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00:00Okay, so which MacBook should you buy and how much do you actually need to spend?
00:04Because with Airs and Pros and M2 and M3 chips different sizes and prices
00:10ranging from £999 up to over £7,000 for a top-spec Max, there's a lot to think about.
00:17But that's why I'm here and hopefully by the end of the video you'll have a
00:20better idea which one is right for you so you don't spend too much money and if
00:23you do enjoy the video a little like and subscribe would be lovely. But why am I
00:26making this video now? Well it's because Apple have just refreshed these, the
00:30MacBook Airs with M3, the 13 and the 15. And these come in at the same price as
00:35the previous M2 Airs, this is the 13, which has now had a price cut down to £999.
00:40It's a hundred quid off meaning it replaces the old M1 Air as the new
00:45entry-level model. This came on back in 2020, still a very nice laptop and it
00:49does have that nice taper design that we've lost with the new models but this
00:53is now no longer officially sold new by Apple. You can still buy it refurbished, you
00:57can buy it from retailers and actually for around 750 quid or so it's not a bad
01:02idea although the webcam is not very good and it is a four-year-old laptop. So
01:06now you have five options to choose from. You've got the cheapest entry-level
01:09MacBook, the M2, which will set you back £999, a thousand. Then for a
01:14hundred quid more you've got the new M3 Air and for 200 more than that, the 15
01:18inch if you fancy. And then for those of you who can spend well quite a bit more
01:22actually you've got the MacBook Pros, both the 14 and 16 with brighter screens,
01:26more ports, better performance and a crazy number of options including the M3 Pro
01:30and M3 Max chips. So these can get much more powerful but also they were a lot
01:34more expensive. So now the entire lineup, bar the cheapest M2 MacBook, uses Apple's
01:39latest M3 chip which makes them all a bit more future-proof and also we're not
01:43really expecting any new releases to the MacBook lineup for probably the rest of
01:47the year. We will probably see new Mac Minis and Mac Studios and the desktop
01:52Mac Pro with the M3 chip coming to Apple's June event WWDC or launch just
01:57after but they're the sort of desktop versions. In terms of laptops, MacBooks, I
02:01don't think we're gonna see anything else new for a while so it could be a
02:03good time to upgrade. So number one, let's talk about the M1, the M2 and the M3.
02:09Apple's switch from Intel to using their own chips with the M1 back in 2020 was a
02:13huge deal. Their own macOS software running on their own incredibly
02:18efficient hardware, it revolutionized the laptop market pretty much overnight and
02:22it certainly made me switch from my old Dell XPS 15. Then a couple of years later
02:26in 2022 Apple introduced the M2 chip which was around 20% faster but more
02:32importantly the M2 powered MacBook Airs came with a big design refresh. Bigger,
02:36brighter screens, much better webcams, new colors, faster connectivity. It was a bit
02:41more expensive but it was also a much nicer laptop. But then fast-forward to
02:45Halloween 2023 and Apple's spooky fast event unveiled the new M3 chip which
02:51first came to the MacBook Pros and now a few months later we have the M3 Airs
02:55which as I say come in at the same price as the previous M2 which has become the
02:59new entry-level model. Now who said Macs aren't for gaming because I've been
03:03playing a bunch of this on my MacBook Honkai Impact 3rd. It's a sci-fi
03:08adventure game which has just had a massive update with a ton of new features
03:12including and making it the perfect sponsor for this video being able to
03:16play it on my Mac. And in case Honkai Impact 3rd rings a bell it's from
03:21Hoyoverse who also made Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail and you can find it
03:25on iOS, Android and Steam and Epic on PC. But this is their first game available on
03:30m-series Macs via the App Store with full-screen resolutions, 120 Hertz
03:35refresh rates and it will also support Apple's upscaling tech Metal FX. It's a
03:39genuinely massive game you can sink dozens of hours into this and with the
03:43new version 7.4 update it's better than ever with a new 3d combat system with
03:48free jumping meaning you can battle enemies in the air and entirely new
03:52story adventures on Mars with new characters like the lemur who's very
03:56elegant and a bit mad, kind of like myself, plus your old favourites. And
03:59speaking of characters the detail and the animations have had a big upgrade as
04:03well and so have the locations with better shading and effects it really does
04:07look good. And alongside some very fancy new outfits simply log into the game to
04:11get her share of origin which is Raiden Mei's S-rank battle suit completely free.
04:16But the best bit it's free to play so if you fancy checking out Honkai Impact
04:203rd and especially on Mac then check out my link in the description below.
