All the scandals, that raised in january-february are now not so active, and lots of people NOW have a MacBook Air.
And they all say it's not bad at all, many of them love the Air, thare are lots of positive reviews on http://www.maconair.com">http://www.maconair.com I don't think that was a bad idea to create a nice but not so powerful laptop.
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS AS MUCH AS MY CELL PHONE!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously, why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less?
Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS XXX LBS!!!!!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously. Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less? Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS XXX LBS!!!!!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously. Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less? Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.
> Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less?
> Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal
> waste of money.
What should I say?
Because weight (and size) DO matter. At least sometimes.
Even if it is "just a few hundred grams", it all adds up in the end.
And then you're going to either have your briefcase complete and still portable or you'll provide some additional unilateral stress to your shoulder, that will make your spine hurt two to five years earlier...
It's just that simple.
If it's not for you, don't buy it.
But I can imagine a whole lot of things, that don't make any sense to me and that still are valuable.
Besides:
Screen resolution, luminosity, contrast and proper font rendering are much more important to lessen eyestrain than the shere size. In fact, most books are remarkably less then 17" in spanning - why exactly should a screen of comparable size be worse for your eyes?
Let me start by saying that I am no computer expert. I do, however, have an opinion about the Macbook Air. I actually did pre order the computer. I am a medical student who is required to carry around a laptop at all times. I have been carrying around a Dell Inspiron 6000 from undergrad, which is obviously less than portable. For a person like me, who simply needs this computer for internet, powerpoint, email, word processing, etc. It seems like a pretty good option. It will fit in my bag and weigh less than any one of my books. I highly doubt that I will ever notice the 4,200rpm hard drive or the lack of an optical drive (especially when the university installs the borrow program on the network). The only option I chose was the 1.8 Ghz processor. The price was a bit much, but oh well. I think it is important to remember that there is a lot to be said about the portability. 3 lbs and less than an inch thick for someone who is carrying around a computer and a couple books at all times is a pretty good setup. Granted, at Universities and Hospitals there is always wireless around too, and with wireless printing the whole package is pretty attractive.
A lot of what I'm reading revolves around people forgetting that not everyone needs 4gb ram and 3Ghz processors...
It weighs a bit more,(3.7lb) but has 14 inch screen (full sized keyboard), faster processor, bigger memory, expendable slots, 2.5 inch hard drives, ports,.. all the functionality you could want.
It weighs 3.3 pounds, has 14 inch screen (thus a full sized keyboard), faster processor, all the ports, an optical drive, 8 HOURS of battery life.
It is even very sturdy physically!
Even production values are higher with these top of the line Japanese notebooks. Macbooks are made in Taiwan/China by Taiwanese OEMs while these models are made in Japan. (Yeah, they do still produce the highest quality electronics.)
There are tons of models with similar functionality as the Macbook Air in east Asia. (Here, ultra portables are the norm.) For example, Samsung builds notebooks almost as thin.
The points is, Macbook Air is pretty mediocre in its technology. Its nothing revolutionary at all hardware wise. (maybe except the touchpad)
Apple is great in design, marketing, software, and dealing with the media industry. (itunes..)
But it is not a high tech hardware firm at all. It just borrows existing technologies, puts them in a nice designed box and manufacture them through Taiwanese OEMs.
And even its display is more than one inch smaller and the price is more than twice as high and the cpu is much slower, has a smaller cache and the thingy ships with half the amount of RAM...
More than twice as thick, plus:
it OPTIONALLY has more RAM. For a little more than the same price you'll get exactly the same amount of RAM.
Additionally it weighs 3.7lb WITHOUT optical drive—so it weighs 23-33% more—and it has a lower battery life.
Neat, only more than two to three times as thick, half the RAM, 500$ more...
We have a nice saying here in Germany which translates to "You cannot compare apples to pears" which is exactly what all you guys have been doing here.
There are laptops out there, that have more features etc. but this usually comes at a cost—either in terms of money, weight or size.
Plus:
None of those I've seen so far has a backlit keyboard :-p
Being honest:
I would have wanted to have some sort of dock connector or at least an additional Firewire (800) port in that thing.
Heh, what you don't understand is to people with money, how good it looks is more important than how functional it is. They don't actually sit in an IT cube with ethernet access only and copy files from and to PC's or write some industrial strength code. They just sip latte all day in some starbucks, or write some blog and socialize on facebook. So wireless and 4200rpm HDD will be plenty for them. This will sell, for sure.
I don't quite get the general opinion about the MacBook Air. It is priced competitively against other portables in its weight class. It is faster than competing products in its weight class too.
lets face it. Apple tries to market existing products or just brand something to look trendy.
This is a great example. Add some chrome hubcaps to an old lincoln-boom, you just pimped my ride apple...
wish this fade would change but people are more concerned with how it looks rather than actual performance.
