MacBook Air 2020 - RAM specification question - LPDDR4 v. LPDDR4X

Thanks for that reply. Yes, that’s what the Apple.com specs page says, too. That’s why it is so odd that the System Report says otherwise. I guess what I was hoping to learn from others online here was whether at the end of the day it matters, and whether others were experiencing the same issue. I’ve encountered the “no one else is reporting this issue” response from customer service from time to time. Would be nice to know whether it’s happening to others before pursuing and, for that matter, whether it’s worth pursuing in the first place.

Thanks. I think I will at least try to run it to ground with Apple. (Hate mysteries like this.). And what started me looking was, if not an actual issue, a question that I thought was memory related possibly — when I started playing the built in Chess game on the machine, the fans kicked in almost immediately and the CPU was running @ 100%. This is just the built in chess game? No voice announcements even for the moves. And the MBA I got was the 16 GB RAM, Core i5. That seemed off to me...

After an hour with “support” their advice was that LPDDR4 is the wrong type of ram for this brand new machine to have and that, notwithstanding this being New York City in phase I of pandemic lockdown reopening I should bring the computer in to be inspected. (The Apple stores are all still closed for safety. The same reason why that won’t be happening. ). Unreal. I know things happen and all, but having the manufacturer install the wrong RAM? That seems a little much. Bummer.

Just in case someone visits this thread at some point, and I know of at least one other thread regarding this same issue, I wanted to close it out with a final denouement post. Apple's Mac OS Catalina update 10.15.6 seems to have solved the issue. System Report now shows the RAM in my still very much new (and even more loved now that I've had more than a month's worth of intense WFH time to get to know it better), MacBook Air 2020 as being:

16 GB 3733 MHz LPDDR4X

The "X" in the LPDDR4X was hiding in plain sight all along. Apparently the OS update was all that was needed to bring it out into the open. It would seem that System Report can report flawed information on occasion. I did not think that was a possibility, nor did Support when I discussed the problem with them. On the Monday of a week in which the MLB finally starts back up, I am happy to report there is, in fact, joy in Mudville.

Stay safe everyone.

-- JDee

PS For anyone wondering, I updated my MBA via System Preferences --> Software Update. That method, however, did not work so well on my fairly ancient (mid-2012) iMac. I think the update was interrupted somehow overnight and right after, I encountered all kinds of restart issues. I ending up using the combo update download as part of a successful restart troubleshooting effort. Big, big shout out to Kappy's excellent post entitled: "A Troubleshooting Procedure that may Fix Problems with macOS El Capitan or Later," which guided the effort and recommended the use of the combo updater.