Apple unveiled its newest M1 Ultra chip at its Peek Performance event held earlier this month. The Cupertino-based technology giant seems to be working on the next generation of M series chip which could be called the M2 and which should debut first on a MacBook Air. This laptop was earlier expected to be announced at the Peek Performance event but as nothing popped up, it seems like the laptop has now been delayed.
MacBook Air with M2 CPU
Mark Gurman of Bloomberg says that the new Apple MacBook Air with M2 has been delayed and is now expected to officially launch in the second half of this year. He further claims in the Power On newsletter that Apple planned to launch its new MacBook Air with “an all-new design, MagSafe, the M2 chip, and more” at the end of 2021 or in early 2022. However, it has now been pushed forward to the second half of 2022.
A recent report from analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claims that Apple could start mass production of the new MacBook Air in the late second quarter or early third quarter of 2022. This stands in line with the Bloomberg report as per which the laptop will debut later this year.
Furthermore, Mark Gurman goes on to claim that Apple will launch the new 14-inch and 16-inch models of the MacBook Pro next year, i.e. in 2023, and will likely be powered by the supposed M2 Pro or M2 Max processors.
As for the recently announced M1 Ultra CPU, it features a 20-core CPU with 16 high-performance cores and four high-efficiency cores. It delivers 90 percent higher multi-threaded performance than the fastest available 16-core PC desktop chip in the same power envelope. Additionally, M1 Ultra reaches the PC chip’s peak performance using 100 fewer watts. For graphics-intensive needs, like 3D rendering and complex image processing, M1 Ultra has a 64-core GPU.