So, part of that unusual demand was also customers finally upgrading their old MacBooks.
I was supplied a decently-specced late-2019 16-inch i9 MBP for work when I started in mid-2020. Basically about the best Intel MBP that ever got released. Then the M1's came, I got a 14-inch base model M1 Pro (which I calculate to have cost about 1/2 the price work paid for my machine) and it runs circles around the work machine. I haven't run benchmarks or anything but in general performance, app startup time, even just how long it takes to redraw the desktop when I plug/unplug a monitor is night and day.
The Intel -> Apple Silicon jump is significant, but if you bought a specced out M1 Max or something, there's not going to be a reason to upgrade for a while.
I generally use an external keyboard anyway (just Apple's Magic Keyboard) but for the times I do move away from my desk it's nice to type on a keyboard where you can actually feel the travel unlike those god forsaken butterfly switches.
People keep perpetuating this myth, but the only significant jump in performance from x86 was with the Air. With all other models, it was always as Apple does with new models, and what we should have come to expect (yet we always expect more for some reason and there is always disappointment at the performance increases of new models), which is incremental performance improvements. What was amazing about M1 was that Apple switched platforms without missing a step. In general, the first M1 models where only incrementally more performant than the immediately previous x86 models they replaced, just like the M2 models are only an incremental improvement over the M1 models they replaced, and just like every new hardware release from Apple... a fractional step forward and never giant leaps and bounds. After all, that's probably impossible, as Apple's new hardware is always cutting edge at release (except for the 1999/2000 G4 tower fiasco when the processor speed actually went down for one release).
M1 generation -> M2 generation is a pretty small difference, not something you'd normally notice. In my experience unless using a stopwatch or running benchmarks folks don't usually notice improvements till they get into the 1.5 to 2x range.
I'm in the market for a new Mac. I'm currently using a late 2013 15-inch Retina as my trusty friend. If the M2 Max came with socketed SSD I'd buy it today with the 96GB RAM and max spec in every other regard, despite the price being nearly double what I paid for my current machine 9.5 years ago.
But because the SSD is soldered on, expensive and non-upgradable, and I'm always running out of space, and I want to be able to work with some large models, databases and VMs, I need to plan ahead the next 5 years in terabytes. Ensuring enough storage headroom for potential future use takes the price to a level where it's a major commitment I'll have to stick with for years, so I decided to wait and see what comes out later this year instead.
So count me as one of the potential M2 customers who was excited to get one, then after a long wait last year for the M2 MBPs to come out, and a long period of deciding which model to get after they came out, in the end decided to wait, with the unnecessarily soldered-in, non-upgradable SSDs being a factor in why.
(I have some other doubts: When I tried in store, the keyboard on the M2 MBPs is not as nice to type on compared with the 2013 model, and the trackpad is annoyingly large, and prone to triggering tap-to-touch from my hands while typing, and click-to-touch is not my preference. But those aren't bad enough to affect my purchasing decision, as long as the M1/M2 processors are still well ahead of the rest.)
I hadn't thought of it, as older USB drives (ie. my experience, 2013 MBP) are much slower for large data than the internal storage, some of my work is storage I/O performance constrained, and I don't want to carry around yet another dongle. But the price differential vs Apple built-in and flexibility/upgradability, at current USB4 speeds makes a compelling case.
(I read anout significant differences between M1 and M2 for some flavours of USB storage link speed, which might persuade me to opt for the M2 after all.)