TomApple's new MacBook Neo is a solid budget performer for the Apple-focused experience. What was it like to spend a week with this low-cost entrant into Apple's lineup? It's not perfect, but for many job roles, it's the exact tool for the job. We're going to buy a lot of these over the next few years.
Will
Being Left Behind Enjoyer@tbridge great review!
disappointing to see the browser performance issues but not entirely unexpected
(Still tempted to have a Neo instead of my iPad because what they recently did with iPadOS making multitasking infuriating!)
as always with Apple I assume the 2nd gen will fix all the teething problems
A. Lee Bennett Jr.@tbridge Thanks for an excellent summary. I was wondering if I should swap my wife's old MBAir with one of these, but she does just enough retouching in Photoshop, in spite of some people thinking it should be fine, I'm simply lacking the confidence that 8GB is wholly inadequate for any kind of Photoshop work.
Daniel Berman@tbridge About 10 years ago I took a non-profit with 130 employees from 90% windows to 90% mac. Most employees only needed MS office and a browser. We bought default spec Macbook Airs at the time. It sounds like if I had a do over today, I could probably hand people MacBook Neos for everyone but the power users.
DK
IDGAF Certified@tbridge it's amazing how building the (less expensive) computer with the #1 feature people have been asking for (less expensive) instead of just making it thinner (less expensive) finally gets people excited about Apple's new (less expensive) laptops again.
Bart@tbridge good writeup and echos my experience. Regarding the "Tom's MacBook" comment, if you jump into ABM and filter on device, the Neo is listed as a varient of MacBook along with the OG and 12", not at its own thing like the air or pro. My head canon therefore tells me this is apples answer to the "why dont apple put an apple silicon chip in the 12" macbook" question.
@bartreardon Interestingly, my MacBook Neo is a 21.5" iMac to ABM.
David Nelson@bartreardon @tbridge I wonder if they were still deciding how to brand it when they had to finalize the software build, so they played it safe and left the suffix off.
Or you could have a head-canon where it’s not actually part of the product name, but a marketing label highlighting that it’s new.
The New MacBook —> The Neo MacBook —> The MacBook… Neo 😜