The 2015 MacBook Review
by Ryan Smith on April 14, 2015 10:15 AM ESTThe MacBook’s Usability
But by far the biggest question however is what all of this lends towards the usability of the new MacBook. With Apple developing a smaller form factor and then charging a premium price for it, whether it’s worth it is a perfectly legitimate question. And the answer to that question is that it depends.
We’ll get to the all-important performance considerations in a bit, but I want to start with design first. For something built for a new form factor like a MacBook I think it’s important to look at the overall design and whether it makes sense in the first place before even getting to the tradeoffs Apple made to get here.
The 2015 MacBook reminds me of the original MacBook Air in a lot of ways, and in fact that’s probably the biggest knock against it. In 2008 the MacBook Air was revolutionary, it created what we now know as the Ultrabook category and was so cutting edge that it contained an Intel Core CPU in a form factor that no one else could get at the time. Consequently the MacBook Air wasn’t just smaller than the MacBook or MacBook Pro, but it was a lot smaller than its larger, heavier predecessors.
Big & Little: MacBook & 27" iMac
The MacBook, by contrast, is not the same jump in size. Calculated against their respective thickest points, the new MacBook is still 73% of the volume of the 11” MacBook Air. Similarly, its 0.92Kg weight is 85% of the weight of said MacBook Air. This means that whereas the original MacBook Air was a very important jump for the Apple’s laptop line, the new MacBook doesn’t get the same benefit.
With that said, there is still a distinct difference between the MacBook and MacBook Air, one that likely doesn’t mean as much in numbers as it does in feel. On a personal note my travel laptop of choice is an Asus ZenBook UX21A, an 11” Ultrabook that is a dead-ringer for the 11” MacBook Air in size and weight. So having toted around the MacBook for the past week working on this review, I was surprised by just how different it felt from my 11” ZenBook. The ZenBook is already towards the light-end of the Ultrabook spectrum, and yet after carrying around the MacBook the ZenBook feels heavy. It may only be 20% heavier in practice, but just carrying the two in hand it certainly feels like it’s more than that.
Left: MacBook. Right: Asus 11" ZenBook Prime (UX21A)
For work purposes I have always favored the 11” Ultrabook for its size and weight. It’s easy to carry around and small enough to hold with one hand or to balance on one knee as situations dictate. And while it’s not perfect – 11” isn’t much screen real-estate and doesn’t allow for much of a keyboard – as an ultra-portable secondary computer for someone who already has a desktop, it fits my needs very well.
Which is why I was surprised by just how much I ended up liking the MacBook’s size and form factor. It’s smaller than an 11” Ultrabook and yet if anything it feels bigger when in use – perhaps due to the 16:10 screen – and the weight difference can really be felt. Before using the MacBook if you had asked me whether I would want an even smaller laptop I would have dismissed the notion, but after using the MacBook I have to stop and reconsider that position.
Ultimately I’m reminded a great deal of the launch of the original MacBook Air, where Apple specifically touted it as a travel computer for someone with more than one computer. For most people it’s smaller than what you’d want to use day-in and day-out, but as a travel laptop it’s great. Consequently the MacBook as it stands is an interesting alternative to the MacBook Air lineup; it fills a lot of the same roles, but it does so while being even thinner and lighter.
Top: MacBook. Middle: Asus 11" ZenBook Prime. Bottom: Surface Pro 3 w/Type Cover
That said, compared to a MacBook Air these size improvements don’t come for free. There are performance considerations to be had with the Core M processor, which we’ll get to in our look at system performance. The trade-off for thin and light is a similar reduction in performance, so even though the MacBook and MacBook Air overlap at times, they are separated by size versus performance.
Finally, we would be remiss in not covering the tablet/laptop crossover factor as well. The fact that Apple takes as many design cues as they do from the iPad – the colors, the focus on size, and the limited number of ports – is telling. I hesitate to say too much about the MacBook as an iPad alternative since these devices are still so different. But for someone wanting to step up from something like an iPad into a full sized, fully capable laptop computer, this is exactly what such a device might look like.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
354 Comments
View All Comments
modulusshift - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
Dudebro, Anand's out. He's at Apple now.Ooh, performance over time would have been good.
Definitely with you on the performance per watt and silence, Apple has never been more environmentally friendly.
That said, I don't think this review was bad. Could have used a little more editing, and discussion of the different models as you said. But it had some good material I've yet to see in the rest of the reviews. I wish it lived up to the standard of Anand's review of the SP3 where he gave more of his subjective opinion of how it actually ran. This guy said, yeah, it's thinner and lighter, and I like how it feels, but it's slower than my current 11 inch, so there's a little bit of a tradeoff... And I wonder, why is it slower? Is it actually less capable? What sort of experiences didn't work as you expected? What is really wrong with it?
wave84 - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
The point is I didn't see anything here that I haven't already read on all the other websites all the way from New York Times to the Verge to ArsTechnica. The reason we all visit AnandTech is for those really detailed, in depth 25 page reviews where every single one of our questions gets an answer. Not the case here.The reason why I'm being so determined is that this is a very important review. Like it or not, Apple fanboy or not, the Macbook Air has probably been the most important laptop of the last 10 years. It has basically defined the laptop market of our times and it has been studied, copied and emulated by every manufacturer out there.
