MacBook Neo Shipments Expected to Double in 2027

Apple and the Neo have a real window now to take a bigger share of the education market with Google telling schools they can't block AI entirely or else lose additional services.

https://apnews.com/article/ai-schools-classroom-students-google-7ba4219e505db1c11d672f6eefe7155a

A laptop with an old phone chip... Thanks but no thanks.

OK well buy an Air then?

give us A19 Pro with 12GB. or even better A20 Pro with 16GB.

A laptop with an old phone chip... Thanks but no thanks.

The chip itself is not a problem for the intended audience, 8GB RAM could be.

8 gigs of RAM hasn't been for the intended audience. It has been a problem for people who expect a MacBook Pro for the price of a Neo.

If you bought a MacBook Neo to edit 4K or 8K video day in day out, or to run local LLMs, when the fault wasn't Apple's, the fault is with the buyer's purchasing decision.

Expectations are the responsibility of the buyer - Caveat Emptor.

There will probably be a 12 gig Neo, but that's not because Apple cares about people complaining that the Neo is not as powerful as a MacBook Pro, it's because the whole point of the Neo is to repurpose chips they already are producing and have a stockpile of. Users will get whatever RAM standard for the chip package chosen.

Apple will switch up from the A18 pro because they don't want to have to keep making A18 pros. They will want to consolidate their chip production and have less chip production lines running simultaneously.

Realistically, this is the only reason Apple upgrades the M chip in iPad airs - the iPad Air and iPadOS really doesn't take advantage of the extra power of the chip bump each year, it's simply that Apple doesn't want to have to keep making M1-M4 chips and have to make M5 and M6 chips as well.

It just feels upside down that you can get a MacBook for $699, while there's an iPhone that starts at $1999.

To be fair, one could just as easily say it's interesting that you can get an iPhone starting at $699 (iPhone 17e), while a Macbook Pro 16" starts at $3399.

Personally I chose the 17e and the Macbook Air.