Some 11" MacBook Air Questions

[Benguitar]

Hello everyone, I have some questions about the new MacBook Air.

I'm looking to downsize my computer setup and make it a lot more portable.

1) What are some of the "favorite" skins/sleeves/cases for the MacBook Air around here?

2) Out of curiosity, Does the MacBook Air come with the pre-installed "Audio MIDI Setup" application?

Seeing that the MacBook Airs do not have firewire, I was wondering if it was possible to create an "Aggregate Device" using two of these audio interfaces.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/TX380LL/A?fnode=MTY1NDA3MA&mco=MTM1NDEyMTc

I figured that since the new MacBook Airs have two USB ports, I was wondering if I could do something like that to record into Garageband or Logic Express 9.

3) What are some good and small external USB hard drives?

I will be most likely purchasing the 64GB MacBook Air, So I'd imagine that it wouldn't need to be bigger than 100GB?

Thank you everyone for reading.

 

[tencentcat]

All Macs have the Audio-MIDI Setup (in the Applications/Utilities folder).

You could set up an aggregate audio device with those adapters, but why not just get something with two mic preamps like this: http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/AudioBoxUSB/

For external hard drives for audio I'd recommend the Mercury portables at http://www.macsales.com

Logic should run well on the Air with better performance than Garageband. At least until your projects get really complex with many plugins.

 

[RDRoe]

And, don't forget to use the cloud as much as you can with storage. I carry the 11" to meetings, events, and just carry that and a MiFi card in a simple InCase bag. I have 60gb of data available on the cloud that I can download if needed. I have the basic 11" / 2gb / 64gb and it works just great.

 

[KPOM]

I ordered a Tucano Elements Special Edition sleeve for my 11" MacBook Air. It has a zip opening, but also a mini pouch inside to prevent the zipper from scratching the computer. It works well enough.

 

[Benguitar]

All Macs have the Audio-MIDI Setup (in the Applications/Utilities folder).

You could set up an aggregate audio device with those adapters, but why not just get something with two mic preamps like this: http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/AudioBoxUSB/

For external hard drives for audio I'd recommend the Mercury portables at http://www.macsales.com

Logic should run well on the Air with better performance than Garageband. At least until your projects get really complex with many plugins.

I like that Presonus a lot.

I've seen those Mercury drives, Do you think I should invest in a SolidState drive or not, If so what size?

I'll probably store my Logic project files along with some photos and videos on it.

And, don't forget to use the cloud as much as you can with storage. I carry the 11" to meetings, events, and just carry that and a MiFi card in a simple InCase bag. I have 60gb of data available on the cloud that I can download if needed. I have the basic 11" / 2gb / 64gb and it works just great.

Kind of off topic, What are the rates for a MiFi card type of thing? Like, How much would it cost for unlimited data?

I ordered a Tucano Elements Special Edition sleeve for my 11" MacBook Air. It has a zip opening, but also a mini pouch inside to prevent the zipper from scratching the computer. It works well enough.

Those sleeves look nice, I've owned an Incase sleeve before, And those look similar. The thing I don't really like with the new Incase sleeves for the MacBook Air, Is they don't have a zipper. Or I could be mislead.

 

[ritmomundo]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_6 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E200 Safari/6533.18.5)

as far as cases go, people have bought the speck hard case. it snaps onto the laptop. but I think that when you go with the air, adding a case like that adds bulk and draws away from the form factor. I ended up getting a zaggskin, which is super durable, scratch resistant, and I customized it with my own design, and I think it looks great, without adding any extra bulk.

for carrying cases, I read a lot of reviews about the Booq Vyper hardcase, and I just placed an order for that, but haven't yet received it. I know it's a bit thick, but I plan on leaving it in my bag and sliding the MBA in and out as necessary. the hard shell should provide adequate shock absorbance in case I drop or bang my bag somewhere...

as for the external hardrive- get any that is portable (ie powered by a single USB, so that you don't need a separate power source). all the major brands make them, WD, seagate, etc. and they are decently priced. I would go for at least 500gb because you never know how much space you'll need, so why limit it to only 100. I believe up to either 500gb or 750gb, you won't have a change in the size of the drive. 1tb and up, you will see a thicker drive.

 

[Benguitar]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_6 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E200 Safari/6533.18.5)

as far as cases go, people have bought the speck hard case. it snaps onto the laptop. but I think that when you go with the air, adding a case like that adds bulk and draws away from the form factor. I ended up getting a zaggskin, which is super durable, scratch resistant, and I customized it with my own design, and I think it looks great, without adding any extra bulk.

for carrying cases, I read a lot of reviews about the Booq Vyper hardcase, and I just placed an order for that, but haven't yet received it. I know it's a bit thick, but I plan on leaving it in my bag and sliding the MBA in and out as necessary. the hard shell should provide adequate shock absorbance in case I drop or bang my bag somewhere...

as for the external hardrive- get any that is portable (ie powered by a single USB, so that you don't need a separate power source). all the major brands make them, WD, seagate, etc. and they are decently priced. I would go for at least 500gb because you never know how much space you'll need, so why limit it to only 100. I believe up to either 500gb or 750gb, you won't have a change in the size of the drive. 1tb and up, you will see a thicker drive.

Good to know, Thanks~

 

[xispec]

I just recently bought a Macbook Air from CL in brand new condition with no scratches but only bad part was that it had 92 battery cycles...but it was well worth it for the price I paid.

I have had a roll of clear film that i use to custom cut to wrap my equipment with for the top and bottom case to prevent scratches (the top is the easiest but the bottom cause of the feet curves). I find InvisibleShield feels horrid and almost impossible to get those tiny air bubble out. I don't mind this film being scratched as I can easily take it off and recut another one and not worry about paying more to get it replaced.

I have tons of external HDs so I would def recommend carrying these around with your air and makes it easy to transfer files instead of over the air (my 500gb being my main one for MBA). I also have the SuperDrive which is nice to actually use with the eject key. I used to use a SuperSlim DVD burner external HD which was nice and worked with the Air.


There is one thing I would like to mention is that the MBA 11" feels weird to type on...maybe it's just me. but the function keys are hard to miss since they are much smaller. I used to have the 13" Ultimate but sold it to get the 11" Ultimate.

 

[tencentcat]

I like that Presonus a lot.

I've seen those Mercury drives, Do you think I should invest in a SolidState drive or not, If so what size?

I'll probably store my Logic project files along with some photos and videos on it.

Solid state would be nice and use less power, but overkill unless your trying to playback huge projects or recording more than a few tracks at once. I'd recommend a 7200 rpm drive for smoother playback based on the cost. If you're made of money definitely get the SSD. And get me one too .

 

[Benguitar]

Solid state would be nice and use less power, but overkill unless your trying to playback huge projects or recording more than a few tracks at once. I'd recommend a 7200 rpm drive for smoother playback based on the cost. If you're made of money definitely get the SSD. And get me one too .

The only reason I was really considering an SSD was because of the fact that it will "never die."

I try to make my devices last as long as possible, So if I can get an external hard drive that will last in theory "forever." Why not get it since the disk drives will die eventually?

I could be mislead on that though.

As far as other reasons to have a SSD, I don't really have any. I most likely won't be recording anything more than two mono tracks at the same time, and I wasn't planning on saving or streaming any files from my external hard drive to my computer while I was working on them.

Instead, Record/Import into the 64GB in the MacBook Air and then move the project/album/folder on to the external hard drive.