Are we witnessing an "active" negative marketing campaign?

[sjperformance]

Been using my air M2 for more than a week now 8/512. What an awesome machine. Arguably the best laptop top I've owned. Last laptop I bought was a dell 8 years ago. I'm satisfied with apple pricing. I laugh how a $1200 laptop is being compared to an even more expensive faster PC and its actually keeping up with. I'm fine paying $1400+ for mine. I know it will last me many years easily.

 

[Ethosik]

Just because you aren't interested in the what a business laptop or rugged laptop has to offer doesn't make those laptops not worth it. The difference between a consumer laptop (mac or PC) and a business/rugged laptops is much greater than the difference between a consumer Apple laptop and a consumer Windows laptop.

Your claim was...


Where the only example you could find was a business laptop that has functions that no consumer laptop has. And now you're seemingly equating the difference between a M2 Air and a Windows laptop with the difference between a consumer laptop and a $4000 rugged laptop just because you don't need the functionality of a rugged laptop!



A $4000 rugged laptop with water resistance, drop protection, a 1500nit touch screen, track pad that can be used with gloves etc. etc. is not comparable!

If you want to make a REASONABLE argument here, stick to consumer laptops.

But...


You can get a lot more for the price of an M2 Air than you alluding to there. For example, for $200 less than a base M2 Air you can get a HP Pavillion Plus 14" from their website with

i7-12700H
16GB RAM
1TB SSD
2.8K OLED

Or for the same price as a base spec M2 Air, an ASUS Vivobook Pro 14" with:

Ryzen 7 5800H
RTX 3050 dedicated graphics
16GB RAM
1TB SSD
2.8K OLED

Now make your argument that it's justifiable for the $1200 M2 Air to only have 8/256GB in comparison to these CONSUMER laptops, not some Dell Latitude or Panasonic ToughBook! This notion of fair assessment is not hard to grasp!

Personally, I don't disagree with you; for me it's OK for the M2 Air to only have 256/8GB at $1200 because I value macOS, build quality, smallness, and battery life above everything else. But, I can see exactly how for some people 256/8GB is inexcusable at this price point. However, you've gone about trying to justify your argument in a slightly strange way using the wrong laptops as comparisons and underestimating what you can get in the Windows laptop market.

I’m not the one making these claims. All people are saying is “at X price it should NOT have 8/256”. They don’t limit their arguments to consumer laptops. You are proving my point that X price doesn’t matter. The fact that the M2 Air even with 8/256 allows more performance and OTHER ADVANTAGES to a $1,099 ($1,049 on sale looks like) Dell XPS (there you go Consumer line that’s still 8/256 and not THAT much cheaper) just shows the Air offers other advantages.

 

[DavidChoux]

All people are saying is “at X price it should NOT have 8/256”. They don’t limit their arguments to consumer laptops.

Yes they do. They probably don't explicitly say it because it should be so obvious. If you seriously think that people who say "at x prince point it should NOT have 8/256" extend that expectation to specialised rugged laptops and business laptops then I don't know what to say dude.

The fact that the M2 Air even with 8/256 allows more performance and OTHER ADVANTAGES to a $1,099

Again, I'm not disputing the advantages of Apple laptops but well done for ignoring the specs on those Windows laptops that are better than the M2 Air. That's the whole point of this buddy. You argue that it's OK for the M2 Air to have 256/8 because of macOS, build quality, trackpad etc. Someone else says that's a load of BS, you can get an i7-12700H, 2.8K OLED screen, 16GB, and 1TB for $200 less than an Air. That's a faster CPU (it is), better screen, more RAM and more storage.

$1,099 ($1,049 on sale looks like) Dell XPS (there you go Consumer line that’s still 8/256 and not THAT much cheaper)

Well done bud, but a far cry from what you were originally trying to pedal:

Yet there are $1,800 Dell laptops that have 8GB RAM and 256 SSD.

And don't ignore the sale price lol, that's just what the Windows laptop world is like, sales all the time. It would be the equivalent of not acknowledging the lowered price of an Apple product after it releases a new version.