All I can say is that I'm very happy I kept my MacBook Core Duo.
I bought my MacBook in May 2006, and after almost 2 years Apple releases a machine that is much, much more expensive, is not any faster, and has much less functionality.
The MacBook Air is a gorgeous design that I lust after... until I see the multitude of compromises and sticker price. It's almost like the Cube all over again.
I'm in for one when the 2nd gen comes out (or at least the next revision). Awesome, just awesome. Apple might not be the first to come out with something but they're usually the first to do it right.
the mac herd will buy these things because of how they look and their efforts to be "cool" to peers. its art to them. for the rest of us using logic, it'll never make sense to pay more money for less functionality.
If for one do not want to carry what I do not need. I hardly need a optical drive so I'm fine without one, as with most of the other stuff found on the more "standard" laptops. When on the move I don't need anything but a USB slot (to do backup on a stick) and wireless is everywhere so that is fine also.
I like that the Air is not so bulky but more importantly it is light while still having a decent size monitor and an full size keyboard.
The slow disk does make me wonder so I shall wait till there are some reviews before making a buy or not. But I do expect that with 2 GB space it will only really be when starting apps that it will be felt.
including Mr. Anand whose judgment has been impaired for quite some time. I am terribly sorry to say this but please Anand, keep your hobby at your blog posts. That was enough already.
very few? i'm sorry, when is
no ethernet port,
no opitical drive.
no expansion slot (pc card or otherwise). no slot for a future dock.
1 usb port!!!
no media card reader
and a 1.8 hdd
Few compromises. Laptop is nice looking, amazing infact. But its form winning over funtion.
Steve said that now people can rent movies on itunes. when i'm on a plane and want to watch a movie... sorry no can do. you must copy it over. but wait, how do i get it on their. hmmm.
so many problems with this thing, yet you claim 'making very few compromises"
what video card does this thing use?
and the perfomance of a 1.8 hdd. like you said yourself, get the flash drive. because 1.8hdd is bottom of the pits performance, perfect for an ipod. Talk about hell for operating an os.
tomshardware ran tests on some a year or so ago. that 15-16mb read rate, and 20mb writes are just amazing.
apple could have went with the 1.3ghz core cpus, because the cpu will be waiting for data
Compared to standard notebooks, agreed, the MacBook Air has made a number of compromises. But compared to ultra portables, some of the biggest compromises aren't there.
I've used ultra portables almost exclusively for years, starting back in my early college days. The keyboard is almost always bad enough where it hinders my productivity, and CPU speed does matter - there's a big difference between a ULV Merom at 1 - 1.33GHz and one running at 1.8GHz.
The MacBook Air isn't perfect by any means, but it looks to be a good attempt at an ultra portable for those who need it.
It includes this:
VGA-out (ihmo more usefull with more projectors)
headphone/microphone jacks
USB 2.0, mini-FireWire, SD card reader
PC Card slot
modem, Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth
DVD burner
Price as reviewed/starting price $2,149/$1,999
Processor 1.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7600
Memory 1GB, 667MHz DDR2
Hard drive 120GB 5,400rpm
Chipset Intel 965
Graphics Mobile Intel Express 950GM (integrated)
Operating system Windows Vista Premium
Dimensions (WDH) 11.1 x 8.5 x .77 inches
Screen size (diagonal) 12.1 inches
System weight / Weight with AC adapter [pounds] 2.4/3.1 pounds
Category Ultraportable
The processor is a bit slower but the review was almost 6 months ago.
look at how thick that is. OMG .77in. a whole .01 thick then the AIR
and yes the keyboard is smaller. But i've gotten used to a smaller keyboard as long as its not crazy small.
So for apple to jump up and down like they invented the wheel, is fine for apple. For the media to then crown them like they are the holy grail of technology, shame on the media.
Wander over to Dell and check out their ultra-portable 13.3in laptop.
It has the following:
3-year warranty
Home Premium
2.2Ghz Core 2 Duo
3GB Memory
200GB 7200rpm drive
CD/DVD Burner
128MB nVidia 8400GS/HDMI out
Wireless-N
Bluetooth
Fingerprint reader
Ethernet
Microsoft Office Home & Student
Adobe Premiere and Photoshop Elements
85kwh battery
All this for $1878. The computer is approx. 4.7lbs, but has a 9 hour battery life and is only 1.3inches high.
cramped keyboard, 1 inch smaller screen, A video GPU that is unable to fully run the included Vista and not a LED screen. Half the ram and $200-400 more. A much slower and power sucking CPU just sweetens the deal. Thankfully the smaller screen keeps the battery life within reach of the air
Apple didn't invent the ultra portable but they made one with full size keyboard and a wonderful screen. I would prefer to have a removeable battery but that would require extra weight and at least greater length or width to handle the enclosure and connections. I want native DVI out because it provides many more options.
