Apple’s M2 Chipset Will Last Me A Decade Or More

Despite the M3 chipset’s rather delayed and, frankly, out-of-the-blue launch at the tail end of 2023, the M2 lineup remains the average consumer’s best friend and shouldn’t be discounted.

Throughout my college years, I toiled alongside a former powerhouse of the MacBook family: a 2019 Space Gray 13-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar, wielding 512 gigabytes of solid-state storage and eight gigabytes of unified memory.

That device could handle anything I threw at it, and I mean anything. Hundreds of class assignments, a handful of STEM programs (courtesy of my peskier gen-ed requirements), and even five Touch Bar-specific games — the MacBook devoured them all, unfazed. Until, that is, the fans started cranking up.

They whirred valiantly, but their valiant efforts were in vain. Within the first two months of classes, my faithful MacBook Pro could have cooked an egg (and did leave a faint burn mark on my thumb as a souvenir).

The quad-core Intel i5 processor handled everything effortlessly, until, well, it didn’t anymore. I kept that laptop for another three years and two months, clinging to it until the cusp of graduation. Then, armed with a scholarship disbursement and Apple Trade In, I finally upgraded to an M2 MacBook Air in the stunning Starlight color.