Apple Silicon M1 chip in MacBook Air outperforms high-end 16-inch MacBook Pro

Replacing my 16" MBP (8 core i9 2.3ghz / 32GB RAM) with the new Air as well. All of that power (yes I know, it's not sustained) without a fan is incredible.

Yeah I had almost the same configuration (2tb/32gb/2.4 ghz). I’m literally getting the new Air for half of what I’m selling it for.

Why did you pay a fortune for 32GB RAM, a larger screen, and a dGPU if you don't need it? You could have bought a 13" MBP and saved enough cash to get the new Air and now have 2 laptops.

Note that the M1 does not support eGPUs, in case you need it.

1. How do you know he didn’t need it?

2. Even if he didn’t need it, why assume he didn’t want it?

3. Why are you assuming that money is an issue for him?

Where are you selling it? I want to know where to buy a used 16” MBP.

He's assuming he didn't need 32GB if he's replacing it with a 16GB Air.

Also: Why assume he would want to have two separate laptops

Where is that spec’d out?

I’ve always used 15” MBPs without external displays as my only computer for years. I like being mobile and don’t particularly like having a desktop + laptop. Since COVID I’ve been stuck at home so I decided to finally get an external monitor. The problem is that you can’t use the 16” with an external display and the lid open without the fans spinning at full speed. Some people don’t mind it but it drives me crazy. Now it’s hooked up to my display in clamshell mode. Do I need all of that power? No, but I did want the biggest screen at the time when I purchased it a year ago. I plan on selling it when the new Air comes in.

eBay-you’re welcome to buy it if you want: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-MacBook-Pro-16-2-4-Ghz-i9-32-...

I've sold on cragislist before... worked out fine.

Somebody else bought it.

> The problem is that you can’t use the 16” with an external display and the lid open without the fans spinning at full speed

Say what? I have a LG 5K and two 27” Apple Thunderbolt displays (four screens total including laptop display) hooked up to my 16” MBP and fans definitely are no where near full speed, unless I’m compiling or in a Google Hangout that is...

    sudo htop 

See what’s going on.

Os-query was going bonkers on me.

You need to plug the power port into the back right usb-c connector.

You guys must have some generic or Apple specific workflows since you are confident that the software is already supported.

As long as you don't depend on x86_64 Docker containers or Boot Camp, you should be fine in general.

I regularly drive a 5k2k display on a 16" MBP, along with glowy keyboard and trackpad, and I only get the fan when I'm doing something like a full-screen streamed video: text editing and web browsing seldom trigger it.

I like the bigger screen, so I'll hold out on this platform for now. Pretty impressed with where the M series is going, though; might hold out two iterations instead of the four I had in mind before the M1 dropped.

Yeah I'm powering 4k external display for normal things (hangouts, photoshop) no fan, only when doing a-frame / three.js stuff in the browser will bring the constant fan and provide a nice finger warmer above the touch bar

If he needs it he wouldn’t move to a laptop that doesn’t offer it. You can’t get 32GB of memory or a dGPU on the new Macs.

It's not a process thing. The left-side TB3 controller freaks out under sustained load and can drive the system to a crawl. We have to unplug one of our LG 4/5Ks and run the other+power on the right when we want to be able to do back to back video conferencing.

It's been a running joke in corporate for years that Apple's "premium fan noise" is a brilliant branding move because you can identify the Mac users as soon as they unmute.

Why? Really interested.

Back in the day I had 2 Sun 20" GDM20E20 (1997) which was major $$ and after then I alway had 2 monitors, moving at some point to a single ultra wide LG (which are pretty neat). One day I looked at my setup and how I used it and realized I did not look at all of the screen. I swapped it for a small single Apple LG 4K and it turns out I am very happy. The dense nature of the 4K was a game changer. I plan on getting an 8K when it comes out.

What video conferencing app? Why is the machine loaded up when running it?

Yeah, I'm not sure what's going on but I'm not the only one it seems.

Here's a 173 page thread on MacRumors about it: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/16-is-hot-noisy-with-an...

> The problem is that you can’t use the 16” with an external display and the lid open without the fans spinning at full speed.

