The 12-inch MacBook with Retina display is sexy to behold, but its specs may leave more to be desired.
Thanks to some new benchmarks, we have a clearer picture of what to expect from the new MacBook’s processor. And it’s basically as powerful as a 2011 MacBook Air.
Geekbench tests of the entry-level Retina MacBook, which was coincidentally unboxed today for the first time, have been posted (and removed) online, and they reflect the kind of performance that’s expected from Intel’s M processor (clocked at 1.1GHz with Turbo Boost at 2.4GHz).
With single-core scores in the 1924 ballpark and multi-core scores in the range of 4038, the new MacBook’s performance is very close to the top-tier MacBook Air from 2011 with an Intel Core i7 clocked at 1.8GHz. For further comparison, the 2015 MacBook Air’s processor is nearly twice as powerful as the new MacBook with scores of 2881 and 5757.
Processors aren’t everything, though. The new MacBook has a Retina screen, and its graphics performance will be far better than older laptops. Improvements in SSD technology will also make a big difference in overall speed.
The 12-inch MacBook starts at $1,299 and will start shipping on April 10th.
Alex Heath is a journalist who works for Tech Insider. He’s the former co-host of The CultCast. He has been quoted by the likes of the BBC, KRON 4 News, and books like “ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.” He lives in Lexington, Kentucky. If you want to pitch a story, share a tip, or just get in touch, additional contact information is available on his personal site. Follow him on Twitter.
50 responses to “New 12-inch MacBook as powerful as 2011 MacBook Air”
I was initially very skeptical about this machine, but the more I see it, the more I’m seeing something closer to what made me love Apple in the first place (in 1986, in my case). It’s an absolutely pared down vision – and something that I’d love to write with. I suspect I’ll be going for it before too long, although it’ll be the quicker version.
If you want something completely pared down and thin get a Microsoft Surface, Chromebook pixel, or even a Chromebook in the 2-300 dollar range. The price of this poorly spec’d Mac Book is absurd. I guess if you want to buy a computer to look pretty, have at it. I’ll keep exercising and eating well to that end.
yeah, I’d agree with you except when it comes to OS and experience… you get what you pay for and those in that “2-300 dollar range” don’t work as a premium device. Which has nothing to do with specs.
Why pay the ‘Microsoft Tax’ for the Surface? It specs out as decent MacBook Air, but at a $300-500 premium (comparably equipped). It seems like just yesterday we used to hear WinDoze fans berating Mac users for paying that kind of “premium” just for OS X. Now they want you to pay the extra just for a laptop with a touch screen – that you can’t even hold in your lap! (screen requires a kickstand). Oh, the irony.
Of course, I’m not paying this kind of money for a crippled Air with a pretty screen. I’ll ‘lug’ the extra pound-and-a-half MacBook Pro around and get a bigger screen and faster, more extensible computer for the same price.
I agree on the older Surface… Too pricey. I am talking about the newly announced Surface 3 that retails a round 499 with full Windows 8.1. Sure the processor is kind of weak and the display isn’t as great as the Mac, but it’s also nearly a third of the price.
You should expect the processor in the Surface 3 to be far slower than the new Macbook. Surface 3 only starts at around half the price by the time you purchase a $130 keyboard and $50 mouse to get full functionality out of it. The Surface 3 also has 1/4 the RAM and an Atom CPU that’s in a class below the Core M processor from the MB.
You definitely get what you pay for with either one. With this particular Mac, you pay for pretty absurd portability, a processor that is very fast considering the lack of fan, design, a great screen, and good battery life. As with all machines there are good things and bad things about it.
As for me, I like the concept behind this machine as a full time student, but I’ll probably wait for the second generation of it. My daily machine is a 2012 Core i7 11″ Macbook Air that isn’t much faster than the 2011 Core i7 they reference in the review. It’s very fast for my daily needs even after 3 years, so I imagine the new Macbook will be fine for most anything aside from heavy photoshop, video editing, gaming, etc. I imagine the processor and SSD improvements since 2012 will add far more functionality to the computer than a slightly slower processor will detract. But we will only know once the new MB is out for real world examination. Even if this new computer isn’t spot on, I bet future iterations of it will be far cheaper and very successful (especially as USB-C catches up).
It’s never all about specs, OSX will run silky smooth on this unlike Chrome OS or Windblows.