Once again, I can't believe that I have to explain all this. That you still think a $4000 professional rugged laptop is valid defence to someone saying "the M2 Air should not have 256/8 at this price point" makes you truly exceptional.

 

[Chateaunole-du-Pape]

I have a work-issued "business" Windows laptop (Dell Latitude). It has 16 GB RAM, a 512 GB SSD and some variant of an Intel Core i5. It's a little over two years old, and has generally been a decent machine.

Last night, I decided to do a little experiment. I took my new M2 Mac, installed Excel, logged into my work account and opened a massive Excel report I've built. (It weighs in at around 750 MB, and until recently was over 1 GB, until I deleted some columns I decided I didn't need.)

This spreadsheet has several very large pivot tables with many calculated items, multiple VLOOKUPS, and the main data table that feeds the pivots is currently 222,000 rows by 159 columns. I'll be the first to admit that it isn't very efficiently built, and my Windows machine struggles with it to a degree, but I only have to use it a few times a week, and trying to slim it down would be more trouble than it's worth, particularly given the cumbersome web interface I use to get the raw data in the first place.

Once it had the file downloaded and into RAM, my M2 Air (16 GB, 1 TB) handled this messy Excel file just fine, certainly no worse than my Windows machine. A few beachballs - the first time I have seen them on the M2 - when updating pivot table filters, but I see those with the Windows version as well (blue circle). And the case of the M2, perched on my chest in bed, didn't get the least bit warm. (This same Excel file makes the fan on my Windows machine spool up like a jet engine, and the case still gets hot.) Oh, and I also had open on the M2 the following: Safari with around 10 tabs, Mail and Mimestream with all of my Gmail, Photos, Apple Music and maybe one or two other things as well. I opened Activity Monitor; memory usage remained below 14 GB, memory pressure was green throughout, and swap was basically zero.

Two conclusions:

1) I'm really not sure what distinguishes a business laptop from a consumer one these days. Is it extra ports? (I have virtually no use for them, as I connect solely to one Thunderbolt port on my Windows machine, linking it to a dock.) It's certainly not battery life - my Windows machine has had awful battery life from the get go. My Windows machine's display is pretty lousy, though I don't care, as it's connected to external monitors. My Windows machine is in the same weight class as the M2 Air, and doesn't strike me as particularly rugged. And, based on my little Excel experiment last night, it's no more robust for business tasks than my M2 Air.

2) The M2 Air continues to really impress me. And it still hasn't gotten the least bit warm. If the specialized software packages we need at my company were available for Mac, I would be clamoring to replace our Dell machines with M2 Airs.

 

[Ethosik]

Once again, I can't believe that I have to explain all this. That you still think a $4000 professional rugged laptop is valid defence to someone saying "the M2 Air should not have 256/8 at this price point" makes you truly exceptional.

Where do I keep saying this? I have said that two components of a computer and ignoring the other dozen is pointless for a price complaint. So it has 8/256. So what. What ELSE does it have. You keep proving my point that a higher cost system ($4,000) that has other advantages makes that price worth it. Yet people keep clinging to the price and ONLY looking at the 8/256.

Yes all up through Dell’s consumer AND professional lines have 8/256 base on some configs. Ranging from $1,099 to $4,000. All 8/256.

We are just going in circles. We are saying the same things. Look at what the M2 Air has OTHER THAN 8/256 and you will see the price is fine. The 8/256 is fine.

It performs better than the crappy i3 in that Dell. So definitely worth the price.

Again it sounds like people are just hating on Apple because it’s Apple.

“It’s fine for Dell to have a $1,099 system with 8/256 BUT NOT APPLE!!!”

Why? Well because it has X, Y, Z features!!!

So Apple features can be ignored?

“It’s fine for Dell to have a $4,000 system with 8/256 BUT NOT APPLE AT $1,200!!!”

Stop limiting you comparisons to RAM and storage. I would rather have M2 with 8/256 than an i3 with 16/512.

