MacBook Air M3 After 3 Months: Value You Won't Believe!
Summary
TLDRIn this video, Kyle Erikson shares his 3-month experience with the M3 MacBook Air, comparing it to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro. He discusses design, performance, and battery life, highlighting the Air's thin and light form factor, its two USBC ports, and fanless design. Kyle finds the Air's performance impressive for productivity, coding, and creative workflows, with only minor GPU differences noticed in GPU-intensive tasks. He also praises the MacBook Air's battery life and overall solid performance, concluding that it meets the needs of most users, except for those with very specific advanced requirements.
Takeaways
- 😀 The M3 MacBook Air has been used daily for 3 months for various tasks, including productivity, coding, and creative workflows.
- 💻 The MacBook Air is often underrated due to its thin design and fanless nature, which some people may perceive as underpowered.
- 🔧 The 13-inch model in midnight color has a new anodization process to reduce fingerprints, but they are still visible and prone to wear.
- 🔌 The MacBook Air has only two USB-C ports, which might limit versatility compared to the MacBook Pro but hasn't been a significant issue for the user.
- 🖥 The Liquid Retina display on the M3 MacBook Air offers a high-quality viewing experience, suitable for photo and video editing.
- 🚀 The M3 MacBook Air's performance has been comparable to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro for most tasks, with minor differences in GPU-intensive applications.
- 💾 The user's configuration has 16GB of memory and a 500GB SSD, which provides a noticeable performance bump from the base model.
- 🔋 The M3 MacBook Air has excellent battery life, easily lasting a full workday with light to moderate use.
- 🔧 The MacBook Air's SSD speed and memory bandwidth are high, but the user has not noticed a significant difference in everyday use compared to other Macs.
- 🌐 External SSDs are used by the user for most workflows, as internal SSD speeds are rarely a bottleneck.
- 🔄 The MacBook Air's fanless design can get warm but does not throttle performance noticeably, even during heavy tasks.
Q & A
How long has the author been using the M3 MacBook Air?
-The author has been using the M3 MacBook Air for 3 months.
What are the primary use cases for the M3 MacBook Air as mentioned by the author?
-The author uses the M3 MacBook Air for productivity, coding, and creative workflows both at home and while traveling.
What is the author's perception of the MacBook Air's design?
-The author thinks the MacBook Air is an underrated laptop with a thin and fanless design, which some people might perceive as underpowered, but it is more capable than given credit for.
How does the author describe the build quality and durability of the M3 MacBook Air?
-The author mentions that the M3 MacBook Air, despite being thin, has held up well even with frequent use and travel, showing minimal signs of wear around the USB-C ports.
What are the limitations of the M3 MacBook Air's port selection compared to the MacBook Pro?
-The M3 MacBook Air only has two USB-C ports, which limits its versatility compared to the MacBook Pro that offers more port options.
How does the author utilize the HyperDrive USB 4 SSD enclosure in their workflow?
-The author uses the HyperDrive USB 4 SSD enclosure with an NVMe drive like the Samsung 980 Pro for high-speed data transfer, which often outperforms the internal drive of the MacBook Air.
What is the author's experience with video editing on the M3 MacBook Air?
-The author finds video editing on the M3 MacBook Air to be smooth, with export times and performance being almost identical to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro, despite the latter having a more powerful GPU.
How does the author's M3 MacBook Air configuration compare to the base model?
-The author's configuration has 16GB of memory, a 512GB SSD, an 8-core CPU, and a 10-core GPU, which is a significant upgrade from the base model with 8GB of memory, a 256GB SSD, and fewer GPU cores.
What is the author's opinion on the M3 MacBook Air's performance for coding and graphic design?
-The author finds the M3 MacBook Air to be very smooth for coding and graphic design tasks, with no noticeable difference in performance compared to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro for regular usage.
How does the M3 MacBook Air perform in terms of battery life according to the author?
-The M3 MacBook Air has excellent battery life, easily getting through a full workday and more with light use, and only needing to be charged once or twice during a week-long trip.
What is the author's stance on the importance of SSD speed in the M3 MacBook Air?
-The author does not consider SSD speed to be a bottleneck or a deciding factor for purchasing the M3 MacBook Air, as they have not noticed a significant difference in SSD speed between Mac models during actual use.
Outlines
💻 MacBook Air Experience After 3 Months
The speaker shares their experience using the M3 MacBook Air for three months, comparing it to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro. They discuss the design, performance, and versatility of the MacBook Air, highlighting its thinness, light weight, and fanless design. The speaker also mentions the use of an external SSD enclosure by Hyper, which provides high-speed data transfer capabilities. They note that despite having fewer ports, the MacBook Air has been sufficient for their needs, including productivity, coding, and creative workflows. The video is sponsored by Hyper, and a discount code is provided for viewers interested in their products.