I never said that was a perfect example. Its 6+ months old.
BUT AT THE SAME THICKNESS AS THE AIR:
IT HAS:
PC CARD SLOT
DVD DRIVE
ETHERNET
MORE USB
SD CARD READER
And is still as thick as the air. And as light, and the battery lasts nearly enough.
You apple fan boi's are as bad as the people that by bose. You think by paying for the name you are getting something 'different' and unique. when in fact other compainies are doing the same thing if not better.
> I never said that was a perfect example. Its 6+ months old.
>
> BUT AT THE SAME THICKNESS AS THE AIR:
>
Check the details again. At the thickets place the Air is like your example and on the thinnest it's like nothing while your example is the same all over so on average the air is half the thickness.
> IT HAS:
>
> PC CARD SLOT
And when did anybody last use one? I have an old P3 where I use it for a wireless NIC but thats the first time ever I found use for that slot.
> DVD DRIVE
Needed for? Unless you rent movies you would hardly ever need it so who cares - when needed hook one up or use the one in a different machine.
> ETHERNET
Because? If really needed there is USB to ethernet that cost peanuts.
> MORE USB
Again - why? Mouse, keyboard - it has Bluetooth.
> SD CARD READER
>
Just hook up the camera instead or get a mem card with wireless on it for $99.
> And is still as thick as the air. And as light, and the battery > lasts nearly enough.
5 hours sound okay. Once the battery is dead the machine will be obsolete anyway and door stops don't need battery power.
> You apple fan boi's are as bad as the people that by bose. You
> think by paying for the name you are getting something 'different' > and unique. when in fact other compainies are doing the same thing > if not better.
>
How about showing a piece with the same solutions then. It's a free world just get what you like and stop the name calling.
> But OMG, it has a apple sticker on the front.
I could care less. Quality, functionality, design, price and so on matters. Brands mean nothing. Except please tell us what you buy so we can avoid being associated with your kind in any way :-)
Heh... yeah... because Steve told you so, you don't need any of those things. Excellent reason to dismiss those features as unnecessary. The thing is that Steve is advertising this as a total solution when it obviously lacks numerous features that many people use daily. Of course, this thing isn't for everyone regardless of Steve's statement so get what works for you.
Can it boot from a shared media device over the wireless network? Hopefully it can either do that or boot from USB DVD drives or else you're up a creek when something goes 'bad', for example. Can you use the Bluetooth mouse/keyboard while booting (drivers loaded during boot of the OS installer of choice)? Sometimes 'simple' is pretty important.
Then get the 64GB SSD that's offered. Sure, it's an extra $1,000, but it solves your HD speed issue. Just because you don't fit the target market doesn't make the product crap.
Its the usual apple "optional" rip-off scheme - only this time you basicly have to go for it if you want to actually work with this puppy. With an additional 900 bucks this thing unfortunately doesnt look so attractive anymore.
An all-in-one card reader? There's a absolute deluge of macs with that built-in.... Complain about the integrated graphics, about no expresscard slot, but stick your cards, you're flaky optical media..... :)
Windows OEM's buy gaming companies so they can sell well-designed behemoths with too many options. There is no real parallel to Apple, and if you follow their choices it's dumb obvious why they are able to get away with what truly seems preposterous every once in a while.
CES who?
This is PERFECT!
I had just ordered a five pound black MacBook for my 80's mother, and it's going back!
It was to be her first ever computer, and was chosen for it's light weight, small size, and easy to see white-on-black keys.
At only three pounds (almost HALF the weight)and with a brighter, easer to read screen the MacBook Air is just right.
She will not be doing video editing, gaming, or use it to record HDTV shows.
She just wants to do word processing, email, and internet.
You could use a Celeron 300A for that!
Plus she'll get to have all the geeks drooling all over it! ;)
You're supposed to use the airport (wireless). The loss of optical drive is significant, how do you update the OS in a year or two when Apple releases a new version? You're expected to use an external? Then it's not very portable is it?
I am thinking about boxing my optical drive in a USB 2.0 enclosure so I can use it with all of my computers. Maybe that is an option with these too if you don't like using the WiFi for that.
The best I've seen in my laptop testing is around 7.5MBps of real throughput. That works out to 60Mbps - so better than 802.11g theoretical maximum, but still about 2/3 the speed of 100Mbit Ethernet. (Note also that many 802.11n chips seem to get more like 4-5MBps average rates, in ideal circumstances.) Now, go use any decent laptop these days and you get Gigabit, with speeds of around 40MBps easily achievable (the bottleneck generally being the hard drive(s) involved in transfers).
