Apple MacBook Air Hands-on: Live @ MacWorld 2008 (With Pix)
By Glenn Derene
SAN FRANCISCO -- After Steve Jobs' big keynote, I got a little hands-on time with the new MacBook Air. Obviously, two minutes of use isn't enough for a full opinion--or to complain that the laptop didn't live up to my dreamt-up, animated MacBook Plus tablet--but the Air makes some great first impressions.
First off, the thing is obviously incredibly thin. Apple gives a range for its thickness of 0.76 in. at its thickest part to 0.16 in. at the edges. At 3 pounds, it's not as light as you'd think for something so slim, which leads me to believe that they needed to put a flat--but substantial--battery in this thing to get the juice up to its claimed five hours.
The MacBook Air's big (for a device this small) 13.3-in. LED backlit screen pretty much sets the width footprint for the notebook, which allows for a full-size keyboard--kudos to Apple for realizing that 85 or 90 percent of keyboards are simply uncomfortable. So typing on the MacBook Air keyboard is pretty much the same as it is on any Mac desktop.
The multitouch touchpad opens up a lot of new possibilities for user interface navigation. At the moment that seems to be focused on photo and Web applications, such as zooming, rotating and sweeping photos around the Preview screen and iPhoto. I'm sure that some level of integration into programs is necessary to make it work coherently across the operating system.
Obviously, there was no way to integrate an optical drive into something this slim (there's an external drive available as a $99 add-on), so Apple's Remote Drive function is a pretty slick workaround. Essentially, any computer on your network with an optical drive (PC or Mac) can work as your drive for installing software. Of course, as more and more software goes online, this is becoming less and less of an issue, but for the time being, this is a slick fix.
The MacBook Air is pretty light on input/output ports. A single USB port, a micro DVI port (the Air ships with adapters for both DVI and VGA) and an analog audio minijack. That's it. No FireWire, and no built-in Ethernet. There is an option for a $30 10/100 Ethernet adapter, but that is functionally slower than the built-in 802.11n wireless.
The guts of the MacBook Air are pretty impressive. A 1.6Ghz Intel Core2Duo chip is standard, and a 1.8Ghz chip is a $300 upgrade. That's a pretty fast chip for an ultralight laptop, and Intel had to do some creative engineering to make it fit. I noticed a little fan inside, but I'm curious to see how hot this machine gets during sustained use.
I wouldn't be surprised if the next-gen version moves to Intel's upcoming Menlow platform for cooler, low-power operation. The standard drive is an 80GB 1.8-in. hard drive, which works quite well. The optional 65GB solid-state drive is a hefty $1300 upgrade--not worth it at this point in my book, especially since none of the Apple reps could tell me for sure if it improves battery life.
Speaking of pricing, the MacBook Air starts at $1799, which places it between the MacBook and MacBook Pro lines. For a full-power laptop, that's not a bad price point, but there are an awful lot of superlight notebooks coming from the likes of Asus and Everex that are selling in the $400 range. I was wondering if Apple would start playing there, but it seems that the company sees this as a premium product, and the fanboys will definitely pay the money. With the SSD and faster chip, however, the MacBook Air maxes out at $3098--and even the most ardent Apple lovers may wince at that.
After using it, I think this is obviously a new platform for Apple, and even though Jobs didn't launch that much-anticipated tablet today, it seems that there is a direct product development line toward one down the line. Until then, the MacBook Air takes the place of the new lust-worthy product from the gurus in Cupertino.
• LIVE BLOG: Steve Jobs's Macworld 2008 Keynote
• ANALYSIS: Could Apple TV 2.0 End the High-Def Format War?
• ANALYSIS: iPhone's Firmware, SDK Updates Make It a Real Computer--and Better Than Your Unlocked One
* LIVE BLOG: Steve Jobs's Macworld 2008 Keynote
* ANALYSIS: Could Apple TV 2.0 End the High-Def Format War?
* ANALYSIS: iPhone's Firmware, SDK Updates Make It a Real Computer--and Better Than Your Unlocked One
MORE: Complete Coverage of Macworld 2008
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