The base 13-inch MacBook Pro M2 model with 256GB of storage and 8GB of RAM is available for purchase right now. You probably shouldn’t buy it. With more details on the slowness that is compared to the higher-spec versions of the M2 and even the M1 model, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the cheaper 13-inch MacBook Pro M2 is a real deal.
Earlier this week, videos from Max Tech and Created Tech showed that storage on the M2 base model was slow compared to the M1 version, with SSD read speeds 50 percent slower and write speeds a 30 percent slower. That’s because Apple chose to use only one 256GB NAND flash storage chip instead of two 128GB chips found in the M1. The move, probably a cost saver, means that reading and writing cannot occur in parallel on two chips. Everything has to go through just one, and this effectively speeds up the high-octane M2 chip.
Now, Max Tech has tested the basic 8GB / 256GB RAM storage model with the more expensive 13-inch MacBook Pro M2 with 512GB of storage and 16GB of RAM, and yes, it’s also slower than this laptop! This is partly because the higher-spec device uses two 256GB NAND chips instead of one, so processes can run in parallel between the two chips. They are likely to be the same NAND chips found in the base model, further suggesting that the slowdown is related to the decision to use only one NAND chip on the cheaper MacBook Pro.
But the slowdown is also due to lack of RAM.
Apple Arm-based computer chips use unified memory. The GPU and CPU, all, extract from the same memory to do the tasks. On other M1 and M2 devices, 8GB of memory would not be ideal, but it would not lead to significant slowdowns. But part of the reason other Mac M1 and M2 can come out with only 8GB of memory is because they have super fast SSDs that the processor can use for memory in a pinch. But when you combine 8GB of RAM with the 256GB NAND storage lens, you get a laptop that regularly performs tasks at half the speed of its high-end siblings that use exactly the same processor.
For example, when Max Tech exported 50 42-megapixel images to Lightroom, the 8GB / 256GB MacBook Pro did the job in two minutes. The 16GB / 512GB MacBook Pro did it in a minute and seven seconds. This is almost twice the speed just using more RAM and faster storage.
The MacBook Pro M2 already feels like a laptop that needs an audience. With the refurbished MacBook Air M2, better specified and cheaper weeks away, and the MacBook Pro M1 on sale, it’s been hard to argue why anyone should buy the MacBook Pro M2. It has a long battery life (it took us over 16 hours of aggressive use to kill the battery), but right now, that’s all it has. If you really need the promise of MacBook Pro M2 battery life, you should save extra money to get the $ 1,499 version with 512GB of storage and 16GB of RAM.
But I’ll be curious to see how many people opt for the perfectly good $ 1,499 model when this stinky base model exists. Historically, the basic models are the best-selling, which means that many of the people who want this weird machine will be picking up the $ 1,299 base model despite the reduced performance. If, as Apple claims, the 13-inch MacBook Pro is the second best-selling laptop in the world, then the company is preparing for a big mess very soon.