7.5MB/s really is not that terrible compared to fast ethernet. Fast ethernet typically only gets 6-9MB/s from windows to windows transfers(standard file sharing), and I've personally seen 10MB/s with Linux -> Windows with Samba, and 11.4MB/s with Linux -> Windows iSCSI.
GbE on the other hand really does not get much more than 30MB/s sustained for long periods of time. It has nothing really to do so much with the HDDs speeds as the disk block size vs TCP/IP packet sizes, and conversion. This of course would be on the garden variety home user type hardware, and laptop hardware should not be any better, or probably even as good. The new Windows Vista + TCP/IP stack etc, is purportedly supposed to fix this issue, but I guess we'll have to wait and see, because from what I understand it is still a work in progress.
Still, your point is made; GbE > 802.11n concerning transfers, although, if you didn't need security, firewire networking would do pretty well . . .
Anyhow for a Portable PC, I think I would rather have a modded Asus Eee, with a 80GB HDD in it. Something for mobile media files, and to have something on hand to upload RAW images to from my DSLR. Then again, I am not much for mobile system, except for what they can help me with while I am away from my desktop.
However, If I were working in the wireless internet business, etc, and needed to have a PC on a rooftop with me while aligning an antenna or something, then the Mac Air would probably be the last laptop on the planet I'd need/want.
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pink78 - Monday, April 7, 2008 - link
All the scandals, that raised in january-february are now not so active, and lots of people NOW have a MacBook Air.And they all say it's not bad at all, many of them love the Air, thare are lots of positive reviews on http://www.maconair.com">http://www.maconair.com
I don't think that was a bad idea to create a nice but not so powerful laptop.
StupidMonkey - Sunday, January 20, 2008 - link
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS AS MUCH AS MY CELL PHONE!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously, why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less?Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.
StupidMonkey - Sunday, January 20, 2008 - link
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS XXX LBS!!!!!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously. Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less? Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.StupidMonkey - Sunday, January 20, 2008 - link
...can you really be? I dont understand all this "OH MY GOD IT WEIGHS XXX LBS!!!!!" Are you people truly so lazy that carrying around a few pounds hinders your day? Are you so out of shape that it wears you out? I understand that portable is nice, I understand that there are times you have to move your laptop 100 times a day, but seriously. Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less? Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal waste of money. Most importantly, someone who spends that much time on their laptop should be more concerned with screen size than they should weight. If you rarely use it, then you would not be carrying it around all the time, and a small screen should be ok. But if you are on it all day long, a larger screen will have less eyestrain. This is better for your eyes, and better for your ability to stay awake while on the job. If ultra portability is really what you need, get a PDA.deeeee - Monday, January 21, 2008 - link
> Why do you want to pay more money for something that weighs less?> Regardless of how wealthy you are, or are not, its a colossal
> waste of money.
What should I say?
Because weight (and size) DO matter. At least sometimes.
Even if it is "just a few hundred grams", it all adds up in the end.
And then you're going to either have your briefcase complete and still portable or you'll provide some additional unilateral stress to your shoulder, that will make your spine hurt two to five years earlier...
It's just that simple.
If it's not for you, don't buy it.
But I can imagine a whole lot of things, that don't make any sense to me and that still are valuable.
Besides:
Screen resolution, luminosity, contrast and proper font rendering are much more important to lessen eyestrain than the shere size. In fact, most books are remarkably less then 17" in spanning - why exactly should a screen of comparable size be worse for your eyes?
walke219 - Friday, January 18, 2008 - link
Let me start by saying that I am no computer expert. I do, however, have an opinion about the Macbook Air. I actually did pre order the computer. I am a medical student who is required to carry around a laptop at all times. I have been carrying around a Dell Inspiron 6000 from undergrad, which is obviously less than portable. For a person like me, who simply needs this computer for internet, powerpoint, email, word processing, etc. It seems like a pretty good option. It will fit in my bag and weigh less than any one of my books. I highly doubt that I will ever notice the 4,200rpm hard drive or the lack of an optical drive (especially when the university installs the borrow program on the network). The only option I chose was the 1.8 Ghz processor. The price was a bit much, but oh well. I think it is important to remember that there is a lot to be said about the portability. 3 lbs and less than an inch thick for someone who is carrying around a computer and a couple books at all times is a pretty good setup. Granted, at Universities and Hospitals there is always wireless around too, and with wireless printing the whole package is pretty attractive.A lot of what I'm reading revolves around people forgetting that not everyone needs 4gb ram and 3Ghz processors...
grosskopf - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
Check Toshiba RX1http://www.dynamism.com/rx1/main.shtml">http://www.dynamism.com/rx1/main.shtml
weighs 1.88 pounds!, has 12 inch screen and an optical drive! as well as many ports.
Even its size is smaller. Its thicker, but other dimensions are 20-30% shorter.
