The limiting factor for processing speed is not your computer but the speed of your internet connection for more and more people.
But as ChrisUpchurch said there are great reasons to invest in a M1 Mac for standard office workers, that I forgot about!
Now - Does anyone know of anywhere that has the M1 Air in stock currently or am I stuck waiting for Apple to restock them?
Web based apps can also involve running a lot of really inefficient javascript code in your browser, so that’s another pretty compelling reason to have a powerful and also energy efficient CPU in your computer.
1 Like
I unplugged my M1 Air Friday evening about 9 PM. I didn’t plug it in again until Monday morning, when it was at 15%.
This after using it for an “average” amount over the course of the weekend. And in a package that’s 100% silent and weighs under 3 pounds. Never thought I would see such a thing.
I just completed an order for a MacBook Air M1 with 16GB and 512 GB HD. Now I just have to wait a month till they’re in stock. 
Thank you for your thoughts. However I am kind of afraid, becaue the new 13" PRO, also has the external moinitor limtations. Therefire I am really really curious about the 16" M1 and hope it will come ouut even in Spring 2021 – with at least 4 external monitors support of course.
Writing is possibly one of the oldest workflows in the history of mankind (apart from spycraft and warfare) and computers, and I certainly spend most of my days not in a web browser 
I see where you’re coming from, but I don’t think I’d be worried. The 13 has never been a “pro” machine in anything other than name. It’s a way to get people to pony up a few hundred extra bucks so they can feel cool because their machine is “pro”. 
1 Like
I have to say…I remember having dozens of tabs open on old Pentium machines, and it boggles my brain how much modern websites use - CPU-wise - comparatively.
3 Likes
That’s really insane. Huge CPU/RAM waste to essentially display some information in text form. If we consider that “The Internet” consumes ~10% of the world’s electricity (or even more considering end devices), decreasing CPU/RAM usage would be a thing…
2 Likes
It’s not really this anymore. A lot of applications are now running in web browsers too, and that’s where having a capable CPU is pretty important. But I agree with you that a lot of pages that should just be displaying information are also running a lot of scripts for (usually) dubious reasons.
3 Likes
Not talking about Office 365 in the browser. Read news, read a forum, etc. The “real” content, some text, would amount to some kB. Some pictures, 100-200kB per picture for the web. If you look at memory usage with some tabs open, how do we get into the realm of several hundred MB? Because of broadband+multicore CPUs+a lot of memory, web sites are rarely optimized for low resource utilization.
The proliferation of CMSs also highly encourages non-optimized code. Each plugin or module gets its own codebase, which is okay functionally - but it’s massively inefficient.
CMS and JS frameworks make It really easy to get stuff working, but, as stated…massively inefficient.
1 Like
Haha, awesome I love it! So you say the real pro is the big brother 15" / 16" right? 
1 Like
There’s also a more capable 13" model that is more pro (and still available).
My guess is they’ll drop that and sell higher specced 14" and 16" Pro models, and keep the 13" Pro at more of an entry-level Pro tier.
2 Likes
Yup. Wait for the M2 or whatever they call it, and see what they do.
1 Like
What I learned with Apple so far: It is better go with the second version of a new product they launch (e.g. rather buy iphone 5s than iphone 5 (i know had to experience the massive quality difference!) not the butterfly keyboard on mpb, but the newer one). I always feel that the second product is much more durable, tested and has less failures, besides the new functions of course. But i think they can implement new insights and new learnings. I am still holding off with my mpb 2015, 15" (only 256 gb ssd and with two 24" external displays, yeah!) and honestly I want hold off as long as this beast lasts an than I wanna go with the most actual mpb 16", which seems durable.
1 Like
Which is precisely why I went for an M1 Mac Air because apart from the chip the hardware is tried and tested. The creases have been ironed out - keyboard / screen - and it works well.
The second iteration may be the one to avoid because it will be the one that is genuinely new.
As for the M1 chip - well they’ve been working at that for years in iPads and iPhones.
Everyone’s experiences are different, of course.
For example, my experience with the 16" MacBook Pro was terrible, even though that hardware was much more “tried and true” than the M1 MacBook Air.
The Butterfly Keyboard went through several revisions, all of which were terrible, and the first version of the “new” keyboards were much better than the 3rd iteration of the butterfly one.
I was on the ’S’ cycle for iPhones for a long time (3GS through the 8) and considered it to be the ‘better’ one to be on for a two-year upgrade cycle, but having been on the annual iPhone upgrade program for the past few years, I don’t think they have as much of an “off” year as they used to.
Of course “next year’s” computer will almost always be better than “this year’s” computer, so the 2nd generation of the M1 hardware will no doubt be “better” in some ways. That’s just the nature of the beast.
1 Like