Some suggestions for my next Macbook , Air or Pro ?

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Some suggestions for my next Macbook , Air or Pro ?

Hi to all ,

hope to find you well :) I have owned Apple products since way back in 2014 , although my first Idevice was an Iphone 4s . I went from a top of the line mid2014 MacbookPro at the time ( with the 750M as video card ) to a MBP M1 13'' in 2020 . Now I was seeing , thanks to black friday and faculty voucher , to get either an Air M3 or a MBP M4 but my indecision stems from the fact that for my use , maybe the Pro would be useless . For work I do cybersecurity and I mainly use a Minisforum V3 with 32 GB of Ram while MacOs I use it for light video editing for my youtube channel , entertainment ( movies ,tv series , nba , dazn , nowtv, prime video etc) and office . My question is : is the basic M3 really that much better than the basic M1 ? Or is it better to wait for an M4 ? Although between M3 and M4 I don't think there will be huge differences . The configuration I was eyeing is a 16/512 while my current one is 8/256 . Thanks in advance for any suggestions .

Posted on Nov 17, 2024 10:19 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 17, 2024 4:19 PM in response to Birkhoff92

The M3 MacBook Air

Has a newer CPU and GPU than the M1 MacBook Air. This might not be a reason to upgrade if you already had a M1 MacBook Air, but if you were coming from an older Intel-based Mac notebook, I'd suggest going straight for a M3 MacBook Air or a M4-series MacBook Pro.
Ships with 8, 16, or 24 GB of RAM – as opposed to 8 or 16 GB of RAM for the M1 MacBook Air. You can't expand RAM on any M-series Mac after purchase, and Apple is now including at least 16 GB of RAM with all new Macs.
Is available in both 13" and 15" sizes. The M1 MacBook Air was only available in a 13" size.
Has a MagSafe 3 charging port. The M1 MacBook Air lacks one. Both have just two multi-purpose USB-C (USB, USB4, DisplayPort, Thunderbolt, Charging) ports, so with the M1 MacBook Air, there might be more port juggling.
Has a better sound system than the M1 MacBook Air
Is further away from the day on which repair parts and hardware repair service will become unavailable
Can drive one external display with the lid open; two with limitations, with the lid closed. The M1 MacBook Air can drive only one external display regardless of whether the lid is open or closed.

Between a M3 MacBook Air and a 14" plain M4 MacBook Pro, the plain M4 MacBook Pro has

A mini-LED backlit screen with support for playing prerecorded HDR video content
A third USB-C (USB, USB4, DisplayPort, Thunderbolt) port
A HDMI port
A SDXC card slot
Support for driving two external displays with the lid open

The ability to drive two external displays with the lid open, and the third Thunderbolt port, are "firsts" for any Mac notebook with a plain M4-series chip. I do not know if these features would come to a hypothetical M4 MacBook Air, but based on the capabilities of "plain M4" Macs introduced to date, I would not say that it is impossible.

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