a 1080p screen, while Apple's Retina display is quite a bit better than that and requires more power, and reduce battery life. So that's not a completely fair comparison.

-This has its TDP upped to 7W for extra performance - therefore it has a fan to reach this level of power draw and hopefully stay there without needing to throttle itself down. So it can sustain its performance.

The base 13" MBP having the 15w CPU, provides 10 hrs of battery life. The MBA(for probably slightly lesser performance) having the 7W processor, provides 2hrs extra battery life. Without gimping on the performance like the MacBook does because it doesnt have a fan.

Hopefully we see the benchmarks and reviews soon, and the real world performance difference is negligible, and MBA surprises us with its speed. It has faster SSD, and wifi. That will make a difference I hope. Do you know when the media people get the laptops for review?

Is it because there was a shortage of CPU’s and later on we will get the option of Whiskey Lake CPU’s? This could be the actual reason as we know these chips aren’t in great supply. It’s actively cooled so it is possible that Whiskey Lake upgrades come about in future, the chassis will support it. They couldn’t have put the KabyLakeR 8th gen CPU’s (8250/8550 etc) because they don’t have the integrated WiFi, it had to be Amber/Whiskey Lake

I think the best course of action here is to wait for the 2nd gen maybe, if you can afford to wait. Its best not to buy a first gen product, and they will probably improve the specs and maybe even the screen. Plus if you wait, you can get this model at a far bigger discount as well.

 

[Ma2k5]

I think there are a few things to consider here.

-Most Windows laptops provide a 1080p screen, while Apple's Retina display is quite a bit better than that and requires more power, and reduce battery life. So that's not a completely fair comparison.

-This has its TDP upped to 7W for extra performance - therefore it has a fan to reach this level of power draw and hopefully stay there without needing to throttle itself down. So it can sustain its performance.

The base 13" MBP having the 15w CPU, provides 10 hrs of battery life. The MBA(for probably slightly lesser performance) having the 7W processor, provides 2hrs extra battery life. Without gimping on the performance like the MacBook does because it doesnt have a fan.

Hopefully we see the benchmarks and reviews soon, and the real world performance difference is negligible, and MBA surprises us with its speed. It has faster SSD, and wifi. That will make a difference I hope. Do you know when the media people get the laptops for review?



I think the best course of action here is to wait for the 2nd gen maybe, if you can afford to wait. Its best not to buy a first gen product, and they will probably improve the specs and maybe even the screen. Plus if you wait, you can get this model at a far bigger discount as well.

There are a lot of Windows 1080p versions you are right, but there are also quite a few 4K and in between resolutions by several manufacturers using the same chip, while still getting very good battery life. I don't think you will gain a lot of battery life between a 7W and a 15W CPU to be honest, both are very efficient.

Also, the base 15W MBP, although rated at 10 hours, it is actually more (I did own one as well). I mean, the figures Apple gives I'd take with a grain of salt, because at one point in time, the TB had <50Wh battery capacity (2016/17) while the nTB had ~56Wh and of course a weaker CPU and no TB, but both were still rated at 10 hours .

I would expect the new Air to probably beat the 12 hour estimate giving it has a 50Wh battery and a 300 nit display. The old Air also lasts longer than Apple's estimates.

In some video playback battery tests, on 1080p and Whiskey Lake, I believe the Window laptops where able to get ~17+ hours of battery life (and you can make it higher if you make the loads lighter, HP managed to get 22 hours on a particular test?), so a higher resolution would maybe cut it back by 3-5 hours, which is still very respectable.

 

[RegularGuy09]

Interesting. I'm very excited and curious to see how this MBA performs in benchmarks and real day to day activities. On its own, and compared to the base MBP, the old MBA and the 12" MB.

 

[pubmsu]

so a higher resolution would maybe cut it back by 3-5 hours, which is still very respectable.

In the keynote, they mentioned 13 hrs iTunes playback IIRC...

 

[lockerc18]

I would agree except all the new premium Windows laptops have the 15w Whiskey Lake and insane battery life and are priced lower than this Air.