Yeah, it also comes with LED back-lit screens, and SSD hard drives.
Or how about Fusitsu S6510?
uhttp://store.shopfujitsu.com/fpc/Ecommerce/buildse...">http://store.shopfujitsu.com/fpc/Ecomme..._ck=5736...
It weighs a bit more,(3.7lb) but has 14 inch screen (full sized keyboard), faster processor, bigger memory, expendable slots, 2.5 inch hard drives, ports,.. all the functionality you could want.
Hey, what about Panasonic Y7 ?
http://www.dynamism.com/y7/main.shtml">http://www.dynamism.com/y7/main.shtml
It weighs 3.3 pounds, has 14 inch screen (thus a full sized keyboard), faster processor, all the ports, an optical drive, 8 HOURS of battery life.
It is even very sturdy physically!
Even production values are higher with these top of the line Japanese notebooks. Macbooks are made in Taiwan/China by Taiwanese OEMs while these models are made in Japan. (Yeah, they do still produce the highest quality electronics.)
There are tons of models with similar functionality as the Macbook Air in east Asia. (Here, ultra portables are the norm.) For example, Samsung builds notebooks almost as thin.
The points is, Macbook Air is pretty mediocre in its technology. Its nothing revolutionary at all hardware wise. (maybe except the touchpad)
Apple is great in design, marketing, software, and dealing with the media industry. (itunes..)
But it is not a high tech hardware firm at all. It just borrows existing technologies, puts them in a nice designed box and manufacture them through Taiwanese OEMs.
deeeee - Sunday, January 20, 2008 - link
> Check Toshiba RX1>
> http://www.dynamism.com/rx1/main.shtml">http://www.dynamism.com/rx1/main.shtml
>
> weighs 1.88 pounds!, has 12 inch screen and an optical drive! as well
> as many ports.
>
> Even its size is smaller. Its thicker, but other dimensions are 20-30% shorter.
And even its display is more than one inch smaller and the price is more than twice as high and the cpu is much slower, has a smaller cache and the thingy ships with half the amount of RAM...
> Or how about Fusitsu S6510?
> uhttp://store.shopfujitsu.com/fpc/Ecomme..._ck=5736...">http://store.shopfujitsu.com/fpc/Ecomme..._ck=5736...
>
> It weighs a bit more,(3.7lb) but has 14 inch screen (full sized keyboard),
> faster processor, bigger memory, expendable slots, 2.5 inch hard drives,
> ports,.. all the functionality you could want.
More than twice as thick, plus:
it OPTIONALLY has more RAM. For a little more than the same price you'll get exactly the same amount of RAM.
Additionally it weighs 3.7lb WITHOUT optical drive—so it weighs 23-33% more—and it has a lower battery life.
> Hey, what about Panasonic Y7 ?
>
> http://www.dynamism.com/y7/main.shtml">http://www.dynamism.com/y7/main.shtml
Neat, only more than two to three times as thick, half the RAM, 500$ more...
We have a nice saying here in Germany which translates to "You cannot compare apples to pears" which is exactly what all you guys have been doing here.
There are laptops out there, that have more features etc. but this usually comes at a cost—either in terms of money, weight or size.
Plus:
None of those I've seen so far has a backlit keyboard :-p
Being honest:
I would have wanted to have some sort of dock connector or at least an additional Firewire (800) port in that thing.
Cheers,
deeeeee
MrHanson - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
Apple is getting a little ridiculous. Limited functionality and a price of $1800 will solidify it's demise.rchiu - Thursday, January 17, 2008 - link
Heh, what you don't understand is to people with money, how good it looks is more important than how functional it is. They don't actually sit in an IT cube with ethernet access only and copy files from and to PC's or write some industrial strength code. They just sip latte all day in some starbucks, or write some blog and socialize on facebook. So wireless and 4200rpm HDD will be plenty for them. This will sell, for sure.andreschmidt - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
I don't quite get the general opinion about the MacBook Air. It is priced competitively against other portables in its weight class. It is faster than competing products in its weight class too.Randum - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
lets face it. Apple tries to market existing products or just brand something to look trendy.This is a great example. Add some chrome hubcaps to an old lincoln-boom, you just pimped my ride apple...
wish this fade would change but people are more concerned with how it looks rather than actual performance.
legoman666 - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
sure is nice looking. Id like to buy one and toss XP on it, but $1800? go to hell. I'll stick with my more capable Thinkpad.Eug - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
All I can say is that I'm very happy I kept my MacBook Core Duo.I bought my MacBook in May 2006, and after almost 2 years Apple releases a machine that is much, much more expensive, is not any faster, and has much less functionality.
The MacBook Air is a gorgeous design that I lust after... until I see the multitude of compromises and sticker price. It's almost like the Cube all over again.