 

[sjperformance]

Now the youtubers have flipped the script. Now the air m2 is awesome. Clowns.

 

[Jumpthesnark]

Now the youtubers have flipped the script. Now the air m2 is awesome. Clowns.

Sure! First they create the narrative that the latest shiny new thing from Apple is the worst. It's slow! It's hot! It's overpriced! It looks like a Jackson Pollock painting if you merely brush it with your just washed fingertips! All for clicks.

Now that they have established that narrative, they know they can get clicks by creating a counter-narrative for their viewers. It's great! What a surprise! Look how fast it is! And so light and pretty! What were all those other reviewers thinking? 🤣

Clowns indeed!

 

[Droid13]

Now the youtubers have flipped the script. Now the air m2 is awesome. Clowns.

So you're saying we were witnessing an active negative marketing campaign, but now it is an active positive marketing campaign?

All in the name of attracting clicks and attention?

I feel old.

 

[sjperformance]

So you're saying we were witnessing an active negative marketing campaign, but now it is an active positive marketing campaign?

All in the name of attracting clicks and attention?

I feel old.

Yup. I’m almost 40 BTW.

 

[DavidChoux]

Where do I keep saying this? I have said that two components of a computer and ignoring the other dozen is pointless for a price complaint. So it has 8/256. So what. What ELSE does it have.
....
Stop limiting you comparisons to RAM and storage. I would rather have M2 with 8/256 than an i3 with 16/512.

We are going round in circles because you're clearly underestimating what you can get 'on the other side' in the consumer windows laptop world. Why are you referencing an i3 and only 16/512? I already showed you in a $1049 HP Pavillion 14 you can get:

an i7-12700H, 2.8K OLED screen, 16GB, and 1TB. That's a faster CPU (it is), better screen, 2x RAM and 4x storage.

You seem to be comparing the M2 Air to the worst value windows laptop you can find and using that to justify why 8/256 is OK. Again, so you don't miss it:

an i7-12700H, 2.8K OLED screen, 16GB, and 1TB. That's a faster CPU (it is), better screen, 2x RAM and 4x storage.

Got it? Those are the specs you need to contend with to justify why, given the other advantages of an Apple product, 256/8 in a $1200 Air is ok.

Again, because your justification before of why the M2 Air is allowed to have 256/8 was:

M2 is much better than the low end i5 s that are included, the screen is typically better, better build quality and believe it or not but I have no issues paying more for macos over Windows.

Now if you don’t care if you are getting a 1080p screen, crappy trackpad, hot i5, and more well that’s your choice.

See, you're severely underestimating what you can get for $1200 in the windows world.

____________________________________________________________________________

Finally:

“It’s fine for Dell to have a $1,099 system with 8/256 BUT NOT APPLE!!!”

It's arguably more acceptable for a $4000 rugged laptop to have 8/256 than for an M2 Air to have 256/8, yes. The advantage of the ToughBook for professionals who need it vastly exceeds the preference between an Apple and Windows laptop. I.e. the ToughBook having an IP65 dust and waterproof rating is vastly more valuable than a "better trackpad" or "nicer build quality". They're incomparable.

 

[DavidChoux]

I have a work-issued "business" Windows laptop (Dell Latitude). It has 16 GB RAM, a 512 GB SSD and some variant of an Intel Core i5. It's a little over two years old, and has generally been a decent machine.

Last night, I decided to do a little experiment. I took my new M2 Mac, installed Excel, logged into my work account and opened a massive Excel report I've built. (It weighs in at around 750 MB, and until recently was over 1 GB, until I deleted some columns I decided I didn't need.)

This spreadsheet has several very large pivot tables with many calculated items, multiple VLOOKUPS, and the main data table that feeds the pivots is currently 222,000 rows by 159 columns. I'll be the first to admit that it isn't very efficiently built, and my Windows machine struggles with it to a degree, but I only have to use it a few times a week, and trying to slim it down would be more trouble than it's worth, particularly given the cumbersome web interface I use to get the raw data in the first place.

