Nuked Apple’s entry-level M2 MacBook Pro’s SSD is significantly slower than that of the M1 MacBook Pro. Apple confirmed to the verge that the base M2 MacBook Air has the same storage configuration as the Pro.
Blackmagic’s disk speed test app shows that the M2 MacBook Air has write speeds that are 15 to 30 percent slower than those of the 512GB model. The base model of the M2 has written speeds that can be 40 to 50 percent faster than Apple sent the verge to review.
The base air only includes a single NAND chip. The M1 models and M2 models have two, which can allow for nearly twice as fast speeds.
The base MacBook Air is only a bit faster than my 2019 Intel MacBook Pro when it comes to write speeds. Microsoft’s surface laptop go 2 also loses to the base air on write but demolishes it on read.
We did n’t have an M1 air with 256GB to test, but the model we do have on hand is faster than the base M2 model on both read and write.
The M2 air’s M2 air will be rolled out in September. The Internet is rolling out in a review of the system. A number of tasks, including file transfers, can also slow down overall performance.
I ran two 4K YouTube videos over 25 open Chrome tabs for 30 minutes on both machines without either needing to dip into swap memory. I did n’t see much of a difference when it came to opening any of the apps I normally use, including Chrome, Safari, messages, photos, activity monitor, Slack, music, etc.
For the MacBook Pro’s target audience, we generally recommend that you buy a MacBook Pro with an M1 pro or Max chip instead of an air.
You’ll need to pay $ 200 to upgrade from 256GB to 256GB, bringing the 8-core M2 MacBook Air’s price from $ 1,199 to $ 1,399. M2 machines are visibly better for graphics-heavy use cases (such as running games) but their performance differences are not hugely impactful in other tasks.
We’ve reached out to Apple for comment on the results. We have n’t received a response yet, but have n’t responded yet.
