Overview
- Apple’s entry-level MacBook is priced at €699 in Germany with education pricing at €599, and the U.S. education model is listed at $499.
- The Neo uses an A18 Pro with one fewer GPU core, 8 GB of RAM, and a 256 GB SSD, with limited ports and support for only one external display.
- Benchmarks report the 256 GB SSD running far slower than recent M-series Macs, and Geekbench scores show the iPhone 17e’s A19 outpacing the Neo’s A18 Pro.
- Asus CFO Nick Wu called the launch a shock for the market and said PC makers, Microsoft, Intel, and AMD are seriously discussing competitive responses.
- Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reports Apple is preparing a Neo 2 for around 2027 without a touchscreen, forecasts 4.5–5 million Neo units in 2026, and suggests Apple may absorb higher memory costs to sustain aggressive pricing.