We'll walk you through all of your MacBook options to help you make sense of all the different CPU, memory, storage, and other component options that Apple offers. (See also our more focused blow. Apple’s best MacBook Air in years has a comfortable keyboard, good performance, and a reasonable amount of storage—all things that weren’t true of the previous model. Buying Options $1,100.
When Apple introduced its MacBooks with built-in flash storage that starts at just 128 gigabytes, the question became: “Is 128GB enough for me?”
Tough question. The answer in most cases? Probably. And maybe it’s even more than enough. But it might be far too little, too. Here’s how to figure it out:
TarDisk is an easy integrated storage upgrade for MacBook Air and MacBook Pro: Use code WICKEDDISCOUNT to get 10% off today.
If you take a lot of photos and video and store them on your hard drive, find out how many gigabytes (GB) they take up. In iPhoto, you can select your events or photos and click on the View menu to “Get Info.” You should be able to see how many photos you have total and the storage space they take up. If you’re using Apple’s newer Photos app, you can find out how much storage space your photos and video take up by opening Photos, then clicking on the Photos menu at the top left, choosing Preferences, then clicking on the General selection. Click the Show in Finder button, which will show you your Photos Library. Make sure this library file is selected, then go to the top left of your screen and choose File, then Get Info. The resulting window will show you the size of your Photos library.
I have more than 24,000 photos and videos that take up 230GB of storage space.
So is 128GB enough for me? No way.
Most people have far less photos, though.
It is possible to offload photos to a fast external hard drive or one of the cost-effective USB 3.0 flash “thumb” drives, which now store up to 256GB at reasonable prices — check out, “Best External Hard Drive for Macs, Plus 256GB Flash Drives” for more detail.
You can even store your iPhoto or Photos library on a connected hard drive. I don’t like to, though. I prefer the simplicity of keeping it all on one drive, in my MacBook Pro, which also makes it easier to backup. Downside is, Apple’s move to super-fast solid-state hard drives (flash storage) means that the company is stingy with its drive space in its entry-level models.
What’s worse is that it’s not easy to upgrade SSDs like old-school (slower) hard drives.
Another option is to upgrade your iCloud storage and store all your photos in iCloud with optimized smaller images on your MacBook. This is a great service, but you’ll pay every month. For me, that’s $9.99 a month, which is $120 a year . . . forever. And if I ever have trouble accessing my iCloud account, I’m not sure I’ll be able to navigate Apple’s security hoops — or that family or loved ones will be able to if, say, I were hit by a bus.
Again, tough question. The price leap into 256GB to a new MacBook Pro or MacBook Air is a good idea for regular people (non-professionals) in these three situations:
The good news is, new Thunderbolt and USB-C hard drives are wicked fast — and good USB 3.0 drives are nearly as fast — both which will ease your photo access and transfer pain. Still, it’s not as portable, and you’ll have to pay attention to what, where, and how you’re storing your files. To me, the ease of management is worth a couple hundred dollars over the course of my usual 3-to-4-year MacBook Pro lifespan between upgrades.
If you have a MacBook Air or Pro that has run out of storage, don’t despair — OWC may have an upgrade kit for your MacBook model.
If you find yourself with a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro that has run out of storage and you simply need more, don’t despair — Other World Computing (OWC) has upgrade kits for the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro that you can use to upgrade your built-in storage. It’s not exactly difficult but it’s not exactly easy, either. Any time you crack your case you run the risk of accidentally breaking something important or expensive. Fortunately, OWC includes the tools you need for opening your MacBook and installing new storage. Plus, you’ll get a handy enclosure for your old SSD storage, giving you a sweet little external drive.
Update: Transcend is now offering upgrade kits for some MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models — but none are available for the newest MacBook models yet.
If you want more on-board, nearly built-in storage, you have two cool options, both of which are tiny flash-based drives in the shape of camera memory cards. They plug into the SDXC card slot on your older generations of MacBook Air or MacBook Pro — the newest MacBooks and MacBook Pros no longer have SDXC card slots. They only have USB-C ports.
How to play blackjack online for real money. The TarDisk Pear system is a tiny drive that you can combine with your built-in drive to create a single “fused” storage system on your MacBook Air or Pro.
For all intents and purposes, the Transcend JetDrive Liteacts like a little USB thumb drive — but it fits flush into the SDXC card slot instead and appears on your Mac like an external drive that is always on, always available. It appears as a separate storage option to your Mac’s operating system. Quite handy.
