Aside from the slower CPU, half the ram, and half the SSD as the Air this is also what it's all missing compared to the Air:
TouchID, MagSafe, slightly bigger wider color (P3) screen, better 12MP CenterStage camera, 2 more speakers, 1 more mic, backlit keyboard, ambient light sensor, force-touch trackpad, WiFi 7, 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports, larger battery with longer runtime and faster charging.
Yes you can get TouchID with the 512GB upgrade for more money on the Neo.
In September I picked up a laptop for $575.
Its specs are 15.6" 1080p IPS display, AMD Ryzen 7 6800H (8 cores, 16 threads) CPU, 32 GB of DDR5 memory, Radeon 680M iGPU that can allocate 8 GB of GPU memory, 1 TB SSD with a backlight keyboard. Weighs about 3.5 pounds and has (5) USB ports plus HDMI port. It comes with a 2 year warranty as well.
Running Arch Linux on it with niri and it's really nice for what it is.
There are decent laptops out there at affordable prices.
I'm not a huge touchpad fan, but it's very usable. It doesn't misclick.
When picking it, you can choose up to 64 GB of RAM and a 2 TB SSD. It was $50 more for 2 TB instead of 1 TB.
The only problem is it seems to be out of stock. It's a Nimo N155. Amazon resellers are also marking it up like crazy compared to its official listed price.
That is an important note though, the price includes a valid Windows 11 license.
I think they used to use edu email addresses to confirm, but now that so many people have alumni emails, that would be useless (and not capture k12 students, whose email addresses typically cannot receive outside emails).
* 86 million (27%) are under 21 and most of those are students. * Those people have parents, assume 2 parents per 2 children = 86 million parents (27%)
That means 55% of the US population is eligible for the cheaper rate before you even account for people getting secondary degrees, educators, and yes - the schools themselves.
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$799 in Canada for the base model & $999 for the one with touchID & 512 GB ssd.
Looks like both models only come with 8gb ram.
Also these days Apple actually allows sales and discounts at retailers. I bet this will be on sale for $499 at Amazon or BestBuy before the end of the year.
Also, the Neo is the ultimate iPhone accessory, for this crowd. Who cares if the ram size is 8GB and Tahoe is a certifiable dog, that the vast majority neckbeards here are fretting about here. The Neo is not aimed at you. For Safari, Apple Mail, Photos and iApps, and ocassional Claude/ChatGPT usage, this is plenty good
For people who have always wanted an Apple laptop, this is it. The niceties are not necessary, and perfect little things to cut out to bring the price down for the masses.
