In-Depth Review of the MacBook Air With Photos

Engadget has the first really in-depth review of the MacBook Air that I have seen with plenty of great photos and specifics. They do a great job of highlighting the highs and the lows with plenty of concrete examples to back their claims up. It seems that while the MacBook Air is a great step towards ultra-portable computing, overall the pricepoint is just too high. Which is not surprising from a new Apple gadget I guess.

Comments

Worth reading if you still care

[sayfawa]

I thought it was a well thought out review. Carefully worded to back up every statement so neither the fanboys or haters could jump all over him as being biased. Though some probably will. Only thing that irked me was how there were several lines that go something like "unlike most ultraportables, the MBA has..." or "also rare in an ultraportable is...". Well, who started calling this 13.3" thing an ultraportable anyway?

Anyway, it did actually make clearer to me who would want this laptop.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Ohreally_factor]

Going by weight, emmmmmmaybe we can kind of, sort of call this ultra-portable, but like you, I've always considered the foot print to be an important aspect (I'm typing this on a 12" Powerbook, btw). And just going by the looks of the thing, I'd really love to own it, but not at this price.

I've been a Mac owner since 1991, and my main machines have always been Macs. Currently I'm considering the Asus eee PC, which is both tiny and light, and which seems capable of handling 80% of my computing needs. It's so (comparatively) inexpensive that I'm tempted to buy now, even though I want to wait and see the 2nd generation of eee PCs.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

It's only an ultra portable if you can smuggle it onto an aeroplane in your ass. You might laugh at the idea now, but just wait for the next batch of TSA rules and we will see who is laughing when your MBA is stolen by a baggage handler.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[jellomizer]

can't have MagSafe AC adapter plugged in on a table, because the connector points down.
Yes, you can. Just not ones from different laptops, modles you need the MagSafe AC Adapter for the Mac Book Air. Others will work but not on a table. The one that comes with it does work on a table.

  -Recessed USB port means that you need a "slim" device to make it in, so start carrying around a mini-USB extension cable.

- Recessed audio jack means partial plugins and that startling "buzz" when ungrounded, so start carrying around a mini-RCA extension cable.

I agree it is annoying and it is an example of Jobs putting style in front of function. But to be realistic if you are going to be carrying around USB Devices for the MacBook Air then you will be putting it in a larger bag which will have room for an extra cable. Power Adapter, etc... The design of the Mac Book Air is for light travel, So most of the time you won't be using a USB device in it. If you need all this stuff then go with a MacBook or Mac Book Pro.

As for RCA connectors they have been standardly small for a while. Unless you make some radio shack monstrosity most headphones will work. Which is the primary use for it. If you wanted to use is as a Mixing station then you will need the previously mentioned Mac Book or Mac Book Pro... Besides if you are doing such advanced audio stuff you will probably want an optical drive.e

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[dreamchaser]

If you think a shiny laptop is going to help you score with the ladies, then you really need to get out of your mom's basement and taste the real world for a change...

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[catwh0re]

I just think they were stuck for things to talk about... when you spend a paragraph detailing how a different laptops power adaptor doesn't fit in the unit, or that if you have dirty/sweaty wrists you'll have to clean the unit (unlike any other material?) - then it just sounds like you've got nothing to really complain about.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

Well, who started calling this 13.3" thing an ultraportable anyway? It's under 5 pounds, and while it does have a larger than average foot print, it's pretty damned thin, and the fact that it uses that custom cpu, 1.8inch (thought it was 1.7) HD puts it into the ultra portable class.

As I was discussing this with someone else, I would call it an ultra portable based on it's weight (sub 5lbs) and its thinness. For me, and keep in mind I'm not buying this, thinness represents more usable space savings. A 1/4 inch off the top to me means extra room for a couple of shirts or 75 to 150 sheets of paper. A 1/2 inch off the sides to me represents traveler sized shaving cream, tooth paste, perhaps a travelers brush and maybe a razor. The space crunch in my bag comes from thickness not width.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[T-Bone-T]

Maybe it is just me, but 13" isn't that big. You say it is a whole 13" but simple conversion reveals it to be just over 1' wide.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

It's funny you should mention that. Macintosh owners pay INSANE attention to detail in regards to their computers. I should know, I'm one of them.

Some users would realistically call "unfit material" a dealbreaker, despite having any other features.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[STrinity]

Maybe it is just me, but 13" isn't that big.

Okay John Holmes, there's no need to rub it in.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[UttBuggly]

I agree. This was a very decent review. We have kids in college and the youngest needed a new laptop. We were going to get it at Xmas, but decided to see if something like the Air would be announced.

After seeing it, and reading other reviews, we got him a tricked out MacBook with the DVI dongle for his big Samsung LCD display. With educational pricing, it was less than the Air by a bit. He gets a good compromise of weight and power for his needs.

What the author pointed out is basically what we came to; not practical as a primary machine and lacking some things.

My wife is next on the laptop upgrade list. With a birthday in the fall and Xmas just after, she's lusting after a Pro. She IS a road warrior, but she needs horsepower, connectivity, and screen size. She lugs a big HP and/or a tiny Dell (that's almost huge compared to the Air!) now, so unless Apple does mate the Pro with the Air, she is not a potential Air buyer.

I can absolutely see executives with these things at the office for meetings and such, but real users, like my wife and son, will probably opt for more capable machines.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[jacksonj04]

Clarification here: The 13.3" is diagonal across the screen. This may be what parent is referring to (In which case it would be wrong, it's not the width), but the entire MBA is, in fact, just over 1' wide (12.8" to be exact). It's also 8.94" deep if you're interested.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

perhaps you should stop using your plebian large as fuck dells all the time.

my 12" ibook is under 5 pounds and as much as i love this laptop, it's not an ultra portable.

macbook air is a bit less than 3 pounds which i would say makes it an ultra portable. but it's not 2.3 lbs like some thinkpads used to be (still are?)

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[dfghjk]

Who cares what someone who packs his computer with toiletries thinks?

Thinness is the ultimate measure only because Steve Jobs said so. Being slightly thinner than most while still having a full sized screen and keyboard does not make it an ultra-portable. Neither does a custom CPU package or an undesirable hard drive form factor.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[SimplyFearless]

As is often the case with really superb, world-class engineering shops, they just don't know squat about marketing and sales.

What with the Vista-Crash, and other recent Microsoft and Dell and various other debacles by their competitors, one would think it so intuitively obvious that the best possible move for Apple would be to simply lower all prices by 5%, every other month, for the next year. That's right, at least 30% price cut across the board by the end of the year. Heck, if the volume of orders doubles every third month, thus making up the difference in proft, go ahead and show some marketing chutzpa Apple, and cut prices by 50%.

You can do it.

You can actually sell electronic gear on a level competitive with Dell, or anyone else.

The formula is simple. Sell low and make money on volume.

But noooooooooooo. They continue to price at the high end of the market, and show a dreadful absence of awareness regarding marketing strategy as a business practice.

Wowzers.

No wonder they are only bit-players. No wonder their stock just took a major hit.

Gee golly geee wonkers. Apple dudes. Hit me up and I will help you make real money on your extremely cool, extremely well engineered electronics.

Thanks SF

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Who cares what someone who packs his computer with toiletries thinks?

An awful lot of people make frequent overnight or two-day business trips, for which packing one carry-on bag, including both computer and toiletries, makes the most sense. Of course you don't pack them in the same compartment, but a good multi-compartment laptop case designed for the frequent flier will allow you safely pack everything. And yes, in that case the thickness of the laptop is the limiting factor for how much other stuff you can take.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[shmlco]

Regardless of whether or not you're hung up on definitions, I know which one I'd rather spend a lot of time actively working with and using on a day-to-day basis.

If a super-small screen and cramped keyboard were the only consideration, I'd be writing articles on my iPhone. ;)

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Anyway, it did actually make clearer to me who would want this laptop.

Although, I'm not so sure the author actually knows so: I thought it was strange to expect a Front Row remote and the USB optical drive with a laptop designed to leave out as many bulk-adding hardware features as possible. Perhaps he either expects people to pay extra for something they might not use, or that Steve was going to throw them in for free out of the goodness of his heart?

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[mollymoo]

If you don't think a shiny laptop, when combined with a shiny car, good clothes, great shoes and a nice watch don't change the way people perceive you in a way which may well help you score, you need to stop dreaming and get with the real world.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[hattig]

go ahead and show some marketing chutzpa Apple, and cut prices by 50%.

Apple's profit margins are 34% overall (probably more profit from iPods than Macs as well). What you suggest makes no sense unless the larger volumes would get them a reduction in component prices, but it's not like they're moving from 10k to 100k, they'd be moving from 1m to 2m - they've already got the cheapest possible component prices.

The 5% price drop every other month makes more sense in that over time production costs are reduced via efficiency gains and component price drops, and Apple could easily pass that on.

I'd call $1b profits a quarter "real money", and it will continue to increase YoY.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

nah ur just crazy, the aluminum is probably the best material decision they've ever made. it cleans easily, it doesn't get dirty easily (if you can get the Al dirty.. then plastic would have never stood a chance.) It doesn't stain, it's difficult to scratch and it can take a knock quite well without leaving a dent mark. It's light, strong and can be moulded quite readily.

It also looks very pretty when you take to it with an inscription laser.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[mollymoo]

Currently I'm considering the Asus eee PC, which is both tiny and light, and which seems capable of handling 80% of my computing needs.

Could you really live with an 800-x-something screen? If they had a decent screen resolution I'd have bought one already.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

Thinness is the ultimate measure only because Steve Jobs said so. I wouldn't say it's the ultimate measure, nor is footprint. But an ultra portable is reduced in weight and form, and a 1/4 inch off the top is significant, and to me represents the most usable space.

Who cares what someone who packs his computer with toiletries thinks? That is rather the point. A huge time saver is to travel only with a carry-on. If I was given one bag to travel with for a brief trip, toiletries while a time saver are lower on my priority list than a change of clothes or documents. You "can" usually get toiletries in the hotel or at the nearest store, which will consume .5-4% of a day if you know where the stores are at, or pick them up at the destination airport. Clothing takes longer, and most often are only offered 9-5, impractical for a business trip.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

It can help when you're ordering an escort off of Craig's List. Of course weather you score or not still depends on what you negotiate with the escort in private.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[@madeus]

I think that not shipping something a insignificantly cheap as a front row remote (which is only a tiny IR remote after all) is petty, I also thing that building a device that requires "yet another set of adapters" (specifically for power and for video output) really puts me off the Apple brand (and I say that as a big fan of Apple products).

Given the price, I can understand selling the optical drive separately, though clearly users ARE going to find they need one at some point (such as when they are not near another computer, or the only other computers nearby are locked down corporate desktops they can't install the remote disc software on).

IMO they should have bundled the remote, the cheap USB-to-RJ45 Ethernet adapter and a DVI/VGA adapter - given the premium price of this product and that they have decided to use yet another interface for video out (and yet another power adepter interface). The lack of consistency in devices from Apple is rapidly heading beyond my tolerance point.

* Having bought multiple video, battery and power adapters (at the greatly inflated prices Apple charge for batteries and power adapters in particular) for my PowerBooks then MacBook I am not keen to go through the process again anytime soon.

I can understand selling the USB optical drive separately, but I think basically ALL USERS are going to want one (even if they don't realize it right away) and it's just a way of hiding the real cost of ownership. There are going to be plenty of times people are away from another computer they can use (not just traveling or in meeting rooms, but also in work places, where the only computers are locked down and where they won't be able to install the remote disc software).

Lots of people (myself included) wanted to see a more portable MacBook Pro, I don't think many people will really want this product (and that it will be a fairly big disappointment, like the iPhone has been in Europe).

It's a small issue, but not bundling the cheap IR remote seems to me to be symptomatic of Apple's general lack of focus on that side of things over the last year or two in particular. They have left the Apple TV to languish, along with Front Row. iTunes has been given the ability to manage video content, but it's half hearted. I guess Steve is bored of that stuff now.

Of course, given the number of issues with Leopard, it could be argued they are not really that bothered about software any more (unless it's on a phone...).

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[ksheff]

According to their website, Apple does include a DVI/VGA adapter with it, so what's the problem?

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

my 12" ibook is under 5 pounds and as much as i love this laptop, it's not an ultra portable. It is not what I'd call an ultra portable. Near as i'm aware that notebook is 11.2x9.06x1.35in. Its displacement i'm sure is above and beyond 120in^3. (136.4in^2). While there isn't presently a clear definition of ultraportable, reduced weight and size are clearly the parameters.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[dreamchaser]

I do hope they find a cure to whatever destroyed your sense of humor ;)

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[Anonymous Coward]

what i was saying was that unless it's in 3 pounds area, it's not an ultra portable.

5 pounds? are you kidding me? most decent laptops are around 5 pounds. macbook is 5 pounds.

