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Who is keeping 15" Air?
- Thread starter kp98077
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Let us know how the new unit goes. I returned mine a couple days ago and I'm gonna wait about three weeks and get another one. I wasn't happy about the trackpad issue.
Oh really? Why are you waiting 3 weeks?
I’m suppose to get it later this week
Still have 14 pro on my mind too 🤔😀
Mine is perfect, they should've had this model out years ago.
I've been using one this past week instead of my 14" MBP and let's be honest, the objective differences between them are clear for all to see.
If you want/need more ports; sustained flat-out performance; the fastest chips and the screen for HDR content, the MBP is the one for you.
If you want/need more ports; sustained flat-out performance; the fastest chips and the screen for HDR content, the MBP is the one for you.
- It is really nice to have a larger screen Mac laptop at last and not have to spend the money on a 16" MBP with its form factor
- Like the 13" version, the Air feels so much lighter and portable than the MBP, but I've still no idea why. It is a very nice machine to use on the move - easily pick it up with one hand; feels solid and doesn't have the heft of the Pro
- The speakers are much better than I thought they'd be - although it's still weird not seeing the grilles. I don't often use the speakers, but these sound nearly as good as the other Mac laptops - the 16" is still in a class of its own though
- The screen is nice, more than bright enough, but side by side with the MBP you can see the difference. You quickly forget the difference though unless you're switching from one to the other regularly
- I find the larger deck with room for your palms very comfortable to use
- It stays so cool, all the time. My 14" Pro is a Max and it doesn't seem to take much to get the base of that one a bit toasty
- Battery life is noticeably better on the Air
- It's only a cm or so smaller in width and depth than the 16" MBP, so on a desk with limited space, you still have that to contend with
You might be right about this. I didn't have as much time setting up the work 14" and when the dust settles it may be more similar.
Has that? Don’t think so because we have an M2 air which doesn’t have those issues. Not sure how your sww it as a lost cause getting what you paid for ?
If that's all you read in the paragraph, you need to read a little bit more. I'm sure many of us were using the previous LCD panels for the past 10 years before Apple introduced the mini-LED on 2021 MacBook Pros. Last I checked, Apple still sells LCD displays used in the 13 and 15 in MacBooks, as well as for the 27 inch Studio display. So, yeah, a Mini-LED screen is not that crucial to have, yes, its nice to have, but not detrimental.
I do notice a difference. First I thought the pro is sort of too warm and reddish tinted but after some testing and disabling and enableing all the auto adjust/night shift modes and checking actual white points. They are identical.
What was different is that the 15" Air had reduce transparency turned on and the pro did not. With this on/off the grey and ui stuff just changes and looks quite different. But match the settings and there is no discernable difference. I find I prefer the reduce transparency on. It probably costs performance and does not add anything, it actually looks more wrong with stuff that should be grey being redish tinted.
Also luminance on just some HDR image of google is not different when it does not actually engage HDR. The reds/yellows/blues and how saturated they are is identical.
Clarity I don't notice a difference to me both got high enough resolution. I do use the 15" at default and am super happy with that on the 14" I cannot decide whether I prefer more space or default. Text size seems the same on default.
I would check if you got actually the same settings. Reduce transparency was enabled on the Air, possibly because that notebook I timemachine copied from my old Intel while the Pro I just used entirely fresh without any backups (work notebook). I spend 30m trying to find any sort of content (SDR Web content) to see a color difference and found none. Just enable night shift or auto adjust and that changes either display a fair bit but disable them all and it is to me at least not discernable which one is more or less on any specific color. White point is to my eye also identical or very close, just being a bit of angle changes more than the difference between the two.
Here they tested the Air professionally and the Pro
Apple MacBook Air 15 2023 M2 im Test - Das Alltags-MacBook jetzt in 15 Zoll
Notebookcheck testet das neue Apple MacBook Air 15 mit dem M2-SoC und 16 GB RAM.
www.notebookcheck.com
Apple MacBook Pro 14 2023 im Test - Der M2 Pro wird im kleinen MacBook Pro eingebremst
Notebookcheck testet das brandneue MacBook Pro 14 mit dem M2 Pro, 32 GB RAM und dem 120-Hz Mini-LED-Panel.
www.notebookcheck.com
Obiously contrast is better on the Pro the Air's screen is quite good and you only really notice that when it is a bit darker in the room or in full darkness. But sitting in full darkness I still preferred the Air to the Pro just because of its size for youtube watching. But here the pro would win handsdown if you actually watch some nice movie, but the Air is still quite usable where some bad IPS woud be just grey ugly things. Black bars are not fully black but at least very dark and not some light grey as I have seen elsewhere. For just coding too much contrast isn't that good anyway as one can see in most Jetbrains(dracular) or VSCode(dark) color schemes which put text not no black background but some dark grey/blue/brown. For coding the MiniLED has zero benefit.
I actually almost prefer the IPS displays over the Mini LED ones. And I mean, I'm not sure that there is really a good logical reason for that. The Mini LED display is better in nearly every way, but something about the differences in the way the backlight works just feels a little bit strange to my eyes. I'm still having to get used to it.
It's namely when I'm doing stuff in dark mode (editing code with small font sizes when VSCode has a dark background, working with terminal windows, etc). The display "feels dimmer" than the IPS ones do, which has me turning up the brightness. But then, as soon as I switch back over to a light window, the screen is too bright.
It's a very minor complaint, and frankly the HDR quality on the Mini LED ones blows the IPS display out of the park.