Once it had the file downloaded and into RAM, my M2 Air (16 GB, 1 TB) handled this messy Excel file just fine, certainly no worse than my Windows machine. A few beachballs - the first time I have seen them on the M2 - when updating pivot table filters, but I see those with the Windows version as well (blue circle). And the case of the M2, perched on my chest in bed, didn't get the least bit warm. (This same Excel file makes the fan on my Windows machine spool up like a jet engine, and the case still gets hot.) Oh, and I also had open on the M2 the following: Safari with around 10 tabs, Mail and Mimestream with all of my Gmail, Photos, Apple Music and maybe one or two other things as well. I opened Activity Monitor; memory usage remained below 14 GB, memory pressure was green throughout, and swap was basically zero.

Two conclusions:

1) I'm really not sure what distinguishes a business laptop from a consumer one these days. Is it extra ports? (I have virtually no use for them, as I connect solely to one Thunderbolt port on my Windows machine, linking it to a dock.) It's certainly not battery life - my Windows machine has had awful battery life from the get go. My Windows machine's display is pretty lousy, though I don't care, as it's connected to external monitors. My Windows machine is in the same weight class as the M2 Air, and doesn't strike me as particularly rugged. And, based on my little Excel experiment last night, it's no more robust for business tasks than my M2 Air.

2) The M2 Air continues to really impress me. And it still hasn't gotten the least bit warm. If the specialized software packages we need at my company were available for Mac, I would be clamoring to replace our Dell machines with M2 Airs.

It's not really performance that differentiates a business laptop from a consumer laptop. It's more professional features like vPro, ExpressConnect, wifi 6E, FIPS readers, smart card readers, more ports and more specific ports, uSIM capability, longer parts availability, higher serviceability etc. etc.. Things like this that only professionals would use and would have no benefit to consumers.

This is why they're more expensive (although I acknowledge they're also bumped up because 'business') and why they're a dumb comparison to use to argue 'it's ok to for the Air have 8/256 because here's a business laptop with that too'.

 

[Chateaunole-du-Pape]

It's not really performance that differentiates a business laptop from a consumer laptop. It's more professional features like vPro, ExpressConnect, wifi 6E, FIPS readers, smart card readers, more ports and more specific ports, uSIM capability, longer parts availability, higher serviceability etc. etc.. Things like this that only professionals would use and would have no benefit to consumers.

This is why they're more expensive (although I acknowledge they're also bumped up because 'business') and why they're a dumb comparison to use to argue 'it's ok to for the Air have 8/256 because here's a business laptop with that too'.

Good points, of course. The funny thing is, my "business" laptop has almost none of these things. It has:

• one USB-C/ Thunderbolt port (used daily)
• two USB-A ports (used very rarely - my wireless mouse and keyboard dongles are plugged into my dock, and our IT folks have disabled the ability to read flash drives for security reasons)
• an HDMI port (used very rarely; my monitors are plugged into my dock. I'll occasionally plug into a projector or large TV in a conference room to present something)
• An SD card slot (never used, and quite possibly disabled for data transfer, like the USB-A ports)

Not exactly a robust or unique collection of ports, yet I really don't need much of anything but the Thunderbolt. It also has a headphone jack and a Kensington lock slot that I have never touched, and a power jack that the Thunderbolt port essentially makes redundant.

It doesn't have any of the other things you've mentioned, with the possible exception of vPro. I suppose parts might be available for a longer period and it might be more serviceable.

 

[Mainsail]

People are over thinking the price increase. Over the last dozen years, when Apple releases a new MBA design, there has been a price increase of a couple of hundred dollars. New tooling. Different suppliers. Production ramp-up costs. Over the next couple of years, the MBA will get updates to the internals and the will price slowly drop to the magical $999 figure as production increases and economies of scale kick-in.

Now, the prior MBA pricing trends were during a period of relatively modest inflation. So, all bets are off if inflation persists or gets much worse. But, that is true of everything we buy.