WileCoyote - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
I'm in for one when the 2nd gen comes out (or at least the next revision). Awesome, just awesome. Apple might not be the first to come out with something but they're usually the first to do it right.Griswold - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
Well, they didnt do it right, else you could buy this one, aye?grifonik - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
the mac herd will buy these things because of how they look and their efforts to be "cool" to peers. its art to them. for the rest of us using logic, it'll never make sense to pay more money for less functionality.BZDTemp - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
Sometimes less is more.If for one do not want to carry what I do not need. I hardly need a optical drive so I'm fine without one, as with most of the other stuff found on the more "standard" laptops. When on the move I don't need anything but a USB slot (to do backup on a stick) and wireless is everywhere so that is fine also.
I like that the Air is not so bulky but more importantly it is light while still having a decent size monitor and an full size keyboard.
The slow disk does make me wonder so I shall wait till there are some reviews before making a buy or not. But I do expect that with 2 GB space it will only really be when starting apps that it will be felt.
AnnonymousCoward - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
High price and low functionality is the Apple standard.This thing is much more interesting: http://tinyurl.com/26lwvh">http://tinyurl.com/26lwvh
lopri - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
"the mac herd will buy these things"including Mr. Anand whose judgment has been impaired for quite some time. I am terribly sorry to say this but please Anand, keep your hobby at your blog posts. That was enough already.
bigboxes - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
B-b-but it's silver and "It just works.™"vailr - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
The keynote presentation also mentioned an external USB 2.0 Super Drive available for $99.Dennis Travis - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
There is also a USB NIC for the the Macbook Air. It does cost $29 but hey at least you can go wired if you have to.michal1980 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
you said "making very few compromises "very few? i'm sorry, when is
no ethernet port,
no opitical drive.
no expansion slot (pc card or otherwise). no slot for a future dock.
1 usb port!!!
no media card reader
and a 1.8 hdd
Few compromises. Laptop is nice looking, amazing infact. But its form winning over funtion.
Steve said that now people can rent movies on itunes. when i'm on a plane and want to watch a movie... sorry no can do. you must copy it over. but wait, how do i get it on their. hmmm.
so many problems with this thing, yet you claim 'making very few compromises"
what video card does this thing use?
and the perfomance of a 1.8 hdd. like you said yourself, get the flash drive. because 1.8hdd is bottom of the pits performance, perfect for an ipod. Talk about hell for operating an os.
tomshardware ran tests on some a year or so ago. that 15-16mb read rate, and 20mb writes are just amazing.
apple could have went with the 1.3ghz core cpus, because the cpu will be waiting for data
Anand Lal Shimpi - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Compared to standard notebooks, agreed, the MacBook Air has made a number of compromises. But compared to ultra portables, some of the biggest compromises aren't there.I've used ultra portables almost exclusively for years, starting back in my early college days. The keyboard is almost always bad enough where it hinders my productivity, and CPU speed does matter - there's a big difference between a ULV Merom at 1 - 1.33GHz and one running at 1.8GHz.
The MacBook Air isn't perfect by any means, but it looks to be a good attempt at an ultra portable for those who need it.
-A
michal1980 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
and the reason I dont give a pass to apple is because they are saying its a 'complete' notebook, just shrunk. they want their cake and eat it too.ethier its an ultra protable that is missing a lot of features. or its a complete notebook, (which we all know its not).
its cute how apple now comes out and says who needs optical media
whats next, a protable laptop without a screen, because apple says you can plug into any tv and use that screen?
To me this is an example of engineers having too much power, and jobs falling of his rocker.
even if I give you that the dvd drive seprate is something that has been done.
The lack of an ethernet port. more then 1 usb hook up. and a lack of a pc card slot make this laptop a toy.
For example, 3com used to make pop out jacks, not the best solution, but would work for having a ethernet port, and would still be compact.
is the battery even user replacable? seems like once again apple says no to that.
michal1980 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
with 2 secs of research on ultra protables I found this one.http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/toshiba-portege-r5...">http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/toshiba...5002/450...
It includes this:
VGA-out (ihmo more usefull with more projectors)
headphone/microphone jacks
USB 2.0, mini-FireWire, SD card reader
PC Card slot
modem, Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth
DVD burner
Price as reviewed/starting price $2,149/$1,999
Processor 1.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7600
Memory 1GB, 667MHz DDR2
Hard drive 120GB 5,400rpm
Chipset Intel 965
Graphics Mobile Intel Express 950GM (integrated)
Operating system Windows Vista Premium
Dimensions (WDH) 11.1 x 8.5 x .77 inches
Screen size (diagonal) 12.1 inches
System weight / Weight with AC adapter [pounds] 2.4/3.1 pounds
Category Ultraportable
The processor is a bit slower but the review was almost 6 months ago.
look at how thick that is. OMG .77in. a whole .01 thick then the AIR
and yes the keyboard is smaller. But i've gotten used to a smaller keyboard as long as its not crazy small.
