I Switched Back to Intel for a WEEK from the M2 Max Apple Silicon!

I switched back to an Intel i5 MacBook Air for a week from my MacBook Pro M2 Max. Is Apple Silicon really that great?

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[alexteixeira]

For everyone thinking something is wrong with the eBay macbook Air, it is because you haven't tried the M series computer yet. After you get used to new apple Silicon laptops, everything else just feels extremely slow, including the highest end gaming pc you can possibly build. The M series feels so responsive, just like using high-end phone, everything opens fast and responsive. I have a 2019 Macbook Pro i9 32GB Ram, 512GB storage and a new Macbook Air M1 13" base model feels so much faster just doing regular tasks

[NotZigza]

Fun fact: The performance of the 2018 Air is actually a fair bit worse than the 2017 model as it has to constantly render 2x as many pixels due to the Retina display.

My old 2017 Air wasn't great but it wasn't as bad as the one in this vid haha

[edgonzalez]

Been using a 2018 MacBook Pro from work. Constantly running Figma, protopie, adobe CC (mostly indesign, illustrator, photoshop, lightroom and after effects), Final Cut; I’m doing A LOT of creative work. That thing was constantly chugging. Just got an M2 pro and my god what a difference.

[DedicatedWendyWilliams]

your crazy, my M2 last 18+ hours on battery life and its way way wayyyy faster than my intel MacBook Pro

[daimebaru]

While I'm sure the performance jump between Intel and Apple Silicon is huge, for that laptop it shouldn't be so huge, so I suspect there might be something wrong with that specific machine.

[elkewheeler]

Totally understand some of the creativity issues with an "older" laptop - but besides my current M1 Mac mini, I use a 2015 MacBook Pro - for almost all tasks (including sending emails, etc for work) the two computers respond exactly the same with none of the lag you mention. Granted - I could not perform any of the creative tasks you showed were hampered (useless on the intel) on my 2015 MacBook Pro - so I agree with you there. However, for most mundane tasks, a older MacBook is perfectly fine.

[itsarce]

Can’t even lie, I miss the touchbar and butterfly keyboard

[Yliannyx]

Interesting video! I was kinda surprised by how performance-lacking you found that 2018 MBA to be, although I suspect that Apple intentionally nerfed the performance of the last generation of Intel MacBooks to make their M-series Macs seem a lot faster by comparison. I'm fairly convinced that there is something wrong with that Mac, however, since it shouldn't perform so poorly. I'm still rolling a late-2013 15" MBP i7-4850QH 16GB of RAM with 2GB Nvidia discreet graphics here as my daily driver. Even though this old Mac is no longer supported by Apple, I'm still holding out on moving up to something newer since it still runs the apps I need and has some life left in it thanks to the OCLP project. It sure can't work with 4K video or HDR content but works for my photo editing and online work and isn't a complete slouch -- it even seems much faster than the 18'Air in the video. Of course, I will have to upgrade when Apple finally ditches all Intel support at the end of the transition period. Where it does fall flat on its face is with the very limited battery life, although being able to slap a 2TB NVMe drive in it is still a strong point.

[EXPERTISE]

Some of those tasks may be doable on apple silicon MBA's, but there's no way you're going to edit 4k on a 2018 MBA lol. And maybe 2 or 3 apps are okay, but having 5-7 apps running is of course going to slow down a 5 year old computer significantly.

[MichaelSeneschal]

I have an M1 Mac Mini, and also a 2018 Intel i5 with 16GB of RAM and I bounce between both of them depending on my location. Final Cut, Pixelmator, Capture One, all work fine on both setups. The 2018 MacBook is a little slower, but nothing prohibitive. Note that I definitely single-task… but that’s my preferred way of working regardless of computer (single-task focus). I think the issues you’re having are due to 8GB of RAM and running many apps at the same time.

[alexkent]

I have an M3 pro 16 and also a 2015 pro with retina display, when I switch for everyday tasks, youtube, safari etc, I don’t see any major difference. I think your specific machine has something wrong, also maybe because you went to an air from m2 max. But believe it or not the late 2015 pro is not laggy at basic tasks and opens the safari web page as expected

[TechTalkwithATM]

I'm using a 2016 Macbook pro 13" and the performace is still okay. I use it to for large pixel designs, motion graphics and not very much of video editing, mostly 1080p. It still handles tasks quite fairly, except for the battery life and how warm it gets when rendering.

[DavidOlivarez]

there is 100% something wrong with that MacBook lol my 2013 MacBook Air with unsupported Sonoma opens apps way faster and no lag on docs at all. I don't edit videos but ya my old MacBook Air runs amazing in 2023

[jinaysanghvi]

my man is editing high quality videos on a macbook air which wasn't even meant to do it in the first place, and now hes doing it 5 years later. a 2020 intel macbook pro would've been a fairer comparison. pointless.

[LieutenantDanVic]

I have a 2018 MBA same specs just a 256gb and while I don't edit videos, mine is not that slow opening things. I play steam games and while that makes the fan spin all the way up it doesn't lag. idk I think something may have been wrong with yours. mine isn't that slow

[daeshaunmoore]

What fan? I thought this was a MacBook Air for 2018.

[Quaniko-yz]

These lags etc seem excessive. Did you try and open it to check if it was caked in dust?

[netrodex]

you know apple slows down their os's to force you to go to the newest one right? like I have my 2015 with Mojve. it's still fast as hell. but of course.. my asus is the fastest machine I have. because intel sucks XD I got amd now.

[trippplefive]

probably the reason why it was an ebay special… seems like a hardware issue to me

[ElSignificado.]

Oh.. i never had Intel Mac, but that looks like any other windows ever i usted. Thanks crack