MACBOOK AIR
22nd January 2008
Last week Apple finally released the long awaited sub-notebook that has been rumored for sooo long. However, it was not the tablet style that has been favoured of late in the rumors. Instead it was the ultra thin lightweight laptop.
On first look its pretty, sleek, looks the business and has some nice built in features. However, on closer inspection there are some issues with it. Lets start with the my main bug bear; the hard drive.
By default it comes with a PATA drive only running at 4200 rpm making slow and already a generation behind normal laptop drives. To get the 64GB solid state drive adds almost £1K onto the asking price!!! I know its the largest of its kind and therefore going to be pricey but that option now puts it in the same region as a top MacBook Pro!
The Air comes with 2GB of RAM, which you cant upgrade. So I've just spent £1200 on something that will need replacing in a year or so when the next version of PS and the like requires 3GB to do anything useful.
No built in ethernet port. Yeah its got wireless, but for gaming or any kind of en masse file exchange then you cant beat a good old cat5 cable.
No optical drive. For me thats not a particular problem as I bearly use my drive as it is, but for your standard user this is how they get programs onto their machines. As a solution you can buy a seperate drive at an additional cost of course.
Overall I would rather save some money and buy a nicely kitted out MacBook of portability or if I was a bit flush a 15 inch MacBook Pro.