Just curious, would the latest Air be considered the best in it's class in terms of performance and graphics when considering it's overall form factor and weight? What other laptops come close?
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Best in Class?
- Thread starter gman901
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I'm not sure for "best", but its one of the better ones. I think sony might have something thats similar in size/weight but more power? Not 100% sure.
I'm not as well read on this as others, but the three immediate competitors which spring to mind are the Lenovo X301, Dell Adamo and Voodoo Envy.
Of the three I believe the Air has the best processor, front side bus and graphics. The Lenovo machine will take up to 4GB of RAM though and has a DVD drive/optional extra battery bay.
Sony have discontinued their TT, which by some is actually considered an inferior product in relation to its predecessor, the TZ. The Z series, which although very fully featured, is more of a competitor to the MacBook Pro 13", rather than the Air.
Of the three I believe the Air has the best processor, front side bus and graphics. The Lenovo machine will take up to 4GB of RAM though and has a DVD drive/optional extra battery bay.
Sony have discontinued their TT, which by some is actually considered an inferior product in relation to its predecessor, the TZ. The Z series, which although very fully featured, is more of a competitor to the MacBook Pro 13", rather than the Air.
I say yes in a sense of primary computer (powerful) capable ultraportable notebook. The MBA has the best CPU as it's low voltage while others are all ultra low voltage with lower clock speeds. The MBA also has, by far, the best GPU in the Nvidia 9400m. The MBA, with SSD, is truly a very capable notebook with beautiful display yet super thin and lightweight notebook. About 90% of consumers COULD use the MBA as their primary/sole Mac if they can get used to digital downloads, wireless access to peripherals, and super amazing computing! I think the best thing about the MBA is the optional SSD, with it the MBA is amazing but without it it's a rather slow. Most other premium ultraportables have SSDs standard.
Definitely think the $1799 MBA should be considered "Best in Class."
Definitely think the $1799 MBA should be considered "Best in Class."
Compared to all the 13in thin and light wi/out an optical drive the MBA is the more better as it is using an intel SL line cpu which is more powerful than the SU line cpu you see in devices like the Samsung X360 and Acer Timeline but it also use more power with the C2D SU line using 10W TDP vs the SL's 17W TDp. The ion GPU is also more powerful than the 4500hd, but again worse on heat and battery life.
However, there is one exception to this, and that is the hard to find LG P310, which also has no optical drive. The LG does have the faster Intel P series of CPU, and its the only 13in laptop to use the more powerful Nvidia 9600 GT gpu. The down side is, it produces more heat that it should because of the pairing of a higher power cpu and gpu than normal in a device that size. It also weight .2 oz more than the MBA.
There is also the Sony Vaio Z, which weights the same as the MBA, but it also comes with more features, like optional blu-ray drive, option for two 256gb SSD and external optical drive, and a higher res screen. But, that has the slightly lower nvidia 9300gs gpu(but you wont notice to much of a difference vs the 9400m), and the intel 4500hd when you want to save battery power. Additionally, the newer models can support 8gb of ram for a 64bit OS use. Base models can be had for less or about the same price as the MBA and can get really price when fully optioned up with everything.
Not sure if Apple enables VT but you can enable via the bios or bios hack VT on both those devices to do improve productivity.
However, there is one exception to this, and that is the hard to find LG P310, which also has no optical drive. The LG does have the faster Intel P series of CPU, and its the only 13in laptop to use the more powerful Nvidia 9600 GT gpu. The down side is, it produces more heat that it should because of the pairing of a higher power cpu and gpu than normal in a device that size. It also weight .2 oz more than the MBA.
There is also the Sony Vaio Z, which weights the same as the MBA, but it also comes with more features, like optional blu-ray drive, option for two 256gb SSD and external optical drive, and a higher res screen. But, that has the slightly lower nvidia 9300gs gpu(but you wont notice to much of a difference vs the 9400m), and the intel 4500hd when you want to save battery power. Additionally, the newer models can support 8gb of ram for a 64bit OS use. Base models can be had for less or about the same price as the MBA and can get really price when fully optioned up with everything.
Not sure if Apple enables VT but you can enable via the bios or bios hack VT on both those devices to do improve productivity.
I agree. I did a little research at home and could not find anything that matched with 9400m and 2.13 Ghz C2D processesor. I noticed that MSI has the slim series, but they are all underpowered machines. The Dell XPS 13" is pretty close, (I actually owned one and got rid of it) but it has crappy build quality. I just played some Quake Live and booted to Windows to play a little FEAR. The Air keeps impressing me with it's capabilities for the size.