Apple’s M3 MacBook Air Features Two NAND Flash Chips, Resulting In Faster SSD Speeds Compared To The Single Chip Used On The M2 Version

Apple likely annoyed a large percentage of the technology community when it was found out that the M2 MacBook Air featured just a single NAND flash chip, resulting in slower SSD speeds. Thankfully, the company has addressed this issue with the latest M3 MacBook Air models, as both 13-inch and 15-inch versions sport two NAND flash chips, resulting in higher read and write speeds.

The new M3 MacBook Air can achieve up to an impressive 82 percent improvement in SSD speeds, according to the latest tests

Only after the YouTube channel Max Tech performed a teardown of the M3 MacBook Air did we learn that the new portable Macs ship with two NAND memory chips on the logic board. Even though a ton of potential buyers will be displeased that Apple resorted to using the same fan-less cooling solution that causes the M3 to reach temperatures in excess of 100 degrees Celsius, at least the technology giant was able to address one problem. The YouTube channel performed a series of tests to confirm whether there was any change to the SSD performance by using two NAND flash chips.

Running the Blackmagic Disk Speed Test, it was found that the M3 MacBook Air’s write speeds reached 2,108MB/s, making it 33 percent faster than the M2 MacBook Air, while on the read speeds, Apple’s latest machine obtains 2,880MB/s, making it a whopping 82 percent than its direct predecessor, making it quite an impressive result. The commendable part is that Apple does not require customers to upgrade to the 512GB storage variants of the M3 MacBook Air to witness higher read and write speeds, as these results were from the 256GB versions.

While 256GB of onboard storage is still comically low in 2024, especially when you learn that there is no easy way to upgrade the internal memory since the chips are soldered to the logic board, we might be able to forgive Apple as it learned from its past mistakes. Now, all we need to do is wait for the company to give its customers 512GB of storage for the base models.

If you are interested in getting yourself one of the newest M3 MacBook Air models or if you need advice on getting the best value, we recommend checking out our detailed buying guide, where we pit the M3 MacBook Pro against Apple’s latest portable Mac to see how both of them stack up in a ‘price to performance’ comparison. Other than that, you can check out Max Tech’s video above and let us know what you think in the comments.

News Source: Max Tech