The 15w Whiskey Lake performance will dance all over the 5W Amber Lake.

The Whiskey Lake models also have more spectre/meltdown bug fixes at the hardware level than their Amber Lake series.

The Air is too close to the price of the Pro when you add the almost mandatory 256GB SSD, which is weird since it doesn’t have the cost of the Touch Bar, not the cost of the better CPU, nor the cost of a P3 500 nit display (only has a 300 nit SRGB).

Remember that premium Windows laptops run Windows. I'd take MacOS on a slower processor any day.

 

[Ma2k5]

Remember that premium Windows laptops run Windows. I'd take MacOS on a slower processor any day.

You missed the entire point. OS has nothing to do with limitiations of what Apple could do. It is not like macOS can't handle 15W CPU's in a chassis that Window's runs capably on.

The premise is this, if we remove OS from the equation, Apple are far behind in the laptop game, which is inexusable.

 

[Caspavio]

Interesting. I'm very excited and curious to see how this MBA performs in benchmarks and real day to day activities. On its own, and compared to the base MBP, the old MBA and the 12" MB.

got this off a youtube video



I am waiting to see if the 3rd gen butterfly keyboard is as bad as the previous one. if it is, i would just buy a refurbished 2017 MBP

 

[Ma2k5]

got this off a youtube video

View attachment 799914

Has the wrong CPU (should be i5-8210Y), not sure how that bench mark works.

 

[Caspavio]

Has the wrong CPU (should be i5-8210Y), not sure how that bench mark works.

not sure. but on intel's website, 8210 is 7W TDP, so 8200 may be right

 

[Ma2k5]

not sure. but on intel's website, 8210 is 7W TDP, so 8200 may be right

The new MacBook Air's use the 7W 8210.

The 8200 can't handle 2133mhz RAM, nor does it have the correct clock speeds advertised by Apple.

 

[SLM9555]

I am upgrading to the new MBA 256/16 from my Mid 2012 MBA 256/8 and Core i7 2.0.

Do you think I will see a considerable performance improvement? I use the computer for regular office and business tasks.

 

[antonis]

I was hoping for a BTO option for a quad core cpu. Sadly, I cannot use it as it is.

 

[Caspavio]

The new MacBook Air's use the 7W 8210.

The 8200 can't handle 2133mhz RAM, nor does it have the correct clock speeds advertised by Apple.

oops sorry my bad. i keep thinking it's 5w, just keep seeing 15w and 5w being mentioned.

 

[lockerc18]

You missed the entire point. OS has nothing to do with limitiations of what Apple could do. It is not like macOS can't handle 15W CPU's in a chassis that Window's runs capably on.

The premise is this, if we remove OS from the equation, Apple are far behind in the laptop game, which is inexusable.

I don't think I did miss the point. Could Apple do more, and produce a more powerful Air, at a lower price? Maybe. But a system isn't just the hardware. You can't remove the operating system from it and still call it a "system". That is particularly true for Apple, who integrates the OS with the hardware so tightly. The OS and the hardware are part and parcel the same package. Windows isn't.

Would you say that the Windows user interface and semantics are better than MacOS's? Probably not. Would it matter what kind of hardware was underneath it? Unless you were doing some computational or storage intensive workloads, not really. The user experience of a Mac is far superior than that of a Windows system, irrespective of the underlying hardware.

I will point out one experience I had with hardware which did make a difference, though. I had a MBP which had a SATA SSD in it. When I changed to a MBP with a PCIe SSD in it, I was really surprised about the performance difference. Same OS level, same apps, same RAM. It was the PCIe interface that made a difference. Would a 15W processor make that same kind of difference over a 5W? I don't think so.

 

[Ma2k5]

I don't think I did miss the point. Could Apple do more, and produce a more powerful Air, at a lower price? Maybe.

That's all that you had to say, we are just saying, Apple should do more.

And yes, a 15W quad core CPU would make a huge difference compared to a 7W dual core.

Also your SSD argument is non-sequitar. A better example is if they regressed to using SATA for the new MacBook Air with the excuse of making it cheaper - when Windows laptops are available with PCIE for low cost.

