Apple’s MacBook Air laptops aren’t generally thought to be very powerful devices. They are more than capable of getting the job done but for the heavier duty stuff, chances are you might be better off with the MacBook Pro if you’re after portability. However it seems that the recently refreshed MacBook Air might be even more impressive than Apple is letting on.
According to a recent report by the folks at ArsTechnica, they have discovered that during their testing that the early 2015 MacBook Air was capable of correctly identifying a Dell P2415Q 24-inch 4K monitor that was attached to it, and subsequently switched its user interface into HiDPI mode. The refresh rate was also found to be at a rather smooth 60Hz which is impressive for the MacBook Air.
However if you’re thinking about getting a 4K monitor with a 60Hz refresh rate to attach to the laptop, there are some limitations. During the testing, it was found that there was visible frame lag when performing animation-intensive actions, such as entering full-screen mode, thus hinting that the GPU on the MacBook Air might have already been pushed to its limits simply by attaching the monitor.
That being said this isn’t to say that 4K monitors aren’t compatible, it’s just that according to Apple’s 4K display support document, it was stated that the max refresh rate it would go to is 30Hz, so if you don’t mind the lower refresh rates then we guess you could go ahead and do just that.
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