60-Something Days With the M1 MacBook Air
I’ve posted a bit of information about the new M1 Macs but I hadn’t yet shared my own personal experience. My M1 MacBook Air arrived the day after Thanksgiving, so I’ve had just about 2 months with it. Now that the honeymoon phase is over, here are my impressions.
First, a little background. I bought a 16-inch MacBook Pro in November 2019 shortly after it was released. It was a huge upgrade from the 13-inch MacBook Pro I had been using for about 3 years, with a dedicated graphics card and 6-core processor. I was also excited to have the larger screen for photo and video work. I opted for the base model, which came with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. It was pretty awesome.
So when Apple announced the first wave of “Apple Silicon” Macs last Fall, I hesitated. The initial M1 Macs are the MacBook Air, an entry-level MacBook Pro, and an entry-level Mac mini. They basically cover the low end of the Mac spectrum, so we know that more powerful models will be released within the next year. Plus, the 16-inch MacBook Pro is a beast, so the safe assumption was that either of these new laptops would be a downgrade.
Then the reviews started pouring out and everyone was losing their minds about the performance of these new Macs. The consensus was that, once you use an M1 Mac, going back to almost any Intel Mac feels archaic...even powerhouses like the iMac Pro and Mac Pro. That’s when I decided to give the M1 MacBook Air a shot. Worst case, I could return it. Best case, I’d love it and I could actually make a little money on the whole deal by selling my 16-inch.
I opted for the upper-tier MacBook Air that has 8 graphics cores, and I bumped the RAM to 16GB, which is the max these machines can handle. That may not sound like much, but the M1 has a new “unified memory architecture.” The RAM is basically part of the processor, so there’s no longer a bottleneck between the two to slow things down. That means that, while 8GB of RAM on an Intel Mac is not going to be enough for anyone, the vast majority of users will get by just fine with 8GB of RAM on an M1 Mac. I still wanted to play it safe and get the max available since you can’t upgrade it later.
So…what’s the verdict?
This is unequivocally the best laptop I’ve ever used. Here are a few of my favorite things.
Speed
The single biggest reason to upgrade a computer is to get a faster computer. Like I said before, the safe assumption was that a MacBook Air would be a big step backward when switching from the 16-inch MacBook Pro. Shockingly, the Air was a much bigger upgrade than I could have expected.
It’s tough to convey the full experience in words, but everything on this Mac feels instant. Even when you browse the web, it’s like the web pages are pre-loaded. It’s so snappy that going back to an Intel Mac can be a bit frustrating. Even my new 2020 5K iMac with its 8-core i7 processor feels a little sluggish now.
Since the M1 is a brand new architecture, applications that are built for Intel machines need to be optimized to run on it. At this point, most of the apps I use regularly have been optimized, but even if they haven’t, it’s hard to notice because of Apple’s Rosetta 2 translation environment. When you try to run an Intel-only app, Rosetta works in the background to translate the entire app into something the M1 can run…and then it just runs. The only thing a user will notice is that the app will bounce in the dock for a few seconds when it’s first launched. After that, it launches much more quickly because Rosetta has already done all the compiling.
It really is amazing how fast these first M1 Macs are. And the best part is, these are the slowest Apple Silicon Macs we’ll ever see.
Battery Life
I’ve gone up to 5 days of regular use without having to plug this thing in. The battery just doesn’t die. Even with constant use, I’d be comfortable going two full days on a single charge. Of course, your mileage may vary.
For example, I tend to use different browsers for specific jobs so that all the bookmarks and logins stay separated. I decided to use Chrome for a job I started recently, and Chrome is notoriously power and memory hungry. I noticed over the past week or so that the battery was running down a little quicker than I expected, and I pin that entirely on the number of Chrome tabs I was running at all times. I’ll always recommend Safari over anything else on a Mac, but if you must use Chrome for some reason, just be aware that it’s still a hog.
Even so, with regular use, I was seeing 2 to 3 days of battery life, which is a massive improvement over my 16-inch MacBook Pro. Under similar circumstances, I’d feel compelled to plug that laptop in every night just to be sure I could get through the next day.
Thermals
There are two main aspects that fall under the “thermals” category. First, this thing runs completely cool. Even with all of those Chrome tabs open, the computer never felt warm at all. That’s a huge departure from an Intel MacBook, which feels warm around the top edge of the keyboard almost all the time. This also means you can use the laptop on your lap without any discomfort.
The other aspect of the Mac’s thermals is the fan...or the lack of a fan in this case. The M1 system runs so cool that they decided to pull the fan out of the MacBook Air, creating a completely silent machine. That’s one of the main differentiators between the M1 MacBook Air and the M1 MacBook Pro, which does still have a fan. Early commentary around this decision assumed that the speed of the MacBook Air would be constrained because, as a processor heats up, it either needs to be cooled to maintain performance or it needs to be throttled to prevent it from melting.
But the M1 barely heats up. All of the testing suggests that the main benefit of the MacBook Pro’s fan really only kicks in if you’re performing a prolonged processor-intensive task like exporting a long 4K video or batch editing a ton of RAW photos. In that case, the MacBook Air will eventually heat up enough to start to throttle after about 10 minutes. Other than those decidedly “pro” tasks, performance between the two laptops is nearly identical.
That’s also one of the biggest upgrades from the Intel MacBook Air, which was notorious for throttling under normal use, even with a fan.
Instant-On
Apple made a big deal about the “instant-on” capability of these new Macs, and it’s no joke. If you have an iPhone or iPad, you know the experience of tapping the screen or pressing the side button and seeing the device instantly spring to life. That’s the experience of an M1 Mac, and one of the biggest differentiators vs. an Intel Mac.
I used to turn to my iPad for most quick tasks because those few seconds waiting for my MacBook Pro to wake created a mental barrier that made it feel less efficient. That barrier is completely gone with this MacBook Air. I lift the lid and it’s ready to go before I’ve even opened it wide enough to see the screen.
Keyboard
This isn’t necessarily a new feature, but it’s worth mentioning that the M1 MacBook Air has the Magic Keyboard that debuted on the 16-inch MacBook Pro. This is my favorite iteration of Apple’s laptop keyboards and it’s just a joy to use.
Wrap-Up
That’s my short list of reasons I love this laptop. I don’t personally have any gripes, but ones I’ve seen have included the fact that it’s the same design we’ve seen for years and there are only two Thunderbolt ports. I think the design holds up quite well, and I almost never plug peripherals into my laptop. I reserve the right to change my mind once the next round of MacBook Pros with the M1X or M2 are released this year, but as of this writing, the M1 MacBook Air is the best laptop I could have hoped for.