 

[KPOM]

Good points, of course. The funny thing is, my "business" laptop has almost none of these things. It has:

• one USB-C/ Thunderbolt port (used daily)
• two USB-A ports (used very rarely - my wireless mouse and keyboard dongles are plugged into my dock, and our IT folks have disabled the ability to read flash drives for security reasons)
• an HDMI port (used very rarely; my monitors are plugged into my dock. I'll occasionally plug into a projector or large TV in a conference room to present something)
• An SD card slot (never used, and quite possibly disabled for data transfer, like the USB-A ports)

My work notebook (HP with an 11th-gen Core i7) has 2 Thunderbolt ports, but otherwise is identically equipped. It's also worth pointing out that most "business" notebooks have 1080p screens that aren't as bright as even the M1 Air. Sure, HP, Dell, etc. offer 4K screens, but few businesses buy them.

 

[chrono1081]

I lost a ton of respect for many tech YouTubers after the absolute garbage "reviews" of the MacBook Air 2s. These machines are incredibly capable but you'd never know if you went off ****** Youtube reviews.

When I got mine I put it through its paces. I ran Houdini sims for hours, edited/exported 4k video, animated and rendered in Blender, did tons of Xcode work, made music in Logic, played games and more. The thing barely got warm and handled it all with ease.

People focus on benchmarks which are terrible indicators of real world use. Any tech person worth their salt knows this yet all these reviews just hammer away at benchmarks and never properly put machines through their paces and make a judgement off of that.

 

[KPOM]

I lost a ton of respect for many tech YouTubers after the absolute garbage "reviews" of the MacBook Air 2s. These machines are incredibly capable but you'd never know if you went off ****** Youtube reviews.

People were disappointed by the price increase. Notebookcheck.net was upfront in their review. They said it is an excellent notebook, just not, in their opinion, worth $200 more than the already-excellent M1. But saying that doesn't generate clicks, so the YouTube reviewers exaggerated other "flaws" about the M2 MacBook Air. Could Apple sell the M2 starting at $1099? Sure, and if they did, there would probably be less emphasis on some of the cost cutting (e.g. using 1 SSD module in the 256GB model).

 

[azentropy]

I really do think a lot of it is because the M1 MBA was such a fantastic improvement over previous models the M2 MBA improvements doesn't measure up for some people. It also lost that magical $999 price. The M2 MBA takes a few steps back due to the $200 price increase, the poorer performance of the 256GB SDD option, and the earlier thermal throttling in certain tasks. Some is also due to while improvements were made (new design, "better" speakers, slightly bigger/better screen, better camera, MagSafe) some of the other requested features were left out (mini LED, TB4, Support for more than one external display, USB-C on both sides, increase of standard RAM and/or storage in stock models, WiFI 6e etc.). So again people look at the $200 increase and rightly or wrongly come away with that wasn't worth those features we got plus the negatives.

A couple adjustments to the features or pricing would have negated the negativity towards it. I think those adjustments will be made with the M3/4 MBA...

Note: I'm purposely excluding the M1 to M2 CPU in the comparison because that in itself didn't lead to the increase in price as the 13" MBP didn't raise in price going from M1 to M2.

 

[Tagbert]

We are going round in circles because you're clearly underestimating what you can get 'on the other side' in the consumer windows laptop world. Why are you referencing an i3 and only 16/512? I already showed you in a $1049 HP Pavillion 14 you can get:



You seem to be comparing the M2 Air to the worst value windows laptop you can find and using that to justify why 8/256 is OK. Again, so you don't miss it:



Got it? Those are the specs you need to contend with to justify why, given the other advantages of an Apple product, 256/8 in a $1200 Air is ok.

Again, because your justification before of why the M2 Air is allowed to have 256/8 was:



See, you're severely underestimating what you can get for $1200 in the windows world.

____________________________________________________________________________

Finally:

It's arguably more acceptable for a $4000 rugged laptop to have 8/256 than for an M2 Air to have 256/8, yes. The advantage of the ToughBook for professionals who need it vastly exceeds the preference between an Apple and Windows laptop. I.e. the ToughBook having an IP65 dust and waterproof rating is vastly more valuable than a "better trackpad" or "nicer build quality". They're incomparable.

