WWDC 22: Apple M2 and new MacBook Air announced

Apple’s WorldWide Developer’s Conference, or WWDC, saw the announcement of the Apple M2 chip, and the new MacBook Air laptop it powers.

Apple M2

Apple has announced the new Apple M2, which is 5nm chipset with 20 billion transistors, 20% more than M1. The Apple M2 has an 8-core CPU with 18% faster CPU performance than M1, and a 10-core GPU which is up to 35% faster than M1. The Apple M2 gets support for a 100Gbps memory bandwidth, and up to 24GB RAM.

The new media engine on the Apple M2 can natively decode 8K H.264, HEVC, and ProRes video.

Also Watch: Asus BR1100C review: the perfect laptop for kids?

MacBook Air

A new, redesigned MacBook Air debuted at WWDC 2022, finally losing the iconic wedge shape in favour of an 11.3mm thin chassis. It’s powered by the new Apple M2 chip, and available in four colours, with ‘starlight’ and ‘midnight’ joining the old staples of silver and space grey. It will also be available with up to 2TB storage and up to 24GB RAM.

The new MacBook Air gets a 13.6-inch Liquid Retina display that gets up to 500 nits of brightness, and support for 1 billion colours. The display has been expanded to the corners, as in the new MacBook Pro models, but does feature a notch.

MagSafe is back on the MacBook Air, as the new M2-powered model gets a dedicated charging port along with 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports, and a high impedance 3.5mm headphone jack.

The new MacBook Air also gets a new 1080p webcam with low-light performance 2x better than the outgoing model. There’s also a new 4 speaker sound system, completely integrated into the keyboard, with no speaker grille. It also has support for Dolby Atmos.

The new MacBook Air will keep the long battery life, with Apple promising up to 18 hours of video playback time on a single charge.

The new MacBook Air starts at ₹1,19,900 in India, and will be available from July, 2022.

Also Watch: OnePlus 10R Review: is it worth the money?

13" MacBook Pro

The 13-inch MacBook Pro does not get a redesign, but has been updated with the new Apple M2 chipset. It will also be available next month for a starting price of ₹1,29,900.