Seems one shouldn’t have to say “it’s never about specs” at this price point. After all, the fact that the macbook is thin, has a “retina” display, and has a USB c port are all specs… It just seems some key areas like CPU and ram are not up to standard.
Nothing I said actually touts any specs (except USB-C transfer speed), even retina doesn’t specify it’s resolution. How are CPU and Memory not up to specs?
It’s a brand new fanless CPU from Intel and has 8GB of memory, this coupled with new double speed SSD’s should be quite fast. The iPhone still has 1GB of memory and runs just as fast and any Android or Windows phone with 3GB.
What it’s lacking in CPU will be made up with memory and SSD.
Again, the average Joe will snap these up…
This article is completely misleading. You’re saying “New 12-inch MacBook as powerful as 2011 MacBook Air”, but that is a) totally unknown, and b) almost certainly wrong. Comparing the CPU is just one part of the equation. There’s also the speed of the GPU, the RAM and the SSD, plus all the other parts of the system.
Yeah, he actually does kind of address that toward the end of the piece….if you read it.
When you’re talking about ‘power,’ not ‘speed,’ you’re talking about the CPU. You may be able to open giant databases or monster photos even faster, but if you actually want to manipulate the data or process PhotoShop changes, a bigger motor will always be faster. Sure, fixing red-eye in your family Xmas photo will probabaly be faster on this, but if you’r erendering full-size images or trying to find correllations in voting patterns, this ain’t gonna compare to the current Air.
I agree. Geekbench tests are heavily weighted toward graphics and are quite short in duration. I suspect doing anything intensive for any period of time will show how slow a fanless Core M processor is compared to an Core iX processor.
That hurts, even my MacBook pro retina 2013 feels like crap dual core for $1500 I feel like I should get something better. Next time I’ll get a windows top tier book, or wait for windows 10.
HP Spectre x360 is your answer
Why does this hurt? The MacBook is designed to be thin and light with long battery life, not a power house machine. To compare to the windows side, there is the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro and Samsung ATIV Book 9, both of which use Core M processors. The Lenovo has substantially worse battery life than the MacBook and the Samsung’s design and quality leave something to be desired. And as mentioned by others, besides CPU benchmarks there are other factors such as the speed of the SSD. The Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro at 554mb/s read and 261mb/s write speed while the Samsung was slower at 551mb/s and 141mb/s. Until we see the benchmarks for the MacBooks SSD we won’t know if it will close to the newly updated 13″ MacBook Air which topped out at 1285mb/s which is nearly twice as fast as most SSds in any Windows laptop. When the original MacBook Pro was testing by PC World, it was the fastest intel laptop they had ever tested, Mac or PC yet PCs and Macs leapfrog each other in specs and performance like in many other fields. For the audience, this is going to be a great computer and it doesn’t sound like you are the target market if you’re obsessed with performance.
The Yoga Pro 3 has a fan, so don’t expect the Mabook to keep up with it even with the same processor.
Be careful those windows machines don’t have Apple Logo in the back. They are probably of inferior in quality. I suggest you look at something “Apple Inside” it’s a safer bet.
I regret I should’ve got something in the windows side something like asus
Did you happen to spell the last word incorrectly? Was it meant to say anus?
Right. Your 2013 is more powerful than the brand new 2015, has comparable graphics, and SSDs. So that feels like crap? Maybe next you’ll complain because your 2013 VW Golf TDi gets better gas mileage than the 2015 Golf petrol? Non. Sense.
You forgot to add for $1500, so yes for that price it feels like crap I ex more cpu power for such amount of money. And mine holds the title “pro” yes I expect something pro when I only get a dual core miserable cpu when a windows counterpart are doing quad cores. And I even forgot lack of dedicated gpu we haven’t even touch that I know is not a gaming machine but we could use sokwthing decent.
Apple sells what people want. They want eye candy. Most people don’t know what a file is. In general, people are more stupid about computing today that they were 10 years ago. OSX continues to be a reasonable unix like os. Some of that shine is coming off as Linux continues to mature and advance while OSX stagnates. But there is a 150 billion dollar a year enterprise behind OSX and nothing comparable pushing linux. The amazing thing is how close linux is to be better than OSX when you compare the resources committed to each platform. Apple is a toy company living off the intellectual capital of smart decisions made 20 years ago. The capital of those past decisions is nearly consumed.
