Ordered. I absolutely love my ARM-based Chromebook, and have wished for the same specs with a bit better construction and build quality. This is absolutely perfect for my needs, and the keyboard looks to be marginally better as well.
I've hardly touched my MB Air (2012 refurb) since I got the Chromebook. Small and light enough to throw in any bag/backpack without care, cheap enough to not worry about theft.
I don't mind it being the same CPU and RAM specs as the original; I don't need much for the Chrome browser and a SSH session to the beefy server where I do most of my work.
Also owned the C7 Chromebook for a while; upgraded it to SSD and 8G of RAM, but it felt like an abomination with the fans, heat it put out, etc. Sold it to a friend, who absolutely loves it.
I'm a few months in on my M1 Air 8GB base model. To fund it I sold a 2020 Intel Air (before the prices started dropping) and a ThinkPad L14. I have no regrets.
For context, I'm a dev. I do DotNet Core, Node, Go, Python, and Ruby. All of them are far faster than previously on the Intel Air, and at least as fast as the L14 with its 16GB and Ryzen 7 Pro. The only performance downside being an initial hit of up to a second or two for the tooling the first time it's used since the last restart (whilst it does its Rosetta wonders). Everything is working as it should, although I have no current need for Docker so can't comment on the progress of that. I had some issues getting Homebrew using ARM versions of stuff (I think, it was a while ago now) but otherwise life is good.
The biggest benefit for me, though, is that unlike previously I am getting this enhanced performance from a stone-cold fanless machine with a battery life good enough that I only plug it in daily out of habit (I could easily go several days without).
Two ports is enough (for me) - bear in mind that really is two ports, as mostly there is no need to be connected to the power so you don't lose one during the day.
The keyboard isn't a patch on the ThinkPads, obviously, but its the proper Apple standard not the dodgy one from a few years back. Feels good, slightly shallow travel. One oddity is there are no longer hotkeys to control key backlights. Unless you open the settings, MacOS does it automatically. I didn't think I'd like that, but it works consistently well.
BTW in the couple of months I've had it, I've had three lock-ups. All when running JetBrains IDEs as it happens, but that's Java for you. Rebooting is quick enough that it wasn't an issue.
I've got the base model M1 Air (8GB, 8/7 cores). I sold 2020 models of the Intel Air and ThinkPad L14 (Ryzen 7 Pro) to fund the purchase and have no regrets.
- Cross-compiling code written in Go (latest beta is native ARM) takes less than 2 seconds (total) even though in that time it is building all 4 platforms (Linux, Windows, Mac ARM, Mac Intel).
- VS Code is more responsive than the Ryzen 7 Pro was (obviously subjective). The Insiders build is native ARM.
- DotNet 5 (Core, which is Intel only until .Net 6) builds apps as fast as the Ryzen 7, and running my own C# web sites/services is indistinguishable from it.
- After decades of coding, 2 of them with C#, I'm fast. So I flip between VS Code, Terminal, and Brave, at a very rapid pace as I iterate code. Not once have I been slowed down on this 8GB machine.
- Node and Python are working great. Node via Homebrew is ARM. Python 3.9.1 was already installed (I've not checked if it is ARM as it is behaving perfectly).
- Running `npm install` subjectively feels far faster.
- The keyboard is very good (not ThinkPad quality, but still better than most). It's using the new type that the 2020 Intel Air got, not the one from the last few years with all the issues.
- The keyboard backlight keys are no longer there, so unless you open up the preferences pane you have to rely on the auto-ambient-sensing, but that is working perfectly.
- Charges off any decent USB-C charger, not just the Apple one it comes with.
- Developing for a full day of combined Go and DotNet Core eats about 40% battery. Probably only that much because Core is under Rosetta. Still runs cold though.
- It never heats up, except for when using the non-ARM Go in which case it occasionally hangs and if I don't kill Terminal it starts eating 1% every few minutes. Nothing else has misbehaved at all.
As an aside, and I know you were only asking about dev work but it may help provide context to others, running DiRT 4 (rallying) on it for an hour only used about 4% of battery life, operating at high res high quality with no lag, and the Air never even got warm. The amazing thing about that is that this was running under Rosetta.
