While I'm hoping for a June (or sooner) refresh here's some reasons to believe it will come in early autumn rather than Spring/Summer:
1. Revenue smoothing - June will be iPhone 5 and Apple may want to avoid releasing other products around it for both revenue balancing and mindshare purposes.
While I agree that Apple will want to give the iPhone 5 it's own little mindshare niche, Apple released the resdeigned Mac Mini last June.
They also updated the iMacs/Cinema Displays and Mac Pros in Late-July. So summer updates aren't exactly rare.
2. Gross margins - Perhaps the key metric Wall St looks at in Apple's financials is GMs. Apple helps maintain its high profit margins by selling Air's with C2D processors and other older tech for as long as possible.Barring a shortage Apple should be able to sell C2D Airs into late summer.
But the SL9400/9600 C2D chips cost about the same as the i5/i7 LV chips, and would eliminate the need for Apple to also pay for an IGP separately. So I bet the margins would remain the same with SB in there vs. the SL9400/9600.
3. Back-to-school - Putting aside price, the Air is a great student laptop. Timing a refresh with back to school would be good marketing.
Agreed. Sell out the C2D models with the free iPod promo all summer and then unleash new models in the Fall? We'll see.
If not June with Lion, then I expect a wait until September/October till we see updates.
1. how well are Airs selling. If the numbers slow, perhaps due to the fact that consumers (like me) are holding off until the new Sandy Bridge version comes out, then Apple may want to release something sooner.
Yeah, I already mentioned that in this thread. That's ultimately all that's gonna matter. If the sales hold up, they'll keep the C2D machines longer. If sales drop off, then the update will be sooner.
2. Competition. The new Samsung laptop looks competitive, and Sony and Toshiba are making some advances. The C2D powered Air is looking extremely old in the tooth. This may force Apple's hand.
The competition is a factor, but a small one, IMHO. As shown with iPad 2 and also the 2010 MBA update - Apple's basing products on "user experience" and emotional connections vs. hardware specs.
I mean, c'mon, not many manufacturers could release low-clocked C2D machines in late 2010, charge 1K+ for them and still sell 1.1 Million machines in ~3 months.
Apple knows how to sell a computing "experience" vs. a spec sheet (like Dell or HP).