So for apple to jump up and down like they invented the wheel, is fine for apple. For the media to then crown them like they are the holy grail of technology, shame on the media.
cscpianoman - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
You know, if you do a comparison do it right.Wander over to Dell and check out their ultra-portable 13.3in laptop.
It has the following:
3-year warranty
Home Premium
2.2Ghz Core 2 Duo
3GB Memory
200GB 7200rpm drive
CD/DVD Burner
128MB nVidia 8400GS/HDMI out
Wireless-N
Bluetooth
Fingerprint reader
Ethernet
Microsoft Office Home & Student
Adobe Premiere and Photoshop Elements
85kwh battery
All this for $1878. The computer is approx. 4.7lbs, but has a 9 hour battery life and is only 1.3inches high.
tayhimself - Thursday, January 17, 2008 - link
You called a 4.7 lb computer an ultraportable?????? * mind boggles*Scott66 - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
cramped keyboard, 1 inch smaller screen, A video GPU that is unable to fully run the included Vista and not a LED screen. Half the ram and $200-400 more. A much slower and power sucking CPU just sweetens the deal. Thankfully the smaller screen keeps the battery life within reach of the airApple didn't invent the ultra portable but they made one with full size keyboard and a wonderful screen. I would prefer to have a removeable battery but that would require extra weight and at least greater length or width to handle the enclosure and connections. I want native DVI out because it provides many more options.
michal1980 - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
yes brown nose to apple some more.I never said that was a perfect example. Its 6+ months old.
BUT AT THE SAME THICKNESS AS THE AIR:
IT HAS:
PC CARD SLOT
DVD DRIVE
ETHERNET
MORE USB
SD CARD READER
And is still as thick as the air. And as light, and the battery lasts nearly enough.
You apple fan boi's are as bad as the people that by bose. You think by paying for the name you are getting something 'different' and unique. when in fact other compainies are doing the same thing if not better.
But OMG, it has a apple sticker on the front.
BZDTemp - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
> yes brown nose to apple some more.LOL - way to go. Very intelligent comment.
> I never said that was a perfect example. Its 6+ months old.
>
> BUT AT THE SAME THICKNESS AS THE AIR:
>
Check the details again. At the thickets place the Air is like your example and on the thinnest it's like nothing while your example is the same all over so on average the air is half the thickness.
> IT HAS:
>
> PC CARD SLOT
And when did anybody last use one? I have an old P3 where I use it for a wireless NIC but thats the first time ever I found use for that slot.
> DVD DRIVE
Needed for? Unless you rent movies you would hardly ever need it so who cares - when needed hook one up or use the one in a different machine.
> ETHERNET
Because? If really needed there is USB to ethernet that cost peanuts.
> MORE USB
Again - why? Mouse, keyboard - it has Bluetooth.
> SD CARD READER
>
Just hook up the camera instead or get a mem card with wireless on it for $99.
> And is still as thick as the air. And as light, and the battery > lasts nearly enough.
5 hours sound okay. Once the battery is dead the machine will be obsolete anyway and door stops don't need battery power.
> You apple fan boi's are as bad as the people that by bose. You
> think by paying for the name you are getting something 'different' > and unique. when in fact other compainies are doing the same thing > if not better.
>
How about showing a piece with the same solutions then. It's a free world just get what you like and stop the name calling.
> But OMG, it has a apple sticker on the front.
I could care less. Quality, functionality, design, price and so on matters. Brands mean nothing. Except please tell us what you buy so we can avoid being associated with your kind in any way :-)
fitten - Thursday, January 17, 2008 - link
Heh... yeah... because Steve told you so, you don't need any of those things. Excellent reason to dismiss those features as unnecessary. The thing is that Steve is advertising this as a total solution when it obviously lacks numerous features that many people use daily. Of course, this thing isn't for everyone regardless of Steve's statement so get what works for you.Can it boot from a shared media device over the wireless network? Hopefully it can either do that or boot from USB DVD drives or else you're up a creek when something goes 'bad', for example. Can you use the Bluetooth mouse/keyboard while booting (drivers loaded during boot of the OS installer of choice)? Sometimes 'simple' is pretty important.
themadmilkman - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Then get the 64GB SSD that's offered. Sure, it's an extra $1,000, but it solves your HD speed issue. Just because you don't fit the target market doesn't make the product crap.Griswold - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
Its the usual apple "optional" rip-off scheme - only this time you basicly have to go for it if you want to actually work with this puppy. With an additional 900 bucks this thing unfortunately doesnt look so attractive anymore.michal1980 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
you mean the target market of idiots?its a good looking piece of crap.
rsasp - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
wow, no optical drive, and not even an all in one card reader? how am I suppose to get my files on to the computer when I'm on my business trip?motrimer - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
An all-in-one card reader? There's a absolute deluge of macs with that built-in.... Complain about the integrated graphics, about no expresscard slot, but stick your cards, you're flaky optical media..... :)Windows OEM's buy gaming companies so they can sell well-designed behemoths with too many options. There is no real parallel to Apple, and if you follow their choices it's dumb obvious why they are able to get away with what truly seems preposterous every once in a while.
