Apple Begins Selling Refurbished 15-Inch MacBook Air in Europe

I was hyped for one of these day 1, ready to finally replace an Intel MBpro with worn-out battery, thinking I could do the lighter-to-modest stuff on this and save any heavy duty stuff for the Mac Studio back at home.

I jumped right into the store the first minute and then configured it as I wanted it: more RAM and more SSD, equivalent to the MBpro it was intended to replace. Total price was just too high... especially relative to MBpros with superior CPUs and many other benefits. So the over-priced upgrades FROZE the purchase, sending me off on a tangent of looking at various configs of MBpro at various deal prices including what the same money could buy in refurbs.

Long story short: I ended up deciding to just replace the battery in the existing MBpro and ride it another year or two. Apple has simply priced RAM and SSD far too high. Anyone with knowledge of what the equivalents of RAM and SSD cost in PCs know this very well. But even if we fully ignore the side with lots of competition competing for such parts (as opposed to our side of the fence where there is only ONE source of both parts- always a very bad scenario for consumers looking for value), step up the configurations from base specs and Silicon Macs get very expensive, very fast.

Farrrrrr overpriced RAM & SSD fully derailed what would have been an easy sale. I ended up spending about $55 to give an aging MBpro about 7 hours battery life again. Yes, that's far from "up to 20 hours" but I don't know many people who work 20 hours per day with no access to a socket anyway.

Hopefully, Apple will someday decide to find those "another quarter of record" profits in some other way, so that essential Mac parts stop seeming like such consumer robbery. Instead of just rolling over and paying up, this consumer decided to stretch what I already have. Maybe the M5 version will be a better value?

That was quick. Could the 15” MBA be the iPhone 14 Plus?

All of this supposed demand just never materializes for one reason or another?

I watched Snazzy Labs last night, and he said basically if you wanted a larger screen MacBook with the best value in a 16/512 configuration, go with the 14” MacBook Pro. It’s only $100 difference and with a way better processor.

What is the quality of refurbished?

I have bought a couple Apple refurbs over the years and they were indistinguishable from a new device.

From what I have read here on the forums, that has been the same experience as others.

That was quick. Could the 15” MBA be the iPhone 14 Plus?

No. The iPhone 14 Plus isn't available as refurbished yet while the MacBook Air 15" is

I watched Snazzy Labs last night, and he said basically if you wanted a larger screen MacBook with the best value in a 16/512 configuration, go with the 14” MacBook Pro. It’s only $100 difference and with a way better processor.

How did this Snazzy person come to this $100 price difference?

15" MacBook Air M2 in 16/512 config is $1699 new.
14" MacBook Pro M2 Pro in 16/512 config is $1999 new.

That's a $300 difference.

A refurb 14" MacBook Pro M2 Pro in 16/512 config is $1699 though.

I was hyped for one of these day 1, ready to finally replace an Intel MBpro with worn-out battery, thinking I could do the lighter-to-modest stuff on this and save any heavy duty stuff for the Mac Studio back at home.

I jumped right into the store the first minute and then configured it as I wanted it: more RAM and more SSD, equivalent to the MBpro it was intended to replace. Total price was just too high... especially relative to MBpros with superior CPUs and many other benefits. So the over-priced upgrades FROZE the purchase, sending me off on a tangent of looking at various configs of MBpro at various deal prices including what the same money could buy in refurbs.

Long story short: I ended up deciding to just replace the battery in the existing MBpro and ride it another year or two. Apple has simply priced RAM and SSD far too high. Anyone with knowledge of what the equivalents of RAM and SSD cost in PCs know this very well. But even if we fully ignore the side with lots of competition competing for such parts (as opposed to our side of the fence where there is only ONE source of both parts- always a very bad scenario for consumers looking for value), step up the configurations from base specs and Silicon Macs get very expensive, very fast.

Farrrrrr overpriced RAM & SSD fully derailed what would have been an easy sale. I ended up spending about $55 to give an aging MBpro about 7 hours battery life again. Yes, that's far from "up to 20 hours" but I don't know many people who work 20 hours per day with no access to a socket anyway.

Hopefully, Apple will someday decide to find those "another quarter of record" profits in some other way, so that essential Mac parts stop seeming like such consumer robbery. Instead of just rolling over and paying up, this consumer decided to stretch what I already have. Maybe the M5 version will be a better value?

Similar situation. But my MBP 2015 was really getting old. Got excited by the Air 15”. Wanted to get a 1tb 16gb. Instead I got a 16/1TB refurb m1pro 14” from a dealer (1 battery cycle only, squeaky clean) for 450 euros less. Apple is not deserving my hard earned cash: if you buy directly from Apple at these upgrade prizes you are being ripped off. Anyone saying 8/256 is enough if you just email/surf the web: why would you spend 1600 euros for it? Let alone the future proofing is nonexistent with 8/256.

I picked one up when they first went on sale, replacing the 13” M1, and think it was a great choice. It’s a great machine and the camera is definitely better.