Apple’s first Arm-based computers include new MacBooks and the Mac Mini

Apple keeps its promise to introduce the first Macs with its arm-based silicon. The company has introduced new versions of the MacBook Air, Mac Mini, and 13-inch MacBook Pro that are reported to offer speed and battery life advantages over x86-based systems.

The new computers revolve around a brand new M1 processor built on the technology of iPhones, iPads and the Apple Watch. The 5-nanometer chip contains four high-performance cores, four high-performance cores and a GPU with eight cores. Apple claims that the new Arm MacBooks offer higher performance per watt than a comparable Intel processor and the fastest integrated graphics in any laptop. Apple boasts that Macs are also more responsive overall, with even Pro apps like Final Cut Pro and Logic performing some tasks several times faster than before.

You will also find the A14 Bionic’s 16-core neural engine to enhance AI-related tasks and improve safety while booting too. Image processing technology should improve camera quality for video calls, a crucial update at a time when many are working from home.

The battery life is also making great strides. Apple claims that the MacBook Air can browse the Internet for up to 15 hours and play 18 hours of video – several hours more than the previous Air. The 13-inch MacBook Pro lasts up to 17 hours of surfing and 20 hours of video, and offers the best Battery life of all Mac laptops.

The MacBook Air design is familiar, but now completely fanless and should deliver roughly twice the SSD performance in addition to the benefits of the M1. Apple boasts that it should be faster than 98% of competing laptops. The 13-inch MacBook Pro (also similar to its predecessor) has a fan system, but it’s powerful enough to play 8K videos in creative tools like DaVinci Resolve without dropping frames. Even the Mac Mini should leave significantly larger Windows desktops in its class behind, according to Apple.

Apple doesn’t think app compatibility will be an issue on the new Arm Macs. In addition to universal binaries that run both Apple Silicon and Intel native code, Rosetta 2 allows only Intel apps to run smoothly on the new systems. Software sometimes runs better than previous Intel hardware, the company claims. However, you may have to wait a while for third-party native apps. Adobe Lightroom will be supported in December, while Photoshop will be released in early 2021.

The MacBook Air starts at $ 999 and the 13-inch MacBook Pro starts at $ 1,299. The Mac Mini drops to $ 699, or $ 100 less than its Intel-based counterpart. All of them arrive next week (orders pending), and MacOS Big Sur hits existing Macs on November 12th.

It is too early to know if these computers live up to Apple’s expectations. Still, there is little doubt that Apple is aggressively setting up its first arm-based Macs. It believes that not only are they making great strides compared to previous models, but they should also be competitive (if not superior) with Windows computers. You could also let Qualcomm crawl. Although you’ve long since found arm chips in PCs like the Surface Pro X, they generally struggle with similarly priced x86 systems. This may not be a problem for the first few Apple Silicon Macs.

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