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Which would be better?
- Thread starter Dorfdad
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Unless you're planning to max out cpu usage and would therefore benefit from the additional cooling, go for the Air. The M1 is really difficult to get hot, so thermals won't be an issue unless you're maxing the cpu for extended periods of time. And even then, from the reviews I've seen the performance loss from thermal throttling on the Air is marginal at best.
Other than that, the additional benefits of the pro (touch bar, screen brightness, speakers, and slightly more battery life) don't outweigh the benefits and peace of mind you'll get from 8GB more RAM.
Other than that, the additional benefits of the pro (touch bar, screen brightness, speakers, and slightly more battery life) don't outweigh the benefits and peace of mind you'll get from 8GB more RAM.
So for anyone else sitting on the fence I went ahead and got both and will be returning one putting it through its paces last night the MacBook Air M1 with 16 GB and 8/8 CPUGPU Seems much more snappy compared to the MacBook pro M1 Both with 512 ssd.
Just opening applications and doing basic functions the 16 GB version feels almost twice as fast as the pro now for a heavy lifting there may be a difference and I definitely prefer the pro for the Touch Bar and Slightly better and Sound but maybe I’m crazy I like the feel and speed and 16 GB M1 Over the pro.
So I will be returning the MacBook Pro I’m going with the air for my needs if you really want the pro I suggest you get the 16 GB Version
Just opening applications and doing basic functions the 16 GB version feels almost twice as fast as the pro now for a heavy lifting there may be a difference and I definitely prefer the pro for the Touch Bar and Slightly better and Sound but maybe I’m crazy I like the feel and speed and 16 GB M1 Over the pro.
So I will be returning the MacBook Pro I’m going with the air for my needs if you really want the pro I suggest you get the 16 GB Version
Glad I decided to order mine online and wait, rather than getting what was available at my local Apple Store.
I went with the MBP 512 16.
Yesterday I bought the MBP M1 8/512 to compare to my MBA M1 16/512/8C GPU. I had the same observations as you between both laptops. The MBA is feels faster with 16GB memory even doing the basic things over the MBP M1 8/512. I ran a few benchmarks to compare both units. The benchmarks were Black Magic Disk SpeedTest, Cinebench R23, GeekBench Speedtest.net, and my own WiFi network file transfer speed.
Black Magic Disk Speed Test really surprised me. The MBA outperformed the MBP by a few hundred MB/s. This test was using the 5GB stress test option.
Cinebench R23 - the MBA was about 10% slower than MBP due to throttling and with no active cooling. I say that the MBA had really scores without active cooling. MBA got to the point of warm at the 10 minute mark, while the MBP fans turned on at the 6 minute mark and I could hear them.
Geekbench - similar results
Speedtest.net and WiFi Transfer Speed test - Again the MBA outperformed the MBP. I have a 100 Mbps internet connection. Both laptops were wifi cards were setup to use the 5 GHz 80 MHz. My MBA was getting 117 Mbps download speed and 11 Mbps upload. The MBP was getting 50 Mbps download speed and about 4 Mbps upload speed. For my 10 GB file transfer speed, the MBA took 1 min and 39 seconds, the MBP took 2 mins 45 secs. Both the MBA and MBP were the same distance away from my router and I ran the file transfer test individually as well as the internet download speed. During these tests the MBP wifi card speed was fluctuating from 585 Mbps to 866 Mbps, while the MBA was constant at 866 Mbps.
The only good thing to me on the MBP was the screen quality. I did not like the touchbar on it. It was unergonomic for typing. I really did not care about the speakers sound quality and mic voice quality. The mic on the MBA is still good as well as the MBA speakers. Personally, I use the Audioquest DragonFly Red audio usb dac and the Bose Companion 2 Series III speakers and both of them are superior sounding than both the MBA/MBP speakers and audio chip.
The only thing that I'm neutral on the MBA is the screen brightness. The MBA 400 nit screen brightness does not bother me as much, but if were 50 nits more brighter that would have been great.
For me it wasn't worth spending an extra $50 on the MBP for a better screen while downgrading overall performance. I can't afford the MBP M1/16/512. I'm going to return my MBP today and keep my MBA M1/16GB/512GB/8C. The MBA suits my needs for now and I feel that it's the sweet spot for the M1 MacBooks.
The fact is the MBA is just as fast as the MBP unless you are doing extreme load tasks for longer then 10mins at a time, and then it is 85% as fast, which is still really really fast.
aka IMHO thermal throttling isn't really a good justification for getting the MBP over the MBA. Way smarter to spend the same $ to get the 16GB on MBA.
aka IMHO thermal throttling isn't really a good justification for getting the MBP over the MBA. Way smarter to spend the same $ to get the 16GB on MBA.
Great observations so I’m glad we had similar feelings. In fact after playing with them all day I’m buying a max mini -6gb myself as well for my daily job.
I don’t have as much experience with max products this is my first foray into max land outside IPhones and I have a lot to learn along the way!
two things I miss right away is the cut/move feature in context menu and the inability to modify add / remove items from the system menu like in the phones (slide down) timer flashlight kinda.
Many consider the lack of a touch bar to be a benefit for the Air.
When I tried out the MBP yesterday, after a few minutes of using the touch bar I did not like it all. I hated scrolling on the touch bar to the next section and previous section in order to get a function. Once the touch bar is dead, the MBP looses a lot of important functions which makes the MBP useless. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple comes out with a touch keyboard similar to the touch bar on the MBP but with haptic touch.
It's a relief that the MBA does not have the touch bar.
A touch keyboard would be miserable to use. Worse than the butterfly. I prefer a trackpad and keyboard to a touch screen, but I'd much rather have a touch screen and a proper physical keyboard than the alternatives. At least with the touch screen, I have the option to not use it.
As for the touch bar, I just turn it into a customizable system key row.
Someone mentioned on this forums somewhere that the audio quality from the pro's headphone jack is better sounding on high end wired headphones and that the internal dac (or something) is different. I would like to know your observation. Is there a difference in any aspect related to audio output via the jack (directly or through a usb dac)?
Also, a lot of customers who have both pro and air are claiming that pro's keyboard is better feeling and have a more tactical feedback. Is your experience similar?
My AudioQuest DragonFly Red USB dac is better than the audio dac in the MacBooks. Its sound quality is sublime due to its ESS Sabre 9601 audio chip and it has . The audio chip in the Macbooks are quite decent and better than most laptops audio chip.
Yes, the MacBook Pro has a better keyboard than the MBA,