MacBook Pro 14" vs MacBook Air

[MauiPa]

In defense of the 13 MBP, which I recently purchased over the MBA. I decided based on, brighter screen, better speakers, active cooling. The price difference is not much, the speakers are amazing (not as good as the 14 and 16, obviously, but really good). The screen is 25% brighter. And I have only gotten the fans to come on once, when I deliberately ran it hard, so not really an issue for me

I would still do it again, not much money, better speakers, brighter screen

 

[Neverless]

In defense of the 13 MBP, which I recently purchased over the MBA. I decided based on, brighter screen, better speakers, active cooling. The price difference is not much, the speakers are amazing (not as good as the 14 and 16, obviously, but really good). The screen is 25% brighter. And I have only gotten the fans to come on once, when I deliberately ran it hard, so not really an issue for me

I would still do it again, not much money, better speakers, brighter screen

I would also add to that the 50% faster charging, bigger battery and subjectively a better design, as the MBA feels to feminine.

 

[TopToffee]

I'm a Salesforce developer, and I actually picked up a 14" MBP (32GB, top level Pro chip) and ended up sending it back after about 10 days, to stick with my 16GB/1TB Air.

Whichever MacBook I use, it spends ~70% of its working time plugged into a Dell 5K2K UW monitor so honestly the biggest plus of the new machine was only relevant ~30% of the time (granted, during that 30% it's a BEAUTIFUL screen), and during that 40% the battery life was somewhere around half what I was getting with the Air - and the Pro warmed up significantly more too (usually without triggering the fans, but the Air doesn't even get warm during the majority of tasks).

It's all about horses for courses. If you need graphical horsepower then the Pro is definitely for you. The Air (most often in the base configuration) is an absolute ideal machine for the VAST majority of users, including plenty of "Pros"

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

In defense of the 13 MBP, which I recently purchased over the MBA. I decided based on, brighter screen, better speakers, active cooling. The price difference is not much, the speakers are amazing (not as good as the 14 and 16, obviously, but really good). The screen is 25% brighter. And I have only gotten the fans to come on once, when I deliberately ran it hard, so not really an issue for me

I would still do it again, not much money, better speakers, brighter screen

You forgot the major selling point to me : the BATTERY.this thing never dies ,it's even better than the mbp 16.while people think this MBP makes no sense compared to the air ,I think it's a very good deal.and for sustained load with the air you're a bit screwed

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

D

I'm a Salesforce developer, and I actually picked up a 14" MBP (32GB, top level Pro chip) and ended up sending it back after about 10 days, to stick with my 16GB/1TB Air.

Whichever MacBook I use, it spends ~70% of its working time plugged into a Dell 5K2K UW monitor so honestly the biggest plus of the new machine was only relevant ~30% of the time (granted, during that 30% it's a BEAUTIFUL screen), and during that 40% the battery life was somewhere around half what I was getting with the Air - and the Pro warmed up significantly more too (usually without triggering the fans, but the Air doesn't even get warm during the majority of tasks).

It's all about horses for courses. If you need graphical horsepower then the Pro is definitely for you. The Air (most often in the base configuration) is an absolute ideal machine for the VAST majority of users, including plenty of "Pros"

Don't you need sustained loads for what you're doing ? I though yes ?

 

[jdb8167]

That probably explains it more than anything. I don't have good enough eyes to see 40% brightness, even in dim light, and I don't like dim light! I'm close to full brightness on my MBA.

Display brightness is something that you can control easily. If I know that I need 12+ hours on battery it is pretty easy to turn the brightness down a bit to 40% or so. Sure, higher is more pleasant but I can make the tradeoff if I need to. In general, my tradeoff is about 50% brightness. I get decent battery life and I rarely need more than 5 or 6 hours on battery anyway. I haven't once had a situation where I've unexpectedly found myself with a dead battery on my 16 GB/8 core/1 TB M1 MacBook Air.