04:24Okay history lesson over the big question a lot of people do have is
04:27what's the difference between the M2 Air and the M3 Air? Is it worth paying a
04:31hundred pounds more for this over this? Well in summary Apple sells the M3 Air
04:36in both 13 and 15 inch sizes the M2 did also come in at 15 but it seems to have
04:40been discontinued so you can't officially buy a new from Apple but
04:43visually design-wise the 2024 Air is identical to the previous 2022 except
04:50for the midnight color which I have here on the M3 Air 15 inch and the 13 M2
04:56apparently the it's not a coating it's like the chemistry they used to make the
05:00material on the lid and the base of the new midnight version on the M3 a little
05:06bit less smudgy and fingerprinty but as you can see there's really not much
05:10difference there so yeah design-wise they're the same really the new Air gets
05:15three main upgrades the new faster M3 chip which has more of a focus on
05:19graphics and gaming and also a faster neural engine for Apple's expected big
05:23AI upgrade later this year it also supports faster Wi-Fi 6e up from Wi-Fi 6
05:28although you will need a 6e router to take advantage of that and almost no one
05:32does right now it can also output to two external monitors whereas the older Air
05:36are limited to one it has an AV encoder which is too complicated to explain
05:40right now but basically means it will be able to stream videos more efficiently
05:43going forward slightly better voice isolation for the microphones and the
05:46storage on the base model with 256 gigabytes is a bit faster is all that
05:51worth paying 100 pounds more for the new M3 probably I mean it's not a huge
05:56upgrade but it makes it a bit more future-proof and it's not that much of a
05:58difference the problem is if you do go for this and you can just go for the
06:02base model at £1,099 but if you do fancy yourself more RAM 16 gigabytes or
06:07more storage 512 which you might want to and perhaps even you might want to go
06:11for the 15-inch if you get this the 15-inch M3 with 16 gigs of RAM 512
06:16storage a decent spec at which point you could just get yourself a MacBook Pro
06:21so M2 Air $999 M3 Air $1,099 Pro 14-inch $1,699 so which is better well the
06:29benefit of going for a MacBook Air is it's cheaper it's thinner it's lighter
06:33and it's also fanless so it's completely silent however the pros have well a lot
06:38more of everything they can be specked with more powerful M3 Pro and max chips
06:42they come with 512 gigs of storage as standard double the air and you can get
06:46up to 8 terabytes of the stuff plus up to 128 gigs of memory it also has a much
06:51brighter and faster mini LED screen the air is 500 nits it's 60 Hertz and it is
06:57a regular LED LCD screen the Pro is 600 nits in SDR and goes up to 1600 nits in
07:03HDR and if using an app like vivid you can unlock across the whole desktop
07:07making it a whole lot easier to see if you're out and about on a sunny day
07:10it's also 120 Hertz or promotion as I will call it so everything feels a lot
07:14faster and smoother and it's using a mini LED backlight so you get much better
07:19contrast deeper blacks richer colors not everyone will care that much about those
07:23things but certainly the pro screen is much nicer we have more ports with HDMI
07:282.1 and a full-size SD card reader significantly better speakers although
07:33the 15-inch air does also have six speakers and is noticeably better than
07:37the 13-inch also most models of the pro have a longer battery life than the air
07:41except for the 14-inch with a pro or max chip which is roughly the same but all
07:45other pros last a good couple of hours longer and finally the pro has a fan and
07:49while it is silent most of the time for just you know everyday stuff when it
07:53needs to it'll wear up to help keep the chip cool meaning you get better
07:56performance although that is almost exclusively under sustained load so
08:01everyday opening of apps and basic stuff you probably wouldn't notice what I
08:04would say though is that for 95% of people a MacBook Air is the one to go
08:09for it's all you need they're incredibly powerful laptops and unless you need a
08:13brighter HDR screen and a lot of extra performance for gaming or graphics work
08:18video editing photo editing designing you know music production then you know
08:22it's in the name it is a professional laptop and it's a lot more expensive for
08:26most of us get yourself an air but if you do want the extra power and the
08:30nicer screen and you can afford it or perhaps your business is buying it for
08:33you then which MacBook Pro should you go for well you've got two sizes 14 and 16
08:39and I feel a bit precarious holding them like that given how much they cost
08:42because the base model MacBook Pro 14 will set you back $16.99 the cheapest
08:4716-inch MacBook Pro because you have to get it with a higher-end spec including
08:52the m3 pro chip this is 900 pounds more and of course you will want to get it in
08:57space black which I have here I've had it for a few months and I have actually
09:00scratched it up a little bit you can see some little scratches over there but it
09:04definitely does stand out compared to the more boring silver and space grays
09:07but regardless we're talking a lot of money for these higher-end Macs
09:10particularly the 16 but the main benefit of going for a pro is that it gives you
