Actually you have a very rare Mac. A MBA with a retina screen, Intel CPU and a proper keyboard.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
(Early) 2020 MacBook Air owners feel like they got screwed
- Thread starter antisomnic
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Actually you have a very rare Mac. A MBA with a retina screen, Intel CPU and a proper keyboard.
LOL. Yep. Apparently even more of a unicorn in that it also runs cool and usually silent. Only hear the fan when I'm doing a batch photo processing job or my Synology cloudsync daemon is re-syncing after a reboot. Topcase and bottom case never uncomfortable. Never bothered to check CPU temps though since (a) I don't ever touch the CPU and (b) I don't presume to know more about CPU thermal longevity than Intel does.
Had been waiting to replace my 2015 rMB12 until they keyboard got sorted out. Knew something was on the horizon but pulled the trigger anyway.
Also you can run Linux on it, Linux on Intel Macs is a great feature to have. I have a similar setup at office and is very efficient.
Just their customer service line, fussed a bit and they told me a sr customer service rep would call in a week. They called the next day and pushed the return through
Generally, no. This is a unique situation. But it couldn't have been done any other way - you just got unlucky (emotionally - in reality you are just as well off as if the new computers weren't any good). In other words, yes you got screwed, but noone screwed you.
I emailed and got a reply from someone who told me to go to the Genius Bar - we're in a lockdown and not supposed to travel into Tier 3 areas of higher infection...
*slow hand clap*
I have ordered an Air and I hope it will throttle. That's how fanless computers work. If it doesn't throttle it means that it is not using performance which is available for short duration, but not for sustained load.
Nothing wrong with throttling, it is a legitimate design choice to avoid the cost, noise, weight, size and reliability penalties of a cooling system in machines which are not primarily used for sustained load.
Having been using a 12" MacBook for three years I also know that throttling is not as extreme as usually thought, so sustained load jobs get done, just take a bit longer.
Last edited:
Best thing to do is to never buy anything and keep waiting till the next great thing comes along. That's how one keeps themselves safe from these companies making newer things, which are just the same thing. Damn you, companies! The fax machine is nothing but a waffle iron with a phone attached!
Sticking one's head in the sand would also be prudent.
I bought my 13" i5 Air in March. I needed it. It's been great and I much prefer it to the 2013 15" MBP I had before.
I'm waiting for some real reviews of the M1 version to come out, but this is just out of curiosity as I won't be in the market for a new laptop for a while. "Newer laptop better and faster than old laptop "is not really a shock headline.
(I'm ignoring the geekbench scores at the moment, as I read they re-wrote geeekbench for the new chip and changed how it benchmarks, so it can't be used to compare back to the Intel version.)
I'm waiting for some real reviews of the M1 version to come out, but this is just out of curiosity as I won't be in the market for a new laptop for a while. "Newer laptop better and faster than old laptop "is not really a shock headline.
(I'm ignoring the geekbench scores at the moment, as I read they re-wrote geeekbench for the new chip and changed how it benchmarks, so it can't be used to compare back to the Intel version.)
I don’t understand this thread. What was Apple to do? Not sell you their best at the time laptop? I’m surprised they are even letting some return them after several months. Nice of them to allow that.
Intel MacBook Air users really have been left behind though. It was never good enough for the price, and now, seemingly for that same price, they could have a decent machine that doesn't get hotter than the surface of the sun when you have two tabs in Safari open.
I just can't understand the business rational of providing returns months after purchase unless you can show you had had a problem e.g. USB not being recognised or it didn't do something that was advertised. Imagine if everyone returned their 2020 intel air, what a waste and a big environmental impact. People were clamouring for a fixed keyboard and got it! I suspect in the UK where consumer law is good, but balanced by a culture of 'you choose the item - you stick with it' I would not expect people to have a hope of this exchange.
Some people really need an automatic upgrade every year scheme like for the iPhone.
Do you think they'll let me return my 1998 iMac G3? Honestly feeling pretty slighted that they've gone and made all these technological advancements since then...! Really unfair to me!
Oh please, let's avoid ridiculous hyperbole. It helps nobody.
If you owned one that truly did get super hot with minimal load you should've had it repaired.
Ridiculous hyperbole? The last few Intel MacBook Airs didn’t have effective active cooling and reach 100 degrees while doing simple tasks.
100 degrees and no effective cooling = extreme throttling = none of the promised “speed” that Apple touted.
man, all we have to go off is a bunch of slides of unsubstantiated benchmarks, we really know nothing until next week.
who knows, you may end up being happy that you bought the Intel, at least for a couple years.
and I'm not getting all the fan problems others are on my 2020 13 MBP, maybe it's because I run Turbo Boost Switcher and keep it off most of the time.
who knows, you may end up being happy that you bought the Intel, at least for a couple years.
and I'm not getting all the fan problems others are on my 2020 13 MBP, maybe it's because I run Turbo Boost Switcher and keep it off most of the time.
Yes, ridiculous hyperbole.
What's wrong with the CPU reaching it's design temperature of 100C? Or are you saying you know something the Intel engineers don't know? Plus, as I recall, the same CPU temp behavior was reported on the 10th gen Intel MBPs back when I was following such things. Seemed to be an 10th gen thing.
Speaking as an actual owner of a 2020 i5 MBA -- mine performs exactly as I expected it to perform.
Quick, snappy, responsive. Topcase and bottomcase temperatures infrequently warm and never uncomfortable. Silent except the occasions where I'm distinctly pushing it with stuff like generating hundreds of raw image previews in Lightroom or converting/exporting a few dozen raw images in a batch. CPU temps? Never cared since I never touch the CPU.
Mostly the folks who were unhappy with their MBA were trying to push substantial continuous CPU loads onto a system designed for brief / bursty CPU usage. Hammering screws rarely gives a satisfactory result.
2020 Air, i5, four tabs of Firefox open, 52°C.
Sun surface temp: 5500°C. Internal temp: 14,000,000°C.
Sun surface temp: 5500°C. Internal temp: 14,000,000°C.
Most people that were unhappy with MacBook Airs were unhappy with the false claims of them being able to edit video and photos and being greeted with a system that was hot and noisy, actually.
I’m pleased that your workflow never exceeded what Apple claimed to be possible.
I have a 16 inch MBP and iPad Pro 2020.
Both of which can do a lot. One without any noise, the other with some and sometimes even jet engine type noise.
My friend bought the 2020 MacBook Air with the higher specifications, and it was terrible. I’m not just listening to hearsay on MacRumors. I saw it for myself.
I’m a huge Mac fan (some would call me a sheep) but I was extremely disappointed with the Airs performance based on what claims were made by Apple themselves.
Like I say. If your use case was vastly superior, good for you, but the product I saw was not worth the money paid.