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Apple Announces MacBook Air

Posted by kdawson on from the thin-end-of-the-wedge dept.

Apple made four announcements at MacWorld Expo: the new MacBook Air, new features for the iPhone and iPod Touch, and movie rentals via iTunes from a TV without a computer involved. The new portable gets most of the attention. It is 0.76" thick at the thickest part, tapering to 0.16". It weighs 3 pounds and has a 13.3" screen and full-size, backlit keyboard. Its Intel chip is the diameter of a dime and the thickness of a nickel. The MacBook Air will cost $1799 and up. Its storage is either 80 GB disk or 64 GB solid-state drive. 2 GB of memory. It has no optical drive (an external one is available for $99) and features a way to wirelessly use the optical drive of any nearby Mac or PC with the proper software installed.

4 of 1,218 comments (clear)

  1. Re:A few thoughts by keithpreston · · Score: 0, Redundant

    3.) 1.8" 80G hard drive. This is the hard drive they use in iPod classics. It's 4200RPM, and it's small by modern laptop standards. The only upgrade option is $1000 for the solid state drive. Why aren't they offering the 160G iPod drive? The 160gb drive wouldn't fit. If you look at the specifications for the ipod classic http://www.apple.com/ipodclassic/specs.html the 160gb is .53" as compared to .41" for the 80gb which is solely due to the drive being bigger (2 platters instead of 1 platter). I'm sure Apple would be happy to upgrade you to a larger drive, once they have ones that can fit in there.
  2. Blame the IRS and FASB for the $20 Upgrade by jordandeamattson · · Score: 1, Redundant

    Blame our good friends at the IRS and FASB for the required $20 upgrade for iPod Touch users.

    The issue here is good old revenue recognition.

    For the iPhone, Apple has an ongoing revenue stream (the monthly fee they get) against which they can charge the cost of this upgrade.

    For new iPod Touches, it is built into the price.

    But for old iPod Touches, Apple doesn't have a revenue stream against which they can charge the cost of the upgrade. Therefore, they had two choices: 1) do not recognize all of the revenue from an iPod Touch sale and use it to match the cost of the upgrade, or 2) charge for the upgrade.

    Revenue recognition around upgrades (vs. bug fix releases) is a major issue for software companies. The complexity of trying to set aside a chunk of revenue and match that against expenses is nasty. It is just easier - unless you have a revenue stream - to charge a nominal amount for the upgrade.

  3. Re:I give it a 3 out of 5 by MrHanky · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I imagine the gentleman is looking to buy stuff, not sell it. Not a proper Apple fanboi, in other words.

  4. Re:Expensive by bhtooefr · · Score: 1, Redundant

    Slashdot? Girlfriend? You must be new here.