09:15the option of an m3 pro or m3 max chip I don't know who comes up with these names
09:19but essentially you can't go into an Apple store and say can I get a MacBook
09:22Pro with an m3 pro but I would argue if you are gonna go with a pro then you're
09:26investing in it for the extra power so it makes sense to me to spend more and
09:30get an m3 pro or an m3 max chip and each has various processor and graphics core
09:35configurations and going for the max chip unlocks the full storage and memory
09:39options but my recommendation would be to get the m3 pro it's significantly
09:44more powerful than the base m3 and not as ludicrously expensive as the m3 max
09:48which I would probably avoid unless you know that you can take advantage of all
09:52that extra power I am definitely simplifying things a bit here for this
09:56buying guide but if you watch my full review of the top spec fully maxed out
10:007300 pounds m3 max MacBook Pro which I've been using for the past few months
10:05it is insanely fast but also absolutely overkill for almost everyone so my pick
10:11of the bunch would be the 14-inch m3 Pro MacBook Pro in space black of course
10:15because it's fun and that will also get you 512 gigs of storage and 18 gigabytes
10:19of memory setting you back a cool 2,000 and 99 pounds or $19.99 in the US for any
10:26music or video producers editors photographers designers I reckon this is
10:31the one to get would I pay 500 more for a 16-inch version well that's a tougher
10:37sell I think yes you do get the bigger screen and the m3 pro chip is a slightly
10:41higher power version of it with more CPU and more GPU cores but it's quite a
10:45lot more money and I think what a lot of people tell me they like because they
10:49use the 14-inch every day is that because it is a good deal smaller and
10:53lighter I mean just to put them side by side there you can see how much more
10:58compact the 14 inches you know if we're working out and about on the go great
11:02you get that portability not too far off the airs really but then when you get
11:06back home or to the office you can hook up to your external monitor and use a
11:09bigger screen that way I do quite like the 16 because I am a video editor and I
11:14travel a lot and I don't always have a monitor but I believe the 14-inch is the
11:17more popular version speaking of monitors though the m2 a can only output
11:21to one external screen the m3 airs and soon to be via a software update the
11:26base m3 MacBook Pro these can output to two but with the laptop screen closed
11:30which is a bit annoying the other frustration I have with Apple and you
11:33probably know what I'm going to talk about RAM memory and just the upsell of
11:36everything once you start adding more RAM more storage they get so much more
11:40expensive we're talking 200 quid extra to go from 8 to 16 gigabytes which is
11:45the base configuration on any of these even the m1 air from four years ago came
11:50with 8 gigabytes of memory as does the base MacBook Pro which is a bit crazy to
11:55me given the price of this and storage of course is easy to expand with
11:59external drives but RAM you're stuck with but certainly if you're going for a
12:04MacBook Pro definitely get 16 gigs of RAM because you really want to utilize
12:07that performance and not run out of memory as you have multiple apps open
12:10and I think if you're going for the cheapest m2 air then you want a tighter
12:13budget and you just want a good all-round laptop probably stick with the
12:16base model I think the m3 air is a little bit tricky because you do have a
12:19lot of performance there you might want to do some more intense multitasking and
12:22have tons of Chrome apps open and things like that so I would probably go for 16
12:26gigs of memory in this guy which brings it up to 1,300 pounds and I do appreciate
12:31that Apple actually now stock a pre-made version of it you don't have to
12:34customize it and then wait like weeks and weeks and weeks for it to ship you
12:38can walk into a store and get one of these with 16 out of the box oh and also
12:41if you do upgrade the memory Apple also give you these slightly higher power
12:45processor an extra 2 GPU cores so that's normally a hundred quid by itself so
12:49makes it a little bit less painful I guess the m3 air is probably the best
12:55bet all round it's future-proof and it's only a hundred quid more than the m2
12:58where also don't just look at Apple's website Amazon and other retailers can
13:02be cheaper and just because Apple doesn't stock it like the old 15 inch
13:06m2 keep an eye out for good deals and finally dare I say consider a Windows
13:11alternative to these MacBooks I mean for similar money you'll get better screens
13:15similar performance especially with Intel's new core ultra processors lots
13:19of different form factors and of course the problem with MacBooks is they're
13:22very expensive starting at 999 pounds for a new model obviously Windows
13:27laptops you can get a decent one for five or six hundred quid but I do also
13:31love a MacBook and I think unless there's a specific Windows app you need
13:34or you're playing a lot more games then something like the m3 air probably just
13:38the base model maybe with 16 gigs is the one to go for so hopefully that helped
13:42and if you do have any other questions drop a comment below thank you so much
13:45for watching and I will see you next time that's actually heavier than I
13:48thought right here on the tech chat