 

[lockerc18]

That's all that you had to say, we are just saying, Apple should do more.

And yes, a 15W quad core CPU would make a huge difference compared to a 7W dual core.

Also your SSD argument is non-sequitar. A better example is if they regressed to using SATA for the new MacBook Air with the excuse of making it cheaper - when Windows laptops are available with PCIE for low cost.

But then you wouldn't have an Air. You'd have a MBP.

Apple designed the Air for a specific set of users who want a specific set of features at a specific price point. Heavyweight computing wasn't part of this. Lightweight processing is the target here. You don't need 4 cores for that.

Higher end processors are more expensive, and require more battery and cooling. Those go against the design points for an Air. The are a lot of things Apple could have done differently with the new Air, but if you want more power, it's not the system for you.

I have a 2017 15 inch MBP with a 2.8 GHz i7 processor, 16 GB RAM, and 256GB SSD. That's a lot of system. I'm thinking of trading it in for a new Air. Why? Because I don't use it for the kind of work that would require all this capacity. I'm not a developer (any more, anyway), and I don't do video editing or other resource intensive work. I'm a writer, and the Air is the perfect platform for that, especially the new one.

But I'll close out by saying again that the people don't buy computers only because they have specific hardware features like a 4 core processor. Almost all users buy a computer for the overall system experience. You can't separate out the OS or apps from that. Especially for Air buyers, they don't care about 2 or 4 cores. MBP buyers might.

 

[Ma2k5]

But then you wouldn't have an Air. You'd have a MBP.

Apple designed the Air for a specific set of users who want a specific set of features at a specific price point. Heavyweight computing wasn't part of this. Lightweight processing is the target here. You don't need 4 cores for that.

Higher end processors are more expensive, and require more battery and cooling. Those go against the design points for an Air. The are a lot of things Apple could have done differently with the new Air, but if you want more power, it's not the system for you.

I have a 2017 15 inch MBP with a 2.8 GHz i7 processor, 16 GB RAM, and 256GB SSD. That's a lot of system. I'm thinking of trading it in for a new Air. Why? Because I don't use it for the kind of work that would require all this capacity. I'm not a developer (any more, anyway), and I don't do video editing or other resource intensive work. I'm a writer, and the Air is the perfect platform for that, especially the new one.

But I'll close out by saying again that the people don't buy computers only because they have specific hardware features like a 4 core processor. Almost all users buy a computer for the overall system experience. You can't separate out the OS or apps from that. Especially for Air buyers, they don't care about 2 or 4 cores. MBP buyers might.

The old Air had a 15w CPU... nothing we were hoping for would make it any less an Air. They instead made something in between a MacBook and the old MacBook Air.

As for heat, cost or battery life, like I said, multiple laptops already disprove this notion that it can’t be done with the 15W Whiskey Lake CPU’s, even the old 15W Kaby Lake managed it, imagine these new and efficient chips?

 

[lockerc18]

The old Air had a 15w CPU... nothing we were hoping for would make it any less an Air. They instead made something in between a MacBook and the old MacBook Air.

As for heat, cost or battery life, like I said, multiple laptops already disprove this notion that it can’t be done with the 15W Whiskey Lake CPU’s, even the old 15W Kaby Lake managed it, imagine these new and efficient chips?

I'm not saying it couldn't be done. I'm saying it's not what the Air is designed for.

You need to think more about market segmentation and customer targeting, which is what defines product features and pricing. Don't concentrate so much on technical nice-to-haves. And think about it from an overall systems viewpoint, too. Having the latest processor doesn't help if you run a crap OS on it. THAT was what my original comment was about.

 

[Ma2k5]

I'm not saying it couldn't be done. I'm saying it's not what the Air is designed for.

You need to think more about market segmentation and customer targeting, which is what defines product features and pricing. Don't concentrate so much on technical nice-to-haves. And think about it from an overall systems viewpoint, too. Having the latest processor doesn't help if you run a crap OS on it. THAT was what my original comment was about.

