Comments on: How the MacBook Air stacks up against other ultra-light notebooks

By: Two Decades of Portable Macs: 1989 - 2009 — RoughlyDrafted Magazine

Two Decades of Portable Macs: 1989 - 2009 — RoughlyDrafted Magazine — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 07:14:43 +0000

[...] How the MacBook Air stacks up against other ultra-light notebooks Is the MacBook Air Another Cube? [...]

By: nicknick

nicknick — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 06:40:19 +0000

Very well written post. I just found your site to day and I’ll be subscribing to the RSS from now on. Keep up the great work. You’re bang on about the cube and macbook air.

By: John Dvorak Finally Gets Something Right on Apple — RoughlyDrafted Magazine

Tue, 29 Jan 2008 06:05:38 +0000

[...] How the MacBook Air stacks up against other ultra-light notebooks 10 FAS: 7 - Apple’s Hardware and Dvorak’s Microsoft Branded PC [...]

By: hrissan

hrissan — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 22:11:37 +0000

Btw, why you need 4 gigs of RAM on this? Half of it would not get used at all in most circumstances… Also Apple are limited by memory density. They use high density chips already and to fit twice as much memory they would need extreme density chips which are more expensive (if they exist today of course).

By: Leonard

Leonard — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 20:15:42 +0000

I have read the reviews on the MacBook Air and don’t disagree that this is a great second computer for the road warrior and those who travel a lot and need/want to take their computer along with them, which all the reviews I’ve seen seem to key on.

I think there is a second demographic, however, that the MBA will appeal to in a very positive way and that is those people, mostly older folks, who use a computer primarily for email and web browsing with the occasional web purchase/eBay sell/buy. These are the folks who currently sit at a desktop PC longing for the ability to join the wireless ranks and be able to use their PC anywhere in the house.

What better way to bring these people into the modern world of computing then with this great Apple product

By: WholesaleMagic

WholesaleMagic — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:06:17 +0000

mmbossman - In my experience, I’ve found that nothing was created by Apple just for the sake of making money. The Apple attitude has been to create something extremely clever, then wait for money to roll in as a byproduct of people liking the creation.

As for the MacBook Air, I think it’s a brilliant laptop. All the people talking about lack of ports, non-user replaceable battery, etc. have some thinking to do. It’s designed as a use-by-day laptop. At home, you have to have a desktop. Period. But during the day, the MBA is ideal for portable work.

By: windyroad

windyroad — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:09:26 +0000

The thing that amazes me most about the MacBook Air is how Apple had completely changed the target market for ultra-portables. Previously they were all targeted towards very niche markets.

While the MacBook Air is not suitable for myself (I’m waiting for the new MacBook Pro’s), it would be ideal for my wife (albeit with Windows XP installed), who is an executive. It would also be ideal for cashed up high school and university students who would never need a MacBook Pro (e.g., Bachelor of Arts, etc students, not you IT/Graphic Design/Animation students).

This is a huge market. Don’t be surprised if you start to see the MacBook Air’s becoming the laptop to own if you are an executive or a student with rich parents.

By: mmbossman

mmbossman — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 12:02:03 +0000

@ fleshintension & amyhre:
I personally have never had a second battery either, and have learned a few tricks to conserve battery energy. However, I know that the battery life of my Dell laptop (don’t bash me, my grad school made me get it) drops very steadily with normal use of the battery so that now, on a full charge, I can get roughly two hours. This is after replacing it 5 months ago, when my previous battery would give me 15 minutes on a full charge after 9 months of use. So at times I sure have wished for a second battery when a wall socket hasn’t been available. I hope that the MBA doesn’t end up having battery recall issues like half the laptop batteries (previously) on the market.

Oh, and I still am curious if it was an engineering problem, and not just a “battery replacement $ making scheme” by apple. I heard it put best by some other blogger: “A non-replaceable battery on an iPod makes sense. One on an iPhone is a pain, but I’ve learned to deal. One on a laptop just isn’t practical”. So I have to assume some people, especially travelers, have found a replaceable battery useful in the past and since that’s one of the prime demographics this will be marketed to, why wasn’t it included?

By: Jon T

Jon T — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 09:07:28 +0000

Of course he is one and the same!

Could anyone have ever doubted it?

Dan must be a Gemini with a bit of a spit personality…

By: PerGrenerfors

PerGrenerfors — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 08:08:28 +0000

The only thing I’m a bit disappointed with is that the high-end MBA doesn’t offer more RAM (DDR2 is dirt cheap nowadays) than the lower end. Since they’re making two different motherboards already with different processors, it would have been easy for them to make it a true high-end laptop.

Other than that I love that Apple is trying to ween us from our wired life style. Apple’s quick adoption of 802.11n may be one of their best moves ever. With laptops that aren’t full desktop replacements, the power chord is really all we should tolerate. This is like the original iMac all over, making us realize that a lot of the things we use (like DVDs) are soon to be legacy hardware.