5 pounds is way to high to be cut off line (even a fuzzy cut off line) for ultra portable

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[cthulhu11]

You'd actually put a laptop into checked baggage for the airlines to bang around? With shaving cream, tooth paste, and a razor you're certainly not going to be carrying that bag on.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Your argument seems to center around that this laptop is not a good standalone device -- that you need a separate computer to be able to do some basic computer stuff. But have you considered that some people are around other compatible computers so much that they don't actually need the versatility of a fully featured laptop? I guess that the MBA is more a computer for when you're not at the desk, rather than for when you go on a long trip. Do you really think that there is no market for such a device?

I don't think it will be their biggest hit. But I don't think it's going to be a flop, either. I think a lot of people are going to buy one anyway and then discover that the omissions don't matter. Not everyone, of course.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

"With shaving cream, tooth paste, and a razor you're certainly not going to be carrying that bag on."

Why do you think I claim a reduction of height represents more usable space :P. Though... you should check out the stuff they sell at the airport after the check point. I could have gotten a 10 pack of reckless swords.

On a side note, my last trip I forgot that I had a tile cutter in my bag, it passed inspection. It also had an electric razor in it.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[CodyRazor]

Why do people always feel compelled to say they've been a mac owner since 19xx?

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[CodyRazor]

How does the size of the cpu affect wheather or not its an ultraportable? My Vaio UX has a full size CPU and its 4.5". Ultraportable is all about footprint. 13.3 inches means you cant put it in a handbag, you cant carry it on a strap or on your belt and and it will always be glaringly obvious your carrying a laptop. Who cares if its thin. Who has ever in their life once said "gee, if only my laptop was a bit thinner." The thinness is for aethetics only. On the other hand having worked in retail every single person that wants a small laptop wants a smaller footprint. Sometimes they care about weight too.

This isnt an ultraportable. Its just a thin notebook where you compromise a hell of a lot of features to save half an inch. Thats not in any way groundbreaking, many similar machines have been made. e.g. the Vaio TZ, its smaller, very light, and has all the standard ports and a dvd burner.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

How does the size of the cpu affect wheather or not its an ultraportable?
My Vaio UX has a full size CPU and its 4.5" The Vaio UX (5.91"*3.74"*1.50") has a volume of 33.1551 in^3 vs the MBair which is 56.81 according to one estimate. That's a 24 in^3 difference, significant, impressive. But to be fair I would class the UX as a PDA, if not sub notebook which is about footprint.

It's using some ultra portable hardware. There is no reason to do that unless your goal was to reduce the size.

Ultraportable is all about footprint. 13.3 inches means you cant put it in a handbag, you cant carry it on a strap or on your belt and and it will always be glaringly obvious your carrying a laptop.

many similar machines have been made. e.g. the Vaio TZ, its smaller, very light, and has all the standard ports and a dvd burner. Ultra portable does not imply foot print at all. That would be a sub notebook.

Anyhow it looks like the Vaio TZ's volume is greater than the MBair

VGN-TZ160N/B 10.9" x 7.8" x 0.8-1.17" @ 2.7lbs. Assuming an average height of .8inches it's volume would be 68.016 in^3 so we can assume since it's average height is larger than .8inches, but close as IIRC it's the battery that puts it over 1.17inches high. Difference of about 11 inch^3 in favor of the MBair. Granted I would likely prefer the Sony TZ as it clearly has ports and the optical drive, but it simply isn't smaller based on current information.

What you and others are not grasping is something that is taller than wide/long by a factor of 10, a reduction along that axis is going to result in a huge reduction in volume. Don't feel bad, I was wrong as well.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[CodyRazor]

I dont feel bad, my whole point is no one cared about volume until it became a selling point of the macbook air. I bet theres not one person here who has ever needed a moderately thinner laptop than what was available. Almost anyone who could use a macbook air could use a Macbook.

My gripe is not so much that its a bad machine, its a good piece of hardware for some, I mean most people would think my UX is stupid. It's the tired predictable hysteria that OMG APPLE DID SOMETHING GROUNDBREAKING when its all been done before.

Apple makes good products. The attitude surrounding them is insufferable.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[zakezuke]

I dont feel bad, my whole point is no one cared about volume until it became a selling point of the macbook air. I cared about volume for a time, bought a Compaq Contura aero way back when you could still kind of get away using DOS. Thing is, while a sub notebook it was still thick, so there wasn't really any usable space gained, well, except for toiletry's. In spite of some oddball issues, I enjoyed that laptop, but I carried about volume then.

Really, the MBAir/MBA is really for those who fly frequently for short trips and want only one carry-on. That's it.

My gripe is not so much that its a bad machine, its a good piece of hardware for some, I won't say they are groundbreaking, I won't even say I like the product. I will say the volume it takes up is pretty damned low, and if I was traveling I would consider something along these lines. Its volume is small, the CPU is decent for it's size, and the screen is huge for its volume.

I mean most people would think my UX is stupid I would find it frustrating as the keyboard is rather small, but not stupid.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[mrchaotica]

...I think basically ALL USERS are going to want [an optical drive]...

Even if that's true, they don't have to get a (relatively expensive) Apple one, especially if they're not planning on using it often. Besides, it may not be true. For example, I have a Thinkpad X series, which also doesn't come with an optical drive, and the only time I've needed one is when I was at home. In that case, I just removed an optical drive from my desktop, hooked it to the guts of a USB hard drive enclosure, and used it like that. If Lenovo had an equivalent to the "remote disk" software, I wouldn't have even had to do that (well, depending on whether it's bootable or not). In other words, in the year I've owned the Thinkpad I haven't felt the desire to go buy an optical drive for it, and I expect the same would be true if it had been an Air instead.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[goatpunch]

Didn't you hear? 'Thin' is the new 'Square'.

So the line

"wow, that Mac Cube is so cool and square and overpriced... that I have no intention of buying one"

becomes

"wow, that MacBook Air is so cool and thin and overpriced... that I have no intention of buying one".

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[@madeus]

Right, because that's the only thing I mentioned.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[@madeus]

Your argument seems to center around that this laptop is not a good standalone device -- that you need a separate computer to be able to do some basic computer stuff

If you buy a computer and still need a "separate computer to be able to do some basic computer stuff" then it rather implies the computer you've just bought is of fairly limited value.

If it was UMPC then there are reasonable trade offs for a some users (although the UMPC market is pretty small), but it's not - it's a laptop it's more or less the same size as a regular 13" MacBook, but much less functional and more expensive - and given that the trade offs are a whole lot less appealing.

Do you really think that there is no market for such a device?

Oh yes that's exactly what I said. Exactly. I said there is no market in the world for this device.

*rolls eyes*

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[M-RES]

I beg to differ. My PBook G4 (Aluminium) is filthy - it's a pain to keep clean compared to my wife's old iBook, when you do clean it, it tends to smear. Granted, it doesn't stain so much (apart from some yellowing here and there - after all, its actually sprayed silver as well), it's very easy to scratch that silver if you wear a watch with a metal strap or buckle (or bracelets/jewellery) and Aluminium is a soft metal, which means that it dents VERY easily (mine has a ding where the PSU plugs in, so the plug's not square to the chassis - and that was from a minor 'incident' where it dropped an inch or two onto a desk as I was putting it down). The iBook's strong internal Aluminium chassis and the relative elasticity of it's plastic case make for a much sturdier machine. I had my hands on an iBook G4 that was still running (except for destroyed screen) after it had been run over by a car! I know the PBook wouldn't stand up to that. Alu has it's uses (heatsink being a major one), but it's not stronger than tough ABS Plastic.

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

If you buy a computer and still need a "separate computer to be able to do some basic computer stuff" then it rather implies the computer you've just bought is of fairly limited value.

But that makes assumptions about what others value.

Oh yes that's exactly what I said. Exactly. I said there is no market in the world for this device.

OK Mr. Smartass: Do you think this will be a flop -- as in it would have been better off for Apple if they had never bothered with it?

Re:Worth reading if you still care

[@madeus]

But that makes assumptions about what others value.

Only the assumptions that they value a computer that can (and I quote) "do basic stuff computer stuff".

OK Mr. Smartass: Do you think this will be a flop -- as in it would have been better off for Apple if they had never bothered with it?

I think it would have been better (both for Apple, and for consumers) if they had built what people appear to have actually been clamouring for - namely brought back having a small "Pro" laptop (like they used to have, with the PowerBook range, but with updated technology), not an expensive-but-limited outsized-Mac OS X-running UMPC. Like the iPhone in Europe, I think it's set to be not disliked per se, but viewed as overpriced and not particularly good value for money. The critics in the press would seem to agree that this years MWSF wasn't up to much.

Everyone I know (who gives a toss) feels basically the same way, even the one guy I know who actually has an iPhone, and they pretty much all have a laptop (about half of them Macs) and some kind of >250 GBP smartphone (even those who arn't geeks). I don't know anyone who actually want's a MacBook Air, AFAICS people are pretty indifferent to it, it looks nice but even casual users and fashion victims seem to be bawlking at it's limitations for a device at that pricepoint.

You can get a laptop for free by signing up for an AOL broadband contract, or by signing a mobile phone contract (or a full featured entry level one for 200-250 GBP at retail). This makes it seem all the more expensive even for something of it's size and functionality - you'd have to really want to run Mac OS X (and really not like Windows or Linux) to opt for the MacBook Air over a conventional "ultra portable". Like many Apple customers I don't mind paying a bit more for a Mac, but for what is ultimately a novelty item - at least as far as most power users with money to spend are going to be concerned - at the list price it's just not a very desirable product

Bad placement

[CastrTroy]

That power adapter has exceptionally bad placement. The only way to charge while using the laptop is to have the book sitting on the edge of the desk. Which isn't always the best place to have your laptop. I don't think I've seen anybody put their laptop directly on the edge of a desk like that.

Re:Bad placement

[matt4077]

It's just showing the previous-generation adapter. The one that comes with the MBA obviously fits.

Re:Bad placement

[geeknado]

Yeah, I was thinking this as well-- that's astoundingly bad design. Barring a sudden launch of the iDesk complete with Air-friendly power cable notch, this coupled with the very mediocre battery life would be a deal breaker for me...If I can't plug it in when I'm inevitably stuck in the Charlotte airport on my most regular air commute, it's a loser.

I was also somewhat intrigued by the '8"-11"' comperable ultraportable statement...I'd think you'd have to put this in the class with the Fujitsu Lifebook S for a proper comparison. Despite its thinness, this thing is wide and deep enough that it seems like a more natural grouping.

Re:NOT Bad placement

[yabos]

Didn't you see the mag safe adaptor that comes with it? It's a 90 degree adaptor that fits while the MBA is on any flat surface. The one they showed on the edge of the table is the MB adaptor and they only show it so you can see how you have to use the MBA adaptor.

Price-point?

[Mister Transistor]

Pricepoint? The 90's called and they want their buzzword back. Gezzus, just say fucking "price". The amount something is for sale at is its price. Period. Sheesh.

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, we have all kinds of points, like "percentage points", so why not pricepoints?

Re:Price-point?

[matt4077]

Percentage point has actual meaning. In fact, the media is quite good in getting it wrong, i. e.: "Today the FED raised interest rates by 0.25 percent".

Re:Price-point?

[Enleth]

The mods should get a break, this guy is quite right, if a bit rough with words, definitely not a flamebait.

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Price point" is in the Merriam-Webster dictionary since 1900, not sure what your problem is with this word, or why you think it originated in the 90's.
Re: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pricepoint

Re:Price-point?

[Moonpie Madness]

It's inflated diction. Just like the term "inflated diction."

It's 100% understandable English, but annoying inelegant.

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as both sides know what they're talking about, being exact is not necessary. Nobody says, "The car was running at 60 mph relative to the road beneath it."

Re:Price-point?

[Mister Transistor]

Probably it was the horrendous over-use of it as a popular 90's buzzword.

From 1900 to 1989 it was only uttered by bearded and PHD'd market analysts describing what we mere mortals refer to as MSRP. Then in the dot-bomb days, everyone decided that sounding like a market-droid was a desirable thing, so we heard tons of over- and mis-used buzzwords.

My biggest problem with it is it is unnecessary extra verbiage that serves no useful purpose other than an attempt to make the speaker appear more "intelligent" or "hip".

Just think of all the print ribbons and extra memory and disk Kbytes used on storing extra useless "points" back in the 90's - that was why main core went from 640K to 4GB, you know.

Re:Price-point?

[ContractualObligatio]

On the other hand, I like having words available that have distinctly different meanings and implications. Price point means there are multiple competitive goods involved, and implies a different approach to pricing than simply margin-based calculation. In a conversation between two people that are not abusing language, then jargon makes things discussions move quicker.