CES who?
Scott66 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
I forgot bluetooth as wellScott66 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Research "Back to my Mac" or use .mac or jump drive or wireless. If none of those work what ancient system are you trying to connect to.crimson117 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Who would use an optical disc or a flash card reader to transfer business files when you could use a USB Flash Drive instead?Chaotic42 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
You're supposed to pull them out of thin air! That's where the name came from. Fortunately they changed the name from "Macbook Ass" just in time.arklab - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
This is PERFECT!I had just ordered a five pound black MacBook for my 80's mother, and it's going back!
It was to be her first ever computer, and was chosen for it's light weight, small size, and easy to see white-on-black keys.
At only three pounds (almost HALF the weight)and with a brighter, easer to read screen the MacBook Air is just right.
She will not be doing video editing, gaming, or use it to record HDTV shows.
She just wants to do word processing, email, and internet.
You could use a Celeron 300A for that!
Plus she'll get to have all the geeks drooling all over it! ;)
Thank You, Steve.
crimson117 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
An 80-yr old might want a larger screen...nofumble62 - Thursday, January 17, 2008 - link
Sounds like she is taking it back to store and replace with a XPS. Hahahavijay333 - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
no ethernet port. one usb port. no replaceable battery. no disc drive. 4200rpm hard drive --- but it's THIN!cmdrdredd - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
You're supposed to use the airport (wireless). The loss of optical drive is significant, how do you update the OS in a year or two when Apple releases a new version? You're expected to use an external? Then it's not very portable is it?ceefka - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
I am thinking about boxing my optical drive in a USB 2.0 enclosure so I can use it with all of my computers. Maybe that is an option with these too if you don't like using the WiFi for that.andreschmidt - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Apple introduced a new feature called Remote Drive that enables you to use the SuperDrive (Read: normal CD/DVD) of another computer wirelessly.Normally you do not need a SuperDrive on the road so I don't see it as an issue.
The name, MacBook Air, indicates you are supposed to embrace the wireless life heh.
cmdrdredd - Saturday, January 19, 2008 - link
andreschmidt, don't need a drive on the road? I want to watch a DVD perhaps...Zoomer - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
Wireless is completely useless when sshing to another system remotely, in even moderate traffic settings.Draft-n approaching 100 Mbps ethernet? Dream on; it'll be great if it gets even half that.
JarredWalton - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
The best I've seen in my laptop testing is around 7.5MBps of real throughput. That works out to 60Mbps - so better than 802.11g theoretical maximum, but still about 2/3 the speed of 100Mbit Ethernet. (Note also that many 802.11n chips seem to get more like 4-5MBps average rates, in ideal circumstances.) Now, go use any decent laptop these days and you get Gigabit, with speeds of around 40MBps easily achievable (the bottleneck generally being the hard drive(s) involved in transfers).yyrkoon - Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - link
7.5MB/s really is not that terrible compared to fast ethernet. Fast ethernet typically only gets 6-9MB/s from windows to windows transfers(standard file sharing), and I've personally seen 10MB/s with Linux -> Windows with Samba, and 11.4MB/s with Linux -> Windows iSCSI.GbE on the other hand really does not get much more than 30MB/s sustained for long periods of time. It has nothing really to do so much with the HDDs speeds as the disk block size vs TCP/IP packet sizes, and conversion. This of course would be on the garden variety home user type hardware, and laptop hardware should not be any better, or probably even as good. The new Windows Vista + TCP/IP stack etc, is purportedly supposed to fix this issue, but I guess we'll have to wait and see, because from what I understand it is still a work in progress.
Still, your point is made; GbE > 802.11n concerning transfers, although, if you didn't need security, firewire networking would do pretty well . . .
Anyhow for a Portable PC, I think I would rather have a modded Asus Eee, with a 80GB HDD in it. Something for mobile media files, and to have something on hand to upload RAW images to from my DSLR. Then again, I am not much for mobile system, except for what they can help me with while I am away from my desktop.
However, If I were working in the wireless internet business, etc, and needed to have a PC on a rooftop with me while aligning an antenna or something, then the Mac Air would probably be the last laptop on the planet I'd need/want.
Blauhung - Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - link
It probably has intel's draft N wireless on board which is faster then what most people have for ethernet.