June 20, 2020, the date Apple’s first virtual WWDC took place. A historic keynote during which the Apple Silicon project was unveiled. The third processor transition for Mac had arrived.
Four years later, we have M3 chips in quite a few Macs, and we might even see the M4 chip soon. Four generations are one enough time to look back and begin to realize what happened over these four years. A few years that seemed like a decade whole if we speak in evolutionary terms.
The M1 chip, a first generation that is not a first generation
You have probably heard this phrase: “The first generations of Apple never turned out well”. And in a way, it’s true. The first iPhone, the first iPad, the first Apple Watch and even the first Apple Vision Pro. They all are. very special products to be revolutionaryHowever, they had and still have much to do.
This did not happen with the M1 chip, in fact it is a chip that It’s still for sale on iPad Air and MacBook Air. And if you use it today, Even if you’re coming from an M3 chip, you’ll barely notice a difference. Later we will talk about a personal situation that motivated me to write this article.
Apple already had a lot of experience making processors
NOW We go back to 2010, when Apple introduced the first iPad. The A4 chip was hidden inside, the first processor designed by Apple. Months later it would arrive on the iPhone 4. The evolution has been such that now, with the A17 Pro chip, we can play video games on the iPhone 15 Pro. Who would have thought this would be possible!
Furthermore, Apple supplied the rest of its products with its own processors. Apple Watch with S chips, AirPods with W chips How could the Mac not have its own processor? It’s because of it the M1 chip is not a first generation; It took years and years of evolution to achieve a product mature enough to convince the most professional Mac users.
With the M1 chip we said goodbye to bad computers
Sorry, I don’t mean to offend anyone. But if, There were Macs with Intel processors whose performance was very questionable. I was a salesman in Apple stores and I was embarrassed to sell a MacBook for 1500 dollars with an Intel Core M. And if you hurry me up, I will sell too a 13″ MacBook Pro with an Intel graphics card. Yes, it was the technology that existed. But the Mac deserved much more, much more.
Price and features of a MacBook Pro in 2016
These Macs are still usable; I myself have a MacBook from 2010 and it is still moderately functional. The same thing happens with MacBook Pros from 2012, 2016… Maybe you even read me in one of them. What is happening? Well, the M1 chip represented such a stark departure from the CPU paradigm that Even if you buy it today, you’ll get an incredibly superior computer to what was proposed a few years ago.
The M1 chip allowed us to achieve nearly a decade of computing advancements in a single year.
He The MacBook Air M1 can easily be found at 899 dollars. The MacBook Air M3 has a base price of 1,299 dollars. If you had asked me six years ago, when I was selling Apple on the street, that this was going to happen, I wouldn’t have believed it in my wildest dreams..
Playing AAA titles on a MacBook M3 is possible
I experienced going back to the latest Mac with Intel and the first with M1
I recently changed jobs; Yes, I came to Applesfera. In my previous company, I used a MacBook Pro M3 Pro and when I left it I had to go back to a MacBook Air M1 for several days. My surprise was that it was perfectly usable.
Yes, video editing gave me a weird boost. The design was not the most current. But I could work without any problem! No warm-up, with brutal drummingand without seeing the famous beach ball spinning.
A few days later, I visited a friend’s house and he had a 2020 MacBook Pro. The latest MacBook Pro with TouchBar. These Macs had the same amount of RAM (8 GB), SSDs and a “pro” Intel processor. The experience? Of course very different.
Mac It was hot just making a video call. The battery, although healthy, felt like it was dying by the minute. Performance wasn’t bad, but for very basic use. Netflix, email, browsing Safari… Of course, with the fan still running.
Temperature of an Intel MacBook Pro and MacBook Air M1
On the one hand I’m glad my friend still has an eight year old Mac and use it in your daily life, and also, quite happily and satisfied. However, Inside, I can’t help but think:
My God, the beast you would have today with the money you spent
It is clear that Today’s Macs aren’t perfect. For example, they still have 8 GB of RAM on a basic basis. Something insufficient for 2024, as we have already discussed in Applesfera. However, You can buy a four-year-old Mac with the M1 chip and feel a real revolution if this is your first Mac or if you want to renew your model with Intel.
Apple MacBook Air 2022 Laptop with M2 Chip, 13.6-inch Liquid Retina Display, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD Storage, Backlit Keyboard, Space Gray
*Some prices may have changed since the last review
And Apple did it so well that it seemed to realize
The progress that the M1 chip represented compared to Intel processors was so great that In subsequent generations, the performance evolution decreased. We have gone through the M2 chip, the M3 chip and maybe we will meet the M4 chip soon.
In part, Apple has accelerated the pace of updates del Chip M to encourage purchase and renewal. A marketing tactic above all. Feeling that something is old because there is a number much greater than yours. Apple is aware of this, and as you can see the performance spike that occurred with Intel’s move to the M1 chip It was not produced again.
And moving from one generation of Mac to another only makes sense if your work rhythm has changed dramatically. If Macs already benefited from good longevity, now imagine that a MacBook Air M1 from four years ago, works like a MacBook Air M3 for most users.
Maybe Apple should have announced the M1 chip as the first processor that actually lets you have a once-a-decade refresh cycle
With this article I have tried to achieve several things: The first of these is that sIf you own a Mac with the M1 chip or later, you should be proud and participate in the best Macs in history. On another side, if you have a Mac with Intel and you are happy with it, congratulations. But you have to know that there exists a world to which it’s worth stoppingand when you do, you’ll wonder how you ever managed without it.
You don’t have to change right now; maybe you can save a little more time on your current Mac or Windows. The golden age of Macs began in 2020 and awaits you so that all the power of M Chips is with you.
In Applesfera | MacBook Air M3 (2024), analysis: superpowers for the most beautiful Mac in the world
In Applesfera | M4 chip, everything we know about the new Apple processors
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