Review of the Apple MacBook Air 15 “

At the Apple WWDC presentation in early June, the new MacBook Air was one of many announcements. Normally, the arrival of the first 15-inch model in the fifteen-year-old series would have attracted more attention, but this time Apple talked about it in ten minutes.

To be fair, the MacBook Air 15″ might not be the most exciting introduction if you look beyond the size. Apple seems to have gone to great lengths to align the looks and specs with those of the MacBook Air 13 as closely as possible to the M2, which we already discussed last year. From the M2 processor to connections, pixel density and screen brightness to battery life: everything should be the same on paper.

Despite the limited innovation, Apple says, characteristically, that the largest Air is the best 15-inch laptop in the world. the manufacture company points on trade-offs that computer manufacturers may make in their laptops between performance, screen resolution, chassis thickness and weight, and battery life. Apple says the MacBook Air 15 “features a brighter display, better system performance, is thinner and offers up to 50 percent longer battery life than competing laptops.

Appearance and links

Externally, the MacBook Air 15 “has no surprises compared to the MacBook Air 13” from 2022. The very simple design of the case is, of course, largely aluminum, and it is available in four colors like the MacBook Air 13 “: dark gray, dark blue and silver gray and champagne stars, like our test model.

The 15-inch MacBook Air weighs 1.51kg, which definitely makes it not a heavy 15-inch laptop. Most premium Windows laptops with a similar screen size weigh more, but often also have a discrete video card and additional on-board cooling. The Air’s weight is comparable to that of the Samsung Galaxy Book3 Pro 16″ and the recently reviewed Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 15″. There are laptops with a screen size that weigh significantly less, for example the Acer Swift Edge (1.17kg), the LG Gram 16Z90Q (1.19kg) that was discontinued last year, and the 15-inch Samsung Galaxy Book2 Pro (1.13kg).

More special than the weight of the Air 15 “is the system’s thinness: 1.15 cm, just a tenth of a millimeter more than the 13″ model. According to Apple, it is the world’s thinnest 15″ laptop and this can be very true. For example, the thickness of many Lightweight Windows laptops are about 1.5 cm thick; a typical 15″ laptop is larger. Like the 13” chassis, the entire chassis is the same thickness, so it doesn’t roll as far forward as netbooks MacBook Air which was designed as a wedge before 2022. With a rounded transition between the sides and the bottom, the new MacBook Air feels more comfortable in housing.

Despite its slim dimensions, this bag makes a solid, high-quality impression, a point where some Windows laptops don’t convince very well. The bottom of the case and screen cover are not easy to press anywhere and feel solid when you grab it with both hands and try to twist it. As usual for a MacBook, the new 15-inch model has a very nice hinge. You can open the lid with one finger without having to place your other hand on the base to prevent it from opening. Once opened, the screen stays nicely in place and when you close it again, it lands neatly on the base and is held in place by built-in magnets hidden in the chassis.

The 15-inch MacBook Air looks and feels exactly the same keyboard as the MacBook Air 13″ M2. So the touch has a bit more travel, albeit more than older Intel-based MacBook Air laptops with their ultra-thinness. butterflykeyboard. Apparent resistance can be felt around running and bottom It feels solid and sounds well muffled. Of course, the keyboard has white lighting again. At the top right is an on / off button and a fingerprint scanner. The precision touchpad has a very large glass surface, which takes up a significant portion of the space between the keyboard and the front. As has been the norm with MacBooks for years, there are vibrating motors under the surface of the glass that give the illusion that you can really hit it with a mouse click.

At the top of the screen, the 15-inch MacBook Air, as with all 2021 model year MacBooks, has a 1080p webcam. The most expensive laptops have had it since Corona. On paper, the MacBook Air 15″ has more powerful speakers than the MacBook Air 13″ M2. Like the MacBook Pro laptops, it has six speakers that can produce stronger bass than the quad-speaker setup in the MacBook Air 13″ M2. Unlike the MacBook Pro and older MacBook Air laptops like the MacBook Air 13″ M1, the MacBook does not have The Air 15″ has speaker grilles next to the keyboard. Instead, the gaps are concentrated between the hinge, where sound bounces off the screen to the listener. On their own, the Air 15 doesn’t sound bad at all, but the 16-inch MacBook Pro speakers get louder. Louder than the new Air headphones, with more powerful bass and clearer treble reproduction.

The MacBook Air 15″ has no additional connections compared to the 13″ model. On the left is the charger’s MagSafe port, which automatically releases when the cable is pulled hard, so the laptop isn’t pulled from the desk. In addition, there are two multi-function USB-C ports that support USB4 and the option to connect an external display. Although the MacBook Air offers a 20-million-pixel 6k screen without any problems, two high-definition screens (4 million pixels) are impossible; MacBook Air can only extend the image to one external display. On a Windows laptop that costs half as much, you can easily plug in a full multi-monitor setup, but Apple reserves this option for its more expensive MacBook Pro laptops.

On the right side of the MacBook Air 15 “there is only a 3.5 mm headphone jack, unfortunately there is no SD card reader, as on the MacBook Pro 14″ and 16”. According to Apple, it “supports high-impedance headphones” and when MacBook Air 13 “M2 jointly tested with Sennheiser HD 660S, the speaker turned out to be indeed more powerful than the previous model.