Of course, when someone is simply trying to appear more intelligent or hip, then s/he's a tosser. But there's nothing you can do about that - they'll be a tosser even if you strip them of their buzzwords. For instance, in the Slashdot editor's post, saying the pricepoint is too high is bullshit. A pricepoint can't be too high because by definition an excessively high price is not competitive. But at least the misuse of jargon let's us know the editor is clueless and their judgement questionable.

Re:Price-point?

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Percentage point has actual meaning. In fact, the media is quite good in getting it wrong, i. e.: "Today the FED raised interest rates by 0.25 percent".

Except that raising and lowering interest rates in 0.25-percent increments is exactly what the Fed does. I.e., reporting it that way is not, in fact, wrong.

Oh, and "Fed" is an abbreviation, not an acronym, so "FED" is wrong.

Re:Price-point?

[toddestan]

Pricepoint? The 90's called and they want their buzzword back. Gezzus, just say fucking "price". The amount something is for sale at is its price. Period. Sheesh. Except that Apple is all about their carefully chosen price points, in case you haven't noticed.

Re:Price-point?

[Tim Doran]

That's why I no longer utilize such language in my lifestyle, irregardless of staying in accordance with societal fashion.

Re:Price-point?

[paulthomas]

I think the OP meant that these are in fact "percentage points." The financial press usually accurately presents this by giving information in terms of basis points, a scaled shortcut for "percentage points". This eliminates potential confusion that over whether you mean a change in the reported percentage number or a percentage change in the reported percentage number. That is, a 3 percentage point drop from 6% to 3% is actually a 50% drop in the rate.

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are being pedantic, don't make mistakes yourself. You really want to use "e.g." when giving an example of something. "e.g." means "for example" and "i.e." means "that is".

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

how about losing irregardless from your language bank too?

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are being pedantic, don't make mistakes yourself. You really want to use "e.g." when giving an example of something. "e.g." means "for example" and "i.e." means "that is". He meant, "that is", though. Not "for example".

Moron.

Re:Price-point?

[krunk7]

how about losing irregardless from your language bank too?

woooshhh!

Re:Price-point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Way to troll, moron.

Re:Price-point?

[Pestilenc]

That's rediculous!

Re:NOT Bad placement

[CastrTroy]

Does it come with the magsafe adapter? I just skimmed the article (this is slashdot, what do you expect), but why would they complain about some other adapter you could use when the adapter it comes with works perfectly fine?

Re:NOT Bad placement

[yabos]

Yes it comes with it's own power adaptor that is the small one shown next to the larger MB/MBP one in one of the pictures. I don't know why they complain about the other power adaptor besides just adding words to their article.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[CastrTroy]

Sony has had ultra-thin Vaio laptops for years now. They used to be quite expensive, but from just checking now, they seem to be quite competitively priced to the MacBook Air.

Banish DVD

[emj]

I hope DVDs will go the same way as floppies already have, they are cumbersome and just takes up space. Create more PCs without DVDs..

Re:Banish DVD

[Ohreally_factor]

I just got back from the future, and in the post apocalyptic road warrior world to come, shiny discs will be the main form of currency. The richest people are those that never threw away their AOL CDs.

Re:Banish DVD

[CastrTroy]

Well, considering that 4 GB SDHC cards are common, and currently only cost $30, I think that eventually giant (by comparison) DVD media will disappear. Sure it's too expensive now, but give it 5 or 6 years. I still want something that doesn't get damaged by scratching like MiniDisc, or SD. Maybe some kind of bluray tech in a MiniDisc formfactor would be nice.

Re:Banish DVD

[evilbessie]

Make SD more resilient and i'd agree, but I have broken SD cards very easily by just bending them slightly putting in and taking out of card readers, DVDs whilst larger can take more abuse than SD cards, even most scratches can be fixed relatively easily.

Re:Banish DVD

[JonathanBoyd]

Why on earth would they do that? It's the main distribution media for software and movies and readers are backwards compatible with CDs, which are the main distribution format for music. None of that was ever true of the floppy.

Re:Banish DVD

[zakezuke]

I hope DVDs will go the same way as floppies already have, they are cumbersome and just takes up space. Create more PCs without DVDs.. To be honest I don't see the issue. They are the standard. If you find them too bulky for your needs
1) 80mm media
2) jump drives
3) copy to HD / virtual drive

Nothing stopping you from putting your important portable shit on any of these.

Re:Banish DVD

[CastrTroy]

Well they could make them twice the thickness and use super hard epoxy like plastic, that would probably make them a lot more resilient. Put a cover over the electrical contacts also to protect against damage by static electricity and other sources of electricity.

Re:Banish DVD

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is, sir, something that you failed to consider.

While it would make sense to use a SDHC or other "small" media format to save data and shit, there is a question of distribution.

Bandwidth is still not cheap enough to download or stream everything. Memory cards are still too expensive to just give out when you have a file.

It is very easy to just give someone a CD or DVD. If I have a meeting or seminar or class or anything where I want to distribute something to a large number of people I can do it very easily. And at a very low cost.

Think of having to distribute something to a small group (say 50 people) and using SD cards. Ok, it would be a bit expensive. But there is another problem. Not everyone may have the card reader. Everyone has access to a DVD drive. Ok. So we will use SD plus USB cards. Shit. That is expensive.

The price has to drop a lot for your plan to work. We would need SDHC to be less than $1.00 per card. 500 DVDs can be printed and distribution for less than $100.00 with printing costs. Give me a price for the same thing on SD plus USB (for compatibility) for 500 units. Replication costs have to come down to a level where these cards can be given away.

Re:Banish DVD

[STrinity]

I hope DVDs will go the same way as floppies already have, they are cumbersome and just takes up space. Create more PCs without DVDs..

I'm sorry, Mr. Jobs, but I'm not buying movies from iTunes.

Re:Banish DVD

[God'sDuck]

Yes, and then we would need some name for these "Compact" "Flash" media which are just like SD, but much sturdier, that still conveys that they are "Compact," "Flash" devices... :-)

Re:Banish DVD

[0100010001010011]

It's the main distribution media for software ... None of that was ever true of the floppy. The 80s and 90s would like to have a word with you. Hell, I remember making my own 7.5.1 Macintosh boot disk (Required deleting color resources and stuff). 1.44 MB and I could boot into a full GUI.

Yes, software was distributed primarily on Floppy's.

And Apple (as they pointed out in the keynote) is hoping to move Music and Movie distribution from physical media to the Internet.

Re:Banish DVD

[DECS]

yes that's why they started offering rental movies from iTunes.

Apple TV Promises to Take 2008

Re:Banish DVD

[JonathanBoyd]

Whoops, should have said 'with the exception of software'. My bad. The rest is true though and even if distribution does change to primarily being over the Internet (Which it wont for quite a while, if ever), there's still going to be a massive legacy collection of physical media. I'd be very surprised if some sort of drive capable of reading CDs and DVDs disappeared any time in the next 10 years. I'd not be in the least bit surprised to still find something there in 20 years in fact.

Re:Banish DVD

[bhtooefr]

Except the device connector for CF is rather fragile...

Re:Banish DVD

[F34nor]

That's a shame because I just got back from a post human future where we used the AOL CDs to add enough mass to Jupiter to ignite a second sun. We are all rich because we have passed through the singularity and indulge in emotion formally known as &*@!!

Re:Banish DVD

[TheRaven64]

About the only thing I ever use the optical drive on my MBP for is watching rented video DVDs. When they launched the new (flash-based) iPlayer, the BBC demonstrated that I had enough bandwidth to stream TV shows at an acceptable (not perfect, but good enough) quality. If someone offered a reasonably-priced service for streaming non-BBC films and shows in the same way then I would cancel my DVD rental subscription and switch immediately, and have almost no use for optical drive. I rarely use flash drives either since the network is generally more convenient, but I occasionally find them useful.

Re:Banish DVD

[mdwh2]

Floppies went because they were replaced by CDs and later DVDs, and in some cases things like thumb drives. What replaces the DVD?

And the floppy drive didn't go because it took up space - after all, it's just been replaced by those other drives. I'm sure at some point there will be a successor to DVD, but that'll still mean having a blu-ray drive or whatever in place, just like DVD is in place of the floppy drive.

Re:Banish DVD

[Anonymous Coward]

And all I have to do is buy 300 dollars worth of hardware to do it? Wow, sign me up(!)

It's almost like the GP's point flew entirely over your head. Oh no, wait, that's exactly what happened. Moron.

Re:Marking me a troll doesn't change the fact...

[CrackedButter]

Apple "got you" to pay for Leopard? What are you a weak simple minded fool who can't make his own mind up when it comes to purchases?

Re:It's Like Apple Is Mocking Its Fans

[Anonymous Coward]

You are wasting your time. Slashdot jumped the shark for Apple a long time ago. They (Apple) could put out the shittiest piece of kit in the world and the fanbois would drool over it like it was the second coming.

Light but lower performance

[soapbox]

News flash: portability is expensive. It costs money and processing power. And they have to pay Jon Ive a mint because he designs lots of cool doodads for Apple. I'm impressed that Apple convinced/strongarmed Intel into a CPU package shrink just for them. But it's not as fast as the other Core 2 Duos currently in the lineup:

Another article here.

Re:Light but lower performance

[DAldredge]

Intel will redo the packaging for anyone that is willing to cover the cost.

Re:Light but lower performance

[Aphrika]

News flash: portability is expensive

Sort of... although I think thin is the expensive kicker here. The Asus eeePC is cheap and - dare I say it - a lot more portable and feature-laden than the Air (removable battery, 3 USB ports, ethernet).

The other issue is that as the Mac hardware is essentially now the same as a PCs, there's not much stopping the likes of Sony from designing a similar form-factor laptop. Apple have proved the concept works, although I can envisage some people carrying around a bag of cables and adaptors to get the most out of it.

On another note, I was interested to see how Intel shrunk the Core 2 for the Air - it seems they shrunk the PCB block rather than the chip die itself, which would make shrinking it a lot cheaper overall. Very nice work though - hopefully it'll encourage them to make their chips smaller overall in future.

Re:Light but lower performance

[miscz]

Portability is not that expensive anymore. You can buy 12" notebooks for about 700 euro or less. Yeah, they aren't that flat (37mm for Fujitsu-Siemens Esprimo U9200, 43mm for Acer Aspire 2920) but they sport modern hardware too. And they have DVD drives... and ethernet ports.

Re:Light but lower performance

[STrinity]

Sort of... although I think thin is the expensive kicker here. The Asus eeePC is cheap and - dare I say it - a lot more portable and feature-laden than the Air (removable battery, 3 USB ports, ethernet).

The Air has more features than some full size portables. Just look at this comparison.

Re:Light but lower performance

[soapbox]

Sort of... although I think thin is the expensive kicker here. The Asus eeePC is cheap and - dare I say it - a lot more portable and feature-laden than the Air (removable battery, 3 USB ports, ethernet).

I saw my first eeePC in the wild yesterday. I was impressed, and the girl using it was happy to show off the new toy*, but I was struck that there's no way I'd be typing on it for long. That keyboard is tiny. That's one thing about the Air (not that I'm buying one--my 2005 PowerBook 15" is fine for now) that I really like: the 13" screen and the full-size keyboard.

On another note, I was interested to see how Intel shrunk the Core 2 for the Air - it seems they shrunk the PCB block rather than the chip die itself, which would make shrinking it a lot cheaper overall. Very nice work though - hopefully it'll encourage them to make their chips smaller overall in future.

I agree. While I still haven't seen a nano-itx or pico-itx in person, pictures I've seen show the relative size of the CPU to the rest of the components, and certainly the PCB block shrink would benefit those guys.

*P.S. She was going to put Ubuntu on the eeePC since the stock setup was a bit too much like a PDA. If I weren't already married...

Re:Light but lower performance

[Divebus]

The Air has more features than some full size portables.

BAWHAHAHAHA.... that was HILARIOUS!

Anyway, the Macbook is nice enough to forgo the Air at that price point. We'll see a lot in Hollywood anyway with Final Cut on them under the arms of wannabe producers.

Re:Light but lower performance

[rbanffy]

Comparing the MBA an the Eee is, to say the least, unfair. One is an exercise on how little and inexpensive you can make a comlhted wighojf crjppling it completely. The MBA is a full featured notebook that runs pretty much anything a desktop Mac runs. It may lack an ethernet port, buf Apple considers wired networks legacy tech (at my home it mostly is and in most of my clients it's only for the desktops). Even my printer has 802.11. For those who need cabled ethernet, there is a USB thingie. As for the optical drive, the external USB one seems more than adequate.

