Since Apple launched the M1 version of the MacBook, the notebook market has spread various "wolf" legends. It is true that the Apple M1's energy consumption performance is not bad, giving the MacBook better productivity and battery life performance, but it still has to face the challenge of the huge WIntel ecological "Double Eleven" (Win11 + 11th Generation Core) camp, and it is still lagging behind in many application scenarios.
Below, we take Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 and Apple MacBook Air as examples, and briefly discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the two camps.
Industrial design needle tip to Mai Mang
The industrial design of Apple's products has always been the industry leader, the MacBook Air series is the benchmark of the extreme thinness and lightness in the notebook field, and the new (M1 version) MacBook Air naturally inherits the characteristics of the family predecessors, and is also the thinnest MacBook on the market.
The MacBook's craftsmanship is also reflected in the "inconspicuous" (rarely noticed by ordinary users) interior design. Take the new MacBook Air, for example, with the low power consumption advantages of the Apple M1 processor to achieve a fanless passive heat dissipation design, symmetrical battery, speakers and clean and tidy motherboard can cure many "obsessive-compulsive disorder patients".
However, it is precisely because of the MacBook's highly integrated design and workmanship that apple notebooks have no room for bargaining, and are synonymous with expensive electronic products. And iFixit in the dismantling of the MacBook Air is also rare to play its "serviceability score", because Apple will be the entire device in the form of patches integrated on a motherboard, it seems that it can indeed improve speed and efficiency, but this change is a "devastating" blow for maintenance personnel, that is, users want to upgrade the hardware or a component problem, can only replace or buy a new machine.
In fact, it is no longer uncommon to match Apple's products in product design and manufacturing, such as Microsoft's Surface series, Dell's XPS series, Huawei's MateBook X series and so on. Take Huawei Huawei has been on the market for nearly 1 full year MateBook X Pro 2021, it is one of the representatives that can challenge or even surpass the MacBook Air in all directions.
Note: MateBook X Pro 2021 default pre-installed Windows 10 system, users can upgrade to Windows 11 for free, the product picture taken in this article is both before upgrading the system and after the upgrade
Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 is also a notebook with exquisite industrial design, the thin and light metal integrated body has been forged by CNC process and precision spraying fine polishing, blended and comfortable and delicate, it is in the use of a larger than the MacBook Air 13.9-inch screen, still maintain a 14.6mm thick and 1.33kg light body, portability does not lose a penny.
When you put two notebooks together, you'll see the differences at a glance.
That's right, the Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 can present a more immersive horizon. The reason is also simple, it not only has a screen size of 13.9 inches, but also a 3:2 display ratio, and the field of view area is significantly ahead of the MacBook Air's 13.3 inches (16:10). Crucially, the MateBook X Pro 2021 also compresses the four-sided bezel to the extreme, compared to the MacBook Air's bezel width is still like the product of the last century.
Both notebooks have huge trackpads that support pressure sensitivity, and the fingertips are comfortable and agile, unlocking new interactive inspiration.
Both machines have speakers on either side of the keyboard, but the MacBook Air is dual speakers, while the MateBook X Pro 2021 is a four-speaker design with dual tweeters and a double subwoofer, giving users a clear and penetrating treble effect and a majestic bass experience.
The speaker opening at the bottom of the MateBook X Pro 2021 fuselage
Both laptops have a built-in 720P HD camera, but the location of the embedding is different. The MacBook Air places it in the very center of the screen border, while the MateBook X Pro 2021 is hidden in the keyboard area, with a pop-up design, the advantage is better security, the disadvantage is that the angle when shooting is not very good, and it is easy to shoot the human face shape.
For added security, both machines support fingerprint recognition and combine it with the power key. They are also equipped with full-size keyboards with their own backlighting, the MateBook X Pro 2021 keys feel softer, the MacBook Air knocking feeling is more brittle, the overall feeling is not much different.
Extended accessory differences gradually widened
Although the productivity of notebooks mainly depends on the processor platform, we still can't ignore their expansion potential, and the number and type of peripherals that can be connected, as well as the ability to upgrade, will greatly affect our subsequent experience. Apple's MacBook Air is equipped with 2 USB Type-C Thunderbolt 3 interfaces this time, which we can also understand as Thunderbolt 3 or USB4 40, in addition to a headphone jack.
Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 is also equipped with 2 USB Type-C, they all support the Raiden 4 protocol, in addition to the headphone jack also added a USB-A interface, convenient for us to connect to the old flash drive or wired keyboard and mouse and other peripherals.
In terms of internal expansion capabilities, as mentioned earlier, all the hardware of macBook Air has been welded to the motherboard, and users simply cannot carry out subsequent upgrades, and feel that 8GB of memory and 256GB of hard disks are not enough children's shoes, they can only choose 8GB +512GB high-end version, the price is 9799 yuan (the good news is that the number of GPU cores +1). In contrast, MateBook X Pro 2021, 16GB LPDDR4X memory is not small, and now many 2TB SSDs have also dropped to a thousand yuan price, and the upgraded SSD can also be sold on the idle fish to return funds, or buy an SSD external hard disk box to create a mobile solid-state drive, anyway, it will not be wasted.
In fact, the upgrade potential has always been a congenital defect of Apple's MacBook, the Windows system has shown a lot of maturity in this regard, even if there is a notebook in order to pursue the ultimate thin and light, but at least 1 standard M.2 hard disk bit will be retained, users can upgrade at any time, without considering any compatibility issues.
