Tested: MacBook Air with M2 chip | Aerial, but heavyweight

With its M2 chip, the latest MacBook Air combines finesse and performance and is almost indecently ahead of the competition. All that remains is for Apple to convince more developers and studios to get on board.

Karim Benessaieh
The Press

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Ever since Apple presented the MacBook Air in 2008 as “the world’s thinnest notebook”, we’ve known the concept, which has been widely copied. In an ultralight computer of 1.24 kg, barely 11.3 mm thick when closed, we assemble high-end components capable of satisfying both the student and the video editor, at a price lower than that of the Macbook Pro.

The new MacBook Air which landed on the shelves last Friday pushes the note a little further with the second generation of Apple’s house chip, the M2. The Geekbench 5 benchmarking software, which sends a series of queries to establish CPU and graphics processing power, is unequivocal.

So here we have a very comfortable MacBook Air to open a 22 GB game at maximum resolution like Rise of the Tomb Raiderand which will be able, we are promised in 2022, to honor a large production such as Resident Evil Village. Editing video with Final Cut and working in Adobe Photoshop is smooth with no noticeable lag, with encoding operations between 5 and 24 times faster than with older Intel-based MacBook Airs. As for the software used on a daily basis, browsers, text editors and e-mail software, their opening is practically instantaneous.

The 13.6-inch screen is labeled Liquid Retina, a technology based on light-emitting diodes. It does not offer the infinite contrasts of AMOLED screens, but provides a resolution of 224 pixels per inch, 1 billion colors and a brightness that reaches 500 nits.

Unlike the previous MacBook Air, it now has a magnetic MagSafe charging socket, which leaves the other two Thunderbolt ports available for the monitor and accessories. We also note that the 35-watt charger included with the most expensive model also includes two USB-C sockets to charge other devices.

The keyboard is backlit and its power key, at the top right, also hides a fingerprint reader for authentication. A good note to the FaceTime HD camera with a resolution of 1080 p, which skillfully compensates for the lack of lighting during video conferences.

The 52.6-watt battery can provide, according to Apple, 18 hours of video streaming “on Apple TV”. We tried it on Disney+ instead and got 16 hours.

On the sound side, we have equipped this MacBook Air with four speakers that deliver an honest performance, rather well calibrated, but with a bass that is too discreet. On the other hand, we have the funny Spatial Audio function when using headphones: the sound then seems to come from the computer when we move around.

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From time to time, we end up with a driver, software or utility that has not been optimized for the M2 chip. The isapplesiliconready.com site has made a specialty of listing these incompatibilities, which are mainly the responsibility of developers. Microsoft Teamsas far as we are concerned, seemed somewhat capricious.

Even if this MacBook Air is ready to handle AAA video games, it misses the essential: studios are still very rare to offer a macOS version of their big games. Apple, after all, only controls about 15% of the computer market.

One buys ?

For the Mac enthusiast, the new MacBook Air delivers on all of its promises, and more, with an utterly stunning M2 chip and a beautiful design. The price is high but the quality is unquestionably there, whether for daily work or heavier video manipulations.

the pure gamer won’t choose a Mac, for lack of high-caliber games. As for the unconditional Windows user, he can always turn to serious competitors, but not yet as powerful as the MacBook Air: Samsung’s Galaxy Book2 Pro.