MacBook Air M3 analysis: continuous, but for most it’s the best laptop

If I put MacBook Air M2 next to the new one MacBook Air with chip M3 which was just released, they are indistinguishable from each other. The external design is absolutely the same. There are no differences in its components, keyboard, size, weight, material, screen quality, ports. Nothing. They are exactly the same. Its only significant change – since there are other minor ones – is on the inside.

This is a trend we’ve seen with Apple hardware in recent years. Now that the company has control of the chips in its Macs again, they can iterate and improve more often without having to change the external design of the device. For example, Mac Studio M1 Max/Ultra is the same as Mac Studio M2 Max/Ultra. Same with the MacBook Pro M1 Pro/Max, M2 Pro/Max or M3 Pro/Max. The latter with a slight difference in the form of a new color.

If it works, why change it, right? Overall I agree with the premise. Although I would like to see some changes in MacBook Air, especially with the screen and its brightness. But I also appreciate the previous models. Although making this observation in 2022 is not the same as making it in 2024, is it?

But regardless of the external design, the MacBook Air is still the best laptop for most people in my opinion.. It is lightweight, powerful, has great battery life, a fairly good screen and great durability. In addition, when using macOS We get rid of hundreds of common Windows problems, especially among non-technical users. It offers a high level of security, is privacy-focused, and guarantees multi-year operating system updates.

Apple is targeting this update at Intel-powered MacBook Air users or those with a PC. If you have a MacBook Air M2, I don’t think there’s much point in changing it, but in any other case, if you’re looking for a new laptop, there’s a good chance that this is the one you’re looking for. However, there are many more comments about this update.

Many similarities and many differences

But although they are not visible from the outside, there are some differences inside. The move to the M3 chip offers some new features, the most important, besides performance, being the ability to connect two external monitors and close the laptop lid. A very welcome improvement for those who use the MacBook Air as their main computer but prefer to have a desktop computer in the office, for example.

In addition to this, the M3 offers Wi-Fi 6E – a newer, faster version – hardware accelerated ray tracing and AV1 video decoding. The first allows certain types of applications, especially 3D design and modeling, to run much faster. The second allows you to watch videos on the Internet, saving energy and significantly increasing the autonomy of the MacBook Air. The AV1 format is used by platforms such as YouTube, Netflix, Instagram, Facebook, Twitch and many others.

So, with one internal change, you can improve performance in certain applications, increase connection speeds in certain conditions, and enjoy video content on platforms for longer. This is not bad at all.

continuous exterior

The MacBook Air M3’s appearance is discontinuous, but it performs well. Apple has found the sweet spot between ultra-light weight, ultra-thin design, without sacrificing keyboard comfort, screen size, battery life or power. So I’m not surprised they keep the look.

Everything we said about the 13-inch or 15-inch MacBook Air with the M2 chip also applies to the M3 models. It’s easy to carry in a backpack, just as comfortable to work with, with a good keyboard, a good quality Retina screen, and a very good trackpad. It is no coincidence that this is one of the most successful laptops in history in all its versions.

The MacBook Air M3, like the M2 version, retains the wedge-shaped design that has characterized the laptop for many years. In effect, the discontinuation of the M1 model ended a slightly triangular era. Forever? Hopefully not, and at some point in the future it will return.

But at the same time, I wish the MacBook Air was more like this even thinner 12-inch MacBook, with a design that would ideally be classified as deliciousworthy of a three Michelin star restaurant. A lot has happened since those days, and Apple could very well take many of today’s technologies and innovations and apply them to an even thinner and smaller version of the laptop. With a better keyboard and Apple Silicon processor, it would be close to perfection.

For now I have to “limit myself” – well, quotes because that’s an exaggeration – to the 13- and 15-inch models, but that doesn’t mean they’re bad. This is by design Very good, because there aren’t as many compromises here as there were back then with that 12-inch MacBook. And we all know that on teams like these, it’s better for form to follow function, not the other way around.

