185: MacBook Neo Is Here — Should You Buy Apple’s $599 Laptop?

On this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, we discuss first impressions of the MacBook Neo, Studio DisplayXDR, and iPhone 17e.

Following its announcement last week, the ‌MacBook Neo‌ arrived this week. Unlike every other Apple silicon Mac, the ‌MacBook Neo‌ is powered by the A18 Pro chip originally developed for the iPhone 16 Pro, making it the first Mac to use an iPhone-class processor instead of an M-series chip.

To reach its substantially lower price point, the ‌MacBook Neo‌ makes some compromises. Unlike the MacBook Air, it does not feature keyboard backlighting, a haptic trackpad, P3 wide color, True Tone, ambient light sensing, a camera indicator LED, MagSafe charging, Thunderbolt connectivity, or a 12-megapixel camera with Center Stage, nor does it come with Touch ID as standard. It is also thicker with a slightly reduced battery life, and has larger borders around the slightly smaller display.

That being said, it is $500 cheaper than a ‌MacBook Air‌ and is designed to compete with lower-cost Windows laptops and Chromebooks, while expanding the Mac lineup with a substantially more affordable option. We talk through the real-world impact of some of these compromises, including performance with the A18 Pro chip and 8GB of memory.

The ‌iPhone 17e‌ retains the same design and price as the iPhone 16e but adds the A19 chip, ‌MagSafe‌ support, Apple's second-generation C1X modem, and 256GB of base storage. Apple also introduced a new ‌Studio Display‌ XDR model, replacing the Pro Display XDR. The new model offers a 27-inch 5K mini-LED panel with up to a 120Hz refresh rate, HDR brightness up to 2,000 nits, and Thunderbolt 5 connectivity. We compare both of these new products to their predecessors, as well as the ‌iPhone 17e‌ and the ‌iPhone 16‌ as the two lowest-cost iPhones on sale today.

All of the newly announced devices became available to pre-order on Wednesday, March 4, with the entire lineup scheduled to launch and begin arriving to customers on Wednesday, March 11. The MacRumors Show has its own YouTube channel, so make sure you're subscribed to keep up with new episodes and clips.

Start your business with Shopify and get everything you need to sell online and in person. Start today at https://www.shopify.com/mac

Ready to tackle bigger problems? Get started with Claude today at — https://www.Claude.ai/mac.