The MacBook Air is the most popular Mac and one of the best-selling laptops in the world. That shouldn’t change. The enhancement of its mechanics with the M3 generation of Apple processors only improves this device which was already very versatile… and opens the doors to the emerging market of artificial intelligence (AI) applications.
In any case, this is the message that Apple intends to send to buyers who are hesitating between a Mac and a PC with a Windows system. The success of the MacBook Air has always been linked to its use in an office context: students, professionals, and other content creators that generative AI like ChatGPT is increasingly trying to attract.
Microsoft has also been pushing hard since last fall on its own generative AI application, Copilot, which is intimately integrated into Windows and its Office office suite. Microsoft hopes to distinguish its software from that of its competitors, including Apple.
Local or cloud AI
Apple doesn’t have generative AI to its name (yet), but on a Mac, it’s not that big of a deal. Because Copilot as well as the Office suite exist on both Mac and Windows, in both native and cloud versions. The experience is therefore the same – provided you have paid Microsoft to subscribe to its Office 365 suite as well as its Copilot Pro service.
Otherwise, there are applications on the Apple App Store that allow you to download locally — without an Internet connection — the generative AI model of your choice.
For example, the Freechat application, free, can embody GPT from OpenAI, Llama 2 from Meta or Mistral from… Mistral (a French company).
Each of these AI models requires gigabytes of storage and RAM to operate, as well as enormous computer processing capacity. However, and it’s obvious from the first question we ask them, the M3 processor and the neural coprocessor of the new MacBook Air are very adept at bringing all this to life… and no need for a fan to cool them.
They don’t have the fluidity of a full data center, but it only takes a few seconds to generate programming code, text in the language of one’s choice, or even realistic-looking images from a simple sentence… without visiting the Internet.
And it works
What makes the MacBook Air so appealing isn’t so much what it has as what similarly priced Windows laptops don’t offer. Starting with extended battery life that goes well beyond a single day of work. Apple claims 18 hours per charge; our initial test exceeded 12 hours without falling below 20%. Add to this a prolonged sleep which allows you to leave your Mac in your work bag for an entire weekend – or even during spring break – and to reopen it once you return to the office without worrying that its battery is flat.
We’re still looking for the Windows laptop that does the same and doesn’t cost $800 more… in the basic version, at least. Because if Macs have a fault, it’s that they aren’t cheap. Their most loyal followers will not fail to point out that a quality PC easily cost $5,000 20 years ago. But in the meantime, we saw a race to the lowest price where you could buy even a Mac for less than $1,000.
Gone are the days when a well-equipped MacBook Air M3 with a 13-inch screen (16 gigabytes of RAM and 1 terabyte of storage) costs just under $2,000. It goes up faster if you prefer a 15-inch screen… Buyers can console themselves by saying that a Mac has an average lifespan of around eight years, which exceeds the average lifespan of a Mac by one year. ‘a new car in Canada. This is a strong argument in favor of teleworking…
For work… or not
The M3 processor is produced using a 3-nanometer printing process, brand new at Apple, but this is not its only improvement over its predecessors. The accompanying graphics processor – its architecture encompasses all central systems – is also revamped. It makes the new MacBook Air 13 times more powerful than the most powerful Intel-based MacBook Air, which Apple sold until November 2020.
In particular, you can operate two external 4K resolution monitors, provided you turn off the main screen… and monopolize the two USB-C ports, which could have benefited from an additional port (USB-A?).
That’s not all. Because the other objective of Macs is to slowly but surely establish themselves in the video game market. It won’t be easy, as Intel and Nvidia’s hold on this market is great, but on paper this MacBook comes close. Its mechanics can generate visual effects dear to the most sophisticated digital environments, such as ray tracing (raytracing) and mesh shading (mesh shading).
In terms of entertainment, the best use we can make of the MacBook Air is still watching films or videos. Its sound system is astonishingly powerful, given the thinness of its case. This explains its popularity among students: it’s an ideal all-in-one for school, work and leisure.
With or without AI.