 

[bobcomer]

Display brightness is something that you can control easily. If I know that I need 12+ hours on battery it is pretty easy to turn the brightness down a bit to 40% or so. Sure, higher is more pleasant but I can make the tradeoff if I need to. In general, my tradeoff is about 50% brightness. I get decent battery life and I rarely need more than 5 or 6 hours on battery anyway. I haven't once had a situation where I've unexpectedly found myself with a dead battery on my 16 GB/8 core/1 TB M1 MacBook Air.

I just don't have the eye's to make that trade off, but it certainly makes sense for those that do! Anyway, I'm plugged in well over 90% of the time, so it really doesn't hurt me anyway. My Air is 16G/1TB too...

I had an M1 Max 14" ordered, but the price ended up scaring me away, I just couldn't justify it. (I'm just a general computer work guy, so I really wouldn't have much advantage using it over a Windows laptop that cost less) I only run Mac's at home -- because I like them.

 

[Queen6]

It sounds like your MBA isn't functioning as expected on battery. I use mine all day, every day on battery, with screen on at about 40% full brightness. Sounds like your system more than anything else.

I've an M1 13" and it pretty much consistently delivers as Apple promised 20 hours which is a big appeal to me. While the new 14" is very much a more feature rich, however it's only better if you have the need or just want to splurge. For me there's every chance as the M1 is hitting Apple's spec of 20 hours that I'd loose as much as 6 hours runtime with the 14" MBP, which doesn't appeal.

Q-6

 

[Buck987]

In defense of the 13 MBP, which I recently purchased over the MBA. I decided based on, brighter screen, better speakers, active cooling. The price difference is not much, the speakers are amazing (not as good as the 14 and 16, obviously, but really good). The screen is 25% brighter. And I have only gotten the fans to come on once, when I deliberately ran it hard, so not really an issue for me

I would still do it again, not much money, better speakers, brighter screen

My family has both and sometimes get criticized for preferring the 13" M1 pro over the air in these forums. Both good machines but IMO if u only can have one... get the 13" M1 Pro over the air.

 

[Queen6]

In defense of the 13 MBP, which I recently purchased over the MBA. I decided based on, brighter screen, better speakers, active cooling. The price difference is not much, the speakers are amazing (not as good as the 14 and 16, obviously, but really good). The screen is 25% brighter. And I have only gotten the fans to come on once, when I deliberately ran it hard, so not really an issue for me

I would still do it again, not much money, better speakers, brighter screen

Very similar thoughts. The 13" M1 MBP simply ticked all the boxes barring ports for me. These days I don't need a lot of performance with a Mac so why pay for it? Must admit I do like the design language and features of the 2021 MBP's, however for me it would just be heavier with less battery runtime.

I did consider the Air, however I live and tend to work in hot climates so the actively cooled M1 MBP with it's larger battery capacity was the better option. Today would be a harder decision, due to the new 14" MBP, That said I think I'd still opt for the 13" being a secondary notebook; little lighter, little smaller, good deal more battery life

Q-6

 

[Queen6]

My family has both and sometimes get criticized for preferring the 13" M1 pro over the air in these forums. Both good machines but IMO if u only can have one... get the 13" M1 Pro over the air.

Big advantage for the Air for some is the buy in price being as low as $850 and that's a factor. I went with the M1 Pro as it works better for my needs, that said I still think it presents tremendous value

Q-6

 

[bill-p]

Actually for HDR movies the runtime is 4h according to notebook check ) .as for editing HDR videos idk,since only one part of the screen will be in HDR while the other may still be SDR (perhaps am i wrong however.in any case the edition part of the screen won't be that bright so...)
Oh and hey,it's you my man,hadn't noticed !

I'm not getting notebookcheck's results. This is likely due to difference in type of HDR content I'm watching versus theirs. For instance, if there aren't many bright scenes that push whole screen brightness to 1000 nits, I suspect battery life isn't affected as significantly.

Bill,there's a big flaw in your comparison,and it's the fact that the mbp14 you have isnt the base binned model,but the 10/16 .I'm not sure the 8/14 will still have better performance,even in low power mode ,while consuming the same etc.
Yet when you talk about purchase decision,you keep comparing it with the 14 base( and even state it clearly when you say ", it's pretty close to the base 14" Pro" )...