🔋 Performance and Battery Life Insights
The speaker evaluates the M3 MacBook Air's performance, particularly in video editing and other creative tasks, comparing it to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro. They note that the performance difference is minimal for most tasks, with the Air only showing a slight disadvantage in GPU-intensive applications like Blender. The MacBook Air's battery life is praised as being sufficient for a full workday, with only a slight reduction in battery life when running at high CPU or GPU usage. The speaker also addresses concerns about keeping the MacBook Air plugged in constantly, stating that there has been no noticeable battery degradation.
🛫 MacBook Air for Travel and Everyday Use
The speaker reflects on the MacBook Air's suitability for travel and everyday use, noting its portability and robustness. They mention the lack of an SD card slot as a minor inconvenience but overall find the MacBook Air to be a solid machine for various tasks, including video editing, coding, photo editing, and graphic design. The speaker also expresses interest in upcoming ARM-based chips from Qualcomm and their potential performance in comparison to the MacBook Air. They conclude by encouraging viewers with a MacBook Air to share their experiences and uses for the device.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡M3 MacBook Air
💡Productivity
💡Coding
💡Creative Workflows
💡Performance
💡Fanless Design
💡USB-C Ports
💡Liquid Retina Display
💡Video Editing
💡Battery Life
💡External SSD
Highlights
Switching to M3 MacBook Air from M3 Pro MacBook Pro and using it for various tasks over three months.
The M3 MacBook Air is fanless, thin, and lightweight, which might lead to misconceptions about its performance and overheating.
The 13-inch Midnight MacBook Air has a new anodization process to reduce fingerprints, but they still show up easily.
The MacBook Air's durability has been good, even with frequent use and travel.
The MacBook Air's two USBC ports limit versatility compared to the Pro, but a dock can provide additional ports.
Hyper's Hyperdrive USB 4 SSD enclosure and Thunderbolt 4 Hub offer high-speed connectivity and power delivery without a power brick.
The M3 MacBook Air's Liquid Retina display offers excellent contrast and color uniformity for photo and video editing.
Performance of the M3 MacBook Air with 16GB memory and 512GB SSD is comparable to the M3 Pro MacBook Pro for most tasks.
The base model of the M3 MacBook Air is suitable for basic use like productivity and media consumption.
The M3 MacBook Air handles video editing, photo editing, graphic design, and coding smoothly.
Memory usage in video editing software sometimes leads to plugin crashes, but it's not a consistent issue.
Battery life of the M3 MacBook Air is outstanding, lasting through a full workday with light to moderate use.
Continuously plugging in the MacBook Air at a desk does not seem to affect battery health negatively.
The M3 MacBook Air is a solid choice for most users, except those needing heavy GPU processing or advanced workflows.
Upcoming comparison between the new Microsoft Surface laptops and the MacBook Air is anticipated.
For 95% of users, the M3 MacBook Air is sufficient for their needs, including front-end web and mobile development.
Transcripts
it's been 3 months since I switched to
the M3 MacBook Air from the M3 Pro
MacBook Pro and after using it daily
over that span there's a lot worth
discussing during that time I've been
using the M3 a for everything from
productivity to coding and more creative
workf flows both while at home and while
traveling and it's given me a fairly
good idea of what to expect from it
today I want to dive into what that
whole experience has been like what the
2024 MacBook Air does great what's maybe
not so great and just my general
thoughts after using it every day that
hopefully provide you with some value it
should at the very least give you a
reference point if you're unsure if the
M3 air is going to work for you so if
that is the case or if you just want to
see what the last four months have
looked like with my own use stick around
and let's get into
[Music]
it this video is sponsored by hyper hey
everyone Kyle Erikson here for the past
few Generations I think the MacBook Air
has been a pretty underrated laptop and
it's more capable than a lot of people
give it credit for which I think stems
from a couple of things one is the
design this is the thinnest MacBook
available it only has two ports and it's
fanless which I think leads people to
believe it's going to overheat or it's
underpowered and that really bleeds into
the other main reason which is the
perception of lack of performance
especially with the bass versions the
one that I have here is not the Basse
version and we're going to get into
performance in a few minutes but let's
just come back to the design first the
version that I have here is the 13-in
model and is midnight in color Apple
says that there's a new anodization
process on these to reduce fingerprints
but they still show up relatively easily
the good news is it doesn't seem to be
overly prone to wear around the USBC
ports there's virtually no difference
from when I got it new even though these
ports see a ton of use now I'm pretty
careful with my gear and if you're hard
on your laptops that might be a
different story but I know for me even
when traveling it's held up really well
I've taken this with me on both short
and long trips and with the air coming
in at 0.44 in thick and weighing in at
2.7 lb it's about 28% thinner and 23%