Apple says the dark blue color of the MacBook Air M3 is less fingerprint-attractive than before. To achieve this, they applied a color process similar to the space black of the new MacBook Pro M3. In practice, this is true, and there is a difference, but hand marks are still visible on the laptop body. Less noticeable, but they are still there.

And there’s nothing better than a laptop where form follows function, with a continuous yet circular design. I end the same way I started: why change something that works so well?

Performance MacBook Air M3

Apple is targeting the MacBook Air M3 for people looking to upgrade from the older Intel-based Air model or PC. If you have the M2 version, this version doesn’t make any sense. If you have a 13-inch MacBook Air M1, I’d say the same thing. It doesn’t make sense at this point. But if you’re looking for a slightly larger screen, 15 inches, maybe yes.

However, if you are using a MacBook Air with an Intel processor, this version will work thirteen times faster than the fastest Intel processor they’ve ever sold. If you are logging in from a PC, I assure you that all of these are advantages.

Focusing on its M3 chip, it includes 8 CPU cores, up to 10 GPU cores, and 16 neural engine cores. It can also be equipped with a unified memory of up to 24 GB. For most people, you can be sure that 8 GB is more than enough, even if some specialized analyst says no. Firstly, 8GB of RAM on a Mac is not the same as on a PC, and secondly, it is more than enough for the vast majority of activities that a person who buys such a laptop will perform.

More CPUs and GPUs mean more performance. The laptop is faster and more efficient. When you compare it to the MacBook Air M2, it’s 15% faster. When you compare it to the Intel MacBook Air, the difference is huge. Apple has been very good at defining the performance they can squeeze out of every watt of the processor and this makes them very efficient and silent because remember they have no fan.

This is why these laptops are so popular among people who are not looking for a professional computer. Because they use Apple-designed chips, they offer much better performance than any competing device with similar specs.

In terms of performance, synthetic tests confirm that the improvement between M2 and M3 is iterative. Geekbench in multi-core mode gives the 2022 model a score of 9650 and this new laptop a score of 9744.

In single-core mode, the M3 scored 2595 points, while the MacBook Air M2 scored 2577 points. So we confirm that if we have one of these laptops released in 2022, there is no point in upgrading to a laptop released in 2023. Macs are powerful enough to last 4-6 years without needing to replace the hardware.

In fact, with the price drop on the MacBook Air M2, it becomes one of the best value laptops available today.

Apple is also highlighting the M3 chip’s artificial intelligence capabilities in its messaging. The 16 neural engine cores enable much faster artificial learning calculations for existing or future applications that leverage these capabilities. But it’s no coincidence that Apple is starting to talk more about artificial intelligence, as it will be one of the new features of its latest hardware – like this – and future ones throughout 2024.

We’ll hear a lot more about artificial intelligence during WWDC 2024, when new operating systems are announced, including macOS for this laptop, and, of course, when the next iPhone launches in September. With 16 M3 neural engine cores, the MacBook Air is sure to get new machine learning-related features in Apple’s next operating system.

Is it worth buying a MacBook Air M3?

He MacBook Air In my opinion, this is the best laptop for most people. It’s lightweight, very quiet, has very good performance and a very attractive price. If you have the Intel version and are looking for something new, this is your device. And if you have a Windows computer and are looking for something fast, always working well and with great battery life, without a doubt, you should consider this option.

Unfortunately, Window remains a mystery when this causes problems for people who are not tech savvy, have no idea what it means to open a terminal window or edit Registry. None of these problems occur when macOSYou will forget about problems with malware and thanks to free operating system updates, you will have a computer that will work perfectly for many years.

But if you have a MacBook Air M2, as we mentioned earlier, there is simply no need to upgrade. You already have a very effective team.

Some Intel-based MacBook Pro users have asked me if the MacBook Air, especially the 15-inch, with the M2 or M3 is a good upgrade. I would say yes, although this is not a professional device, the performance gain between the Intel laptop processor and Apple Silicon is already worth it.