It's namely when I'm doing stuff in dark mode (editing code with small font sizes when VSCode has a dark background, working with terminal windows, etc). The display "feels dimmer" than the IPS ones do, which has me turning up the brightness. But then, as soon as I switch back over to a light window, the screen is too bright.
It's a very minor complaint, and frankly the HDR quality on the Mini LED ones blows the IPS display out of the park.
I heard many people saying that Macbook Pro 14 is better than a specced-up Air 15. Nevertheless, I chose an Air 15 with 24GB RAM/1TB SSD because:
1. I'll never benefit from the GPU power of the Pro, so I value the longer battery life of the Air more than the power of the Pro;
2. The larger screen on the Air is more important for me than the HDR and the promotion of the Pro;
3. the portability of the Air is more important for me than many ports on the Pro;
4. For my workflow 16GB RAM is quite tight, but I would not need 32GB RAM in the foreseeable future. So the Air's 24GB RAM option, which is cheaper than the 32GM RAM option, is nice. 14” M2 Pro with 32GB/1TB is way more expensive than my Air;
5. The only thing I would miss is the Pro's capacity for more external displays, but currently I'm using only one external monitor anyway.
1. I'll never benefit from the GPU power of the Pro, so I value the longer battery life of the Air more than the power of the Pro;
2. The larger screen on the Air is more important for me than the HDR and the promotion of the Pro;
3. the portability of the Air is more important for me than many ports on the Pro;
4. For my workflow 16GB RAM is quite tight, but I would not need 32GB RAM in the foreseeable future. So the Air's 24GB RAM option, which is cheaper than the 32GM RAM option, is nice. 14” M2 Pro with 32GB/1TB is way more expensive than my Air;
5. The only thing I would miss is the Pro's capacity for more external displays, but currently I'm using only one external monitor anyway.
There is always the ultrawide option too. Honestly, I think prefer it over the dual monitor setups for external screens.
Yes, that's very true. But the reality is that the ultrawide option is very limited when it comes to the retina level ppi.
That’s probably the pwm or dithering bothering you. I know what you mean and it’s the reason I won’t buy a mini led panel. I constantly feel it’s just too bright and then just too dark. It’s the flickering that’s causing that feeling.
i still have a MacBook Pro 15” 2017 I basically just use to export pictures from Lightroom and keep them organised.
I have an iPad 11” M2 in which I edit the pictures most of the time.
I was thinking of getting a new MacBook Pro with the M2 because I thought they were coming in 3nm, but as they’re not, I’ll stay with my MacBook a bit longer, and replace the battery and repaste cpu/gpu.
But when I decide to buy the new one I’ll have the same thoughts as I have now: is the pro worth it for Lightroom/capture one? I’d love the better screen, but will it be noticeably quicker editing/exporting pictures?
I’m used to 15” and I wouldn’t like to go smaller, and the pro 16” is too thick and too expensive.
I’d love the hdmi port though, the sd slot I don’t care as I use Cfexpress 99% of the time.
I have an iPad 11” M2 in which I edit the pictures most of the time.
I was thinking of getting a new MacBook Pro with the M2 because I thought they were coming in 3nm, but as they’re not, I’ll stay with my MacBook a bit longer, and replace the battery and repaste cpu/gpu.
But when I decide to buy the new one I’ll have the same thoughts as I have now: is the pro worth it for Lightroom/capture one? I’d love the better screen, but will it be noticeably quicker editing/exporting pictures?
I’m used to 15” and I wouldn’t like to go smaller, and the pro 16” is too thick and too expensive.
I’d love the hdmi port though, the sd slot I don’t care as I use Cfexpress 99% of the time.
That would explain it. It otherwise doesn't really bother my eyes, it definitely doesn't give me eye strain or headaches. It just has taken some getting used to more than anything, particularly when using apps or websites that have dark backgrounds.
Apparently you're right, the new Mini LED ones have a much lower frequency of PWM than the LCD ones do (although both seem to be fairly good by industry standards).
I have a degree in neuroscience... the PWM frequency of 15kHz is way beyond anything the human eye can perceive. The neurons in your retina have a firing (spike) rate way below even 1kHz and typically no more than a few hundred Hz. The PWM frequency doesn't even make it past the first layer of your visual system.
What's more likely happening is you're sensitive to the extremely high contrast of the Mini LED displays. Especially with Apple's industry-leading antireflective coating, you have parts of the display that are like black holes for light with almost zero brightness pure black, with other parts running at 500 nits or more. That might cause eye strain if your pupils open wide to compensate, making the white parts too bright.
You can easily test that theory by installing BetterDisplay and using the Image Adjustment feature to increase the overall "brightness" of the screen (in old TV terminology) so that black levels are raised and become grey / slightly off black.
What's more likely happening is you're sensitive to the extremely high contrast of the Mini LED displays. Especially with Apple's industry-leading antireflective coating, you have parts of the display that are like black holes for light with almost zero brightness pure black, with other parts running at 500 nits or more. That might cause eye strain if your pupils open wide to compensate, making the white parts too bright.
You can easily test that theory by installing BetterDisplay and using the Image Adjustment feature to increase the overall "brightness" of the screen (in old TV terminology) so that black levels are raised and become grey / slightly off black.
I've settled on a single monitor setup until Apple do an ultra wide (which will never happen) or they make a larger than 27" monitor with built-in speakers and webcam.
You ended up with the 14 m2 right? I’m listening to the neuroscientist lol - given I can’t decide!