Calling Windows a crap OS is child like, honestly. I make a six figure salary doing dev work on Windows, something tells me if it was a crap OS, no one would be willing to pay so much for people to develop on the platform, and it’s a damn lot of people!

Secondly, it’s not me, but Apple, who need to think about market segmentation because their product lineup is a mess, something even diehard fans can’t deny.

Thirdly, nice to haves? Come on now. At that price, it’s insulting to call them nice to haves. If this was priced £200-£250 lower, I could have accepted it for what it is, but it’s overpriced and way too close to TB prices. I think a lot of people buying this won’t be aware of the CPU (they just read i5) or the 300 nit screen (they just read Retina). Yes Apple will be able to sell these, but all the criticism on this board is more than justified.

It’s not even about affordability, I would have happily paid £2k+ if it had what the Windows competitors have.

 

[lockerc18]

Calling Windows a crap OS is child like, honestly.

Secondly, it’s not me, but Apple, who need to think about market segmentation because their product lineup is a mess, something even diehard fans can’t deny.

Thirdly, nice to haves? Come on now. At that price, it’s insulting to call them nice to haves. If this was priced £200-£250 lower, I could have accepted it for what it is.

Yes, there is some overlap in their product offerings, and that needs to be cleaned up.

Don't call me child like. I've worked on DOS / Windows (and OS/2) since the days of the original IBM PC. And on many other systems before that. Compared to MacOS, Windows 10 lacks a lot. Sure, the various versions of Windows still have a 90+ percent market share, and it's hard to beat that. But from a usability and management standpoint, IMO, MacOS is far better. I switched to Mac because I couldn't stand the Win8 interface, and I've never looked back.

Windows is a Computationally Regressive Anachronistic Program. No doubt about it.

 

[Ma2k5]

Yes, there is some overlap in their product offerings, and that needs to be cleaned up.

Don't call me child like. I've worked on DOS / Windows (and OS/2) since the days of the original IBM PC. And on many other systems before that. Compared to MacOS, Windows 10 lacks a lot. Sure, the various versions of Windows still have a 90+ percent market share, and it's hard to beat that. But from a usability and management standpoint, IMO, MacOS is far better. I switched to Mac because I couldn't stand the Win8 interface, and I've never looked back.

Windows is a Computationally Regressive Anachronistic Program. No doubt about it.

Windows 8 wasn’t their best moment, but I’ve probably got more pro’s than cons for Windows 10, as opposed to macOS last couple of years. People sometimes just like to throw around stuff like “unix OS”, “Microsoft Version of Java”, “Omg register system” to dismiss Windows 10 in a child like fashion. Then there are those who dismiss Powershell altogether and praise the terminal like it is the second coming of Jesus.

Usability and management on Windows 10 isn’t rocket science nor is it so much better on macOS. I get people will have preferences, but productivity wise, there is nothing stopping you being very productive on a Windows machine unless you don’t know what you are doing.

Windows has issues, but let’s not pretend macOS is any more perfect. There is a reason many jumped off both to go to Linux.

 

[Elwe]

One of the notable capabilities I am just considering for this little portable machine now is as a quick scrubbing and massive 2D visualization that we do.

I think the single 5k display connection is getting most of the press, and fine. That is a great capability. But for those that use two 4k monitors, this relatively cheap laptop could be use for some serious visualization. I am not aware of any other thin/light machine that can really do this, and have the added high throughput IO capabilities because of splitters and docks. Everyone I know here just uses the Macbook Pro or Dell XPS 15 or something like this. But if the graphics subsystem and OS can really keep up on this 2D stuff . . . that is really significant cost savings.

 

[RegularGuy09]

What kind of performance can we expect from the UHD617 in the new Air? Is it as good as the UHD620?

I heard somewhere the UHD615 has worse performance than the HD6000 of the older Air...is that true?

 

[Populus]

@RegularGuy09 I'm eager to see the first reviews, to see what's the graphical and overall performance of the new Air, when does it trigger its fan, how much noise does it... But mainly thermals and performance.