I had the same problem, when connected to a USB-C monitor I wanted to use the keyboard, but not the built in monitor. Even with the display backlight off the fan would still run. After a lot of searching I found that you can disable the built in monitor by:

- Booting into recovery mode - Opening Terminal - Entering `sudo nvram boot-args="niog=1"` - Restarting - Close the clamshell - Plug in the external monitor - Open the monitor

I hope that helps.

I want to do the same, but I like being able to do some gaming on my Windows partition (I opted for the 8GB dGPU as well).

I have the same problem and I've tried plugging it into all 4 ports, no difference at all.

The monitor gets plugged in and the fans just start taking off to the moon - no workload or anything. It's extremely annoying.

Have you tried only using the ports on the right side of the laptop?

As crazy as this sounds, using the left hand side ports for charging causes the fans to kick in more often[0].

[0]https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/363337/how-to-find...

> why? Really interested.

Generally speaking, I’ve never found that to be genuine, but assume best intent and all as the site rules say, so here goes...

For me, I often am doing multiple things at once and juggling between unrelated tasks which actually need my attention sporadically. The LG 5K with it’s beautiful display gets my primary attention and is what I want to be focused on. Apps there are what I should ideally be working on. The two Apple TB displays then flank either side, and they get the “distractions”, but stuff important enough to allow distracting me when needed. What that is is variable from day (sometimes Slack makes the list, sometimes it doesn’t, as one example), but it’s intentionally in my peripheral vision so I only “look” for motion/changes in certain areas, not actually try to read. If I need to read, I context shift by rotating my chair slightly to the left or right (better for you than rotating head).

End of the day, do whatever works for you. Yes, there are folks who can legitimately take advantage of lots of screens like me. Some folks who have tried multiple don’t, and are happier when they switch back, but I’m not one of them and it’s something I routinely experiment with to ensure I’m still using the best “for me” setup. I’ve gone as high as nine screens attached (with eGPU) to my laptop (eGPU seems to keep laptop fans on elevated, but not full power btw, back to original thread purpose), but I found I was too easily distracted and hence am back to four. Ideally I’d like to do two 8K 32” or less monitors, but haven’t justified buying them yet.

I have two identical top-specced MBP16", bought them as soon as they were released. They BOTH do that with my LG 5K Ultrafine display, whether they're closed or open, without doing anything particularly heavy. Sent them both to Apple, they passed all checks with flying colours. And that's the end of more than a decade of giving Apple tons of money. I built a Ryzen desktop this year and, despite missing macOS terribly, I couldn't be happier with the speed and ergonomics.

edit: I've tried both sides of the laptop, I have iStat Menus and keep an eye on temps, etc.

edit2: they "only" spin to 3.5k-4k at idle, but go up as soon as I do anything with Chrome or am on a video call, which is most of my job

Make sure the resolution is set to “native” for the external monitor.

Thanks, that makes sense. For me I have found having something on the other monitor catch my eye a distraction, so I have gone back to a single high DPI one.

It is a general theme, people say how they are switching their specced out 2019 16inch MBP to these new M1 Macbooks, then getting all upset when people point out, they are probably not the professionals the top-end MBPs were aimed at.

A lot of people run around with way more powerful laptops than they actually need for whatever they are doing, because it's through a business or it's deductible, but news flash, buying a Macbook Pro doesn't make you a pro.

A question, if ALL pros were fine with 16GBs of RAM, why does Apple offer 4x as much? Answer, because a lot of people will actually need it.

I am happy for people who will get these new devices an be happy with it, I might get one too. But truth be told, most of us getting these devices could make it work with the latest iPad Pro + Magic Keyboard just as well. (OK, I do need to code occasionally, but even for that there is pretty ok apps for iPad I could use)

The expectations have to come the fuck down from where they are today, because the expectations put on these devices are just crazy. It's so overhyped that I think many will be disappointed, when compatibility issues surface and when people realise that the 3x, 5x, 7x performance digits are mainly down to Fixed Function Hardware and Accelerators and general performance increase is just slightly above the generational leap we are used to, with a bigger increase in efficiency.

They're all set to native, I don't do scaling. I've since got a free top case replacement from Apple (keyboard was slightly busted because I spilled soda on it lol) and, after a PRAM reset, it's not going crazy at idle, only when being in WebRTC calls (which is 90% of my job).