The TarDisk Pear system, on the other hand, also uses the SDXC card slot but it combines with your built-in storage to form a single “fused” drive. If you want a near-permanent — but easy storage solution for your MacBook Air or Pro, the TarDisk Pear system might be your best bet.
Of course, if you use your SDXC card slot for loading photos, you can pick up a small USB-based card reader like the Kingston Digital MobileLite G4 Card Reader to easily load photos and video off of your SD camera cards through a USB port.
If you will start taking a lot of photos and video — especially if you use an iPhone 6 or 7 that lets you do things like shoot HD video at 60fps — spend the $200 extra to bump yourself up into the next model of MacBook Air, MacBook, or MacBook Pro and get 256GB of storage. If you buy from a third-party (like B&H) that often offers a slight discount and free shipping, you can lower the total cost at time of purchase to help offset the hit to your budget. For instance, at a third-party online store like B&H, you can often get into a 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display or with Touch Bar with 256GB of storage for about $100 less than Apple’s price and only about $100 more than Apple’s 128GB version. If you consider drive time and fuel to get to an Apple store, along with B&H’s free shipping and the likelihood that you won’t be charged sales tax . . . suddenly you might get the savings you need to get into the right MacBook for you.
This article is updated regularly. Bookmark it (Ctrl + D) to get redirected to the latest version.
Note that the Macbook 12 and Air 11 have been discontinued, hence why you get redirected to this page.
1. How to choose the best Apple Macbook Air (this article)
2. How to choose the best Apple Macbook Pro 13
3.How to choose the best Apple Macbook Pro 16
Anyone who wants a laptop that’s solid, lightweight, with an excellent battery life, great backlit keyboard, an excellent trackpad, higher CPU performance and at the lowest price for an Apple laptop.
– Dimensions: Height: 0.41-1.6cm, Width: 30.4cm, Depth: 21.23cm
– Weight: 2.8 lbs (1.27kg)
– RAM: LPDDR4X 3733MHz
– GPU: Intel Iris Plus
– Screen: 13.3″, resolution: 2560 x 1600 Retina IPS, with True Tone technology, which automatically adjusts the white balance to match the color temperature of the surrounding light.
– Storage: High performance PCI-Express based SSDs (Solid State Drive) storage. This offers you a better computer experience because it responds to your inputs much more quickly. Programs launch far more quickly, the Operating System starts in seconds and resumes from sleep instantaneously. No noise, no vibration, higher reliability and higher resistance to shocks. See theSSD FAQ for more details on SSDs.
– Ports: 2 x USB 3.0 Type-C with ThunderBolt 3, 3.5mm combo jack
– Networking: 802.11ac 2×2:2, Bluetooth 5.0
– Battery: Up to 11 hours
I refer to those new updated models as the Early 2020 models through this article. Compared to the older model, referred as Mid 2019, here are the changes:
1. Massive CPU performance upgrade! The Mid 2019 model was limited to an Intel 8th gen Dual-Core CPU, while you can now get an Intel 10th gen quad-core CPU, as an upgrade, the base model still has a dual-core CPU. This pretty much doubles the CPU performance of the Macbook Air!
2. Higher RAM Frequency: You get a significant upgrade from LPDDR3 2133MHz to LPDDR4X 3733MHz.
3. GPU: You get an upgrade from the Intel UHD Graphics 617 to an Intel Iris Plus.
4. Storage capacity upgrade: The entry-level storage capacity has doubled from 128GB to 256GB, while the maximum has also doubled, from 1TB to 2TB.
5. Keyboard: The new MacBook Air goes back to a more traditional ‘scissor’ Magic Keyboard, which should be more reliable than Apple’s butterfly keyboard, which was plagued with issues.
6. Battery life: Battery life takes a small hit, going down from 12 hours to 11-12 hours.
7. Bluetooth gets updated to the 5.0 standard.
8. Lower entry price point: The launch price of the least expensive Early 2020 model is $999, compared to $1199 for the launch price of the least expensive Mid 2019 model.
Simply put: No.
The Mid 2019 and Late 2018 models are difficult to find in stock now.
The Mid 2017 models aren’t worth it. I’d spend a bit more to get the newer models, just to get the twice as fast CPU and the much better display.
Models that are older than Mid 2017? Stay away from them. They are equipped with only 4GB of memory (RAM), which is hardly enough for anything more demanding than basic tasks (word processing, web browsing, listening to music). This lack of memory will become a bigger limiting factor in performance as time goes on, forcing you to change computer sooner and spend more in the long run.