This whole sub thread seems to be going around in circles. I’m not sure that either of you are convincing anyone else. Most of us are resigned to just scrolling past. It might be best to just let it go.

 

[Chateaunole-du-Pape]

My work notebook (HP with an 11th-gen Core i7) has 2 Thunderbolt ports, but otherwise is identically equipped. It's also worth pointing out that most "business" notebooks have 1080p screens that aren't as bright as even the M1 Air. Sure, HP, Dell, etc. offer 4K screens, but few businesses buy them.

Agree. My work Dell's screen is quite lousy, and I almost never use it.

 

[Abazigal]

Again, I'm not disputing the advantages of Apple laptops but well done for ignoring the specs on those Windows laptops that are better than the M2 Air. That's the whole point of this buddy. You argue that it's OK for the M2 Air to have 256/8 because of macOS, build quality, trackpad etc. Someone else says that's a load of BS, you can get an i7-12700H, 2.8K OLED screen, 16GB, and 1TB for $200 less than an Air. That's a faster CPU (it is), better screen, more RAM and more storage.

I don't think he is ignoring the specs as much as he is acknowledging that specs alone don't always tell the whole story. At the end of the day, specs is just the means. User experience is the end.

Storage is storage, fair enough. Maybe I can get more ram and a "better" processor on a windows laptop for less, but what exactly does that do for the end user exactly? Does it give me more battery life? Will my videos export faster on a windows laptop compared to an M1/M2 laptop? Will I get the same degree of performance with an i7 chip in an equally thin form factor or will it similarly be throttled, or throttled to a worse degree? Sometimes that higher-res display is counterintuitive because it further reduces battery life.

And again, depending on the model, you may also end up with a crappy trackpad, or horrible build quality, even disregarding the whole windows vs macOS debate.

And I think I see what Apple is doing here. They know they have a legitimately superior product in the form of the Mx chip, and are using it as a way to boost their profits by giving us less specs on paper, and they know they can get away with it because even with less specs on paper, Macs will still offer comparable or superior performance to a windows laptop with theoretically better paper specs, while still costing the same or even less.

While choosing to compete in areas Apple knows the competition can't hope to match, such as performance per watt, and sleek and thin form factors (eg: you won't find a desktop PC which matches the Mac Studio in performance while sporting an equally compact and quiet form factor).

If Apple can get enough people to care about these intangible factors over raw performance, Intel and PC manufacturers may well have a genuine problem on their hands if they can't offer the same experience that Apple is renowned for.

 

[KPOM]

I don't think he is ignoring the specs as much as he is acknowledging that specs alone don't always tell the whole story. At the end of the day, specs is just the means. User experience is the end.

Storage is storage, fair enough. Maybe I can get more ram and a "better" processor on a windows laptop for less, but what exactly does that do for the end user exactly? Does it give me more battery life? Will my videos export faster on a windows laptop compared to an M1/M2 laptop? Will I get the same degree of performance with an i7 chip in an equally thin form factor or will it similarly be throttled, or throttled to a worse degree? Sometimes that higher-res display is counterintuitive because it further reduces battery life.

And again, depending on the model, you may also end up with a crappy trackpad, or horrible build quality, even disregarding the whole windows vs macOS debate.

And I think I see what Apple is doing here. They know they have a legitimately superior product in the form of the Mx chip, and are using it as a way to boost their profits by giving us less specs on paper, and they know they can get away with it because even with less specs on paper, Macs will still offer comparable or superior performance to a windows laptop with theoretically better paper specs, while still costing the same or even less.

While choosing to compete in areas Apple knows the competition can't hope to match, such as performance per watt, and sleek and thin form factors (eg: you won't find a desktop PC which matches the Mac Studio in performance while sporting an equally compact and quiet form factor).