lighter than the 14-in MacBook Pro which
is a little more convenient but it does
come with some tradeoffs the MacBook Air
only has two USBC ports so you don't get
the same versatility as the pro with
Port selection but I can probably count
the times on one hand where that's been
a pain point for the most part I'm just
using this around the house are at my
desk and anytime it has been at my desk
it's in a vertical stand plugged into a
dock and my studio display the dock
gives me all that I need in terms of SD
Thunderbolt and USBC ports and it'll
power the MacBook Air and all my
accessories the main being my external
USB 4 nvme SSD enclosure that I've had
at my desk for the better part of a year
which just so happens to be made by this
week sponsor hyper their hyperdrive USB
4 SSD enclosure combined with an nvme
drive like my Samsung 980 Pro gives me
USB 4 and Thunderbolt speeds that often
outperform the internal drive on my
MacBook Air on top of that they have a
thunderbolt 4 Hub that is really unique
which I am going to feature later on in
another video but the great thing about
this is not only do you get four
Thunderbolt 4 ports capable of 40 GB per
second speeds you've also got 96 Watts
power delivery that will power any
MacBook and the best part is there's no
external power brick which I've
personally never seen before all the
Thunderbolt hubs or docks that I've seen
regardless of size have a giant power
brick attached to them or this has an
integrated Gan power source so this is a
lot easier to place or carry around with
you if you're traveling they also have a
bunch of other great travel gear all of
which will be linked in the description
and right now if you use code hyper Kyle
15 at checkout you can get 15% off
anything here so please check that out
if you're interested because it's all
great stuff now one other thing that's
related to the design that's often
somewhat underrated is the display the
M3 MacBook Air has a liquid Retina
display in both the 13 and 15in models
which is an IPS backlit screen with a 60
HZ refresh rate so no mini LED promotion
display like in the MacBook Pro but in
all honesty it's still fantastic the
contrast ratio in my own testing far
exceeds a standard IPS panel and you get
virtually no backlight bleed with great
uniformity and color I've edited a ton
of photos and videos on this thing and
like all Apple products it looks pretty
much the same on this display as it does
on an iPhone iPad Studio display you
name it well except maybe this thing the
point being for the majority of people
even if you do have some Advanced
workflows it's still more than capable
speaking of video editing that's
probably what I've done the most of on
here just in terms of pushing the M3 air
to its limits and that's where I want to
start while getting into the performance
side of things so the configuration that
I have here has 16 gigs of memory and a
500 12 gig SSD with an 8 core CPU and 10
core GPU so this is a noticeable bump
from the base model that comes with a
256 gig SSD 8 gigs of memory and two
less GPU cores I'm not going to sit here
and talk about how the base version is
useless and why no one should buy it
because I definitely think there is a
place for it especially for lighter use
I had the base 15-in M2 air for 6 months
and was quite impressed with it for
basic use so don't sleep on it for basic
things like productivity and consuming
media I got this particular config
because this is what I would actually
buy if it were just me looking for
something as a consumer considering
everything that I would do with it and a
big part of me buying this was also to
see how much I would notice the
difference coming from the M3 Pro
MacBook Pro and the answer was not much
working on these videos every week
Everything feels virtually identical I
don't really notice any difference in
terms of speed or processing power the
M3 Pro might be a little more Snappy say
if I have a super long clip and and I go
to do some kind of heavy processing on
it but by and large it hasn't felt like
I've ever sacrificed anything sure the
air does get warmer with a fanless
design but I've never noticed it
throttle performance to the point where
it's perceivable outside some Niche GPU
heavy tasks and there is a lot of chips
that are arm-based like the M3 that
don't use fans so that's never really
been a concern for me speaking of arm I
did pre-order one of the new Microsoft
Surface laptops that claim that they are
better than the new Macbook Air for
around the same price
so if you guys want to see how those
stack up against each other make sure
that you're subscribed and drop a
comment down below if there's anything
that you would like to see between the
Surface and the air anyway scrolling
around the timeline and adding effects
on the M3 feels indistinguishable
compared to the M3 Pro and because it is
exactly the same encoding and decoding
engine on both machines export times are
almost identical just a side note one
area I wonder about here is with memory
usage where if I'm working on my
timeline for an extended period of time
I'll often get plug-in crashes in Final
Cut Pro but if I restart it doesn't seem
to be an issue any longer I don't recall
this ever happening on my 32 gig memory
desktop machines that I've had in the
past and it does happen on my MacBook
Pro that has 18 gigs I can't say for
certain if that's a memory issue or what
is going on there but developer should
be responsible for properly managing all
of that anyway and depending on what
happens at WWDC this year I might just
