Apple Unveils MacBook Air

Apple Unveils MacBook Air

Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - by Michael Santo
Today Apple unveiled the much-anticipated razor-thin notebook, the MacBook Air.  One problem though.  More on that later.

During his Macworld Expo keynote address on Tuesday morning, Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced the MacBook Air Tuesday, a computer that the company billed as the world's thinnest notebook -- small enough to fit inside an interoffice mailing envelope. It's priced starting at $1,799 and will be available within two weeks.

Sporting a silvery finish, the MacBook Air features a 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display that has a 1280 x 800 pixel resolution. The backlighting saves power and provides "instant on" response from the moment you turn it on, according to Jobs. The device has a slightly wedge-shaped profile. It weighs about 3 pounds, and sports a thickness of 0.16-0.76 inches. It's 12.8 inches wide and 8.95 inches deep.

None of that is bad.  It has iSight, 802.11n, 2 GB RAM, all built-in - and more.  But the battery is not user-replaceable!  A phone maybe, but a notebook?  That's crazy!  On the other hand, the "battery replacement plan" is sure to fatten Apple's coffers.

Via: Macworld | News Archive | Tags: Apple, Macbook, App, MacBook Air, Mac, Book
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Comments

By MikeL_HH on Jan 15, 2008

Pros:
- Extremely thin
- backlit keyboard
- multi-touch touchpad
- slightly above average battery life (for an ultraportable)

What else does it have going for it besides that? Everything else it has should be a given for something built for the ultraportable niche. At 3 pounds, it's actually on the heavy side for an ultraportable (which is traditionally classified by weight, not screen size).

Major Cons:
- 1 USB port (seriously?)
- battery not user replaceable
- no WWAN (not very portable)

Minor Cons:
- only 80GB hard drive, 64GB SSD at additional $999
- soldered-on, non-upgradeable RAM
- no Firewire
- no eSATA
- no microphone port
- Mono speaker (under keyboard)

Almost all of these cons could have been easily addressed and most ultraportable products have these features. The lack of an optical drive isn't a con for an ultraportable. How can you call it the Macbook Air and leave out WWAN?

This thing just seems like a huge toy/gimmick. Not to mention the $1,799 price tag, which is ridiculous for what little you get. Considering the hardware you're (not) getting, I'd say $1,000 would have been more reasonable.

By Crisis Causer on Jan 15, 2008

That's waaay too big to be an ultra-portable. Forget about thickness, it's the same size as a regular macbook. I'm entirely unimpressed. Should be much smaller, even if that requires a 10 inch screen.

By Lev_Astov on Jan 16, 2008

No surprises here. It's just Jobs soaking up all the fanboy money. I wonder how long Apple can keep that up before everyone notices how much they suck.

By kid007 on Jan 16, 2008

Steve Jobs is a Joke i was about to puke when i saw the video on cnn. My God, everything his company make has to be HUGE sounds like Donald Trump.
Either ways thinner i think the future owners of that laptop would demographicly speaking air head's

By recoveringknowitall on Jan 16, 2008

I'm no Bruce Lee, but I bet I could chop at least 2 of those in half at once!!!

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