The history of the MacBook is one of the most interesting (and disappointing) in the company’s entire catalog. Those of us who have been around for a while remember this MacBook fondly white polycarbonate 2006 Or the brave but obscure 12-inch MacBook 2015.
Apple has spent years trying to reinvent the “laptop for everyone” essence, and a recent internal code leak confirms that They tried it a few years ago with the A15 chip from the iPhone 13but they decided to cancel it. And looking at the data, thank goodness they did. Running this team would mean repeating the mistakes of the past.
The best they could do was wait.
Information obtained from the kernel debug kit indicates the existence of the J267 project. A MacBook with the same iPhone 13 processor that physically existed in the Cupertino labs. however, prudence prevailed.
You only need to look at the raw performance to see why Apple shelved the project. Compare the chip they were going to use (A15) to the one they plan to use now (A18 / A18 Pro) and with the first M1 it gives us the answer.
chip | monofilament | multi-core | RAM |
|---|---|---|---|
a15 | 2,345 | 5,748 | 4 GB |
a18 | 3,235 | 8,247 | 8 GB |
m1 | 2,312 | 8,383 | 8 GB |
The difference is obvious. The A15 is a fantastic iPhone chip, but Its 4GB of RAM would make running macOS a nightmare Minimum – we open three tabs and a Word document. The system would have to constantly pull the hard drive to compensate for the lack of memory, causing slowdowns. It was impossible.
Instead, the new code discovery (identifier J700) points to a model with the A18 or A18 Pro. Be that as it may, we are already speaking a different language here. With 8 GB of RAM (which until recently was standard for the MacBook Air) and ualready power that matches the M1 in multi-core tasks and surpasses it in a single core, this device has the heart to be a real computer.
The lesson of 2015: The problem wasn’t the design, it was Intel
To appreciate the importance of this upcoming MacBook, you only need to look back at the 2015 12-inch model. I had one and On a design level, it still seems unbeatable to me.. It weighed less than a kilogram and was a marvel of technology. But he had a burden: Intel.
2015 12-inch MacBook
This computer arrived five years early. It had Intel Core M processors that heated up and offered a performance that hardly justified the €1,500 it cost. Apple has learned its lesson. Now, with full control of our own chips, the scenario is different. The A18 offers the kind of thermal efficiency they were looking for in 2015, but with real power for the job.
The A18’s score is double that of the 2015 MacBook
The Rule of Three Ranges: A Missing Piece of the Puzzle
Steve Jobs popularized the famous grocery chain, but The current Apple works better with the “rule of three”. We have iPhone (Base, Plus/Air, Pro) and iPad (Base, Air, Pro). However, the Mac is still limping along: we only have Air and Pro. No input range, MacBook only.
Mac is still the only category with a 2×2 grid
If the rumors are confirmed, we will see a 13-inch computer in colors and with an A18 chip. A laptop that fills that gap in pricing strategy and with plenty of power to move macOS.
We have a big question, where will this place in the market. There is talk of a price well below a thousand dollars (which we would certainly be around €700-800) to compete with Chromebooks in schools. The move makes sense, but faces Apple’s own catalog: The iPad Air already costs €699 and comes without a keyboard. If you add the Magic Keyboard, the price of the tablet soars to almost 1,000 euros.
Is Apple willing to sell a full laptop for less than a mid-range tablet? This is the piece I’m missing to complete the puzzle. My understanding is that if they manage to balance the price, we’ll see the rebirth of a category that should never have gone away: the MacBook that (almost) everyone can afford.
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