On March 2, 2021, the Barrington 220 School Board approved a four-year lease to upgrade laptops of certified staff members. Our previous four-year lease for our current MacBook Air 13-inch laptops will be paid in full this year.
Both options are the same price and use the same design, the primary difference is the chip that powers the laptop. The Intel chip option is an “incremental upgrade” of our current model—a modest upgrade that uses an evolving technology architecture that has been in Macs for 14 years. The M1 option is brand new chip designed by Apple—their first-ever commercially available chip in a laptop or desktop. Apple calls the M1 “the most powerful chip it has ever created and the first chip designed specifically for the Mac” (Apple, 2020).
How did we decide? We researched and tested.
The Research
There is no shortage of sources regarding the performance of M1 Macs since they were announced in November 2020.
To begin, the 13-inch MacBook Air laptop itself has a different design than our current MacBook Air:
- The M1 has the same screen size as our current laptop (13.3 inches), but the M1 can show more detail.
- The M1 has nearly the same thickness as our current laptop, but it the M1 is about 1 inch smaller in width and over one-half inch less deep.
- The M1 is 0.16 pounds lighter than our current laptop.
I have observed that Barrington 220 teachers are particularly fond of keeping many, many browser tabs open—a practice that greatly affects performance and battery life (especially in the Chrome browser). Reviewers at the Wall Street Journal (2020) apparently share our affinity for Chrome tabs. They reported:
“Fifty browsing tabs? Not at a peep or a degree above 80 Fahrenheit on either M1-powered system. The Intel-powered Air? Thirty-five tabs got its fans revving, and it hit 93 degrees.”
A reviewer at tech blog Engadget described the M1 MacBook Air as, “shockingly responsive” and added that “Safari, in particular, delivers the best web browsing experience I’ve ever had on a computer.”
The Verge, a technology/lifestyle publication, mentioned the M1 laptop’s battery life and reported, “between eight and 10 hours of real, sustained work depending on how hard I am pushing it. That’s not quite 50 percent better than the last MacBook Air, but it’s very close.”
The Testing
In order to do our own testing, Barrington 220 ordered a small number of M1 MacBook Air laptops in the base configuration immediately after they were announced. Since the Department of Technology and Innovation will eventually be supporting over 1,000 of these laptops, we wanted to be certain that they could, at minimum, run all our existing software and systems. Otherwise, we would need to stay with an Intel-based laptop.
We began by testing all our apps and systems, including everything in Jamf Self Service, our PaperCut printing system, SMART Board software, and other systems. We also tested the functions of Schoology, Seesaw, Infinite Campus, Skyward, and other primary district systems. We then tested anything we typically connect to our current laptops (using new adapters and dongles—but more on that later).
Meanwhile, we asked a few teachers to test the M1 MacBook Air in the classroom. We selected teachers at every level and included a Barrington High School Computer Science teacher in the mix. During the pandemic, we arguably have never been more reliant on our laptops, and our tests immediately included heavy uses including videoconferencing (Zoom), many simultaneous open apps, and a need for as much flexibility as possible.
My own testing included what I consider the most resource-intensive activity in which I engage—creating and exporting videos in iMovie. After four years, the iMovie interface on our current MacBook Air laptops is usable, but has become sluggish and laggy. On our current MacBook Air, scrubbing (moving the pointer through video/audio clips) along the timeline is now best accomplished with audio scrubbing off (I prefer it on), and the days of instantly seeing a preview with no lag (latency) by hitting the space bar are over. Not so with the M1—iMovie is back to being ultra-responsive and video/audio scrubbing is instantaneous.
My real shock happened when I exported a long iMovie project. I recorded a parent presentation on Zoom and edited it down to 1 hour, 19 minutes. On our current MacBook Air I would have expected an export time of well over 90 minutes (exports on our current MacBook Air take slightly longer than the actual length of the movie), but the M1 took 8 minutes. I initially assumed an error had occurred with the export, but when I played it back, there was no mistake!
Among the Barrington 220 teachers who tested the M1 MacBook Air, one commented that the M1 is extremely fast, especially during startup, login, and when waking from sleep mode. Another teacher noted that she Zoomed all day while sharing her screen without using a power cord, and the battery life was still at 56% by the end of the day.
Dongles, and Cables, and Plugs, Oh My...
One unfortunate, but unavoidable, issue with our switch to any new laptop is a change in ports. Our last two laptops used MagSafe power, “standard” USB (USB-A) ports, and Apple’s “Thunderbolt” (mini-HDMI) port for connecting external projectors and displays. All new Mac laptops for the past few years have switched to using just one type of port that handles all of these connections: USB-C.
Thus, we will need to provide a new set of dongles, cables, and adapters to all our certified staff when updating to the M1. You will still be able to use all your current USB flash drives, hard drives, and other devices, they will just need a USB-A to USB-C adapter. To plug our M1 laptops into our projectors, we will provide whichever adapter(s) you require for your room(s). Of course, a new power supply and cable will be provided.
Conclusion
If you follow any of the links referenced below, you will find that the reviews address far more information than I have included here. Reviewers include topics such as gaming, the M1’s ability to run iOS (iPhone and iPad) apps, and a technology Apple is using called “Rosetta 2” to help bridge older apps to run on the M1 until new versions are released—and more. This article is intentionally focused on our laptop uses here in Barrington 220.
Originally I felt that the M1 articles must be dispensing a fair amount of hyperbole. However, when I started using the M1 for myself—using Barrington 220 software on our network—I found that the reviewers had not been exaggerating. As education users, I feel that we will greatly benefit from the current and future benefits of Apple’s M1 chip.
This led us in the Department of Technology and Innovation to make a confident recommendation to upgrade our MacBook Air laptops to the new M1 version. The Board approved that recommendation. Our next step is to execute the lease paperwork (currently in process), place the order, and wait for our shipment. If all goes well, our new laptops may arrive in about six weeks. We will begin coordinating our swaps as soon as possible by working with principals. Our goal will be to swap all staff laptops before the end of the school year.
As we have done in the past, our old MacBook Air 13-inch laptops will be sold to an asset company and revenue will go back to our Education Fund.
If you have specific questions about the switch to M1 laptops, please contact our Tech Support team who conducted most of our testing (x.1500 in school or 224-655-1500). Of course, you may also contact me at any time mfuller@barrington220.org.
References
Apple. (2015). MacBook Air (13-inch, Early 2015) - Technical Specifications. Retrieved from https://support.apple.com/kb/sp714?locale=en_US
Apple. (2020). MacBook Air (M1, 2020) - Technical Specifications. Retrieved from https://support.apple.com/kb/SP825?locale=en_US
Apple. (November 10, 2020). Apple unleashes M1. Retrieved from https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2020/11/apple-unleashes-m1
Engadget. (November 17, 2020). MacBook Air M1 review: Faster than most PCs, no fan required. Retrieved from https://www.engadget.com/apple-macbook-air-m1-review-140031323.html
Verge, The. (November 17, 2020). Apple MacBook Air with M1 Review: New Chip, No Problem. Retrieved from https://www.theverge.com/21569603/apple-macbook-air-m1-review-price-specs-features-arm-silicon
Wall Street Journal. (November 17, 2020). Apple’s M1 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro Review: The Laptop’s Biggest Leap in Years. Retrieved from https://www.wsj.com/articles/apples-m1-macbook-air-and-macbook-pro-review-the-laptops-biggest-leap-in-years-11605621601
I agree with everything Dr. Fuller says. I've been piloting the new M1 laptop for more than three months now, and it is blazingly fast with amazing graphics. It's a game changer. You're going to love it.
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