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Initial Hands-On Impressions of the New MacBook Air
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I can't deal with no backlit keyboard. No new MacBook Air for me
Same here
I was finally ready to dump my Dell XPS 1330 and buy my first Mac (love my iPhone), but this is a deal-breaker.
I agree. I love my current MacBook Air but I'm really set with my iPad in terms of mobile computing.
Here's the positive way to look at things and how I think Apple thought this would roll...
64gb iPad.....................................$699
bt keyboard or dock keyboard..........$69
TOTAL..........................................$770
CONS to the iPad equation are:
Lower res screen (hints at retina in iPad 2?)
No OS X
No USB
So is it WORTH $230 more to have a new 11.6" MBA over the highest end iPad?
I say yes.
"The most remarkable feature, however, isn't cosmetic, it's these machine's boot time.
Bootup takes less than 15 seconds, according to my watch. That's a good deal less than the roughly 50 seconds it takes my trusty Windows laptop to come to life."
Oh, you, it's the SSD, not the computer or the OS!
Bootup takes less than 15 seconds, according to my watch. That's a good deal less than the roughly 50 seconds it takes my trusty Windows laptop to come to life."
Oh, you, it's the SSD, not the computer or the OS!
Wow
That guy is such a D-Bag "Wrapped in this totally environmentally sound plastic" ... as I'm sure your awful sunglasses are environmentally sound as well. "If you're typing in the dark you're out of luck" ... Like the display doesn't actually give off any light.
That guy is such a D-Bag "Wrapped in this totally environmentally sound plastic" ... as I'm sure your awful sunglasses are environmentally sound as well. "If you're typing in the dark you're out of luck" ... Like the display doesn't actually give off any light.
That guy is such a D-Bag "Wrapped in this totally environmentally sound plastic" ... as I'm sure your awful sunglasses are environmentally sound as well. "If you're typing in the dark you're out of luck" ... Like the display doesn't actually give off any light.
Humor dude. Relax, not everyone is an Apple nut. Engadget is usually pretty fair and tends to slightly favor Apple. But they do sometimes make snide comments like that. But seriously, just chill.
I need optical drive to play games. That is RTW demands DVD to be inserted. Any way to do it without the DVD removal?
Humor dude. Relax, not everyone is an Apple nut. Engadget is usually pretty fair and tends to slightly favor Apple. But they do sometimes make snide comments like that. But seriously, just chill.
It's usually to appease the PC boys that hang out and bash almost every successful Apple product. The only thing most of them have ever had good things to say about lately is the new iPods and the 27" iMac. Mostly it's teenagers who have little to no job and can troll a site enough to argue about products they never owned or ever will own.
I think they are both great products and I'll be getting the 13" shortly.
Even though the 11 inch has the higher horizontal rez I can't consider it because of the short vertical...32 pixels may not sound like a lot and maybe it won't be once I see it but the 1440x900 13" will be for me.
What I do not get however is all this talk of instant on. I have turned my MB Pro off...well never...When I bring it home I plug it in. When I leave I unplug it and I just shut the lid in between uses.
It does not sleep, and even if it did with the SSD I'm back on in 4-5 seconds resuming but the battery life is so good that during my normal usage I never run out of battery and leave it running 24/7.
So maybe its my usage but instant on doesn't mean much to me since thats what I already get, if anything my wait time is more determined by waiting for my aircard to pick up the wireless.
The 4GB of ram will make all the difference. Even though its an extra $100 without that option I would have stuck it out with my MB Pro.
Even though the 11 inch has the higher horizontal rez I can't consider it because of the short vertical...32 pixels may not sound like a lot and maybe it won't be once I see it but the 1440x900 13" will be for me.
What I do not get however is all this talk of instant on. I have turned my MB Pro off...well never...When I bring it home I plug it in. When I leave I unplug it and I just shut the lid in between uses.
It does not sleep, and even if it did with the SSD I'm back on in 4-5 seconds resuming but the battery life is so good that during my normal usage I never run out of battery and leave it running 24/7.
So maybe its my usage but instant on doesn't mean much to me since thats what I already get, if anything my wait time is more determined by waiting for my aircard to pick up the wireless.
The 4GB of ram will make all the difference. Even though its an extra $100 without that option I would have stuck it out with my MB Pro.
I've been a macrumors member for years, and this is one of only a handful of posts I've ever submitted -- remarkable what a small world the internet has created -- I am in the EXACT situation as you, waiting for this update and the update to the GF2.
Hope it has some great HD video recording and another pancake lens option as high quality as the one in the GF1 kit!
They have backlit keyboards!!!!!!!
I'm building these on Apple's store and its saying they have a backlit keyboard when building one! So who is wrong here...Apples website or these dudes?
I'm building these on Apple's store and its saying they have a backlit keyboard when building one! So who is wrong here...Apples website or these dudes?
Onfi
Apple uses with high probability a newer Intel storage controller, which supports the ONFI 2.0 specification. To make a long story short: This specification allows manufacturers to use "RAM-like" Flash modules instead of SSDs. Depending on the hardware application, this can result in large energy savings and in faster wakeup/boot times, like you see it in the newest MBAs. G3 of the ONFI spec allows a bandwith of 400 MB/s (= 3200 MBit/s), and is faster than SATA 2.0 (3000 MBit/s).
More Info:
http://onfi.org/specifications/
http://onfi.org/news-events/onfi-breaks-speed-barrier-for-nand-flash/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ONFI
;-)
Apple uses with high probability a newer Intel storage controller, which supports the ONFI 2.0 specification. To make a long story short: This specification allows manufacturers to use "RAM-like" Flash modules instead of SSDs. Depending on the hardware application, this can result in large energy savings and in faster wakeup/boot times, like you see it in the newest MBAs. G3 of the ONFI spec allows a bandwith of 400 MB/s (= 3200 MBit/s), and is faster than SATA 2.0 (3000 MBit/s).
More Info:
http://onfi.org/specifications/
http://onfi.org/news-events/onfi-breaks-speed-barrier-for-nand-flash/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ONFI
;-)
I was almost sold on the 11" model until another member pointed out that it doesn't have an SD card slot. Bummer. I'll stick with my 2-year old whitebook for now and maybe upgrade to a Macbook Pro after next year's update. That, or I'll get the next revision of the iPad. I really like the sleek portability of the 11" Air but not having the option for additional storage hurts (for me, anyway).
Even though I have the money for an SSD, its still way too expensive for a 1TB and I have not come across a 2TB that is even sold locally.
I will wait for the price to come down some more, when it makes more sense. Saving a minute or 2 here and there is not a big deal, I set my Mac to auto start-up and shut down. No concerns here.
BTW thank you to all those who are paying for the R&D now for all those SSD technology advancements so I can benefit down the road.
And the next MBAir will sport LiquidMetal enclosure for an even thinner design/for factor. Who knows a thinner bezel around the screen, that thing is just way to thick for my liking.
one of the reasons why i bought the 11.6" is to play starcraft. with the Core 2 Duo, 320M GPU, and 4GB memory, it should be capable of smooth low/medium detail play
rolls. 
I use my first gen macbook air (1.8 cpu, 80g hdd w/ 2g of memory & 9400 graphics) for graphic design on the go. I've been using "Sketch" (a great vector program) lately which runs fairly well, but will slow down considerably after many layers are used and will often crash. Does anybody have a professional opinion on how this new Air at 2.13 core duo, 256 flash w/ 4g of memory will hold up? I was going to go for 15" mbp, but I really like having the small form factor of the air.
Thanks!
Thanks!