Today, Apple said goodbye to what has been the most important MacBook in recent memory. The M1 MacBook Air is longer being sold by Apple, having been replaced by the M2 MacBook Air directly, which itself has been bumped down the product line by the new M3 models.
Now almost three-and-a-half years old, it was certainly time for this laptop to head into the sunset. It uses an old chassis and a fairly old chip, and it was no longer competitive at $999.
But let’s take a moment and appreciate what an important laptop the M1 MacBook Air was — and what it’s represented for Apple over the past few years.
The M1 MacBook Air was first launched in the fall of 2020, a few months after the M1 chip itself was announced at WWDC 2020. Of course, this wasn’t just a chip — this was the beginning of Apple’s two-year transition from Intel to its own Apple Silicon. You might think you’d also want to release some dazzling new laptops that showcase the chips and punctuate the moment. In particular with the M1, you might want to redesign the MacBook Air, let’s say, to demonstrate the efficiency of these chips. But no, that wouldn’t come until almost two years later with the M2 MacBook Air.
For this first M1 MacBook, the focus was squarely on the M1 chip itself. The same was true of the 13-inch MacBook Pro and Mac mini that launched alongside it. All three kept the same chassis as was used in the Intel days. In the case of the M1 MacBook Air, this design had been in use since 2018. The continuity in design, however, allowed Apple to spotlight just how big of a difference the M1 made, especially against the dual-core Intel chips used previously. And man, the difference couldn’t have been more drastic.
The apples-to-apples comparison in performance and battery life showed just how far ahead Apple was jumping with the M1. At the time, many apps hadn’t been recompiled to run natively on Apple Silicon (because it’s ARM-based instead of x86), which in theory would have caused concern about performance. But no, everything ran amazingly smooth, allowing for developers to adopt the new platform over the coming months. People were still discovering just how significant the M1 was, upgrading to it years after its release.
So, while the M1 MacBook Air was the perfect vehicle for building Apple Silicon buzz, it also had a long life — hence why it’s still being sold many years later. In the past, the MacBook Air would get updated with new Intel chips each year, immediately replacing the previous version. But as the M1 MacBook Air would prove, Apple would find space in its lineup to keep around old models sold at a discount. The M1 MacBook Air was actually so good that, for a while, it was to the detriment of the M2 MacBook Air when it launched at $1,199. I found myself happily recommending the cheaper M1 MacBook Air to many, especially since it was often discounted.
This calculus changed once the M2 MacBook Air dropped to $1,099, but the M1 MacBook Air continued to drop to prices as low as $750. That’s an astounding value considering the build quality, battery life, and performance of this laptop. A previous era in Apple marketing might have been ashamed to devalue a product to prices this low, but Steve Jobs’ quadrant approach to Macs was abandoned long ago. And you better believe the M1 MacBook Air will continue to be sold at online retailers for low prices long after its official retirement.
The M2 MacBook Air very well may have the same kinds of legs as its predecessor — it’s already on its way to a two-year anniversary. But it was the M1 MacBook Air that proved it could be done, establishing Apple Silicon in this new era.
The absolutely absurd idea of putting a touchscreen display on a mouse isn't exactly new. Turtle Beach already did it with its Command Series MC7, which features a 2.25-inch control screen. But apparently, even that wasn't ridiculous enough for Arctic Fox Technologies. Its new Super Mouse looks like someone took the chunky old Atari ST mouse, slapped a touchscreen and scroll wheel on it, and called it an upgrade.
The result is a rather unusual-looking mouse that is now on Kickstarter, starting at $199. And as ridiculous as it looks, some of its features are genuinely intriguing.
Apple is less than a day away from launching its highly anticipated OLED MacBook Pro with a touch-sensitive screen. But it appears that the upgrade is going to cost a pretty penny. According to a report by Bloomberg, Apple is reportedly eyeing a starting price of $2,899 for the 14-inch MacBook Pro, while the 16-inch version could start at $3,399 in the US.
"At $2,899, the 14-inch model would mark the highest starting price for a new MacBook Pro model, surpassing the $2,799 Apple charged for a 17-inch version introduced in 2006," says the report. The report claims that Apple is targeting a minimum price hike of $400 for its upcoming redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models.
I've spent a good amount of time digging into the spec sheet of the new M6 MacBook Pro (14-inch), and for all intents and purposes, this is a classic Apple "chip and connectivity" refresh. It's not a full redesign. The chassis, Liquid Retina XDR panel, speakers, ports, and battery, all of them carry over unchanged.
However, the M6 brings more cores, stronger on-device AI, higher memory bandwidth on the larger configs, and modern wireless. Here’s the practical rundown of what actually improved, and whether those gains are worth your money.