And some people don't understand how the SSD has nothing to do with a CPU bottleneck. Skype alone uses quite a bit of resources. Easily determined by how warm and loud the machine gets. That's just ONE application and he's running multiple apps at the same time. So while it will handle it, it can indeed lag at times, even with the SSD.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
MBA Ultimate as my SOLE working computer... POSSIBLE?
- Thread starter KohPhiPhi
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
And some people don't understand how the SSD has nothing to do with a CPU bottleneck. Skype alone uses quite a bit of resources. Easily determined by how warm and loud the machine gets. That's just ONE application and he's running multiple apps at the same time. So while it will handle it, it can indeed lag at times, even with the SSD.
the MBA ultimate is more than capable of running plugged into a HDTV or big monitor.
I play Starcraft 2 on it it plugged into my 40" Samsung TV. Running smooth at 1080p. (all settings on low)
I do a little photoshop and some imovie and webdesining and for me its more than enough. And Yes, its my sole working station.
go for it, you won't be disppointed .
I play Starcraft 2 on it it plugged into my 40" Samsung TV. Running smooth at 1080p. (all settings on low)
I do a little photoshop and some imovie and webdesining and for me its more than enough. And Yes, its my sole working station.
go for it, you won't be disppointed .
Can you ever offer anything constructive without trolling? Its only "underpowered" to someone who knows nothing about computers.
To the OP, as someone who OWNS this computer I can tell you a few things:
First, I am a power user. The Mac Pro in my sig is my main machine and I use the following daily:
-Maya
-XCode
-Unity
-Logic
-Handbrake
-Houdini (sometimes not daily)
-ZBrush
-Corel Painter
-Photoshop
-Aperture (sometimes not daily, depends if I just had a shoot or something)
-BOINC
-iTunes
-VMWare
-Realflow (sometimes not daily, only when I need to simulate liquid or something)
-Adium
Usually these are all open at the same time and a lot of programs like Handbrake or Maya are batch processing. I'm not some person who thinks just cause they use Photoshop that means they are a power user.
That being said I use my Macbook Air as a supplementary machine. I see a lot of misinformation on this thread by people who don't know much about computers. The people haggling over specs are WRONG. The SSD alone offers HUGE performance increases in this machine. Its not going to be the fastest for someone who wants to do video encoding but I can comfortably run Maya, ZBrush, Houdini, Unity, Painter, Photoshop, XCode, and Logic on the machine. I know because I've done it. Sometimes when my main machine has a ton going on it I hop to my air to work on some more things.
The Macbook Air is fast, light, powerful computer and can be easily used as a primary machine. I use it all the time as a primary machine when I have to travel for weeks. No regrets at all.
Don't listen to these people on this thread who obviously don't own the machine or have never put it through its paces.
I disagree with that (insulting) statement.
I don't push my 13" MBA quite as hard as chronos above but I can vouch it's a very capable machine and should suit your needs perfectly.
I own the ultimate, as it replaced my MBA rev B ssd. It is my main and only machine. I am in the financial business and use the following daily always on:
VMware: xp
SQL database
IE 8
Remote desktop
Office 2011
Mail
Safari
Adobe PDF pro x
Adium
Enclose
Pathfinder
Ibank
iTunes
When at work, it is connected to a 23" hd monitor, with a apple wireless kb, the new bt keypad, and a magic mouse.
Best machine I have ever owned, and I loved the rev B. Just hated the lack of ram for my VM.
VMware: xp
SQL database
IE 8
Remote desktop
Office 2011
Safari
Adobe PDF pro x
Adium
Enclose
Pathfinder
Ibank
iTunes
When at work, it is connected to a 23" hd monitor, with a apple wireless kb, the new bt keypad, and a magic mouse.
Best machine I have ever owned, and I loved the rev B. Just hated the lack of ram for my VM.
Are you in Koh Phi Phi?? I just moved to BKK and have been carrying around my 13" Air all over the place. My new daily commute is 1 hour by subway and BTS. The Air is so light. Great machine, you'll love it.
I envy you MB Air Power Users....
I debated long and hard and at the end of the day....memory requirements won over everything and I went with the MBP as workhorse. I travel 7-12 business days a month, but productivity ....or bottlenecking with my 4 current 4 gig MBP was the reason why I wanted a newer *more memory* speced box in a smaler 13" footprint
I debated long and hard and at the end of the day....memory requirements won over everything and I went with the MBP as workhorse. I travel 7-12 business days a month, but productivity ....or bottlenecking with my 4 current 4 gig MBP was the reason why I wanted a newer *more memory* speced box in a smaler 13" footprint
Yes, it will do all that just fine. I am a similar user to your needs and I purchased an 11 Inch cheapest MacBook Air (after 3 replacements of a top of the line 15" i7 last year, I got sick of it and bought this until apple redesigns the MBPs) and even THIS handles most of my daily tasks (Image editing(Gimp, although it lags a bit but it is still usable), music, video, Pages, Keynote, occasional coding, Safari with a buncha tabs open, and it runs like a champ. Get the biggest SSD though. My main gripe with this computer is the small SSD. I have about 9GBs left in it. I can easily say this MacBook air is one of the best computers I have ever purchased, because of the power, speed, and portability. My MBP owning friends always get jealous when my Air beats their MBPs boot in 15 seconds! The air is Apple's best machine and once it gets Sandy Bridge in June... oh my god, they will be perfect.