Re:Light but lower performance

[12WTF$]

comlhted wighojf crjppling All those mistypoes are from not reaching the proper key, hitting the key below it
Your keyboard accuracy would improve with a smaller keyboard such as on the DddLC
Err, I meant EeePC :)

RE: Light but lower performance

[itsdapead]

The Asus eeePC is cheap and - dare I say it - a lot more portable and feature-laden than the Air (removable battery, 3 USB ports, ethernet).

OK - I've got an EEE and am not particularly inclined to buy a MBA, but I'm not sure about "feature laden". You've picked out some strengths - Ethernet, USB ports, portability and removable battery* but rather neglected RAM (512M vs 2G), storage capacity (4G vs 80G), CPU power (630MHz x 1 vs 1.6GHz x 2), screen (800x480 7" vs 1280x800 13"), trackpad (tiny with scroll area vs. humungous with multi-touch), keyboard (tiny vs. full size) and Bluetooth (none vs. 2.1EDR)...

Oh God, did I just try to compare specs on a £220 computer largely aimed at kids with a £1200 Apple aimed at jet-setters? The EEE is a credible "alternative strategy" if you want a second computer to travel with, but there's not much sense comparing feature lists - you'd use them in different ways.

Re:Light but lower performance

[rbanffy]

Actually, I was typing that on my iPod Touch, but you pretty well got the idea.

Any keyboard smaller than the one on my trusty IBM Z-50 is too small for me.

Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Engadget has the first really in-depth review of the MacBook Air that I have seen with plenty of great photos and specifics. They do a great job of highlighting the highs and the lows with plenty of concrete examples to back their claims up. It seems that while the MacBook air is a great step towards ultra-portable computing, overall the pricepoint is just too high.

Great post! :-)

Power Users?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who are these power users everyone is talking about? I run genetic simulations and I'd be fine with what the MBA is offering. There can't be that many people doing video editing (and even that should be possible since people have been doing it for years on slower computers).

Maybe too many people are simply obsessed with the technology per se, instead of some actual creative work.

Re:Power Users?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you are absolutely correct - for 90-something percent of the tasks people use their laptops for the power of Air will be absolutely sufficient. Also, I don't think Air is any more niche product than Mac Pro, in fact quite the contrary, yet people already predict its demise.

Re:Power Users?

[mccalli]

Who are these power users everyone is talking about? I run genetic simulations and I'd be fine with what the MBA is offering.

Well, there's me. The things that it lacks for me are...

• Memory - I run large VMware images and 2G is barely sufficient for me.
• Storage - Not big enough to store lots of vms plus a large amount of music and video. Probably not fast enough either - I do a lot of compilation and have multiple processes writing huge log files simultaneously. A fast drive is appreciated.
• CPU - inside my VMware images I'm often running 5 or more large Java VMs - I like my CPU.
• Screen - it's both not quite big enough for what I do, and it's glossy whereas I prefer matt
• No firewire - so no input from a DV camcorder
• No wired ethernet - I hate adapters
• "There can't be that many people doing video editing"
  Oh, and I also do video editing. And Logic Express for music work too.

Now don't get me wrong, the above wasn't an anti-MacBook Air rant and in fact I quite like the device. Those answers are specifically addressed to your question - "who are these power users?". One would be me. That's fine though, a MacBook Air isn't aimed at me whereas a MacBook Pro is. I'm actually fine with the no optical drive thing which others are seeing as such a controversy, but the other compromises are a bit too much for my usage.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:Power Users?

[Anonymous Coward]

You need a desktop.

I'm sure a million dollar CAT land excavating tool is probably not ideal for your daily commute to the office either. So why not try to form an opinion on rational thoughts.

I too think the Air is a POS, but what you were describing is what a desktop is meant to provide, not a laptop [not a sub-10lbs one anyways].

I've got a carbon fibre shovel

[petes_PoV]

It's lighter and thinner than every other builder's shovel and it looks really great.

OK, it is 20 times more expensive that a wooden-shafted version with a steel end, and it will only do the same work, but that's more than made up for by it's looks.

Did I mention it looks great?

Re:I've got a carbon fibre shovel

[goatpunch]

You forgot to mention that your new shovel is missing a handle, and that handles aren't considered necessary to shovel users nowadays.

Re:NOT Bad placement

[eMartin]

Personally, I would complain about the one that comes with it too, because with the cable coming out like that it will be a lot easier to pull it from the connector by accident.

global warming

[jmichaelg]

This laptop will be owned by two kinds of people:

1. People who think humans aren't causing global warming
2. People who think humans are causing global warming but the extra carbon footprint the sealed-in battery exchange costs is ok because, well..., just because.

Both types of people won't think twice about the aggravation of either forgetting to format their hard drive before sending in the computer for the new battery or the aggravation of having to format their drive just to exchange a battery. Neither type will care that they'll be without a computer for a few days while the laptop is winging its way to Apple and back.
 

I find myself wanting to be one of the above kind of people...it's an awfully nice looking piece of hardware.

Re:global warming

[MacarooMac]

..it's an awfully nice looking piece of hardware.

You just need to remove that smug-looking fruit logo from the case, which increasingly marks Apple owners out as the equally smug, techno-dopey fashionistas many of them tend to be.
Hardly innovative and clearly a triumph of style over substance - but it's certainly a great indication of what's to come when the technology required to produce ultra-thin, light weight, low power consumption 'minimalist' notebooks - without compromising functionality or processing power (or $$$$!)- really starts to come together over the next 24 months.
As the parent suggests, it does look the business, though, and looks and status will inevitably generate far more sales than it really deserves.

Re:global warming

[WMD_88]

The battery is actually fairly easy to replace. You just unscrew the back, take one screw off the battery, and pull out the connector. You won't have to ship it in.

Re:global warming

[shmlco]

"...but the extra carbon footprint the sealed-in battery exchange costs is ok because, well..., just because."

EXTRA carbon footprint? Give the thing a removable battery and a battery compartment like that of the MBP and you need MORE materials for both the compartment and the battery, and for the replacement battery... which you'd probably have to drive to the Apple store to buy anyway.

nice try

[oever]

The new MacBook Air will hopefully point laptop makers in the right direction: small and silent laptops. From what I can tell from the specs and the review, though, the MacBook Air is not as nice as the laptop on which I'm typing this: the Dell Latitude X1. Although the X1 is now out of production, it is still, in my opinion, the perfect laptop. Someone else has already taken the trouble of comparing the two machines. Here's the summary:

Dell Latitude X1 is smaller (albeit slightly thicker), has a gigabit ethernet port, comes with a external DVD burner, has two USB ports and and SD and a CF slot. The battery is easily removed and replaced or upgraded.

The MacBook Air has a dualcore 1.6 GHz processor where the X1 has a single core that clocks 1.1 GHz. Also the Air can take 2GB versus the 1.25 GB of the X1.

The X1 comes with an obligatory copy of Windows XP, but I upgraded it to Kubuntu Feisty. The MacBook comes with an obligatory copy of Mac OS X.

I have been developing KDE4 on my X1 just fine. The extra speed would be nice, but for a portable machine battery life is more important.

If the X1 were still in production, it would clearly be the better laptop.

Re:nice try

[Anonymous Coward]

Well if you can sacrafice some thickness, the Dell 640M inspiron (14.1 screen) can be had fairly cheap with the bigger 9 cell battery and realistically get 7hrs+ usage out of it with wireless active. Costs much less too, and still can be upgraded with standard components. Granted it probably doesnt touch the Air for asthetics, but at half the cost or less with double the battery life, who cares? Its also very , very quiet.

Re:nice try

[tgd]

The X1 is a great laptop -- I love mine, but I'm sorry its not even close to the Airbook. Its extremely slow (less than half the speed of a 1.6ghz C2D), its got a small keyboard and a low-resolution display.

Its *great* for use on an airplane because the seat in front of you can be back and you can still fit it on the tray. Its great for tossing in a bag.

There is no way on Earth you could use it as a full-time laptop unless you had midget hands and only used Office.

Re:nice try

[tgd]

Yes MacBook Air.

I know I got it wrong. I've been on hold with Comcast for 90 minutes and my brain is turning to mush from their horrid hold music.

I'd like to see how durable the Air is by cracking someone over the head over at Comcast.

Re:nice try

[stewbacca]

The MacBook Air has a dualcore 1.6 GHz processor where the X1 has a single core that clocks 1.1 GHz. Also the Air can take 2GB versus the 1.25 GB of the X1.

I'll take the faster CPU over an SD card slot any day of the week.

Re:nice try

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Both systems make different compromises. MBAir has more memory and a lot more CPU power, but that blog post doesn't really seem to acknowledge that.

The blog post you linked used some specious reasoning to show that the X1 is better at some of the comparisons. I think the X1 looks generally better, but the biases used to show that the X1 is better by a huge margin are as over the top as an Apple cheerleader's biases.

I'll take just one example here. The calculation for "pixels per inch" is completely wrong and shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how it's measured. Ppi is a linear number, it's how many pixels you need to line up to make one inch, you don't take the number of pixels on the screen and divide it by its diagonal length like that blog did. For example, a common ppi for desktops is about 100, give or take a few. Notebooks might have ppi numbers of 100, 125, 150 and a few are a bit higher than that. But there are no notebooks with ppis in the tens of thousands. I think the X1 might still be better with that, but it's best to not use a false argument to reach a conclusion, even if the conclusion ends up being the same.

Re:nice try

[Smurf]

Dell Latitude X1 is smaller (albeit slightly thicker) "Slightly" is quite an understatement. The article you cite quotes the dimensions as:

MBA: 1.94×32.5×22.7 = 1431.235 cc
X1: 2.5×28.6×19.68 = 1407.12 cc

But the thickness of the MBA tapers from 0.76" = 1.930 cm to 0.16" = 0.406 cm. The average thickness is thus 0.46" (1.168 cm, so the X1 is 2.14 times thicker), and the actual volume is more like 861.692 (so the X1 is 1.63 times larger).

And quite frankly that's not the only flaky part of the comparison. The author makes claims such as "the processor in the MBA totally owns the one in the X1, but you can change the battery of the X1 so it is more powerful". Talk about spinning it!

Re:nice try

[hattig]

Wow, that's the least biased comparison I've ever seen. It's pathetic. "It I twist the argument around, or change the parameters, or make a huge assumption, or lie, I can make the X1 win" - on almost every entry.

"Power. Intel core 2 duo 1.6GHz versus a Centrino mobile 1.1GHz?" - yup, winner X1, even though there will be external battery packs for the Air for long journeys in mere weeks (battery + MagSafe cable, not that hard, and less hassle than carrying a spare battery and swapping it out).

Never mind that the Dell power adaptors that I've seen are veritable bricks - the MBA's adaptor is quite diminutive.

Of course if the X1 was still being made, it would have more up to date specifications - it'd be a dual-core 1.2GHz ULV probably.

Still not quite the right specs or the right price for me though. More USB ports are a must, and lacking Firewire is sad.

Re:nice try

[Zebra_X]

Let me introduce you to the Dell XPS 1330...

Poor presentation, but some useful content

[JonathanBoyd]

That article's a mess: poor grammar; photos that focus more on looking arty rather than providing information (the fourth one down is near useless); horrendous distortion in some of the shots (the second one down makes the screen look like it's melting); and attempts to make the writer look smarter by using fancy words that the writer doesn't even know the meaning of (you cannot have an eliolated CPU). If you can get past that though, the content's not bad. I'm curious about what battery life would be like with the brightness turned down, WiFi and BLuetooth off and just using Office/iWork for some actual work. Just using TextEdit I was able to get 8 hours out of my old iBook, but my MacBook can't stretch that far.

Re:Poor presentation, but some useful content

[tgibbs]

...and attempts to make the writer look smarter by using fancy words that the writer doesn't even know the meaning of (you cannot have an eliolated CPU).

Maybe you should spend a bit more time with a dictionary before presuming to nitpick. "Etiolated" is not that fancy a word--it's hardly the first time I've seen it used in its broader meaning of "feeble."

Even if one only knew about the specific horticultural meaning, it would be a pretty good metaphor.

Re:Poor presentation, but some useful content

[cbart387]

Thank goodness. I was looking for comments on the article (which was what the summary was pointing to after all) but all the other comments were bitching about the laptop itself. The grammar didn't bother me but looking back at the article you're absolutely right about the pictures. They (at least most) look like something you'd use for a splash page on a website instead of showing proper perspective.

Re:Poor presentation, but some useful content

[dayid]

I wondered how they/he had tested the battery life as well.

This is one reason I am still hanging onto my 13" iBook. The ~8 hours of battery time I have yet to see in any other "ultraportable" laptop. It's still not heavy to lug around, and for anything the 800MHz w/ 640MB of RAM can't hadnle, there's always VNC and SSH to get into a more powerful machine - which it seems the MacBook Air is still relying on you having another server/desktop anyways.