The base model gets around 10000 points in Geekbench, and even in Low Power Mode, it's still around 8000.

So it is faster regardless.

There is no flaw. Honestly, you just have to have a MacBook Air to see how slow it gets. In Low Power Mode, the multicore score for the thing gets only around 4500.

Even if Low Power Mode isn't engaged in the MacBook Air, if you push the CPU hard for longer than 5 minutes, it starts throttling by quite a bit due to the lack of any cooling.

 

[TopToffee]

D

Don't you need sustained loads for what you're doing ? I though yes ?

Somewhat, but nothing that the Air hasn't handled with aplomb.

 

[TopToffee]

I'm not getting notebookcheck's results. This is likely due to difference in type of HDR content I'm watching versus theirs. For instance, if there aren't many bright scenes that push whole screen brightness to 1000 nits, I suspect battery life isn't affected as significantly.



The base model gets around 10000 points in Geekbench, and even in Low Power Mode, it's still around 8000.

So it is faster regardless.

There is no flaw. Honestly, you just have to have a MacBook Air to see how slow it gets. In Low Power Mode, the multicore score for the thing gets only around 4500.

Even if Low Power Mode isn't engaged in the MacBook Air, if you push the CPU hard for longer than 5 minutes, it starts throttling by quite a bit due to the lack of any cooling.

Wait, a machine costing double the price is faster than the cheaper one? Stop the presses!!

Have literally never felt the need to engage Low Power Mode on the Air by the way

 

[bill-p]

Couldn't disagree more on the battery life differences.

And honestly the speed difference depend entirely on what tasks you're doing and (particularly) the level of threading.

Well, I can tell you my usual tasks are basically:

1. Code compile: heavily multithreaded and parallelized. Basically scales with number of CPU cores almost linearly
2. Photo importing/exporting in Capture One Pro: seem to scale with number of CPU cores and also with the much faster GPU
3. Autodesk Fusion 360: pretty much all GPU task
4. Ultimaker Cura or Prusa or Chitubox: for slicing 3D models for my 3D printers... pretty much pure GPU and CPU workout.
5. Room EQ Wizard: uses JTransforms, which is also multithreaded and scales with number of CPU cores

Wait, a machine costing double the price is faster than the cheaper one? Stop the presses!!

Have literally never felt the need to engage Low Power Mode on the Air by the way

No, I get it. I'm just saying: Low Power Mode makes no sense on the Air. The performance drop is insane and it doesn't really seem to bring any other benefit except that the computer gets to stay very cool even under heavy load (but it's also very slow).

Even without Low Power Mode, the Air (and even the 13" Pro) is already quite slow for some of the tasks I listed above. In particular, Fusion 360 and Room EQ Wizard run just... "okay" on the 13" Pro that I used to have.

Also under those tasks, neither the Air nor the 13" Pro held any particular battery life advantage. It makes sense because the Air doesn't have that large a battery (50WHr) versus the 13" Pro (60WHr) and the 14" Pro (70WHr).

 

[dogslobber]

I've an M1 13" and it pretty much consistently delivers as Apple promised 20 hours which is a big appeal to me. While the new 14" is very much a more feature rich notebook, however it's only better if you have the need or just want to splurge. For me there's every chance as the M1 is hitting Apple's spec of 20 hours that I'd loose as much as 6 hours runtime with the 14" MBP, which doesn't appeal.

Q-6

Battery life is where it's at for me and being super cool to the touch. So tired of Intel laptops that are noisy, hot and have mediocre battery life. The 18-20 hours is so far out there that you don't want to go back. So the 2021 MBPs with fans are a downgrade to me.

 

[Buck987]

Big advantage for the Air for some is the buy in price being as low as $850 and that's a factor. I went with the M1 Pro as it works better for my needs, that said I still think it presents tremendous value

Q-6

for sure the AIR is fine as your only Mac....and the value cannot be beat

 

[calstanford]

I would also add to that the 50% faster charging, bigger battery and subjectively a better design, as the MBA feels to feminine.

