Apple had recently announced its new MacBook Air which according to the company, would feature 8th gen Intel Core i5 chipsets. While this is technically true, it should be noted that there is a subtle difference and that not all Core i5 chipsets are made the same because upon further digging, it was discovered that the new MacBook Air laptops are actually more specifically powered by Intel’s Amber Lake CPUs.
For those wondering what are the differences, Intel basically has chipsets that are designed to be high-powered as part its U-series which you can find in the MacBook Pros. Then you have the lower-powered Y-series chipsets which is what the new MacBook Airs are using. This means that a Core i5 MacBook Air and Core i5 MacBook Pro are two very completely different beasts.
What does this mean for would-be customers? Basically the lowered powered Amber Lake CPUs aren’t necessarily designed for professionals who need to render images and videos at high-resolutions. However as an everyday laptop for work, watching videos, surfing the web, maybe even light gaming, then these chipsets should do just fine. Plus they also have the added advantage of consuming less power, which according to Apple translates into 12 hours of web browsing time, or 13 hours of watching movies on iTunes.
Filed in . Read more about Intel, Laptops and Macbook Air.