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

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: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.

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: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: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.