Early Review of 11" Macbook Air 348
adeelarshad82 writes "Apple's latest entry into the ultraportable space is no netbook, even though it's the closest the company has come to making one. Its chassis is, amazingly, even thinner than the original MacBook Air, with a screen two sizes smaller. Moreover, the MacBook Air's 11.6-inch widescreen is not the only first for Apple; so is its 1,366-by-768 resolution. Although Apple found a way to squeeze in two USB ports and a speedy solid-state drive (SSD), the MacBook Air (11-inch) is not nearly as feature-packed or as fast as the rest of the MacBook family, primarily because its 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo SU9400 Ultra-Low Voltage (ULV) processor is running on previous-generation Intel technology. Still, it will give the latest batch of Consumer Ultra Low Voltage (CULV) laptops a run for their money."
Why it has Core 2's (Score:5, Informative)
a) Graphics performance. The integrated graphics on the i-series can't touch Nvidia's 320M, and Nvidia hasn't come out an equivalent for Arrandale yet.
b) Arrandale needs a separate memory controller, and there's no room for it on the MBA's tiny motherboard.
Good points, though I still want to see head-to-head performance numbers to see if the choice was a good one.
Re:I dunno man (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Not a netbook? What? (Score:5, Informative)
But netbooks got their names because they can basically only surf the web, unlike this one.
I've been using a netbook as my primary work computing device since last March. People tend to snub netbooks because they're "underpowered", without considering what they're underpowered to actually do.
You're not going to play high end games on it, but I use autocad, do DVD transcoding, email, excel...everything I need to do for my job works just fine. This macbook has better specs in some areas, but my netbook blows the doors off of it in practicality, and the macbook isn't going to get my work done any more efficiently than the netbook that cost 1/3 as much.
Re:Not a netbook? What? (Score:3, Informative)
If any of you are old enough to recall when the laptop displays hit 12" it was the beginning of really usable portable computers because the keyboard could be full size. IBM had even gone out and created a laptop before then which had a cool keyboard( butterfly? ) which slide out in both directions when you opened the top so that it provided a full keyboard.
The reason Microsoft and Intel define what a netbook is is because they want to keep charging top dollar for full laptop software and hardware(CPUs). If they don't define where the line is, someone is going to create a cheap laptop and blow away years of price defining contracts and licensing deals.
If you don't believe me, just find a site which lists available netbooks. they all have very similar specs for CPU, screen size and shipped memory.
LoB
Re:Netbook Pro (Score:2, Informative)
If I'm doing a full backup/data dump of gigs at a time, it's a bit faster to just plug in and go than wait for everything to make it over wifi.
Re:Not a netbook? What? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:not according to Meatloaf (Score:3, Informative)
+5 funny. Only thing is I bet most of the /. crowd is too young to know the song.
Re:An Ad? (Score:5, Informative)
Your Aspire One with no SSD, smaller screen, lower resolution, twice the thickness, 6 ounces more weight..
It does include a web cam (Now called face time camera). I can not find your reference to room for in any of the specs..
Re:Not a netbook? What? (Score:3, Informative)
You run Autocad on a netbook?
You must only do 2D and must only use it to look at floorplans!
I used SoildWorks 2005 and had to upgrade my video card and RAM way past what a netbook can be expanded to do even light 3d work.
That and the resolution and size of the screen would make me question your statement. If you are doing anything real with Autocad Yes going to C2D and an Nvidia gpu will make you a lot more productive. And unless you work for free it will pay for it's self in a short amount of time
Frankly You would be better off with any number of non netbook Wintel machines for that matter over a netbook for doing Autocad.
Yea sorry but you lost me with the Autocad statement.
Using Excel and email sure no problem. DVD transcoding... Not for work and you must have a lot of free time...
Re:An Ad? (Score:5, Informative)
The Acer is more extensible, with user-replaceable battery, savvy-user-replaceable hard drive and RAM (though the RAM is a total pain to get to, not just a door on the back, everything has to come out to get at it) and the possibility for a lot more storage as laptop hard drives get bigger. If it gets stolen, and your data on it is backed up and protected from malcontents, it's $300 and not a huge deal in the grand scheme of things.
The Macbook is much thinner, a little lighter, significantly more powerful with it's 64-bit dual core processor, has reportedly better battery life (Apple's reporting has been pretty close to reality lately) and a full-sized keyboard and almost full-sized multi-touch trackpad (compared to the postage stamp Acer calls a trackpad,) slightly larger screen with quite a bit higher resolution, higher resolution webcam, much faster but more limited storage, can be configured with 4gb RAM (must be done at config time, part of the logic board) and for those that care, Apple's customer service and reliability are rated much higher (per the keynote video.)
Between the two? I'm probably going with the Macbook Air. I don't mind the premium for what I think will be better usability. I'm a larger gentleman with larger hands, and I haven't found a netbook keyboard and/or trackpad yet I want to use for more than a few minutes at a time... too small, slash key and period/comma keys are half size, etc. While the machines are similar in size, the MBAir has it beaten quite soundly in specs. It's really easy to say "haha, Jobs-o made a netbook after putting them down..." but he really didn't. This is no netbook. I had a netbook for two months, gave it to my mother, and I'll never own one again.
Re:An Ad? (Score:3, Informative)
check out the dell m101z, for 500 bucks you have an 11,6 screen, a decent size hdd (which you can replace with an ssd if you want) and an AMD dual core CULV CPU
Granted, the cpu probably is slightly lower then the intel CULV in this new apple, but there is no way the apple is twice as good in terms of specs
Not meaning to argue, just ask a question... What kind of display is in the Dell? I don't believe Apple uses the low-end TN panels that are found in most netbooks.
A friend of mine was bragging about his new HP 27" display (not on a netbook obviously!) as "just as good as the Apple Cinema Displays, but cost hundreds less", but you get a few degrees off-center from his monitor and the color goes all wonky. Display quality does make a difference (FWIW I've got my Mac laptop plugged into a very good quality Dell monitor right now).
Re:An Ad? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Even though I hate Apple.... (Score:1, Informative)
I mean, 1.4GHz? The used laptop I sold for $200 last week had a 1.6GHz dual core.
Yes, 1.4 GHz. Dual-core. That's how Apple gets 5 hours+ runtime from the dinky 35 watt-hour battery in the 11.6" MacBook Air: they use Intel's CULV CPUs, which have much lower power consumption than normal at the cost of being limited to fairly low clock rates. (The "ULV" stands for ultra-low voltage, which means that essentially it's a very undervolted and underclocked version.)
That 35 Wh battery is probably all that's possible to squeeze in. The machine's average thickness is probably less than 0.5". Your Asus appears to have a 58 Wh battery, in a much much thicker case.
I'm not sure why you expected Apple to break the laws of physics. (Or, alternately, make a product compromised in areas Apple doesn't like to compromise, such as battery life.)
Video performance/heat? (Score:2, Informative)
I have a first generation MacBook Air. Although it's generally pretty good, if I try to watch video for any length of time (netflix or skype video) it always overheats, turns off one of the cores, and then becomes unusable for video (one core on its own can't keep up). If the new Airs are better at video I'd love to get one to replace mine!
Re:So is it a SSD drive or a Flash drive? (Score:2, Informative)
SSDs _are_ flash drives.
They're considerably faster than the ones you plug into a USB port, but they're basically the same thing.
Re:An Ad? (Score:2, Informative)
As for the desktop monitor you mentioned, just sounds like the usual IPS vs. TN. HP does have their own IPS monitors, in fact they actually are one of the very few companies that actually make the panels (And supply them to e.g. Dell).
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)