I don’t see linux getting any closer to OSX. Linux is not easy to use. Unless you are just browsing the web. OSX on the other hand has beatuiful user interface and it’s easy to configure. You never run through incompatible hardware.
yawn
Actually the picture subtitle is wrong. The new MacBook is exactly what “most people” need. Most people are not power users of power hungry apps but use their computer for work or play maybe even extensively with email, web, MS Office but that’s it. They will LOVE this computer.
They will love this computer because….???
Really its just thinner and lighter, is that really all that much more compelling over the already very slim MacBook Air? and you don’t have to sacrifice processor speed, keyboard feel and lack of ports.
If you’re purchasing a new laptop, you would have to consider this, yes it has less ports, but that one port performs just as fast as the thunderbolt ports on the Air. It’s for people on the move who don’t use 3D modelling software and are happy to access everything via iCloud or Dropbox. Who uses USB keys anymore. I don’t and I’ve got the 15″ MacBook Pro with Retina.
Ps. Have you tried the keyboard or the new touchpad…. Er No.
Well, that makes it a very basic computer for users with very limited needs. OK. There is a market for that. Everybody who wants to use more than email and a word processor needs to look for something more powerful.
This will still run photoshop fine, I don’t see your point. Perhaps if your running 3D modelling it may not cut it, but that’s a small population and they generally wouldn’t buy this device. Hence the MacBook Pro.
Good luck with that.
Well thought out, intelligent reply.
Scores of 2881 and 5757 (for 2015 Macbook Air) aren’t “nearly twice as powerful” as the Macbook’s 1924 and 4038. Nearly twice as powerful would be more like 3800/8000.
Clickbait article. Why?
1) Inaccurate/Outrageous title designed to garner attention
2) The author admits the error in the second-to-last paragraph
3) Reality is: the new MacBook has everything the majority prospective users want/need. People who honestly need high-horsepower machines need mobile desktops or dedicated gaming rigs, not MacBooks.
4) The author surely knows all the above, so: Clickbait
I think the point was made that the new MacBook is a downgrade from the Air.
For most people the Air is all they need, this new macbook really doesn’t serve anyones needs with its higher price, slower processor and lack of ports.
what he said
“Really doesn’t serve anyone’s needs”? I think you’ll find this will suit more than 90% of everyone’s needs, just maybe not yours. Let’s not forget, you don’t get a retina screen with the MBA.
The MacBook Air currently serves 90% of everyones needs. If Apple had put a retina in the Air as people have repeatedly asked for, it would serve 95%.
So yes, the new Macbook doesn’t serve anyones needs that isn’t ALREADY being served BETTER by the Air. I’m not sure it can be any clearer than that.
My point exactly, so if you’re looking to buy a NEW device (if you’ve got one, why would you need another?), you would choose the MacBook over the Air for the screen and portability.
You write, “and it’s graphics performance.” That means “and it is graphics performance.” You want “its,” the possessive.
Whoops! Thanks
Overpriced for what you get
“New 12-inch MacBook as powerful as 2011 MacBook Air”
The next to last paragraph is in sharp contrast to the headline. Click-bait.
Does it connect to the internet and stay connected because thousands of Macbooks Pro`s dont. Apple are completely ignoring the problem however and have decided to stick their in a bucket of sand.
That happens on my iPad 2 all the time. It is quite annoying.
Previously I had the MBP 13″ with Retina and now the 15″ MBP with Retina and don’t have these issues….
Meh, go MBpro or go home.
I’m not sure what everyone is on about, it’s super thin, super light, has a sweet retina display and has kick ass battery life. It’s new tech (USB-C, 10GB transfer rates). As with all new tech it comes with a price tag. If you don’t want it don’t buy it. This would be more than adequate for 90% of the population who use word/pages, Excel/Numbers, PowerPoint/Keynote and email. It’s designed for people who will use this device with iCloud and use it wirelessly. It’s board alone is fractionaly bigger than the iPhone 6 Plus. Yes it’s pricey, but damn it’s sexy. I’m considering one just for traveling. Under a kilo… Super portable!
Well said.
I can see past most of the issues people have with the new Macbook, but the ability to charge my iPhone off of my Macbook pro is huge. I know with a USB to USB C adapter that would be possible with this Macbook, but since it runs so efficiently, the battery/capacity is smaller and would probably take out more than half of it’s battery to get a full charge.