So this was emulating Intel. Running a game better than the Intel Air 2020 did, whilst under emulation, on the cheapest M1, silent, cold, using only 4% battery for an hour. Almost unbelievable.
EDIT:
It also plays Monument Valley (iPad or iOS version, not sure which) perfectly, in full screen with mouse support. Bonus.
The M1 Air is a wonder as far as I'm concerned. It's very thin and light, fanless, yet I can happily do java dev on it all day and I'm not lacking in capability or waiting around for build and test runs. It rocks.
I'm on a 2014 11" MB Air. I love it. Best laptop I've ever owned. Yeah, I wish it had 16 GB RAM, and a hires display. But it works, and works well for me.
I run IntelliJ on mine, the basically feature rich version of PyCharm.
Agonised briefly about a low end Pro vs new Air, and went for the latter chiefly for portability.
Absolutely love the new Air. It’s so small, so relatively light, great battery life, and the new keyboard (which I had dreaded) is one of the few that haven’t given me RSI after long continuous use. Love it. At some point I’ll have to buy an adapter, which is annoying but I have yet to bemoan the lack of old school ports.
I have 3 year old mb air, i made the mistake of getting the lowest spec version, but even then I'm still able to do lightweight RoR development (sublime, rails s, guard, chrome all running at once).
Honestly, same. I was afraid I'd regret purchasing my M1 Air last year, but my needs for a personal laptop have gotten simpler as time goes on. I want a small, thin, and light laptop that's easy to travel with. I've got a big gaming PC if I need power.
My work will probably upgrade to these when it's time to refresh our work machines, but for my own personal use the M1 Air just hits all the sweet spots.
I absolutely adore the Air. I do a lot of remote HPC coding and typically just connect to the cluster via SSH. I have a monstrous desktop at home for when I'm back.
To me the Air is magical because it has a balance of my exact needs: portability, toughness and, battery life. I would give anything for an updated model.
I'm on chrome, absolutely no issues at resolutions up to 1080p. Haven't bothered with higher since screen res isn't. I throw video and AE rendering on the machine when I'm out with it, occasional compile with gcc.. damn thing is great. I would love to see newer generation Air come to light. I'd buy one immediately.
My laptop is my primary coding machine. I also walk to/from work (well, not all the way, but quite a distance) which makes laptops with 15" and larger screens a bit unsuitable for me. Because of my recent back problem (no more heavy messenger bags!), I decided to sell the 13" MacBook Pro I've had since last year and instead get a top-of-the-line Air (though a refurbished one). Which I did three weeks ago. This was an absolutely correct decision. The Air turns out to be not only lighter than the Pro, but also (1) its screen is significantly higher-resolution -- the 13" Air actually has the same effective display size in terms of pixels as a regular 15" Pro, which is great for text/coding, (2) the screen is noticeably less glossy than on the Pro, which makes it easier to work in cafes or other places where I cannot control the lighting, and finally (3) even the charger is a bit more compact.
During the three weeks of use so far, I've never once needed an optical drive. Definitely laptop nirvana so far.
I have the M1 Air and it is incredible to have such a powerful machine that doesn't blast an annoying fan at all times, and is still thin, light weight, and with a very high resolution display and incredible battery life. I travel frequently so it's the perfect laptop for me. And the best part is there's NO TOUCHBAR. I will absolutely be trading this in for the M2.
I thought this Air would be a placeholder until the M1 MBP, but unless you need a real GPU, I find this more than good enough. I won’t need to upgrade.
I've hardly touched my MB Air (2012 refurb) since I got the Chromebook. Small and light enough to throw in any bag/backpack without care, cheap enough to not worry about theft.
I don't mind it being the same CPU and RAM specs as the original; I don't need much for the Chrome browser and a SSH session to the beefy server where I do most of my work.
Also owned the C7 Chromebook for a while; upgraded it to SSD and 8G of RAM, but it felt like an abomination with the fans, heat it put out, etc. Sold it to a friend, who absolutely loves it.
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