completely move away from Final Cut
outside of that though things also feel
very very smooth with photo editing
graphic design and coding I know there
might be outliers here with huge
projects and batch processing but
regular usage is very Snappy on the M3
air and working on a number of software
projects of my own both in web and
mobile things rarely ever like one area
that I mentioned where there is a
noticeable difference between the M3 air
and the M3 Pro MacBook Pro is when you
start taxing the GPU where FS like
blender feel a lot smoother and render
much quicker on the M3 Pro that's to be
expected given the M3 pro has a more
powerful 14 core GPU and you'll likely
notice it with gaming or with plugins or
visual effects that really lean into the
GPU but because the M3 introduced
Hardware enabled Ray tracing apps that
take advantage of it see pretty huge
gains in performance over the previous
generation where I would say performance
in the M3 air is about on par with the
M2 Pro there are also a bunch of other
specs on paper that make this seem like
it's better or worse performance-wise
that don't really make any difference
the M3 air has 100 GB pers second memory
bandwidth that is much higher in other
Pro and Max machines that I've never
really noticed and likewise the SSD
speed is quite a bit faster than the
base M2 air and still a lot slower than
the N3 Pro but I've honestly never
really noticed a difference between any
of these machines in SSD speed while
actually using them that's why I run
most of my workflow from an external SSD
I remember years ago getting my first M1
Pro machine thinking that importing and
working with large files while video
editing would be a noticeable
Improvement on the internal drive versus
the external one that I had at the time
and it ended up feeling almost exactly
the same so while I do like to bump up
this spec to around 512 gigs minimum
just to give myself enough room to
comfortably work around Mac OS I
generally prefer to keep that lower and
just work from an external drive to
bring the cost down a little bit and
reduce the mileage on the internal drive
keep in mind that I am using this mostly
at home though and I can totally
understand why you wouldn't want to haul
around an external SSD if you're a lot
more nomadic but I think the main point
to be aware of here is just that SSD
speeds on any of these Macs is rarely
ever going to be a bottleneck and I
don't think that that should be a
deciding factor for purchasing any of
these one thing that is a reasonable
factor for a lot of people will be
battery life and the M3 air has been
great in that regard this like every
other new Macbook will get you through a
full work day no problem and then some
and that hasn't really changed since I
did my initial review I've taken this on
trips with me where I've been gone for a
week and I've only had to charge it once
or twice with light use and while the
pro does last a little bit longer than
this it's still outstanding now if you
start running this at 100% CPU or GPU
usage that's going to fall down much
quicker and you'll likely want to have
some kind of power brick or external
power bank handy and you're probably
looking at more like a half day of
battery life but I don't know how often
you're going to tax things that much and
it's still more than acceptable in my
opinion one question I do get a lot of
with people seeing this sitting at my
desk in a vertical stand plugged in all
the time is if I have to worry about
that killing the battery or if I noticed
any degradation there that really hasn't
been an issue on any of the Macs that
I've owned since the M series came out I
had the M2 MacBook Air at my desk for
about a year and I rarely ever unplugged
it and it was still completely fine
after that year Mac OS does a really
good job with power management these
days so that isn't really something that
I worry about anymore nor should anyone
else overall there really isn't anything
over the last 4 months with this machine
that I felt disappointed with other than
maybe not having an SD card or something
like that well traveling but outside of
minor annoyances like those this is a
super solid machine it's done everything
completely fine in my workflow whether
that's making these videos coding photo
editing or graphic design you name it as
far as software goes I'm mostly doing
front-end web and mobile development on
here and if you need to set up VMS or
have really complex projects with
software or with 3D models for that
matter you're probably going to want to
step things up and get yourself
something more powerful but for 95% of
people the M3 MacBook Air is likely all
that you're going to need it will be
interesting to see what the new
Snapdragon X Elite chips are like in
these new Microsoft co-pilot plus
machines like the surface laptop
especially considering there doesn't
seem to be a new Mac on the horizon for
a little while so I am really interested
to see how those stack up against the
MacBook Air that being said I don't
think that you can go wrong with the air
and if if you have one yourself let me
know in the comments down below how it's
working out for you and what you're
using it for that's all I have for you
today I hope you enjoyed this video or
you found it useful if you did feel free
to hit that like button if you'd like to
see more Tech related content or help me
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Please Subscribe thank you so much for
watching and I will see you in the next
upload
[Music]
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