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M1 vs. M2 Chip Buyer's Guide: How Much Better Really Is M2?

sideshowuniqueuser said:
Yeah, curious to see the Midnight in person!

Nah, I like the big screen of my new 16" MBP. Maybe if the 15" MBA comes out, I might change to one of those. I won't be in a rush though.

What Mac are you rocking these days?
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2021, MacBook Pro 16" M1 Pro (Silver). I pre-ordered it right away last year.

I agree, If MBA comes in 15" It would be an instant buy for me. I can't go back to smaller screen size.
 
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I think it would be useful to make clear in the article that the M2 has "up to" a 10 core GPU. The base model still only has 8 cores, meaning a big chunk of that 35% gain over M1 is from the 2 (optional) extra cores. Core for core it's more like a ~10% gain from M1 to M2 on the GPU.
 
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erikkfi said:
For all the old-timers, this isn't like G4 to G5. It's more like G3/333 to G3/500.
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Agreed... more of a .5 upgrade. They should have reserved M2 for a more significant bump in performance either through a more advanced fab process or architectural changes or both. But M1.5 doesn’t sound as sexy as M2.
 
Mr. Dee said:
If you have a M1 Mac you really don’t need this. Heck, if you have a Mac as far back as 2017 you don’t need this. Upgrade only when Apple stops supporting your Mac with macOS releases.
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That'd be my 2015 13" MacBook Air I use daily. I've held to Big Sur (honestly, just recently updated it from High Sierra.. hey, it was good!).

So like you said, push it 'til it can't go no more!
 
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w5jck said:
If you are like me and money is tight, drive your car until the thing refuses to run any more, then park it under a tree and buy another one. :cool: When I worked for various software development companies years ago (Computer Associates, IBM, BMC Software), developers rarely got new company bought computers more than once every three years or so, and they were never top of the line. For most people it just isn't cost effective, or necessary, to upgrade every year. Unless you are in a rare exception group, the M1 is sufficient for now and probably a few more years as well. Those who have unlimited budgets can spend it on whatever they want, but an M1 will be good enough for me for another few years (at least).
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Developers absolutely do NOT need top of line gear. Force them into a Pentium Pro with 1 GB RAM and a 11" CRT. Force them to optimize their code and make things work with minimum resources. It's embarrassing to see apps run like crap on average hardware because the developer had an IMAX screen for a desktop themselves. Sigh... Modal and fixed dialog windows with overflowing GUI widgets and content.... dumbass.

Giving developers high end gear is like giving a 12yr old keys to a Ferrari.
 
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Karma*Police said:
Agreed... more of a .5 upgrade. They should have reserved M2 for a more significant bump in performance either through a more advanced fab process or architectural changes or both. But M1.5 doesn’t sound as sexy as M2.
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Well there were rumors they'd call it "M1X" which sounds way cooler than M1.5, and is more in line with the iPhone's iterative upgrades (5, 5S, 6, 6S, etc).
 
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MacDarren said:
To me it seems like Apple should move the M series to the newest process...there are many fewer needed compared to what the iPhones need and frankly the A series are still ahead of most of the competitive phone processors... This approach would help keep the Ms at the cutting edge where they need to be to keep out ahead or competitive with the x86 and the GPU pressures from others. Basically make the M the leader and the A the follower being scaled back M which maybe also lags in the process size too.
Also obviously puts the reliable high yield process on the part where they need the most volume...
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Not the best thing to do when you are having supply chain issues. TSMC's 3nm isn't production ready as very likely their yields are too low. Apple will likely adopt it when TSMC has reported a mature process.
 
jav6454 said:
Imply all you want. In the end, I see the 13" MBP as a MacBook. Which works fine for all intents, sells quite well and purposes.
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Oh, sorry. I’m not the one that labeled it pro when it is not. Just having a little fun with it.
I agree that it is sufficient and will exceed expectations for the average user.
 
Hard to imagine 20 billion of anything fitting on something so small.
20 billion pennies stacked would reach the moon.
 
cicalinarrot said:
I was really impressed with the M1.
This wasn't a huge leap and frankly, I'm a bit disappointed that they had to crank the clock up by 10% to get that improvement. It's a risky move, considering you can't just do that with every upgrade.
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I'm not bothered - they can get away with it due to the extra power efficiency. This was fairly telegraphed by the A15. They increased the clockspeeds on that as well from the A14, and the M2 with essentially the same cores followed suit in essentially the same way.
 
teh_hunterer said:
I'm not bothered - they can get away with it due to the extra power efficiency. This was fairly telegraphed by the A15. They increased the clockspeeds on that as well from the A14, and the M2 with essentially the same cores followed suit in essentially the same way.
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Except when loading or doing work, the M2 will consume more power than an M1. You are still paying for that extra bump in clock speed.
 
urnotl33t said:
That'd be my 2015 13" MacBook Air I use daily. I've held to Big Sur (honestly, just recently updated it from High Sierra.. hey, it was good!).

So like you said, push it 'til it can't go no more!
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If its one of the things that always attracted me to the Mac platform, was its appliance like nature. Look how far back they supported the G3? Some models of the iMac G3 with minor upgrades could even run Leopard.
 
jasnw said:
I'm just waiting for Apple to put an M processor in a box I can use. The M1 Mini and iMac are too little, and the Mac Studio is too much. I'm waiting for an M2 Mini with ports, dammit.
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yup, me too with 16/32gb and 1TB that does not cost an arm and a leg. No interest in graphics
 
For basic computing tasks, there will be no noticeable difference.

For heavy computing tasks, it's a no-brainer... the M2 delivers a heftier punch.

(and golly-gee... who wrote that headline? Where's the editing review process?)
 
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jav6454 said:
Except when loading or doing work, the M2 will consume more power than an M1. You are still paying for that extra bump in clock speed.
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Are you sure? That doesn’t really match up with yesterday’s article’s reviews.

“TheStreet's Jacob Krol said the new 13-inch MacBook Pro delivers even more impressive battery life compared to the previous model:”

Notably, our battery test beat the promised 20 hours of video playback that Apple was promising. In our testing, the 13-inch MacBook Pro lasted for 23 hours and 15 minutes with a 4K playback test. I also set the brightness to 50% and turned off connectivity during the playback. It's quite impressive, and in day-to-day use, it's tough to make the MacBook Pro die.
I could easily have the 13-inch MacBook Pro last over a full day of use, coming in around 18 hours of full use, and the laptop can sit in standby mode for several days.
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