Re:Poor presentation, but some useful content

[TheRaven64]

Straying way off-topic, but what is performance like with an 800MHz iBook running a recent OS X (can it even run Leopard)? I've been thinking of picking up one for a parent to get them to stop asking me Windows questions. The one problem might be that they use OpenOffice for a lot of things which was fairly slow even on my 1.5GHz G4. Have you tried using iWork?

Re:Poor presentation, but some useful content

[Scudsucker]

That article's a mess: poor grammar; photos that focus more on looking arty rather than providing information (the fourth one down is near useless); horrendous distortion in some of the shots (the second one down makes the screen look like it's melting); and attempts to make the writer look smarter by using fancy words that the writer doesn't even know the meaning of (you cannot have an eliolated CPU).

Methinks you are being overly fussy. Besides, I give them points for having the review on on page instead of splitting it up into twenty pages with three paragraphs and a picture on each.

Re:I hope you buy a box that stabs you in the face

[armada]

I have been a personal computer user for 28 years. I have been writing software for 20 of those. I learned about 15 years ago not to buy the first of anything. Hell I even waited for the second version of the Honda CRF450 motocross bike (first one ended up with some issues) and honda is just about the best R & D house in the world. Why would you, I'm guessing at least a slightly intelligent person (slashdot user and all), assume something as uterly complex as an operating system would have zero bugs on its first release? Or do you just like to bitch?

a revolution

[Anonymous Coward]

the macbook air is a revolution more because it changes the way you use computing. the fastest airbook at 1.8Ghz is slower than the mini and is slower than anything except the base macbook air. most people are complaining about the lack of ethernet and firewire. but...

genius can be defined as something extremely common sense that noone thought of before the genius. although not quite genius, apple has decided that the burden of connecting to the internet needs to be on the network not the computer. that's huge - it's also why i can't get one.

you really need a robust enough network at home/school/work to justify no cat5 or firewire. my home i can control, maybe i'd even get one of the Time Capsules. Work, not so robust and the network is still mostly 11b with some 11g going up recently. Nowhere near sufficient to warrant clipping the cat5. unfortunately i can't just upgrade the routers at work. school, 11g WHERE THERE IS wireless. but the school has explicitly decided NOT to put wireless in some places, even though cat5 is available in those rooms.

So the problem isn't with apple, it's with my employer and my school. it's not about the price of the device as much as it's about moving the responsibility of connectivity to wireless, where everybody wants it. now, if all of the major computer companies start making devices without cat5, the institutions will HAVE to upgrade their networks to accommodate their user base.

That would be a revolution.

A ripoff aimed at the iPhone crowd

[Anonymous Coward]

The price doesn't even remotely meet the specs and some technical issues probably dictated from the marketing folks (bad choice of some connectors, no user replaceable battery, external drive purposely incompatible with well accepted standards) make this laptop attractive only for execs who blindly accept as technically advanced anything coming from Apple.

If there's one point in buying that thing, it's that it doesn't come with Windows.

Re:A ripoff aimed at the iPhone crowd

[MacarooMac]

Interesting Wiki link:

Reality distortion field is a term coined by Bud Tribble at Apple Inc. in 1981, to describe company co-founder Steve Jobs' charisma and its effects on the developers working on the Mac project. Later the term has also been used to refer to perceptions of keynote (or Stevenote) observers and devoted users of Apple computers and products.

Bud Tribble claimed that the term comes from Star Trek. In fact, while the expression is in Star Trek style, it is unknown on Memory Alpha.

In essence, RDF is the idea that Steve Jobs is able to convince people to believe almost anything with a mix of charm, charisma, bluster, exaggeration, and marketing. RDF is said to distort an audience's sense of proportion or scale. Small advances are applauded as breakthroughs. Interesting developments become turning points, or huge leaps forward. RDF focuses less on outright deception and more on warping the powers of judgment. The term audience may refer to an individual whose attitudes Steve is intending to affect.

So what we're saying is that a MacBook Air is pretty much like an unlocked, unactivated iPhone.

Re:A ripoff aimed at the iPhone crowd

[Anonymous Coward]

Theres 5 or 10 other reviews on various sites where the macbook is actually either slightly more or slightly less then notebooks in the same market.

Newsflash: that 499 notebook that weighs 8 pounds, is 2 inchs thick, and is on sale at best buy isnt in the sale category.

Check out Sony, Thinkpad, Dell, or other ultra lights and compare them.

Dell Latitude D420 / D430

[zerofoo]

As ultra portables go, my D420 is almost perfect. Small, light, plenty of power, replaceable battery, solid state drive, external optical drive....etc.

The D430 is a current model, and can be had for less money.

Unfortunately, if you want/need to run Mac OS, the MBA is the only game in town.

-ted

Maybe it's a showcase?

[autophile]

Lord knows I love all things Apple-y, but not the MBA. That being said, perhaps the MBA is a showcase machine, not really designed to be practical, but to show off new technologies for light laptops. And, unlike concept cars, you can drive this one home with you.

I guess that's positive enough spin :)

--Rob

Re:NOT Bad placement

[tgibbs]

The good news seems to be that the old adaptors will work for charging the machine when it is idle, even if they aren't really suitable for charging it in use. That's useful for people who already have one of the old ones. I imagine somebody will come out with an adaptor at some point.

Nice try, indeed

[tgibbs]

You are seriously comparing a 1.1 GHz single core to a 1.6 GHz dual core? That's not even close to the same class of computing power.

Meanwhile, people are quibbling that the MBA is slightly slower than other Mac dual core laptops...

PWNT

[Anonymous Coward]

The fanboy mods pwnt your noob ass. Ha.

Re:PWNT

[dreamchaser]

I for one love when the fanboi mods show their true colors :-)

To the fanbois: YHBT YHL HAND :D

A 3th party ext. battery will solve the core issue

[Anonymous Coward]

I can imagine a company like Belkin producing an external battery for the air that connects to the power supply connector. When such a device hits the market the core problem of the mba for travellers will be solved. Otherwise, I don't really mind the compromises in the context of an ultraportable laptop.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[peragrin]

I actually did a price comparison on the vaio's and the Vaio's give you slightly more bang for the buck but at the cost of less battery life. All in all you are talking about ~$100 price difference. Apple also surprisingly has the least expensive 64gb SSDrive on the market. Hundreds less than retail and competitors.

What I want to know is does Intel and apple have an exclusive contract on that motherboard? or can Intel start selling those boards to anyone? in 6 months will sony be selling these? Better yet will someone merge one of these and an LCD TV to make turely interactive TV.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[Fred_A]

Sony has had ultra-thin Vaio laptops for years now. They used to be quite expensive, but from just checking now, they seem to be quite competitively priced to the MacBook Air. Quiet you fool ! don't you know whet they do to your kind around here ?

Re:Marking me a troll doesn't change the fact...

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Odd, I've been running Leopard since it was leaked to TPB and I've never had my wireless drop out. I've had nothing but a good experience with Leo so far.

Maybe you have a PEBKAC problem?

Boot from USB??

[JoeCommodore]

Apple disabled the booting of system CDs from USB CD drive a long time ago (required either a direct connect drive or fire wire) I figure the special CD drive changes the situation for the MacBook air.

Re:Boot from USB??

[oberondarksoul]

Actually, it's only PowerPC Macs which cannot boot from USB . PPC can boot from internal ATA, SCSI, or FireWire. Intel Macs can boot from those, plus USB.

Oddjob's Laptop?

[Roger W Moore]

From the article: It fits in a manila folder, you can slide it under a door, and if you threw it hard enough you could probably chop someone in half with the thing.

So instead of the MacBook Air we should call it Oddjob's Laptop? Seems appropriate given that it's an Apple and they definitely made some bizarre choices when designing it.

Re:Oddjob's Laptop?

[ChristTrekker]

If it were made of vibranium instead of aluminum, it could be Captain America's laptop.

Re:Marking me a troll doesn't change the fact...

[p0tat03]

Most certainly not. Leopard has been causing a lot of networking problems for many users, including myself. My MacBook Pro regularly kernel panicked (especially when running BitTorrent) when connecting on WiFi, back in 10.5.0. Thankfully .1 fixed that for me, but I'm still hearing sporadic reports of it for some people.

10.5.1 still has one major bug for me - it seems to not play nice with my router (whereas Tiger did perfectly), by refusing to use the router's DNS. I've had to manually enter my ISP's DNS addresses into Leopard just to go to websites. The more frustrating part of this is that the driver seems to refuse connections for CERTAIN domains, but OK others, and this "blacklist" seems to change from time to time. For about 2 days I couldn't access Slashdot, but after then I was fine.

This baby has a long way to go before I will call it a success. It's not a debacle on the scale of Vista, but it ain't nothing to write home about either.

Re:Marking me a troll doesn't change the fact...

[Tim Browse]

It's unlikely to be PEBKAC, as it's a well documented problem (just google for it).

I also had it last night on my MacBook which I upgraded to Leopard about 2 days ago. Previously (under Tiger), it had been fine - the most reliable Wifi I'd ever used. Full signal strength at home, never dropped out.

Last night I watched my wifi icon mysteriously blink on and off every few seconds, and the list of 5-ish wireless networks around me dropped to 1 (my external WAP, not my internal WAP). My Macmini (also Leopard) could see all the other networks fine.

For a period of about an hour (the amount of time I spent looking into it), my wifi seemed to be utterly unreliable. After about 6 months of trouble-free usage under Tiger. During that hour I found lots of complaints about Leopard's wifi support being unreliable on forums, news sites, Apple's web site, etc.

But, you know, feel free to call it a PEBKAC. Maybe I was sitting wrong, and it blocked the wifi signals or something.

Comparison with Lenovo's X300

[MBHkewl]

Shameless plug: http://mbhtech.blogspot.com/2008/01/macbook-air-vs-lenovo-x300.html

Even though Lenovo's laptop isn't out yet, anyone for a portable laptop would surely wait after seeing the difference in features.

If you're after an "ultra"-portable, I guess your choice would be Asus's eeePC.

Good balanced review

[ContractualObligatio]

Personally, I've been convinced that the MBA isn't for me because of the lack of 3G (which would be my definition of "Air") and it looks like the USB port is actually a bad piece of design, which ruins it for my usual "I pay extra for good looking designs" fetish.

Overall, a good review - it's nice to see it acknowledged that thin, light and stylish is a feature some people will pay for. But there's one thing in particular that bugs me about all reviews of the MBA, namely the lack of replaceable battery. I simply don't believe the frequent flying people who can easily afford to buy the MBA (not geeks with a design fetish) carry around a spare battery. Many of the highly paid sales people and execs I've met struggle to carry around a spare brain cell, fer chrissakes. Expecting them to have a train of thought that lasts longer than a couple of hours is kinda pointless :)

I want to love this machine, I really do

[shagoth]

I was an Apple loyalist through the worst of times, I was first out the door to buy a Titanium laptop. I have diversified a lot in the last couple of years. Those things said, I really, really want to like the MacBook Air. It's a gorgeous machine. It evokes the same kind of visceral "must own" response that the original Titanium Powerbooks did. This machine makes too many compromises to be a primary machine for the serious poweruser or developer. No ethernet, no WWAN, no optical drive, no firewire and oddly no audio-in. In headier times, having one of these machines for sofa browsing would be great, but that's not where I am right now nor or most of the computing "professionals" that I know.

It's hard to know the target market for this machine, though it's clear the machine was designed for Steve personally. I'm sure that this machine will look great sticking out of the designer backpack on the passenger seat of a new 3-series BMW that Mommy and Daddy bought for college commuting, but it's hard to relate to a market that far removed from the kind of office that has machines in varying states of assembly. The MBA is a glorious consumer machine but the slashdot crowd is not the core market for this product.

Ultimately, the slashdot crowd isn't Apple's market at all and it's a happy accident for Apple that slashdot intersects with other products aimed at Apple's core demographics.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[eclectic4]

"This machine makes too many compromises to be a primary machine for the serious poweruser or developer."

As it's been said a gazzilion times, it's not meant to be a desktop replacement, or a "power" users portable machine. It's an ultra-portable, meant to be nothing more.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[ratboot]

It's hard to know the target market for this machine

That one is too easy : for Starbucks' patrons! Who else?

