I ran into that all the time on the 8GB model (admittedly with multiple RAM-intensive apps and lots of tabs open), while it now happens very rarely on my 16GB model.
Also: this makes a red flag of the recent shift to half-speed drive performance
Same with code, not always but sometimes I need a wider view.
There are a lot of subtle gains that I'm probably forgetting about and really only one negative that I've run into - games don't play super nice on the ultra-wide, but that's not really what I use this machine for.
Oh another bonus I forgot - watching shows / movies on it is really nice. I have very rarely considered this but with an 18 month old, you find you have to squeeze in time here/there, we had to stop the new batman movie on HBO with 20 minutes left... I probably would not have ever watched the ending (it was pretty good!) if I didn't have that display, it was a nice way to spend 20 minutes during lunch and I've been watching movies/shows on it randomly during lunch since. It's pretty great for this use too.
It would solve the “center bar” issue, for example
Officially Apple specs out a single external screen, but using DisplayPort you can do more. The video below shows how to connect an unreasonable number of external monitors to an Apple Silicon laptop, but a two-external-monitor configuration doesn't seem too crazy.
I don't have any personal preference (I'm fine with a big single monitor/ultrawide) but from reading around and listening to other experience you're likely to hit performance/compatibility issues with that since it's a software solution.
I run three 1080p monitors off of my M1Pro, and I don’t notice any heavy CPU load from whatever software load the driver may be adding.
Thanks, staticfloat and ksala_!
What are you basing this assumption on?
a normal Intel machine has some kind of southbridge, this means a traditional CPU that has 16 PCIe lanes total (this is actually the standard for intel) can have more than just 16x lanes, usually a PCH can add another 20 with an internal PCI switch.
Great in theory, but it does mean you can be constrained in bandwidth since that switch is limited to 16x on the upstream, in fact usually there's only 4! upstream PCIe connections to the CPU and there's some natively attached items (like the USB controller and some lanes of a GPU).
Apple's M-series CPUs do not have any southbridge or PCI switch, you get the full bandwidth of the lanes; this is why Apple M1 can run all of its ports at native speed at the same time, (where most laptops can't).
It also means that when you dedicate PCIe lanes for graphics, they can't just take away bandwidth from inactive ports.
It's only when they increase the die area and add more lanes that they dedicate more lanes to attachable graphics.
It's not a soft limitation, it's a trade-off.
They're banking on the fact that casual consumers won't use more than 2 displays (1 internal, 1 external); and that casual consumers would prefer more ports.
I'm convinced it's exactly this. I gave them the benefit of the doubt with the M1 that it's just a first-gen quirk, something that they managed to address with the Pro and Max and would become a non-issue going forward.
But now that M2 has been introduced with the same limitation, it's become crystal clear that this is yet another classic Apple anti-consumer profit-seeking tactic.
Hoping the rest of the industry can eventually catch up to and hopefully overtake Apple silicon in performance/watt and discourage this kind of behavior, but given the sheer amount of resources they have available compared to every other player, I'm not holding my breath.
Definitely the most valid complaint about it. Apple always seems to heavily encourage customers to spend "just a little" more.
It's really hard to justify the M2 Air if you want more than 8/256GB; by the time you upgrade to 16/512GB, you're approaching 14" M1 pro price territory which has a better screen (with MiniLED backlighting & local dimming) and better sound too. I'm very happy with mine and have zero regrets.