I bought my MBA intending to use it as my workhorse. Obviously, if it doesnt cope with the work load, I will change it for a MBP. But I was willing to give it a try... I think it's going to be enough, let's see how it goes.
The MBA is perfectly suitable for being ones sole computer, unless you do a lot of the type of video/photo editing or number crunching that would be better suited to a loaded quad or 8-core Mac Pro, or need firewire (or thunderbolt), gamer graphics cards, dual monitors, etc. For small video edits, the MBA may be faster than an Mac Pro without an SSD.
Depending on your usage, you may want a large external HD or NAS, and maybe a large external monitor to go along with your MBA.
Depending on your usage, you may want a large external HD or NAS, and maybe a large external monitor to go along with your MBA.
What about regular "family type" video editing? Not pro work, just your basic video shot in AVCHD format. Can the MBA handle this ok, or is a MBP a wiser choice for this?
Thanks.
Apple advertises that you can do "family type" video editing on an iPhone 4, and an MBA is several times faster at this. Draw your own conclusions.
Yeah, but I'm asking about AVCHD video editing, not iPhone 4 videos. There's a difference.
Anyone familiar with this? Can the MBA do this type of video editing acceptably, or not really?
Congrats! You will not be disappointed. It is truly the best computer I've ever owned.
I am by no means an expert in video editing but it plays and I can edit (in iMovie) the 1080p video my Canon 5DMark II shoots just fine.
Thanks, but I don't think that's AVCHD video (although I don't know that for a fact).
Oh well, I'll do some research and find out.
MBA can be sole machine for some
As a software consultant I travel a lot and tend to run a wide variety of software. I used an original revA MBA as my primary machine for about a year but it had neither the power nor the capacity to be my only machine. It was however a great travel machine for limited use.
I tried a revC MBA for a while too and it was considerably better than the revA but still didn't have the power or capacity to be my only machine.
When the latest revD came out it looked like it could actually my only machine, but then I saw the 11" version and liked it's form factor so much I got it intending it to be my travel machine but not my only machine.
But since I got the 11" MBA I haven't used anything else. It's fast, light, runs cool, gets good battery life, runs as much software as I want at once (including VM's). Unbelievable given it's specs and while I never would have guessed it's so capable, it's my favorite travel and home machine ever At home I run it in clamshell mode with a 27" ACD and Bluetooth keyboard and trackpad and it runs without a hitch. No lags no delays.
So I'd say a maxed out 13" MBA would do you just fine.
As a software consultant I travel a lot and tend to run a wide variety of software. I used an original revA MBA as my primary machine for about a year but it had neither the power nor the capacity to be my only machine. It was however a great travel machine for limited use.
I tried a revC MBA for a while too and it was considerably better than the revA but still didn't have the power or capacity to be my only machine.
When the latest revD came out it looked like it could actually my only machine, but then I saw the 11" version and liked it's form factor so much I got it intending it to be my travel machine but not my only machine.
But since I got the 11" MBA I haven't used anything else. It's fast, light, runs cool, gets good battery life, runs as much software as I want at once (including VM's). Unbelievable given it's specs and while I never would have guessed it's so capable, it's my favorite travel and home machine ever At home I run it in clamshell mode with a 27" ACD and Bluetooth keyboard and trackpad and it runs without a hitch. No lags no delays.
So I'd say a maxed out 13" MBA would do you just fine.
I brought some footage I had shot with my Panasonic AF-101, their new "prosumer" camera that shoots AVCHD (a codec I´m not very fond of by the way). I stuck the SD card in the 13 Air, base model, in an Apple shop.
They clips came up fine in iMovie, preview playback went well, it even imported the AVCHD into ProRes (or is it AIC iMovie use? I´m used to FC) much faster than I thought it would. A 10 sec clip took about 10 sec to import. I think longer clips will take more than real time though.
I did not have time to try to edit, but I have read on another forum of a guy using Final Cut Pro on his 11" Air and basic editing went smooth
Editing works fine. It's when you export your finished project that takes forever. Which is OK for recreational use, you can just start the processes and the machine (with 4GB) is still responsive enough to do basic tasks like browsing and music. If however you're going to be spending a lot of time in iMovie or FCP and working with particularly large AVCHD clips, you'll want something with more computing power.