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[EastCoastSurfer]

That's fine, but then I question who the MBA is aimed at. I'm pretty sure more laptops sell than desktops at this point (it was close the last time I saw numbers and the trend showed laptops over taking desktops soon enough). So that leads me to believe people aren't buying laptops as second machines (like the MBA is positioned to be), but as primary machines. Can you see a college kid having a desktop and a MBA to carry around? No, they want a single laptop that they can have everything on and not use up much space (not to mention the cost of that setup). Executives? The ones I see and know all have laptops as their primary machines and docking stations at their various offices. Again, the laptop is their primary machine. I don't doubt that there is a market for an ultra-portable machine, but I question the market for the ultra-portable that pretty much requires you to have another computer as your primary, even moreso starting at $1800.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[Anonymous Coward]

It's hard to know the target market for this machine

You might consider that the acronym for this machine is more commonly used for a group of people who fall smack dab in the middle of the target demographic.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[Confuzzled]

FYI, you can get an ethernet adapter for it.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[vonFinkelstien]

Biz Target = executives who have a main computer at the office and home, but want a small WOW presentation computer.
Home Target = your wife.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[TheRaven64]

Exactly. Laptops have been good enough to be primary machines for so long that I have a couple of older ones lying around this room in the same way that I used to have a load of old desktops. Now my primary machine is a laptop and my secondary machine is a palmtop (a Nokia 770, to be precise). The Air doesn't compete with my laptop for power or my palmtop for portability. To me, it is as portable as my laptop (I can't stuff it in my pocket, so I have to carry it around in a bag, and the fact I can fit it in a slightly smaller bag doesn't really add much value). Something closer to the iPod Touch form factor, with the ability to use a bluetooth keyboard would be very attractive. If it also let me plug in an external display then I'd be completely sold.

My ideal Mac would be about the form factor of the touch and slot in to the back of my cinema display when I was at my desk (where it would connect with a few extra CPUs and recharge its battery).

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[DaveCBio]

Don't you think it's a little pricey for a secondary laptop? I mean there are more powerful and cheaper laptops that aren't that much heavier or bigger that are full featured. I see this thing as a status toy and that's about it.

Re:I want to love this machine, I really do

[CodyRazor]

I was an Apple loyalist through the worst of times Why?

Honestly im not trying to troll, but do people think that will give their opinion credence? If you were using a mac in 1998 I would say you probably have pretty poor judgement and hold irrational loyalties, thereby causing me to dismiss your opinion.

You can tell a fanboy the moment they say "I've been using macs since 19xx." Unless it pertains to your point, no one gives a shit.

Misses the point.

[quibbler]

As Engadget does too often for my taste, the review misses the point of this product entirely. Please pull your head out of the tech-sheets long enough to look at the thing as a 'product' not a 'laptop'

The MacBook Air is not for old-school hardware-centric geeks. Its not for 'road warriors'. In fact, I think the crafty (doubtless purposeful) acronym "MBA" should tell you alot. This product is designed for management types, social types, the fringe of the tech-savvy users. I will go so far as to say if you don't love the MBA, you're not in the the target market group. All the MBA nay-sayers remind me of film critics panning a movie like StarWars saying how trite, contrived, overstated, and juvenile it is. The fact is that for millions (billions?) of people, StarWars is the magnum opus of film. If you don't agree, you're not wrong, worse you're just he wrong reviewer, and too tunnel-visioned to realize it.

This article actually comes closest to the truth by repeating itself on how solid the keyboard/engineering 'feels'. Bingo! Two points. (I'd have to see the audio port in question- that sounds like a possible legitimate problem.) But look, the target market doesn't care about how much gigahurtses or how many RAMS it has... The target market for the MBA cares about looking really good at client meeting and having a beautiful, dependable machine. And by this measure, the MBA solidly delivers.

The only competent criticism I've seen from this review (or really from any review) is the lack of 3G/Edge built in for always-on internet. While I'm sure it would be a great boost to the product and the image of the MBA to have it, I say with almost certainty that this was an issue with the carriers, not Apple's engineers.

Finally a smidge about the tech: 2gb isn't enough for you? 2gb is overkill except for hardcore adobe geeks. I'm pleased they put that much in. MacBooks ship with 1gb, and almost nobody ever goes over 2gb. Remember, this is OSX, not Windows. Ethernet, HD, processor: all are ample for the aforementioned target market. No optical drive? for what? Who actually installs software after you buy the machine? Oh, I get one for $99? Should I buy two incase I need to install the software again? Are you familiar with the target market yet? This is a laptop for people who don't like computers, to love.

Re:Misses the point.

[drmerope]

Maybe you're missing the point that small changes could have made the product noticeably more useful. Unfortunately the story is out: Jobs and Ives worked on the form-factor mockup. Then the rest of the team got tasked to make stuff fit in there. Surprise, surprise someone (Jobs) needed to go back and budge on the form factor a bit. The tapered edges for instance steal substantial internal space from the case but don't offer the user very much.

You say that the MBA isn't for "road warriors" but rather for people who "cares about looking really good at client meeting". I don't know how your company works, but in my company our sales and field application engineers are most definitely "road warriors". "Client meetings" take place at the client's place of business.

Re:Misses the point.

[ronanbear]

2gb is what you need if you're thinking about running Parallels. If it's hard to upgrade then you run into all sorts of problems. It's probably not all that expensive to add the ram once the extra engineering involved in fitting the stuff is taken account of and also the difficulties that are encountered with build to ordering, stocking additional ram, warranty claims.

Also, it's not really 2gb of ram. The integrated graphics take their share and that would really make 1gb impractical. Performance is going to be affected by using the smaller, slower drive and that would be exacerbated by a shortage of ram as any use of virtual memory involves a bigger than usual hit.

Yes, Apple are frustrating with some of their design choices, but they also know their stuff. They have one of the biggest selling notebook ranges of any manufacturer based on only 2 models (3 if you count the 17"). They'll be expecting big things if they're going to the trouble of adding a 3rd. But I expect this thing to sell. I've been considering one but eventually decided that 2 pounds isn't worth the difference to me as I'm a pretty strong guy and I drive most places. But public transport commuters might see things differently.

They'll have a lot of data on who's been buying additional batteries for their MBs and MBPs. I'm sure they're confident enough that they know they it's not that big a deal for enough of their customer base. To be honest, I've never bought a 2nd battery and most of the people I know never really even consider it. Magsafe will be an issue with coming up with power accessories (such as an extra, external battery pack) but if the demand is there...

Apple are design leaders when it comes to laptops and I can see their policy on ports becoming more popular. Many people use their DVD drives very rarely so it was only going to be a matter of time with all the memory sticks and wireless out there. FW was a bit of a shock, as was the Kensington slot but ultimately the shape of the side dictated things. That shape is designed to sit more easily and comfortably on someone's lap. It also makes it easier to pick up. Thinner design is really useful for typing. It makes for more comfortable typing as does the thinner front. I had been hoping Apple would make this change soon as there were some other nice laptops out there that were showing the way.

Re:Misses the point.

[drsmithy]

As Engadget does too often for my taste, the review misses the point of this product entirely. Please pull your head out of the tech-sheets long enough to look at the thing as a 'product' not a 'laptop'

Doesn't work as a "product" either (at least for any product where "works as a computer" is a significant factor). A regular old MB gives you essentially the same amount of portability at a much lower cost (and with much more functionality).

This is a laptop for people who don't like computers, to love.

The MBA is a laptop for people who want a toy to look cool with at the coffee shop.

Once the RDF wears off, the MacBook Cube is not going to be a big seller. There's just not enough people who fit into its tiny demographic.

Re:Misses the point.

[riker1384]

I think that if the price comes down over time on this sort of ultra-thin laptop design, it could be good for students. If you have a backpack full of heavy books, you would want something with about the same area, but as thin and light as possible.

Re:Misses the point.

[Anonymous Coward]

hahahahaha osx wastes more memory than windows ever did.

-1, starry eyed apple fanboi. get a room lovebug.

Re:Misses the point.

[theanorak]

Agreed, largely. It does feel exactly like a product aimed at business class fliers from the regular management side of the room. Consultants. MBAs. People with helpdesks to solve "install software" and "backup data" problems. The 3g bit could be a bigger problem though. The suits in question are all addicted to always-on. Blackberries, 3g datacards etc. When all the Dells are available with built-in no-dongle data, it's a silly omission. I'm not sure how a "carrier issue" could really affect it though...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Too many missing things - like a modem.

[rueger]

I'm sure that Apple will sell quite few of these things, but to my mind the point of a laptop is to carry around less stuff, not more.

Sitting around at home with a reliable WIFI connection it may be fine, but if I were travelling I'd feel obliged to also drag along the external DVD, the external Ethernet dongle, an external USB hub (probably powered), and I suspect a few other things that I would later realize Apple has left out.

It's interesting that no-one seems to comment on the lack of a dial up modem. There are still many places - small rural motels come to mind - where you won't find WIFI, and will still need to dial up to download e-mail. Guess that an external modem is another thing to haul around.

Re:Too many missing things - like a modem.

[EverLurking]

Ethernet or Modem Dongle? We don't need no stinking dongles....

http://groups.google.com/group/mac-book-air/web/networking-tweaks

Re:Too many missing things - like a modem.

[shmlco]

I think the point here is WHERE you carry all of those things. Most of the time when I travel I carry my iPhone and its cable, my notebook, and a single charger in my backback, and then I put additional uSB chargers, dongles, cables, connectors, and other thingamabobs in a bag in the luggage, where a few extra ounces isn't going to be noticed. You may want those things handy, but you don't need to carrythem.

And Apple dropped internal modems in all of their notebooks back when they made the Intel switch.

Re:Too many missing things - like a modem.

[TheRaven64]

There are still many places - small rural motels come to mind - where you won't find WIFI That's what Bluetooth is for. Even visiting my mother in the sticks where there is no 3G coverage, I get better speeds going via my mobile phone with bluetooth than I would with a MODEM.

reviews - bah, humbug!

[constantnormal]

In virtually every review of any computer, with few exceptions, the reviewer treats the product as if it is intended to be of general use by all computer users. The truth is that no computer is of general use for everyone. People don't complain that the OLPC is underpowered, or lacks a DVD burner -- it is obviously targeted at a specific market segment. A Macbook Pro is also targeted at a different market segment -- one that attempts to replace a desktop machine, while sacrificing little along the way. The Macbook targets the cost-conscious portable computer user, who needs a machine that does a bit of everything, sacrificing perfection for cost. It's a heck of a bargain, and sells accordingly. The MBA targets a different market segment.

The MBA targets the upscale mobile user who needs a notebook for traveling, that sacrifices little in the uses one encounters while traveling. This would seem to hit the mark. How many people carry stacks of DVDs to watch while traveling? Especially when so much content is downloadable and with Apple pushing iTMS video rentals. I can easily see airport wifi video rental franchises catering to this market. Does it run Office? Yes -- either the OS X version of Office, or Windows via a variety of ways. Corporate email platforms supported? check.

The horsepower seems perfectly adequate to me, as I surf the web and am typing this on a 1 GHZ iBook G4 (my desktop machine is a venerable Powermac G5 dual 2 GHz machine, something that is pretty close the the MBA in horsepower). The 1.6/1.8 GHz Core Duo seems admirably powered to me, perhaps not to a full-time gamer, but THAT'S NOT THE MARKET THIS IS TARGETING.

If we compare the competition in this marketplace, the MBA seems very robust, with more horsepower, a better display, better keyboard, and a price that is comparable to its ultralite competitors as well. For a traveling business person, especially one with a corporate-supplied notebook, this would be a VERY desirable machine. Gotta have the corporate-approved Windows install? Install it via Boot Camp and run Windows, Apple is still happy to make the sale and get an entry into the corporate markets.

Watch and see if these machines don't start showing up at business conferences, or accompanying CEOs on weekend golfing boondoggles via the corporate jet. Or with journalists (broadcast and print) who travel a lot. Heck, a significant amount of production feature film editing has been done using less capable notebooks than this in the not-too-distant past -- although no one would use a machine of this performance level today, when others are better suited to the task (it's a DIFFERENT MARKET).

The biggest failure I can see, given the targeted market segment, is the lack of a cellular connection capability. And given that such a feature would lock one into a particular cellular network, I can understand the omission -- but a space to add such a card at a later time would have been nice.

Fer the FSM's sake, pull yer heads out and quitcher moanin about it not being the machine made personally for YOU. That machine does not exist, and likely never will. It's why we look at what's available and choose what best suits our needs. Just because I have no use for an OLPC or a high-end GPU, does not mean that those things are doomed to failure, it only means that I have no use for them. Nothing more.

If a given product satifies nobody's needs, or has a competitor that is superior in either price or fit, then it is in danger of failure. The Macbook Air is not.

Re:reviews - bah, humbug!

[willy_me]

Great comment, but I would like to make one observation.

The biggest failure I can see, given the targeted market segment, is the lack of a cellular connection capability. And given that such a feature would lock one into a particular cellular network, I can understand the omission -- but a space to add such a card at a later time would have been nice.

OSX can simply utilize a cell phone as a cellular connection via a bluetooth link. Since those who purchase a MBA will most likely already be carrying a cell with them, it's no big deal. One might however want to utilize a USB cable to ensure the cell doesn't run out of juice while in use.

Willy

Re:reviews - bah, humbug!