Macbook Air Early 2020, from the lowest to highest performance:
– Intel Core i3Dual-Core + Hyper-Threading 1.1-3.2GHz
– Intel Core i5Quad-Core + Hyper-Threading 1.1-3.5GHz
– Intel Core i7Quad-Core + Hyper-Threading 1.2-3.8GHz
Do yourself a favor and get at least the Intel Core i5 model!
Unless you only use your Macbook Air for web browsing and checking e-mails, and even then, you’ll be better served with an Intel Core i5 or Core i7 CPU, which features twice as many cores and pretty much offers twice the performance as the Core i3 model! Mac os x kitchen design software.
Let me state that in another way: A $100 upgrade from a Core i3 to i5 CPU gets you twice the performance. This is a wise move.
Not only that, but in the long-term, you’ll be able to keep using the quad-core Core i5 and i7 models for more years compared to the dual-core Core i3, which will eventually feel too slow in day to day usage.
As for the Core i5 versus the Core i7, the performance difference is minimal, with the Core i7 offering roughly 9% higher performance compared to the Core i5 CPU. Still, if you want the highest CPU performance possible in a Macbook Air, the Core i7 is the way to go.
You have the choice between 8GB and 16GB of memory.
Is 8GB of RAM enough for you or do you want 16GB? Facebook casino games real money.
It depends on what you intend to do with your Macbook Air.
If you only use your MacBook Air to run a few basic programs at once, like email, some Excel, Word, a web browser, and iTunes, 8GB is fine.
On the other hand, if you run multiple programs at once, run heavier programs (audio/photo/video/3D), like to multitask and have no time to lose, 16 GB is the wiser option.
Warning: You cannot add RAM to your Macbook Air.
Keep in mind that the memory is soldered in the Macbook Air computer, so you cannot add memory to upgrade your computer.
So if you intend on keeping your Macbook Air for many years, going with 16GB is a good idea, seeing as memory usage keeps increasing, with newer versions of programs using more and more memory.
Unsure about how whether you want 256GB, 512GB, 1TB or 2TB of storage? Read our article on How to choose the right SSD storage capacity and pay less for your computerto figure it out.
I recommend the least expensive option by default, although the other colors are often the same price or hardly more expensive.
Prices for B&H as of September 17th 2020. Note that I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post. Prices and availability are subject to change.
Is it safe to buy a Mac from B&H Photo Video instead of the Apple Store?
B&H Photo Video is an Authorized Apple Reseller. That means B&H has received authorization from Apple to sell Macs, iPods, etc. This is great for you because B&H prices are generally much lower than the Apple Store. Items ship promptly and you receive the same warranty as if you had made the purchase at the Apple Store. In fact, you still receive all the benefits of the Apple Store (classes, Genius Bar access, etc.) when you buy from B&H Photo Video. So really, the only difference between buying from B&H and the Apple Store is that with B&H you will probably save a lot of money!
Base Dual-Core Core i3 CPU models:
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 8GB RAM, 256GB storage: $999.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 8GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1199.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 8GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,399.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 8GB RAM, 2TB storage: $1,799.00 at B&H
Base Dual-Core Core i3, with twice the RAM:
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 16GB RAM, 256GB storage: $1199.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 16GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1399.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 16GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,599.00 at B&H
– Core i3 Dual-Core, 16GB RAM, 2TB storage: $1,999.00 at B&H
Quad-Core Core i5 CPU models:
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 8GB RAM, 256GB storage: $1099.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 8GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1199.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 8GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,499.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 8GB RAM, 2TB storage: $1,899.00 at B&H
Quad-Core Core i5 CPU, with twice the RAM:
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 16GB RAM, 256GB storage: $1299.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 16GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1449.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 16GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,699.00 at B&H
– Core i5 Quad-Core 1.1-3.5GHz, 16GB RAM, 2TB storage: $2,099.00 at B&H
Fastest CPU, 8GB of RAM:
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 8GB RAM, 256GB storage: $1249.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 8GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1449.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 8GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,649.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 8GB RAM, 2TB storage: $2,049.00 at B&H
Fastest CPU, 16GB of RAM:
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 16GB RAM, 256GB storage: $1449.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 16GB RAM, 512GB storage: $1649.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 16GB RAM, 1TB storage: $1,849.00 at B&H
– Core i7 Quad-Core 1.2-3.8GHz, 16GB RAM, 2TB storage: $2,249.00 at B&H
I hope that you’ve enjoyed this article on how to choose the best Macbook Air.
Do you have any feedback or any questions? Are you unsure which Macbook Air is the best one for you?
Please leave a comment below and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.
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