On the other hand, although Apple has joined the embrace of Type-C, the official accessories are expensive, and the family barrel, the whole ecology is not ordinary users and families can afford it. In this regard, it is still the advantage of the Windows system, a variety of hard disk boxes, docking stations, video cables, input peripherals unified standards, the price coverage range is larger, we can completely match different grades of peripheral accessories according to the number of budgets.
The dominant battlefield of the soft and hard ecological Windows camp
The biggest change in Apple's new generation of MacBook Air is that it is equipped with the self-developed Apple M1, and since then Apple has switched from Hardware devices such as Mac, iPhone, iPad, Wacth and other hardware devices to ARM architecture chips, which also constitute a complete ecological closed loop.
Due to the difference in soft and hard ecological environments, this set of data is for reference only
To tell the truth, this generation of Apple M1 is really strong, can beat the X86 architecture chip in many application environments with the core of the ARM architecture, which is enough to prove the strength of Apple M1, and this version of the MacBook Air has a really long-lasting battery life and can last for a whole day.
However, the strength of Apple M1 has a condition - Apple M1 must run in the macOS system ecology, and the biggest advantage of this ecosystem is that it is extremely friendly to new users, it is very easy to get started, and it comes with iMovie, Number, Keynote Pags and other productivity tools, and it can also find pure APP in the APP Store that does not exist in the virus Trojan hidden worries, basically there will be no installation of a software that will automatically install the family barrel, Issues that drag down the responsiveness of the entire system.
However, it is also Apple's unique ecological closed loop, which leads to its strong external enemies, internal governance of users, user stickiness is larger, but the openness is insufficient. Especially in the domestic network and ecological environment, the software payment environment destroyed by the pirated environment, and the uneven network environment of various enterprises, MacOS can not meet 100% compatibility, can only be a productivity tool, after Apple canceled Bootcamp is more obvious. In addition, the macOS system ecosystem does not support games very well, and the game resources are far less abundant than Windows (if you say that it is compatible with countless mobile games, then I did not say it).
Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 is equipped with Intel's 11th Generation Core i7-1165G7, which has greatly improved performance over 10th Generation Core, especially the performance of the Iris Xe 96 core display is comparable to the GeForce MX350 unique display. Considering the large heat generation of the X86 architecture processor, the MateBook X Pro 2021 uses a rare huge VC heatsink and 2 cooling fans in order to tuck this chip into the slim body, and its TDP can be stably released at about 18W in the long-term AIDA 64 FPU copy test, which is enough to cope with the strong challenges of video editing and LOL-level games.
Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 can now be upgraded to the latest Windows 11 system, the system style is more stylish, the ease of use has also been improved, and there will be no obstacles in terms of file versatility and software compatibility. In particular, a lot of optimizations have been made for touch operation, so that the touch screen of the MateBook X Pro 2021 has more use.
Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 also has a killer function, that is, multi-screen collaboration, under the condition of the adapted software version, you can open up to three mobile phone application windows on the computer screen at the same time, shopping price comparison, cross-platform interface processing work, multi-window learning... Make the information more abundant, and see the information on one screen.
As we all know, Intel and Huawei PCs have been working together to drive the development of consumer computing experiences. This time, Huawei PC and Intel introduced Android mobile APP to PCs through in-depth joint research and development and collaboration, built a unified cross-terminal application market, and created a unified presentation of mobile and PC applications.
With Intel's long-term accumulation of technology and experience in system architecture and hardware integration, Huawei PCs can achieve superior performance and compatibility, smoothly run mobile applications on PCs, and achieve efficient office and mobile games on a single screen, providing consumers with rich ecological choices and superior experiences. You know, only intel versions of Huawei PCs can achieve this function.
brief summary
Overall, the Huawei MateBook X Pro 2021 and Apple's MacBook Air represent two evolutionary directions for notebooks. MateBook X Pro 2021 is a typical representative of the open ecosystem, Intel Core processor to provide surging computing power, Windows system is the cornerstone of various soft and hard functions, and OEM manufacturers can also carry out in-depth optimization and research and development on this basis, to create similar multi-screen collaboration and mobile application engine and other features, a hundred schools of concert, the "Double Eleven" (Win11 + 11th generation Core) advantages to play the fullest. Whether you like to play games, create content, or have other quirky needs, only the WIntel camp notebook can satisfy you.
Apple's MacBook Air is a representative of the closed-loop ecosystem, all software and hardware are built by Apple, and a strict entry threshold is formulated to ensure that all apps in this ecosystem have better execution efficiency and security. However, it is precisely because of the ecological closed loop, resulting in the high price of Apple MacBook and its peripheral accessories, so far MacOS is still unable to take care of all consumers' office, entertainment and game needs, the most suitable for Apple's old users to upgrade. In other words, if you're using an old MacBook, the M1 version of the MacBook Air (including the subsequent MacBook Pro series) is indeed a good choice.
Soon, Intel will release the 12th generation Core mobile version of the processor, the new product in addition to provide stronger power, in the performance of the core of the power consumption has also been improved, can further shorten the endurance gap with the M1 version of the MacBook notebook. If Intel's big and small core strategy is successful, the future X86 chip also has the opportunity to counterattack ARM's dominant battlefield (such as tablets), and look forward to it.