So, this MacBook absolutely blew up the

laptop market when it came out a few

months ago, but it did have some

compromises and get some complaints. Uh

one of them, strangely enough, that it

was too cheap. Now, I've been using my

MacBook Neo every day for the last few

months, and here is what the everyday

experience is actually like. So, first

up, something that is really important

to me for my tech devices, especially

ones that cost a fair bit of money, is

the build quality. Particularly laptops,

because I am constantly, you know,

interacting with it every single day,

unlike something like a, you know,

monitor, for example, that just sits on

my desk and I never really touch it.

With a laptop, like I'm just constantly

moving it around, you know, opening and

closing the screen, using the built-in

keyboard and trackpad. And at this, you

know, $500 to $600 US dollar price

range, that is usually where a pretty

massive compromise is made in the form

of, you know, a plastic chassis that

squeaks and bends and just feels really

cheap. But not the Neo. And

interestingly enough, when I compared it

to the most expensive MacBook lineup

currently available, which is the M5 Pro

and Max MacBook Pros, build quality

feels identical, which is crazy to me,

because, you know, this is 500 bucks,

and this is like four times more

expensive. But what is often not

mentioned is what effect such good build

quality means for the future. You know,

when I get into year two of Neo

ownership or three or four, with the

more plasticky, cheap laptops, um the

plastic on mine would always discolor

and go dull where my palms would rest on

the chassis when typing. Uh also, over

time, it just gets more squeaky and

wobbly, and scratches show up really

easily, or things just straight up

break, like the ports or the screen

hinges or something like that. Now, I've

only been using my Neo for a few months,

which is still too early to show any

kind of long-term wear and tear, but I

know it's going to age really well

because this is my M1 MacBook Air. Now,

it is 6 years old at this point, you

know, pretty similar build quality to

the Neo, and it still looks and feels

almost brand new even 6 years later.

Now, in terms of everyday performance of

the Neo, I find most videos on this

subject tend to get a little too nerdy

and show, you know, graphs or benchmarks

or complicated workflows. And let's be

honest, this is tech you should, right?

If you're watching this video, you're

probably more knowledgeable about tech

than the average person. But, it is

still important to not forget that the

average person is who the Neo is aimed

at. Like, you know, the type of person

who doesn't even know what RAM is or has

never used Photoshop in their life, for

example. Like my mom, for example. Like

imagine asking your mom, who might be in

her 50s or 60s or whatever, uh how she

feels about the screen being LCD and not

OLED or only having 8 GB of RAM. She's

going to have no idea what you're

talking about. And this is the point I'm

trying to make, right? Like the average

person will just walk into an Apple

Store, say, you know, I need a basic and

affordable laptop for XYZ,

>> [music]

>> what can you recommend? And then they're

happy with the price of the Neo and they

just get that. And the Neo does this so

well. Like it's not flashy. In fact,

it's actually a really basic laptop, but

I can watch movies with the built-in

speakers and have a pretty decent

listening experience. and the mic works

well for video calls. Actually, it's an

upgrade over some previous MacBooks. The

screen isn't some fancy OLED like super

high refresh rate thing, but it still

looks bright and colorful and more

importantly has a super sharp

resolution. So, text and UI elements

look incredible. For battery life, I've

been getting about 8 to 10 hours of

normal use as well. And everyday

performance is really good, too. In

fact, side by side with the more

powerful and also much more expensive M5

MacBook Air.

I really struggled to tell the

difference when doing those everyday

tasks, you know, stuff like web

browsing, watching YouTube videos,

multitasking. Sure, exporting videos or

editing photos, etc. is going to be

snappier on the more powerful laptop,

but that is not something that 95% of

people do regularly. But, this is where

I'll get into some of the commonly

mentioned complaints about the Neo. It's

pretty obvious that Apple had to make

some compromises to get the price of the

Neo so low, but I think these

compromises have been made in areas

where it's not really an issue for the

average Neo user. For example, the 256

GB SSD, now my preference is for 512 GB,

but I have been using 256 GB SSD

MacBooks for, you know, six, I think

maybe even eight years at this point,

and it is fairly easy to manage. I just

keep all of my large files on an

inexpensive external drive, and then I

just use iCloud or some other cloud

service to store all of my other stuff.