I am sorry to hear you have issues with your sexuality

 

[Mike Boreham]

Even if Low Power Mode isn't engaged in the MacBook Air, if you push the CPU hard for longer than 5 minutes, it starts throttling by quite a bit due to the lack of any cooling.

Depends what you mean by "quite a bit". 10% after 30 minutes of continuous Cinebench runs. About 4% after 5 minutes.

 

[bill-p]

Depends what you mean by "quite a bit". 10% after 30 minutes of continuous Cinebench runs. About 4% after 5 minutes.

If you look at Geekbench scores, it may seem like the performance drop is only 10%, but I gotta remind you that the M1 Pro with 10 cores, which should be 2x faster in almost every CPU task compared to M1 due to having 2x more performance cores, only scores about 12300 points, which is roughly just 64% faster.

So Cinebench scoring does not scale linearly. In reality, if you're losing only 10% in Cinebench, you may be losing a lot more.

My experience is much closer to this post here.

When the Air throttles due to the GPU-intensive tasks I listed above, the performance drop is closer to 30% or more. Fusion 360 and Room EQ Wizard both become noticeably sluggish, and the machine was very hot to touch.

 

[jdb8167]

No, I get it. I'm just saying: Low Power Mode makes no sense on the Air. The performance drop is insane and it doesn't really seem to bring any other benefit except that the computer gets to stay very cool even under heavy load (but it's also very slow).

I've been playing around with this tool: asitop which makes it easier to see powermetrics data. I also added a peak package power output to the tool which seems to not be reported by mistake. When I have normal power with the charger connected, I can easily see 100W of peak package power. Obviously on an M1 MBA that peak doesn't last long but it is there at least according to the powermetrics tool. When I turn on the Low Power setting, again on the charger, I get a peak package power of only 21 W. That is a pretty significant difference.

I think there is more going on with the M1 Air Low Power Mode that you are crediting.

Edit: Also the Low Power Mode change seems to be limiting the 4 performance cores to about 1.3 GHz max.

 

[yitwail]

My family has both and sometimes get criticized for preferring the 13" M1 pro over the air in these forums. Both good machines but IMO if u only can have one... get the 13" M1 Pro over the air.

There's pros and cons for both choices, so far be it from me to criticize, but the choice is now complicated by the fact that base 14in MBP is only a few hundred bucks more than 13in MBP with 16gb/512gb.

 

[bill-p]

I think there is more going on with the M1 Air Low Power Mode that you are crediting.

Edit: Also the Low Power Mode change seems to be limiting the 4 performance cores to about 1.3 GHz max.

Well, you are right. Maybe there's much more going on. All I'm seeing is just the effect of the mode itself. From what I'm seeing though, the drop is a bit too much for my workflow.

There's pros and cons for both choices, so far be it from me to criticize, but the choice is now complicated by the fact that base 14in MBP is only a few hundred bucks more than 13in MBP with 16gb/512gb.

To be fair, I still remember the 13" Pro having more battery life than the 14" regardless (even when the 14" is in Low Power Mode) and I think it is worth the price if anyone would like the longest lasting laptop possible.

 

[jdb8167]

Well, you are right. Maybe there's much more going on. All I'm seeing is just the effect of the mode itself. From what I'm seeing though, the drop is a bit too much for my workflow

It makes sense that if your work is pushing the M1 MacBook Air to its limits already, you aren't going to see much benefit from low power mode. I think if you could run in LPM you would find that it does give you additional battery life. It seems like it probably has to given the power limits I'm seeing. But it's also possible that other things like screen brightness and peripherals consume much more power than whatever change comes from low power that the reduced CPU usage is swamped by it.

 

[Buck987]

There's pros and cons for both choices, so far be it from me to criticize, but the choice is now complicated by the fact that base 14in MBP is only a few hundred bucks more than 13in MBP with 16gb/512gb.

not saying you did...and having choices is always a good thing for a consumer