THE ALTERNATIVES
chip, running at 1.1GHz. This doesn’t make it sound like a speed-demon… and it isn’t. But it is plenty fast enough for average use, and because it’s a new-gen chip, it gets more than respectable scores in benchmarks. It feels more than fast enough in real life too, for work such as document editing, light editing of photos and browsing the web.
When it comes to multi-core performance – for tasks such as compressing files or video exports – this is clearly a weaker machine but it still doesn’t find itself totally embarrassed by its own quad-core bigger brother.
Finally, battery life here is decent but not exceptional. Apple says you can get 11 hours out of it but you’d have to be working really lightly to achieve that. We found six or seven hours was more typical, though it does vary a lot by task.
The MacBook Air 2020’s screen hasn’t changed from the previous model, which is no problem with us. It’s a 2560x1600 Retina display; that’s impressively high-res compared to the competition at this price, which tend to be Full HD (1920x1080).
It looks perfectly sharp from a standard viewing distance, and is bright enough to overcome reflections well. It’s also pleasingly colourful. The MacBook Pro 13-inch’s screen is about 20% brighter, and we do wish this could have that extra vibrancy. But it really isn’t a problem – it looks great as is and colours are highly accurate.
Hot keys
The main thing you should know is the backlit keyboard on the new MacBook Air is just excellent. Introduced a few years ago, Apple’s ‘Butterfly’ keyboards were very divisive. Not only was the feel of them unpopular, they seem to have reliability issues, failing more often than Apple’s previous keyboards.
The last MacBook Air still had one of these keyboards, but this model doesn’t. You’ve got a new key type with more travel, and a different mechanism that should prove more reliable. It feels great to type on and it’s no problem for accuracy either. It definitely doesn’t feel cramped.
But we need to end on a gripe. Apple has improved the microphones in the MacBook Air for clearer voice