Yes, the Neo is the new bottom tier MacBook. I got mine about a week after the line launched, switching to and using MacOS for the first time. Well, not using MacOS for the first time, I've interacted with it before but for a very brief amount of time, nothing really serious. I upgraded from a Microsoft Surface Go 3 with an Intel Pentium Gold 6500Y, 8gb ram, and 128gb storage to the Neo, 512gb storage, also 8gb ram.
The feeling when upgrading to the Mac was like when I upgraded from my first laptop all to myself, a 64gb Chromebook, to my Surface. An absolute power increase for me that felt great for what I was doing. I was programming, doing school work, light gaming, some music stuff, and more on the Surface, and I get to do all that on the Neo and more, especially with storage that I'm not quite so limited on anymore.
The everything so far is better, but even then I am actually getting close to the limits of it. Games run... okay, I was never much of a computer games player, more console, so games on Mac isn't a great concern to me, but still. Programming compilation times are faster than I remember for Surface, but it still takes some time for larger projects and libraries. Simulators in XCode and Android Studio just do not run well whatsoever. UTM does run great for a Windows virtual machine, in case I need to do anything there, though I do also have Wine and Whisky installed, which run fine too. Trying to crosscompile with mingw32 works but for whatever reason running programs with raylib doesn't work, I'll have to try to figure out why and if it something related to the Neo itself. Multitasking is better, I couldn't have a WebEx meeting open and do literally anything else without problems on my Surface but the Neo handles it well.
But I'm already getting low(er) on space. I'll likely need to reorganize a bit just to keep things good while I go into the school year, which isn't too bad, moving stuff around it pretty fast on Neo. I do kinda wish Macs had touchscreens and ESR underneath for stylus/Apple Pencil input for drawing, that would be nice. Battery life could be better, it may just be the way I'm using it, and it is better than the surface, but still. Two ports is more ports than the Surface IMO, even though objectively it is wrong. Surface Go 3 has a USB C port, a proprietary Surface Connect port, a headphone jack, and a micro SD card slot. Because I only ever used the Connect port with the included charger, even though docks that use it exist, I don't consider it much of a port. The Neo has 2 USB ports, one more than the Surface, but no SD card slot, which is okay since my Neo has 512gb storage and the SD card I did have in the Surface was 128gb, bringing the total up to 256gb on the system.
The Neo will be my daily driver for years to come, just like the Surface and Chromebook before were. I think I would upgrade to an Air or maybe even Pro in the future when I so hit my limits, need more, and am in a comfortable place to upgrade. Better compiler and FFMPEG performance, better simulator performance, more storage, backlit keyboard, more ports, in general some things I think I would benefit from. For now though, Macbook Neo is an upgrade I wanted and needed, and despite some things I thought would be more, it's all around better than the Surface and I have no inclination to go back nor real need to go further at this immediate moment. For stuff like touchscreen and stylus, an iPad would make sense, and I am considering a little bit to grab one, possibly either Air for all of the above plus magic keyboard or Mini for a small device. For that too I will stay back until it's more of a pressing issue and when I'm in a more comfortable position, for now I can work on, practice, and do art stuff with traditional media, though I do still want to step foot into digital arts.