[TheRaven64]

I currently do this with my UMTS phone, and the bluetooth connection is the bottleneck. With HSDPA networks being deployed, bluetooth is going to be much too slow. You can get around 3-4Mb/s in the real world via an HSDPA connection, which is about ten times the speed I've ever managed to get over bluetooth. In theory, Bluetooth 2.0 EDR supports up to around 2.1Mb/s, so it might be almost fast enough, assuming no interference.

Re:reviews - bah, humbug!

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely it makes sense for a reviewer to consider all possible users, since they cannot discriminate what type of consumer is going to read the review. The consumer who reads the review can then decide for themselves whether the reported faults are important or not.

Re:reviews - bah, humbug!

[goatpunch]

The MBA targets the upscale mobile user who needs a notebook for traveling

So when the WiFi signal at the hotel is patchy and they want to switch to ethernet... and when their client gives them a copy of all the relevant files on CD/DVD... and when they need to plug in more than one USB device... they'd better hope they remembered to bring along their bulging sack of Air Accessories.

Heck, a significant amount of production feature film editing has been done using less capable notebooks

These 'less capable' notewooks- did they have FireWire ports? Thought so, film people love their FireWire.

People don't complain that the OLPC is underpowered, or lacks a DVD burner -- it is obviously targeted at a specific market segment.

The OLPC is 1/10 the Air's price, (aims to be 1/18), and they managed to give it 3 USB ports, SD slot, and audio in.

A Macbook Pro is also targeted at a different market segment -- one that attempts to replace a desktop machine, while sacrificing little along the way.

No, that's the target market for a regular laptop. Users are going to be very disappointed when they get their hands on this underperforming-but-flashy machine. It's a big step back from Apple's great MacBook Pros.

My only question wasn't answered...

[fuocoZERO]

Does it blend?

Re:My only question wasn't answered...

[DECS]

Do you have an 8 x 12" blender?

The MacBook Air does stack up well against other ultra thin laptops in its category however, mixing leading performance, graphics capabilities, a full size keyboard and display with an ultra-thin package priced very competitively. And it solves many of the engineering tradeoffs with light and thin laptops in software. So it should blend in well with the rest of the hot selling MacBook line.

How the MacBook Air stacks up against other ultra-light notebooks

Battery is Easy to Replace...

[EverLurking]

It would've been nice if the battery was removable, but in the interests of a clean, thin design, they didn't decide to do it this way. Someone did point out that usually your laptop is dated/obsolete before the stock battery is dead anyways. However, apparently taking out the battery isn't that much of a chore, 10 case screws (00 Phillips, not even the fancy Torx screws used in other Apple laptops) and 9 holding down the Lithium Polymer battery pack which is REALLY thin. Gizmodo had some gutting/tear-down pics and a video up for awhile, but they look like they've been taken down (as they did it to their Apple Review unit, I'm sure Apple isn't too pleased about that). Here is a mirror of the video and pictures: http://groups.google.com/group/mac-book-air/web/macbook-air-tear-down-pictures Actually, that Google group site also has a nice list of alternatives to resorting to a USB Ethernet dongle and some solutions to the "no built in Wireless WAN (EVDO/WiMax)" issue: http://groups.google.com/group/mac-book-air/web/networking-tweaks

Re:Listen up, airheads

[Anonymous Coward]

Some people complain about Apple products being proprietary... They should use one of Sony's compact laptops.

Air Smaller

[shmlco]

At 12.8x8.94x0.16~0.76, the Air takes up 52.63 cubic inches of space in a bag or briefcase. Your 12" PowerBook, at 10.9x8.6x1.18, takes up a whopping 110.6 cubic inches of space in the same container, or over twice as much room.

Further, the Air is only a third of an inch deeper (8.94 vs. 8.6), so in terms of depth (and in screen height when opened) they're functionally identical. As such, on a airline tray table they'd behave pretty much the same. (Since tray tables are typically 16.5" wide by 9.5-10.5" deep, the Air's extra width has little impact. Still room for it and a cup of coffee.)

Heck, going by the same calculations, the Air is even smaller than the Eee.

Re:Air Smaller

[Anonymous Coward]

Those calculations don't quite make sense. You are calculating the volume as if the average thickness is halfway between the thinnest point and the thickest point, which I find quite hard to believe, for these calculations you should just use the thickest point since the thinner areas will just be around the edge and may not amount to usable space when packing it. Going by that metric the Air will take up 86.97 cubic inches of space, which while still less than the 12" Powerbook, is more than the Eee. If you want to work out the exact volume of space the Air takes, then please find a source for a measurement of the average width of the Air and cite it.

Re:Air Smaller

[shmlco]

The calculations are based on a trapezoidal solid that's 0.16 at the base, 0.76 at the top, and with the other dimensions given. It is thick at one end and thin at the other.

Re:Air Smaller

[Anonymous Coward]

I have an eee pc... and a coworker shelled out the dinero for the air. If you put them side by side and had a person pick the "smaller" laptop they would choose the eee pc everytime.

The air is an impressive piece of engineering and a cool notebook, but if apple was aiming for the ultra portable market they missed it by several miles.

Re:Air Smaller

[drsmithy]

Further, the Air is only a third of an inch deeper (8.94 vs. 8.6), so in terms of depth (and in screen height when opened) they're functionally identical. As such, on a airline tray table they'd behave pretty much the same. (Since tray tables are typically 16.5" wide by 9.5-10.5" deep, the Air's extra width has little impact. Still room for it and a cup of coffee.)

Or you could get a regular MB, which takes up essentially the same amount of space on the tray table as an MBA, but is substantially more capable and leaves you with enough change to buy an iPhone and an AppleTV as well.

It's a struggle to see why anyone interested in a useful computer, rather than a cool looking toy, would by an MBA instead of an MB. It just ain't that much smaller.

Re:Air Smaller

[zakezuke]

At 12.8x8.94x0.16~0.76, the Air takes up 52.63 cubic inches of space in a bag or briefcase. Your 12" PowerBook, at 10.9x8.6x1.18, takes up a whopping 110.6 cubic inches of space in the same container, or over twice as much room. I don't buy the Macbook's displacement @ 52.63 in^3. I'm not going to say you are wrong, but I'm going to wager that the average height is 1/2 inch at best, not .46 inches. I would guess it's between 60 in^3 to 80 in^3. The area where it's .16inches would seem to be so small that an average max/min height would seem to be inaccurate.

I would call it an ultra portable, but I would strongly suspect that the Asus Eee has a lower displacement.

Re:Air Smaller

[shmlco]

Examining the Air's cross-section, and calculating the top and the bottom back, front, and midsection separately as discrete elements, and accounting for the radius curves along the sides, I got a combined total of 56.81 cubic inches. Larger than 52.6, but still smaller than the Eee.

Of course, that got me wondering if what was fit for the goose was fit for the gander, and lead me to search out a cross-section of the Eee, which isn't a simple trapezoid either. In fact, the Eee bulges rather sharply about a third of the way back to nearly its maximum thickness, which means it too is larger than I first calculated.

Shall we run those numbers?

Re:Air Smaller

[zakezuke]

Examining the Air's cross-section, and calculating the top and the bottom back, front, and midsection separately as discrete elements, and accounting for the radius curves along the sides, I got a combined total of 56.81 cubic inches. Larger than 52.6, but still smaller than the Eee. So you calculate an average height as .496in where I guessed 1/2 inch at best. So it looks like I may be incorrect about the displacement of the Asus eee being smaller, still a good guess.

and lead me to search out a cross-section of the Eee, which isn't a simple trapezoid either. In fact, the Eee bulges rather sharply about a third of the way back to nearly its maximum thickness Well, I suspect your estimate on the Eee is closer to reality than the MBAir was before. While not a simple trapezoid its thickness is 0.9~1.5. The MBAir has very sloped sides where the Eee is more square. I would guess a displacement of 66 in^3 or an average height of 1.14 inches.

Re:Air Smaller

[el americano]

I think the only fair way to resolve this is to have a water immersion measurement to determine it's actual volume. Have you bought one yet?

Re:Air Smaller

[goatpunch]

The calculations are based on a trapezoidal solid that's 0.16 at the base

Interesting choice- when you could have based the calculations on... reality. The MBA is wedge-shaped, but clearly not 5 times thicker at one end than the other. The only part that could be .16" thick are the very tips (which sharply curve away from the main body)- but as someone pointed out the other day the very edges of a pickup truck are .16" thick too. I could also be considered to between 6 feet and 1 inch tall(because that's how tall my toes are) - it's not very useful.

Why bother? Get an Eee.

[sudog]

I did. I'm glad I did, the thing rocks, especially after I plugged 2GB RAM and a 8GB SDHC into it.

Here's why an Eee PC rocks:

- Eee software is 99.9% hackable. Replace your OS with another distro, or boot off the SD slot.
- Eee hardware is hugely hackable. For another $450, you can plug in additional USB hubs, a GPS module, bluetooth, another SDHC card reader with another 8GB SDHC card, another 4GB USB drive, a 802.11N wifi, an FM transmitter, a Conexant modem, and a 2GB DDR2 memory module. All of it internally. Yourself.
- Eee hardware is so cheap, you won't worry about breaking it when you hack it. Just buy another one.
- 18 second boot-up.
- 4 second shutdown.
- Super-portable, about the size of a large-print paperback.
- Super-portable! Only 0.92kg!!

Honestly, for the features on the $350 version, I don't know why anyone would bother with anything else if they want an ultraportable. And if they're willing to buy a more expensive machine, then go with the Thinkpad X61s, or wait for the upcoming Lenovo ultraportable, or a Sony Vaio.. Why pay the premium for the Mac except to get the Mac software and usability?

Re:Why bother? Get an Eee.

[evil_aar0n]

I'll bite. Along the lines of "X Windows is only good for holding more X term screens," I _love_ Expose for its ability to show me what I'm working on - on all my screens - at the touch of a button. The other day, I wanted to send a partial screen capture to an associate. I hit cmd-shift-4, and selected exactly what I wanted to send. Didn't have to edit the picture to crop off stuff I didn't want, etc. Maybe Windows has that, now. I don't know - I pretty gave up on MS a while ago.

I also like the ease of use and simplicity that comes with owning OX 10.5. I don't have to muck with it. I muck with things enough trying to get Solaris 10 to do what I want as part of my job; mucking with my workstation, a MacBook Pro, is not something I want to do. It's my rock of sanity in a stormy sea. Ubuntu's nice - I like it and recommend it to people who've already bought PC hardware. But it's not nearly as simple as OS X. Dependencies? What are those? ". ./configure ; make ; make install"? Huh? Nope, there's an extra cost for Mac OS & its hardware, but, for me - though I'll grant not all - it's worth it. If I can't use Mac OS on an eee PC, I don't want it.

But, it's a wide world out there; we don't all have to like the same things, thank goodness.

Re:Why bother? Get an Eee.

[DaveCBio]

Personally, I am waiting for the touchscreen version of the Eee that is rumored to be in the works. I saw a user made hack version where he put in his own touchscreen and it was pretty damn cool.

Re:Why bother? Get an Eee.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll bite. Along the lines of "X Windows is only good for holding more X term screens,"

It's quite obvious you know nothing about Linux desktop environments from the past decade.

I _love_ Expose for its ability to show me what I'm working on - on all my screens - at the touch of a button.

I've been doing this on Linux for years.

The other day, I wanted to send a partial screen capture to an associate. I hit cmd-shift-4, and selected exactly what I wanted to send. Didn't have to edit the picture to crop off stuff I didn't want, etc. Maybe Windows has that, now. I don't know - I pretty gave up on MS a while ago.

Considering alt+print screen existed back in Windows 95, must of been a very long time ago.

Dependencies? What are those? ". ./configure ; make ; make install"?

What the hell are you talking about? Nobody has needed to type those commands on Ubuntu to get dependencies and such working, infact, the package manager handles everything transparently so the user doesn't even need to know.

Re:Why bother? Get an Eee.

[sudog]

Be sure to track down the source of those rumours. Asus is happy about the sales volume of the Eee, I'm not so sure a touchscreen is even in the works.

Re:NOT Bad placement

[TMonks]

I think it's a perfectly valid complaint, especially for someone like me who already spent $50 on the macbook airline adapter and would now have to buy a new one specifically for the macbook air. I would also venture to guess, based on the macbook air's target market, that I am certainly not alone in this situation.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[AdamReyher]

Knowing Apple, it probably is an exclusive contract on that particular motherboard. However, given the fact that Intel pretty much designed the thing, I think the could put out a different but similar form-factor motherboard in a couple months time. Knowing Intel, I can guarantee they'll be pursing that avenue. - Adam

what the hell are you talking about

[Anonymous Coward]

"the extra carbon footprint the sealed-in battery exchange costs is ok"

First of all, the phrase "Carbon Footprint" is so last year, and meaningless. I'd like to tell you why, but I suspect you'd rather not know. It's more fun to say "carbon footprint", and it makes you seem thoughtful. I say stick with what makes you feel happy.

