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Comment by smoldesu | Hacker News Reader

I'm prepared to catch a lot of shit for this, but I get the feeling this is where we're at with the M1. Yes, the M1 Macbook Air is faster than Intel Macs, but that's not a high bar of entry. People were reasonably frustrated with how Apple gimped Intel's CPUs to run in ultra-thin machines, so why take that anger out on Intel? Intel is far from being the best company on the block (or even the CPU space), but it's pretty concerning to watch how fast people jump to conclusions based on the messaging they get from YouTube and Twitter. I've argued about this with several Apple users, and it always boils down to the same closing argument: "but I want to use a Mac!" There's nothing wrong with that, but it's certainly a certainly a better place to start than "This x is so fast!"

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I'm not sure what you're getting at.

I might agree that the M1 Air being faster than the previous Macbook Air is one reason why users perceive it as faster, though that doesn't really explain it seeming "much faster." You'd also have to argue that Big Sur makes up for some of the difference, and assume comparisons aren't being made between updated Intel Macbook Airs.

I haven't had an opportunity to use an M1-based device, so I really just have to accept that it's surprisingly fast. Of course, just like some "want to use a Mac", I "want to use a gaming PC/laptop" and so I do. And my gaming PC and laptop are both "very fast." I don't know that their speed would surprise people coming from older, Intel-based PCs or laptops, though depending on what they are doing, they might.

But I still don't know what point you're trying to make. I guess you're just saying people read that the M1 machines are fast, and so they think they are. But there also benchmarks that show it performs remarkably well, on par with low-wattage Ryzen laptop CPUs and in some benchmarks / single-core with high-wattage Ryzen desktop CPUs, which are really fast.

Try actually using one?

The 2015-2017 12" Macbook was an ultra-thin fanless machine that was delightfully portable but was basically unusable for anything more than basic web browsing. It'd burn my thighs just watching Youtube.

The 2021 M1 Air is a slightly chunkier fanless machine that runs circles around Intel laptops with desktop-class processors, at lower cost and up to triple/quadruple the battery life. It's unlike any Intel laptop you'll find on the market today.

Apple deserves plenty of flak for their laptop design decisions (crappy webcam, fat screen bezels, port selection...) but the M1 is probably the biggest improvement to laptop performance in a decade.

How does it compare to the Ryzens?

In any case, x86/x64 is a terrible ISA and it really needs to go. Sad that it's still around and I'm surprised it can even run as fast as it does.

> The 2021 M1 Air is a slightly chunkier fanless machine that runs circles around Intel laptops with desktop-class processors, at lower cost and up to triple/quadruple the battery life. It's unlike any Intel laptop you'll find on the market today.

Second this. I got the cheapest M1 macbook air in december and it really is streets ahead of competetion in terms of performace/ battery life.

>Try actually using one? I actually have one, sent in by corporate. They gave me an M1 Macbook Air for unit-testing various things, and it collects dust most of the time. It doesn't work with either of my displays, 70% of the software I run on it has some sort of "gotcha", and the GPU performance is... well, not great. That said, it's not the weakest machine in the drawer, but it's certainly not as zippy as I've heard people claim. I still reach for my Thinkpad when closing issues or reading emails.

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