I typically have around 50 to 70 GB free

after this, and I do have to regularly

clean up my downloads folder or, you

know, delete movies and TV shows that

I've finished watching just to keep

space free on the SSD. Now, if you're

looking for something that will take

care of all this for you and more, you

can check out an app called CleanMyMac,

and big thanks to CleanMyMac for

supporting my channel and sponsoring

this section of the video. Now,

CleanMyMac has many features, but the

most powerful is something called Smart

Care. With just a few clicks, Smart Care

initiates a thorough scan of your system

and takes care of everything from

cleaning up junk files to enhancing

performance. It'll show you the results

in a neat dashboard and allow you to

take action by simply clicking the run

button. Now, I personally love the

cleanup feature because I have had

issues in the past where my Mac's SSD

has filled up almost entirely, and it

can often be hard to pinpoint where this

issue is coming from using macOS's

built-in storage manager. Using

clean-up, I can not only free up

invisible junk like deleted user

profiles, outdated caches, and broken

login items, but take it a step further

with the my clutter feature to easily

find large unnecessary files or

duplicate files. On top of that,

CleanMyMac comes with a built-in

protection feature designed to safeguard

your Mac by detecting and addressing a

wide range of threats and

vulnerabilities like malware, even in

USB drives and email attachments. So,

use the link in the description and

download CleanMyMac today and get 10%

off using code created10 at the

checkout. Okay, getting back into the

compromises of the Neo, another one I

hear about is the ports. Now, the Neo

does have much slower USB 3 and USB 2

ports versus Thunderbolt on the other

Apple Silicon MacBooks. And this doesn't

really seem to be an issue in my

opinion, like the average Neo user is

not using super fast SSDs or really

expensive 5K resolution monitors that

require those faster ports. There's also

no Touch ID, uh but I've seen a lot of

comments from Neo owners on my videos

saying that they don't really care about

Touch ID. So, it seems again it's just

not really a big deal. Another criticism

I regularly hear apart from the 256 GB

SSD is too small, is that 8 GB of RAM is

not enough and that because of this the

Neo will be e-waste in 2 to 3 years. And

to answer that question, I'll go all the

way back to the M1 MacBook Air where

people said the exact same thing. And

yet, here we are 6 years later and the

M1 Air is working perfectly. In fact,

it's working so well that a lot of M1

Air owners see no point in upgrading.

And I think the Neo is the exact same.

Like it all boiled down to what I was

doing on the Neo, right? So, web

browsing, watching YouTube videos,

emails, Word documents, maybe editing

the occasional holiday photo, etc. These

tasks are not going to be significantly

more demanding in 5 years time. In fact,

to give you an idea of RAM usage on the

Neo, here's a pretty typical usage

scenario for me. Now, I have about 20

browser tabs open in Chrome, uh about 10

in Safari for about 30 total active

tabs, the Mail app, Notion, Excel,

ChatGPT, and Spotify. You might look

straight away at the memory used figure

and think, "Oh, well, he's, you know,

maxing out his RAM already." But, macOS

is designed to try and use all available

RAM at all times for best performance.

Now, the best indicator of RAM usage is

actually the memory pressure chart in

the bottom left corner. Now, this ranges

from green, which means good, uh you

know, you're not using that much,

yellow, which means the available RAM is

being mostly utilized, and red, which

means, yeah, you need more RAM. You can

see the memory pressure right now is

just barely yellow. In fact, if I close

a few Chrome browser tabs, and I go back

to green, my workflow on the Neo doesn't

really get more intensive than this. So,

8 GB is fine for me, and I don't really

see that changing anytime soon. Now,

yes, if you're a white-collar

professional who needs, you know, 15

different apps open and 70 browser tabs

while doing a Teams call, for example,

uh this is not the laptop for you. That

will bring the Neo to its knees. But,

you know, for everyone else, it is

perfectly fine. So, after months of

using the Neo, what are my overall

thoughts? Well, first of all, I'm

actually really surprised that Apple

entered this budget laptop market. Their

cheapest laptop for years has always

been the MacBook Air at around the

$1,000 price point. So, to come in with

a MacBook, half the price is a pretty

big move in my opinion. And they didn't

really compromise on the overall MacBook

experience, either, even though it's

half the price. You know, I get great

battery life, the keyboard and trackpad

feel really nice, significantly nicer

than the competition at this price

range, and just everyday performance is

fast and snappy, and that build quality

is just chef's kiss. It's literally a

single piece of aluminum. You know, show

me any other laptop around the same

price that would give me an equivalent

experience. It doesn't exist. And I

would know that because I've really

tried to find one. Now, if you are

considering buying a Neo, I actually

made a video going into more detail on

some of the things I mentioned here,

including talking about that $100 SSD

and Touch ID upgrade, and if it's worth

it or not. And you can find it here, or

I'll also link it down in the

description somewhere.