Similarly, the new Macbook is probably on a quest to do the same. I would have preferred to wait 2 weeks and read the real thing, not the same article that I've already read 10 times so far (by the way, isn't it strange that all these articles are so similar?)
I'm in a strange boat myself. Started out getting a 2011 13" Macbook Air as a secondary computer, then it slowly transformed into a desktop replacement with an external monitor with the old desktop sold for parts (doing web development, mostly). I would currently kill for the weightlessness / screen / quietness of the Macbook, if the questions above would have been answered. Should I go for the updated 2015 Air? A somewhat bulky Pro? Or maybe just wait for Skylake?
Why have you deserted us, Anand?!... :)
BillBear - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
I don't get the feeling that this would be a viable desktop replacement if you're at all concerned about gaming.lilo777 - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
Hence the term "hybrid". This device is not good either as a desktop replacement or a tablet replacement (or even as a regular laptop replacement). It's a "hybrid" then (probably good for nothing).Ryan Smith - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
Hi Wave, thanks for the feedback. To get right to answering your questions.1) This was the base model, so the $1299 5Y31 model. Apple only samples a single model, so I do not know how the higher end model would fare. However what we've found when looking at other Core M devices is that faster processors can end up throttling sooner, which can be counter-productive. http://www.anandtech.com/show/9117/analyzing-intel...
2) If a load is going to cause the laptop to throttle, it does so almost immediately. As noted in the review, even the 28 second Photoshop benchmark is long enough to require some throttling. As a result pretty much anything longer than a long webpage load is going to face power limits, and longer use will also bring on thermal limits.
Also, while it's not in a chart, I mentioned in the Geekbench 3 section that we ran the stress test. the MacBook reaches equilibrium almost immediately; by the second run it's already down to its steady-state score of 4200.
What this means is that the MacBook can only run at its higher clockspeeds for very, very short periods of time. As a result "performance over time" would be on the order of seconds. This isn't like an Ultrabook or other laptop where performance slowly degrades over time as the cooling system slowly falls behind.
3) Poorly. I wouldn't suggest it. DOTA 2 is about as strenuous as it's going to be able to take. Unfortunately we can't test any of those games as there isn't a suitable FRAPS-like utility for Yosemite to let us do proper benchmarking.
4) The issue with testing efficiency is that to properly test it we need to isolate the CPU and measure it directly. You're not wrong, this is a very efficient processor, but there isn't currently a great way to systematically show that since there's no way to separate the CPU's power consumption from the display's power consumption.
Anyhow, I'm sorry to hear the review didn't live up to your full expectations, but none the less thank you for the feedback and thank you for reading it.
wave84 - Wednesday, April 15, 2015 - link
Thank you for answering all of my questions, Ryan. I withdraw all my complaints :)Kevin G - Wednesday, April 15, 2015 - link
3) I thought Apple's developer tools for OpenGL has a FRAPs-like tool included. I'll have to check when I get home later today.I do know for certain that it has the ability to record VRAM usage over time. Found this out playing around with a GTX 770 and 970 to see just how difficult it was to go over 3.5 GB.
Ryan Smith - Thursday, April 16, 2015 - link
It shows you the frame rate, but it doesn't allow you to record it to find the average frame rate over time.yticolev - Wednesday, April 22, 2015 - link
Hi Ryan, thanks for the excellent review. It supplied details that no other review did. I do have one question that I was hoping would be addressed and that wave84 also asked: buying advice related to Skylake. If what I read is correct, Skylake will be out in just a few months with significant changes to chip architecture promising both better performance and battery life. Better GPU is part of that. It would kill me to purchase now and miss out on an extra hour of battery life with a midyear update.I certainly can wait. I have a perfectly cromulent late 2007 Blackbook that I have not been tempted to upgrade until this new MacBook (which is a huge upgrade to be sure). Now I've got buying fever despite the hassle and expense of upgrading a number of applications that require Rosetta.
One other very minor point, I was surprised you didn't mention iSight as it is a downgrade over other current Apple machines.
modulusshift - Tuesday, April 14, 2015 - link
Replaceable instead of replicable, page 2table instead of cable, DisplayPort instead of DisiplayPort, page 6
could you fix the number for 2010 MBA (last entry) in the 4KB Random Write (8GB LBA, QD3) chart? page 8
tuning instead of turning page 9
On the one hand instead of For one the one hand, second to last page as mentioned by earlier comment.
Thank you for your review.