Macbook 12 Inch 2017 m3 8GB RAM vs i7 16GB RAM Comparison

Review of the 2017 Macbook 12 Inch m3 with 8GB vs i7 with 16GB. Is worth the $500-$800 upgrade?

Both units bought new, and were unplugged from the charger. One of many videos to come!

[moses]

Wow these prices were out of control back when this was released. I just picked up am i7/512/16 for 400 USD in excellent shape

[supercalifraocious]

Wow. He already had an M3 Macbook back then! ; ) I'd love to have an 12" (Apple Silicon) M3 Macbook today!

[darwiniandude]

The reason your i7/16/512 machine is slower for disk access is that you have FileVault whole disk encryption enabled, and this is not a T2 based Mac. That is why the boot process is different - on the i7 you enter password, the disk is mounted encrypted, and the boot process starts. The m3 starts up, you enter the password, and log in. Whole disk encryption has a massive speed penalty for spinning disk machines, and far less on SSD ones, but due to these machines being fairly low power, the performance hit is noticeable. T2 based macs fix this with hardware based whole disk encryption. Sadly the lovely 12” never got an update like that. Disable FileVault (security in system preferences) and the i7 should fly :)

Thanks for the video, and great to use the useful Geekbench comparison. I now want to get one of these machines on the used market now it’s sadly discontinued.

[SubterraneanXiu]

Honestly, even before viewing this I felt the m3 processor to be most efficient for this MacBook design. The 12" is fanless, and overtime, the processor and logic board as a whole will take a beating, especially if this is your primary resource and go-to EDC. Also, an upgraded dual-core i7 is still a dual-core. The 12" was made for portability-over-everything users.
Mobile workstations are still heavy and bulky in 2019 for this reason. Every laptop on the market historically comes with compromises and a handful of trade-offs.

[michaelfedorsha]

I could see maybe if it was a $100-$150 price difference, but $800?!?!? Hell Thanks for the video.

[RadekPogoda]

I personally use the 2016 12 MB in the base spec - 1.1 GHz, 8GB of RAM as an EDC. I thought about buying the new 2017 model due to the better keyboard and much faster SSD's. My initial idea was to go for the m3 CPU, but upgrading the RAM to 16GB to fully utilize it when occasionally editing a 1080p video on the go.
After watching your comparison - I surely stick to the m3/8GB and spend the same money on bigger (and because of that - even faster) SSD instead.
Thanks for this video and keep the ball rolling. You do it right.

[LazsalzariRomnzevroskki]

I'll tell you the difference. The m3 is a dual core mobile processor, like the one on your smartphone or tablet (with a very simple but useful arquitecture, it's made by Intel, other m-chipsets manufacturers include Snapdragon, Helio, Exynnos by Samsung, HiSilicon by Huawei, Mediatek ... among others), they are known to be high efficiency chipsets because they perform tasks real quickly and have a low energy consumption, due to that they produce less heat and don't need too much RAM, you can tell they're more 'light'. BUT on the other side, the Intel core i7 processor, is an Octa core computer processor, made for computational efficiency, they have a more complex arquitecture. They don't rely on efficiency but rather on power, these are more powerful chipsets that can perfom multiple calculations at the same time, they also produce more heat (you can find them on Intel's "i", Celeron and Pentium series or AMD, among others although these two lead the market). So it really depends on the type of user you are, if you're more into basic tasks as web browsing or word document processing, you'll love handsets with a low performance chipset, as the m3, m5, m7 or the aforementioned, as they perform basic tasks more quickly. BUT, if you're a more demanding user, who needs more power in tasks such as: playing 4K games, editing and rendering photos and videos in 4K or more, simulation softwares that need a lot of 3D processing (say Autocad, Autodesk, Cinema, etc), you'll definitely need an i5 and up chipset, as they're more demanding (they also need more RAM). Although somehow these microprocessors always compromise efficiency (it's all a physics thing involving heat, they call throttling) ... so there you have it! : D

[euge]

Please somecan help? i dont know which choose between macbook 12 2017 core m3 256hb battery 40cycles.... And macbook 12 2016 intel i5 512gb battery 350cycles.

The 2016 (less cycles, less storage, m3) or the 2017 (more storare, i5 but more cycles of battery)????

[yanitedontop]

Can you do a separate review for the Maxed out 12 Inch MacBook?

[toniosanchez]

Do you still recommend the MacBook 12 in 2017 as a very portable laptop ??? In 2022

[mytesting]

Hey man. Thanks for this video.
Can I upgrade m3's ram from 8gb to 16gb?

Is m3 good for software development?

[aminozuur]

Interesting results. I suspect the i7 is throttled quite hard to allow for a fanless design.

[elsizzle]

how is video edting on m3 vs i7? I plan on doing mild editing for youtube channel or short instagram videos. WOuld the m3 be painfully slow for this (using imovie or other entry level editing software)?

[experimacnovi]

Opening and closing different websites and programs really isn't the most efficient way of testing the true capabilities and differences between the processors. The best way would be to actually render and play 4k videos with both, do heavy photo editing, music production, basically use any program that is going to be very CPU heavy and cause it to potentially start lagging and see what one comes out first. There is when you'll start to see the differences in handling between the two in both single core and multicore performance. If there isn't any significant strain on the CPU then both will perform almost identically. Having 30+ tabs open (especially in Chrome) is a good start in terms of straining the CPU, but just simply opening and closing tabs, websites and programs pretty much any MacBook nowadays can do. This is not a bad comparison don't get me wrong, I just don't believe there was enough efficient testing done or shown to really see the true potentials and drawbacks of both models that make them worth comparing. Other than that the video was not bad at all. Keep up the good work!

[stomperr]

Have you tested how hot can it gets on m7 16gb if you play YouTube 4k video? N what is most problem you encounter

[EShelby]

B&H has the m3/8GB Gold or Rose Gold for $799 this week! I took the plunge. Thanks for making me feel good about my choice! BTW, it's likely that video rendering would be much faster with the 16 GB RAM, but either configuration of this machine would be unfit for serious video projects. Thanks again!

[mohamedezawi]

Great review; thanks a ton! I really can't wait to see whether or not Apple is going to update this device. I care about the form factor and I HATE FAN NOISE with passion, so this device is perfect for me! I have been using a mid 2011 11-inch MacBook Air, but sadly they don't make them anymore. I hope the MacBook 12 inch receives an upgrade in 2019!

[javierbelloso]

Nice Review. I would like to have your opinion, I have a MacBook Pro 15 mid 2015 base model, I’m thinking change my MBP by MacBook 12 2017 with i7 16 Gb ram and 512 SSD. Would you recommend me to make the change? Thanks

[gaberivera]

Do you still recommend the MacBook 12 in 2017 as a very portable laptop ??? In 2020

[robbryson]

You can pick these up all day with the 1.1 core M or the core M3 for $400-$550 in like new used condition and I've had them all, like this video shows there is basically no real difference in performance.