Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “M2 MacBook Air 2022 Review – A Student’s Perspective”.
The base model 1200 m2 macbook air is sandwiched in between the power and price of the m1 macbook air at 1 and the two thousand dollar m1 pro macbook pro. All of these laptops are great, but the m2 2022 macbook air is an excellent option for a specific type of student. So to see, if you’re, the right student for the m2 macbook air we’ll have to look at three different categories: hardware, battery and, most importantly, processing power. Let’S dive in [ Applause, ], [, Applause; ]. If you look at the size and overall design of the 2022 macbook air, it has a refreshed design. The classic sharp angles of the macbook airs of the past are gone, and now we’ve got this boxy design with rounded edges. It looks more like the newest macbook pros than it does in macbook air, and i kind of appreciate that i’m sure most of you guys are curious on how this midnight colorway looks like and honestly speaking.
It has this like navy blue kind of look, depending on the lighting condition you’re in if you’re, in slightly darker lighting. It looks more of like a black colorway, but out here. It definitely gives this blue like dark, dark blue vibe, almost like a gray and depending on how i’m kind of like positioning it but yeah.
It’S very interesting, and i have to say, aside from it being such a huge fingerprint and finger smudge magnet. This is definitely my favorite colorway so far in terms of the actual hardware specifications. This is still very clearly an air, it’s 2.7 pounds or 1.24 kilograms.
That’S 0.1 pounds lighter than last year’s macbook air. It also has a slightly larger display at 13.6 inches with the resolution of 2560 by 1664.. What’S really great is that this display is slightly brighter than what we got last year. It also does make a difference when i’m working outside – and i think, students who prefer to sit on the quad and work are going to really appreciate this improvement.
Also, you can find a new 1080p webcam, which is great for zoom meetings. I still don’t understand why they can’t just throw a smartphone sensor on here, because this iphone mount they announced is real extra. Another cool, subtle improvement are the new speakers. If you look right behind the backlit magic keyboard, you’ll actually be able to see a speaker system.
Hidden under there, the new 4 speaker sound comes with spatial audio, dopey, atmos and white stairs sound. This is definitely subtle, but those new speakers paired with the laptop’s lack of fans makes for a really easy listening experience. You’Ve also got a 3.5 millimeter, headphone jack on the side and two thunderbolt usb c ports on the side and, of course, magsafe3. The addition of maxsafe is another subtle, but awesome thing apple did this year.
This year’s macbook air will come with the usb c to max a charger that will match the color of the laptop speaking of the magsafe charger. The charging and battery life of the m2 are pretty great in the box base models of the m2 air come with a 30 watt, usb c power, adapter and high end models get a 35 watt power adapter. If you upgrade to a 67 watt adapter, you can fast charge these laptops and you can charge with either mac safe or usbc, which is pretty convenient. You are ready to get 18 hours of movie playback and 15 hours of internet use on the 52.6 watt hour battery life on here in my testing, i found this to last multiple days of light use which can range anywhere from watching a few youtube videos to Internet browsing and maybe typing up a research paper on google docs now when it comes to heavy use such as video editing or doing anything power intensive, this can last you a full day just depending on what you’re doing. Luckily, we do have that fast charging feature here if we need to work portably on a power intensive task. Something to consider is the fact that, since this is a 2022 macbook air, it doesn’t have fans. This laptop will already throttle intensive programs to keep cool and it’ll automatically throttle even more if it needs to save battery life. That takes us straight to the most important factor to determine if this is a right laptop for student performance. The base model m2 chip has an 8 core cpu and an 8 core gpu and 16 core neural engine for storage. It comes with 256 gigs of ssd and 8 gigs of ram, but you can upgrade your ram or storage if you want more. The 1500 model bumps your gpu up to 10 cores and a base of 512 gigs of ssd storage, but otherwise has the same specs as a base model. When i render 4k video edits photos or work on graphically intensive projects, you can definitely see the improvement in render times and general performance that the m2 bumps up in 95 max benchmark.
The m2 chip beats out the m1 with about 21 more computer power, but still falls behind the base model. M1. Pro now computing power isn’t everything. The m2 still doesn’t see a huge gap in multi-core performance from the m1 and falls pretty steep behind the m1 pro. In multi-core benchmarks, it’s important to note that 925 mac ran these tests on a macbook pro with m2, which does have some extra fans, so these benchmarks are a bit inflated compared to what a macbook air can actually do. Now, if you are a student, what do all of these numbers mean? It means if you are a student that has to run computationally intensive work like coding projects over and over the m2 is going to be really valuable and squeezing in some extra debugging time.
If you are a 3d graphics, video, editing or game design student, it also means that this laptop might not be the best one for you, since m2’s improvement in graphics, don’t translate to huge gains in productivity, i will say i was able to easily pull off 4k Video editing, however, it wasn’t as efficient as my 14 inch macbook pro with the m1 pro, if you’re, neither of those type of students – and you just need something for movies, research and papers. The 200 difference between the macbook air 2022 and the air 2020 is just a little extra squeeze. The average student probably won’t even notice a huge difference in computing power that the m2 has compared to the m1.
If the convenience of mac, safe, better battery life and slightly brighter display are worth that 200 extra price point, i’d say: go for this, but apple is still supporting the m1 ship with software updates. So if you really need to save money, i wouldn’t be afraid to go for a new or slightly used 2020 macbook air with the m1 ship. In conclusion, whether you’re a student looking for a portable machine to handle anything from day-to-day tasks to power, intensive applications or a business professional who’s, always on the go and needs a reliable machine, then the m2 macbook air is worth considering.
However, if you are coming from the previous generation, m1 macbook air, this is honestly not worth upgrading unless you need that extra screen real estate. My name is victor kamanga. Thank you for watching. I look forward to seeing you in the next one bye.
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