MacBook Air M2 or MacBook Pro M2?

[boxst]

This is for my wife. I thought it was a no-brained and was just about to buy a 16gb MacBook Air when I started to listen to the reviews:

Basically the SSD speed seems to be not very good. My wife doesn’t move around large files but does appear to have hundreds of tabs open and pages and a bunch of other things, so to me it’ll cache to disk and then give a bad experience ?

For £100 more I can get the Pro - but my wife isn’t keen as it isn’t as pretty (and for me has a lower camera spec and screen size).

Anyone experienced the two and make a recommendation? Or in fact used the Air and noticed the slow SSD?

[somouk]

Based on the way people have been testing the Air in order to stress it in to thermal throttle I don't think you'll notice the SSD issues under normal load.

Unless you are moving lots of small files about SSDs will be plenty quick enough.

[Gweeds]

Air. And IIRC it’s only the base 256gb SSD that has any potential issues anyway.

[LeeM135i]

The 256 gig SSD Air and Pro use the same storage chips so will have the same problem, if you want fast read and write speeds you need to look at the 512 gig SSD in both.

The choice between the Air and the Pro is more to do with how hard you will use it. If it’s office / light photo editing / web browsing / you tube then get the Air, it has a nicer screen and web cam and will do a great job. If you need sustained performance for video editing / game play then get the Pro.

I have the M1 Pro and it’s been brilliant for office tasks and video conferencing but if I was buying today I would probably go for the 512 gig storage M2 Air.

[boxst]

Thank you all. I will just take the £200 hit and upgrade the hard drive of the Air.

[AB]

Bit of a thread resurrection but my wife's laptop has also died not too long after I got an M2 Max Macbook Pro 14" / 32GB / 1TB SSD

I've just ordered a 15" Midnight M2 Air w/ 24GB unified memory and 1TB SSD.

One will go to my wife. I don't really want to be playing with them both side by side then giving my wife "the cast off" so want to decide before it arrives next week. I think I'll prefer the 15" Air but wondered if there were any further thoughts on any glaring differences between the two?

Will the part of me wanting a new shiny toy come back to haunt me?

[S600BSB]

AB said:

Bit of a thread resurrection but my wife's laptop has also died not too long after I got an M2 Max Macbook Pro 14" / 32GB / 1TB SSD

I've just ordered a 15" Midnight M2 Air w/ 24GB unified memory and 1TB SSD.

One will go to my wife. I don't really want to be playing with them both side by side then giving my wife "the cast off" so want to decide before it arrives next week. I think I'll prefer the 15" Air but wondered if there were any further thoughts on any glaring differences between the two?

Will the part of me wanting a new shiny toy come back to haunt me?

Obviously you give your wife the new 15” Air.

[jinkster]

Rumour has it the M3 Air will be out shortly - March/ April.

[AB]

S600BSB said:

Obviously you give your wife the new 15” Air.

Not that obvious to me I use mine for work, she uses hers a lot less.

[AB]

jinkster said:

Rumour has it the M3 Air will be out shortly - March/ April.

Bit late for that!

[Bungleaio]

If you bought it from an apple shop then you have 14 days to return it, no reason required.

[AB]

Bungleaio said:

If you bought it from an apple shop then you have 14 days to return it, no reason required.

Bought online through the Apple Store, assume I can take it back to a physical store unopened?

[Bungleaio]

Yeah you can take it back opened as well I believe. I bought a MacBook Pro at the weekend and the guy said I could test it out and bring it back if I didn’t get on with it. There’s a return window date on my receipt. Check with them first through but unless you are desperate to have a new laptop I’d hold out for the new ones that are strongly rumoured to be announced in the next few weeks.

[jinkster]

M3 Macbook Air available from 8th March on Apple site.

[BlueMR2]

Available from costco as well at a discount if you’re a member.