Second of all, the sealed-in battery exchange makes no difference, since "sealed" in this case refers to 6 screws. By the time you need to get a new battery, you'll be able to do it yourself.

And the laptop is merely trendly and fashionable. It would have been tremendously more useful to be 1/2" thicker and include an optical drive.

The battery life is awful. I have an HP NC8000 which is now 5 years old and gets 5 hours of useful life on wifi as long as I don't use the optical drive. I replaced the battery last year since after 4 years, battery life was down to 3.5. That's *really* reducing my carbon footprint. Whatever the hell that means.

Armchair Quarterback

[shmlco]

"You can actually sell electronic gear on a level competitive with Dell, or anyone else. ... extremely cool, extremely well engineered electronics."

Typical financial analysis from someone whose probably only managed and owned a paper route.

The first point to consider is that if they concentrate on hitting Dell's price points they'll have to do the same as Dell and start going for the cheapest components they can find. They'll also have to cut R&D, design, and materials costs. As such, those "extremely well engineered electronics" will begin to be anything but.

And speaking of R&D, one has to remember that Apple, unlike Dell, has an entire operating system division to support. Cut costs and reduce margins, and ultimately you begin to cut out all of those things that make a Mac a Mac.

Next, what's wrong with being high-end? Do you see Lexus or Mercedes or BMW or Jaguar going after the econo-box market?

Further, you're making a common assumption that the "make it up in volume" approach always applies. Making more machines means higher fixed costs, as you need more factories, suppliers, shipping, management, etc.. And I'm willing to bet that Apple is already getting the best deals possible from its suppliers. Besides, do you know how many more machines they'd have to sell to make up the difference if they cut prices 30%?

Which leads us to the next point. You're assuming that price is the primary reason people aren't buying Macs. I mean, it can't be proprietary software needs, Window's requirements, comfort levels, corporate hardware requirements, existing software ownership, lack of games, or the "if it isn't broken too bad then there's no need to fix it" mentality.

If the market isn't ready to switch, then cutting costs simply means cutting revenues.

Finally, take a peek at Apple's stock performance vs. Dells. I'd say they're competing quite well.

Re:Armchair Quarterback

[hattig]

And speaking of R&D, one has to remember that Apple, unlike Dell, has an entire operating system division to support.

Apple sells how many Mac OS X devices a year? 8m or so? That's ignoring the Touch and AppleTV and iPhone which are derivatives that leverage the technology.

How much does Apple spend on Mac OS X development each year? $200m? That includes licensing patents and technology and buying out third party stuff like Coverflow.

200m / 8m = $25 per device - that's far cheaper than licensing Vista Premium as an OEM.
Oh, and they sell boat loads of each new OS release to existing users. If every two years, 20% of the existing users (of say 16m computers, or 2 years past sales) spend $130 on the upgrade, that's $416m - that's covered the OS development on its own assuming the $200m figure above. Even if Mac OS X development costs were double, it would still only be a cost of $25 per computer sold overall.

Anyone know of a reasonable ballpark figure for the yearly development costs of Mac OS X (not iLife, not iWork)?

Stock Price

[shmlco]

Oops. Blew the stock link. Here's the correct version, where you can see that Apple is outperforming the market by over 2,000%.

Yep, Apple's "marketing strategies" and "business practices" really suck.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[kenmtraveller]

I don't know what VAIO you looked at , but my Sony VAIO G1 has a carbon fiber case, a 12" screen (I think), an internal writable DVD drive, and wifi, and it weighs just over a kilogram, and gets way better battery life than this Apple laptop - I often get 6hrs.

Ken

It's the software, babe.

[argent]

Eee software is 99.9% hackable. Replace your OS with another distro, or boot off the SD slot.

The 'distro' of my choice isn't legally available for the Eee PC, nor for anyone else in the target market for the Macbook Air.

Why pay the premium for the Mac except to get the Mac software and usability?

Well, that's kind of the point, isn't it? Why would you bother comparing it with anything that's not running OSX?

Re:It's the software, babe.

[sudog]

"Legally"? Ah, I see. OS/X is your "distro" of choice. Well, the choice is of course one of usability and friendliness versus FSF-styled freedom. But for sheer volume of software (and quality, since you're willing to pay for it) Windows XP work on it straight out of the box.

And I would compare an Air with an actually useful ultraportable because the only thing the Air has going for it is super thin-ness.. the dimensions aside from height unfortunately strike it right off my list of "bring with me when I travel" devices.

One's the size of a large-print novel and fits into my inside pocket. One is huge and wouldn't fit in anything but a briefcase. To me, the choice is clear.

If I do say so . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine a boot stamping on a human face, forever. Now imagine that boot connected to an American and the face being yours.

Brilliantly played.

Re:Listen up, airheads

[weg]

Apple also surprisingly has the least expensive 64gb SSDrive on the market. Hundreds less than retail and competitors.

An 64GB SSD drive costs around 900$ (e.g., from Samsung), Apple charges $999 on top of the price for the MBA with an 80GB parallel ATA harddisk, which is, of course, removed when you buy the SSD version (a value of around $70). While that's surprisingly cheap for Apple (considering their prices for RAM), it's definitely not hundreds less than retail and competitors.

Re:Will we ever see a Macbook Air on display, thou

[ChunderDownunder]

Simple, you can look but not touch!

Put a locked display case in the centre of the room. People will flock from far away just to catch a glimpse of it!

"But it has no firewire port!"
"But it has no gigabit ethernet!"
"But it has no DVD writer!"
"It costs $US700 more than a MacBook!"

"But it's less than 200mm thick!"

Wrong

[kramulous]

Tell me how I upgraded to Ubuntu on my MBP? My DVD drive on this machine doesn't work, and I don't plan on getting it fixed. USB drive worked flawlessly. Or maybe it's the rEFIt I installed.

Re:Wrong

[JoeCommodore]

Hmm maybe they changed it for intel, back when you went to OSX on the PPC, USB drive boot/install was an impossibility (I had to swap preloaded drives on older macs with only USB when the CD was gone)

Re:NOT Bad placement

[Shawn Parr]

I don't know why they complain about the other power adaptor besides just adding words to their article.

Well many of us laptop users, including us Macbook and Macbook Pro owners, have multiple power adapters. I have two magsafe adapters, one for at home and when I travel, and one at the office. That way in a typical month when I only work with the MB at work or at home I can pop it in a bag without having to grab the power cable.

Why is that relevant? Well if I were to decide to buy an Air (which I won't, doesn't fit my needs) it would be nice if it would work with my extra power adapter so that I wouldn't have to buy another one. Now I know that I would either have to arrange my desk so that the Air would be on the edge, or get another new adapter with the smaller right angle plug.

Re:I hope you buy a box that stabs you in the face

[armada]

I'm afraid you lost me. How did I manage to make it sound like it was his fault that the OS had bugs? Was it when I said that all sofware has bugs, specially new extremely complex code?

Many a true word ...

[chris_sawtell]

This MBA thingie appears to me to be just a fashion accessory for the wealthy to flaunt - complete with a CPU installed.

When the fiscal patrician's children get sick of their latest toy, beacuse it's running at half cock, can I replace the battery and do real work in full sunlight?

I thought not - Looks to me that I'd be better off saving myself about $1400. :-)

Jest is just so wonderful.

Re:Many a true word ...

[sailor164]

And: bought one and have a misterious spiderweb appear on the LCD. I protect the thing like gold, and Apple say I smashed it. Googled it....lots of people with this problem and the MBA specific.

No Kensington Lock

[Paul_Hindt]

A review of the MBA at Tom's Hardware points out that there is NO Kensington lock point on the notebook.

Re:Will we ever see a Macbook Air on display, thou

[ChunderDownunder]

Oops that should have read "But it's less than 20mm thick!"

Oh Well, "Up to 10 times thinner!" :)

Decent review but...

[binary paladin]

The conclusion really killed me.

"Give us the lovechild of the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro, and it's all over."

It's called the MacBook. Lighter and smaller than the MBP yet more powerful and possessing more features than the MBA. I'm not quite sure what the lovechild of those two products would produce if not the regular MacBook. A slightly thinner MacBook? An aluminum MacBook?

Why not just say: "But we want dedicated video AND we want more ports and we want it thinner! Oh yes, and drop the price by $500.00 and we'd buy it in a heartbeat." Well, I really want some ice cream, and the nice thing is that unlike that sort of wish, I'm gonna get what I want in about 2 minutes.

Superdrive

[Cancel-Or-Allow]

I just wished that the super drive had a way to work on a PC. Even if it had to have a tiny Nokia power port on it to make up for the needed power. I'd still buy it in a heartbeat.

Call me when they actually do research.

[CrazyWingman]

FTA: "Also rare for an ultraportable is the Air's full-size keyboard, which adds some (worthy) width to the body."

As the owner of a 12" Powerbook (which is allowing me to type this comment), I can attest to the fact that it was, most definitely, *not* the full-size keyboard that required the extra width.

Leopard may have issues on upgrades from Tiger

[kabz]

I upgraded a couple of laptops from Tiger to Leopard, and both of them have wireless issues. Typically, they take much longer to reconnect after waking, maybe 30 secs, and obviously if they do ever drop the connection, then it is much easier to notice the problem.

On the other hand, my MacBook, with a fresh install of Leopard has been spotless when using the wireless.

It's looking like there may be issues with the upgrades, and I'll be doing a complete reinstall on my wife's MacBook, once Dave Nanian gets Super Duper backup running properly on Leopard again.

Re:Leopard may have issues on upgrades from Tiger

[p0tat03]

FYI I did a full wipe and install for Leopard, feeling that my Tiger machine was taking too long to boot, and simply wanting to start with a fresh home directory... The kernel panics were abound all over the place, especially when I was pushing my throughput to its limits.

The only bug I'm experiencing now with 10.5.1 is the inability for the machine to use my router's DNS, necessitating me to specify my own (God bless you, OpenDNS). At least this has a workaround.

I *would* go back down to Tiger, but I love the new garbage collecting Objective-C too much to do that...

MBA != UMPC

[itsdapead]

Going by weight, emmmmmmaybe we can kind of, sort of call this ultra-portable, but like you, I've always considered the foot print to be an important aspect

Reducing the footprint much more means that you lose the full-sized keyboard, and the screen that will show the width of an A4 page at 100% + a couple of tool palettes. The MacBook Air is not an "ultraportable" in the sense of the tiny Sonys or even the Asus EEE. Its just a particularly thin and light implementation of the popular 13" widescreen form-factor.

The name should be "MacBook Executive" - its for suits who want to conspicuosly sit in business class and tweak their Powerpoints to ensure that they don't convey any actual information, and wouldn't be seen dead using the same type of "cheap" MacBook that they gave their daughter when she started college. Looking swish is an important technical specification.

Re:I hope you buy a box that stabs you in the face

[ungybungy]

Would you play the role of apologist if this were a Windows Vista discussion?

Re:I hope you buy a box that stabs you in the face

[armada]

A. "I learned about 15 years ago not to buy the first of anything." (Anything) B. apologist? does that not require an apology of some kind?

great review but...

[scolbert]

Great review but I don't believe what they say about the 8 hour charge time on the battery. They've got a faulty battery on their unit... info on MacBook Air battery here.

Re:It's Like Apple Is Mocking Its Fans

[M-RES]

Im a diehard Apple fan (I guess)... I've been using their products for 20+ years so it's probably as apt a description as any (apart from being a Linux fan as well), but to me the MBA does seem like an overpriced and under-equipped machine. I can't really see who it's aimed at truthfully. The Macbook Pro is not massive in comparison (it's really not - I mean, for years now they've been telling us they're 'x'-inches 'thin') and for a tiny bit more in price you get a LOT more machine. Much faster processor, much better port spec, optical drive etc etc etc. For most people, an optical drive will be of paramount importance. So much so that a lot of MBA owners will probably buy the additional external optical drive for travelling - hence negating the size saving in the MBA. To rely solely on other people's optical drives could be very tricky unless you know their network settings and all the relevant security info (not always to hand if the IT guys aren't around to tell you) at the company you're visiting. It's the new '20th Anniversary Mac' or 'Cube'. It looks nice, but it's not very practical for many people. It's a good thing that Apple sometimes take design risks, and it's not surprising that sometimes they don't get it right for the majority, but invariably sometime they do (original iMac with no floppy drive anyone!?). If it fails, it fails... no biggie. If it succeeds in the market sector Apple are aiming for, then good on them - time will tell. Apple fans don't always 'shoot their load' over Apple's 'latest and greatest'. They're as vocal as anyone when Apple get it wrong - and they're not afraid to tell Jobs the truth (people still wave Newtons at him from time to time during keynotes).