If Apple can get enough people to care about these intangible factors over raw performance, Intel and PC manufacturers may well have a genuine problem on their hands if they can't offer the same experience that Apple is renowned for.

Exactly. The average user isn’t going to notice the SSD speed but will notice that the Mac used 10% of its power while the PC used 50%.

 

[DavidChoux]

I don't think he is ignoring the specs as much as he is acknowledging that specs alone don't always tell the whole story. At the end of the day, specs is just the means. User experience is the end.

Storage is storage, fair enough. Maybe I can get more ram and a "better" processor on a windows laptop for less, but what exactly does that do for the end user exactly? Does it give me more battery life? Will my videos export faster on a windows laptop compared to an M1/M2 laptop? Will I get the same degree of performance with an i7 chip in an equally thin form factor or will it similarly be throttled, or throttled to a worse degree? Sometimes that higher-res display is counterintuitive because it further reduces battery life.

And again, depending on the model, you may also end up with a crappy trackpad, or horrible build quality, even disregarding the whole windows vs macOS debate.

And I think I see what Apple is doing here. They know they have a legitimately superior product in the form of the Mx chip, and are using it as a way to boost their profits by giving us less specs on paper, and they know they can get away with it because even with less specs on paper, Macs will still offer comparable or superior performance to a windows laptop with theoretically better paper specs, while still costing the same or even less.

While choosing to compete in areas Apple knows the competition can't hope to match, such as performance per watt, and sleek and thin form factors (eg: you won't find a desktop PC which matches the Mac Studio in performance while sporting an equally compact and quiet form factor).

If Apple can get enough people to care about these intangible factors over raw performance, Intel and PC manufacturers may well have a genuine problem on their hands if they can't offer the same experience that Apple is renowned for.

Of course I agree. It's all about looking at both sides, weighing everything up and deciding what works best for you.

But in the context of justifying whether it's right for the Air to have 256/8, it's hard to argue if the person believes a $1200 Windows laptop gets you inferior everything.

It needs to be understood that are advantages of a Windows machine at that price point. A 2.8K OLED can be advantageous, so can an H series i7. But as you say, some people might find this to be a drawback as both of these use more battery and in lots of cases the M2 chip is actually faster.

But when the other person doesn't have a balanced view it's impossible to make a point.

 

[DavidChoux]

This whole sub thread seems to be going around in circles. I’m not sure that either of you are convincing anyone else. Most of us are resigned to just scrolling past. It might be best to just let it go.

You're free to scroll past, I'm not trying to convince you.

 

[Abazigal]

On the flip side, the opposite of hate is not love but indifference.

I read somewhere else where some people expressed frustration because their preferred products were not being covered on YouTube (likely due to its lack of popularity), which in turn made it difficult to find out information about them.

We have a glut of Apple-related content online, and I guess it's a happy problem having to sift out the legitimately useful ones from the click/rage-bait.

 

[Jumpthesnark]

I lost a ton of respect for many tech YouTubers after the absolute garbage "reviews" of the MacBook Air 2s. These machines are incredibly capable but you'd never know if you went off ****** Youtube reviews.

When I got mine I put it through its paces. I ran Houdini sims for hours, edited/exported 4k video, animated and rendered in Blender, did tons of Xcode work, made music in Logic, played games and more. The thing barely got warm and handled it all with ease.

People focus on benchmarks which are terrible indicators of real world use. Any tech person worth their salt knows this yet all these reviews just hammer away at benchmarks and never properly put machines through their paces and make a judgement off of that.

I completely agree. It's easier and faster for a YouTube reviewer to run a machine through a bunch of benchmarks than it is to do a nuanced real-world look at how it performs. These folks aren't interested in nuance, they're interested in getting clicks by putting up content, then moving on to creating the next batch of content.

In their defense, if they were to do more real-world tests and not lean on benchmarks so much, they would be open to charges of unfairness because they spent more time on one machine in Xcode and less time in Final Cut than they did on another machine, for example, so the results couldn't be accurately compared. So I can see the reasons why they just rely on benchmarks.

Which is why it's a great idea to ignore them.