Better display and better speakers apply to all. And you do not know when the higher bandwidth and added ports of MBP may prove useful. I would choose the M2 MBP.
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M2 pro Macbook Pro vs M3 Macbook air
- Thread starter Milly342
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For what it's worth, I have both of them. The M2 pro (MBP 14") for work and the M3 air (15") for personal use.
I tend to prefer the Air over the Pro. But in general, for my usecases they pretty much equal out.
If this person is a student, isn't the student discount the same or lower price than an Apple rerun?
It’s probably gonna be a primary tv to be honestEither machine will do fine for the applications you mention but eh…. Are you planning to do more in college than GeForce now, YouTube and Netflix?
That might be a good idea and if so, maybe throw those intended use cases into the mix for your buying decision.
Idek tbhEither machine will do fine for the applications you mention but eh…. Are you planning to do more in college than GeForce now, YouTube and Netflix?
That might be a good idea and if so, maybe throw those intended use cases into the mix for your buying decision.
I wouldn’t even have a monties to display to that wouldn’t affect me and is the better screen worth the drawback of being heavier for the pro?
To picture purists streaming content on 55-inch TVs, yes.
To common folk streaming content on a 13/14 inch screen, less so. Most wouldn’t notice as most people are bad at detecting picture quality unless they’re looking at an A/B test side by side.
Myself, I wouldn’t buy an Air over a Pro simply for AV1 hardware decoding. I’m not suggesting it. It’s just a nice little feature to have since you’re streaming NVIDIA GeForce Now. But the Pro has 120Hz VRR and 60% faster GPU so it’s going to win with local gaming, though, so keep that in mind.
For your use case, it'll be about the same speed. I was a Project Management major myself, which required a lot of typing. The 2017 MacBook Air didn't break a sweat unless I was OCR-ing those books. My 2020 M1 MacBook Air didn't break a sweat at all - EXCEPT when I had to boot into Windows via Parallels
No it wouldn't be (assuming you mean like streaming shows from Netflix, Apple TV, etc). It'll just be very overpriced that's all.
I don't think the AV1 is ever going to be a big deal on a 13 or 15" display. By the time websites like Netflix or Apple TV stop supporting the older protocol, the machine won't be getting updates and it'll be difficult to go online with it (imagine streaming videos using a 2008 MacBook Pro today, for example).
I heard the single core is a decent amount faster on the m3 but I think mostly what I do I wouldn’t even notice the difference in single core and to a none trained eye is Av1 important?
No it’s mostly for work but in my dorm I’ll probably use it as my personal tv also
Most things are single-threaded tasks, meaning one core will work on it, so having more performance cores isn't going to help most tasks. The M3 has 4 efficiency cores and 4 performance cores—anyway—which I would estimate to be way more than most people need, certainly for your use cases, especially for single-threaded tasks. Only when you start using apps that have specific multi-threaded operation for performance reasons (eg. video editing, audio production, 3D production) does having more performance cores help complete a task.
But the M3 has a multiscore of 11959 and the M2 Pro has a multiscore of 12144 so in many tasks they will behave similarly even if multithreaded.
And yes, the m3 has an even faster single-core score by about 15%—but thats not noticeable. Some task taking 2.8 seconds or taking 2.4 seconds will feel exactly the same to you. What matters to you is that either an M2 Pro or M3 chip will both be about 3x faster for you than the i3 2020 Air you're currently using. So performance wise, for your use case, either laptop is taking you into the future, so to speak.
I want to say something in the most friendly way possible, because I overthink and over-research everything I do, so I say this as a fellow overthinker—I think you're overthinking this—because you're probably a very rational person and this purchase is an expensive one so you want the best fit. But since you've surpassed the threshold—both laptops will serve you super well—the best way to make a decision is to just go with your feelings and intuition. Use the force! Remember, you can change your mind and return the device—Apple gives you 14-days.
When I finally made the switch to Apple Silicon from my Intel MacBook Pro, I couldn't decide between a more powerful Mac Studio or an M2 Air. I had to buy both. I had to run my apps using both. I had to feel the Air and walk around with it to go, "I want that!" You're going to need to go to the Apple Store again, or just buy one and try it. It's like choosing a puppy—you gotta make eye contact and go with your gut on which one to take home.
(AV1—as I mentioned before—is nice to have for technical reasons, especially if you're going to be streaming a game in AV1 on a big 4K screen—but to an untrained eye on a 13/14-inch screen you probably won't notice)
Thanks man, I am overthinking thsi, I’m gonna go with the air bc it’s lighter and I like the form factor bc it’s less bulky and slimmer
In summary, I gave a similar answer. But there is some nuance to the answer I want to bring up.
Due to adaptive bit rate (ABR) streaming, we're not watching one quality throughout, but multiple qualities of video throughout, depending on the quality of our connection—which varies many times throughout even a 10 minute youtube video, or say a live Twitch stream or Youtube event. Less so if you have a solid connection, but many people around the world have inconsistent connections, especially if their internet is cellular-based, and they are moving on a bus throughout a city and in between buildings and cell towers, so AV1 will make a huge difference in improving quality of image when bitrate is low even on smaller displays like tablets and phones. It handles internet quality variation much better.
But if someone is fine with current H.265 streaming at home with a solid 1 Gbps connection, then theres no reason to rush to the Apple Store simply for AV1 decoding.
Now to the people with 4K TVs, an Apple TV 4K box, and a subscription to AppleTV+, when Apple releases the new Apple TV 4K box with AVI support, you better run out and get it asap because you'll be getting a better bitrate at the same internet speed, or better quality at the same bitrate. AppleTV+ delivers something like 4x better quality image than Netflix so you're going to see AV1 being used beautifully—especially in dark scenes because compression really degrades dark scenes and shadow detail. Bitrate is important, which is why I'd rather watch 1080p Blu-ray than 4K streaming via Netflix, in some movies.
How Netflix will use AV1, they may simply cut the bitrate by 30% to save on content delivery costs because they are cheap as hell and pride themselves on delivering the worst quality video out of all the streaming networks (even though they charge extra for 4K delivery).
I do think AV1 decoding is important in and of itself, but is it important to the user...probably not the general users. But if streaming Twitch or streaming a game via NVIDIA GeForce, probably yes its a bonus because detail matters more in games than watching The Office or Is It Cake? season 2.
Student discount is only 10% so the refurbished store is great discount. I don’t believe the student discount works for the refurb store either so unless you absolutely want brand spanking new (which you basically get with refurb from Apple), refurb is the best deal overall
nah im using ge force now less and less now thinking about utEither machine will do fine for the applications you mention but eh…. Are you planning to do more in college than GeForce now, YouTube and Netflix?
That might be a good idea and if so, maybe throw those intended use cases into the mix for your buying decision.
