Apple MacBook Air MC234LL/A 13.3-Inch Laptop

Product Description
MacBook Air continues to redefine what’s possible. Just 0.16 inch at its thinnest point, 0.76 inch at its thickest point, and a mere 3.0 pounds, it’s still ultrathin and ultraportable. And now, pushing the performance limits of ultraportable notebooks, it features a faster 2.13GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, a 1066MHz frontside bus, 2GB of DDR3 memory, and 6MB of L2 cache, so you can be as productive on the road as in the office. Offering ample storage, MacBook Air comes with either a 128GB solid-state drive that uses less power and provides enhanced durability. Its advanced NVIDIA processor brings you amazing, high-speed graphics, delivering a graphics performance boost up to 6x that of the original model. Unlike other ultraportables, MacBook Air doesn’t compromise on features users care most about: the display and the keyboard. It includes a bright, 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display, a full-size backlit keyboard, a spacious Multi-Touch trackpad, and a built-in iSight camera. Engineered for the wireless world, MacBook Air also comes with 802.11n Wi-Fi,4 Bluetooth 2.1, and Remote Disc to deliver unparalleled wireless versatility.

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With the MacBook Air, Apple has created the world's thinnest laptop--measuring an unprecedented 0.16-inches at its thinnest point (and 0.76 inches thick overall). Apple brings its vaunted multi-touch technology, found on the iPhone, to its laptops with the MacBook Air, enabling you to pinch, swipe, or rotate to zoom in on text, advance through a photo album, or adjust an image via the oversized trackpad. And the MacBook Air embodies Apple's continuing environmental progress with its aluminum enclosure, a material highly desired by recyclers, a mercury-free LCD display with arsenic-free glass, and brominated flame retardant-free material for the majority of circuit boards as well as PVC-free internal cables.

Despite the its slender shell, the MacBook Air doesn't skimp on the specifications. It includes a 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display, full-size and backlit keyboard, and a built-in iSight video camera for video conferencing. This MacBook Air (model MC234LL/A) is loaded with a 128 GB solid-state drive, which has no moving parts for enhanced durability. It's powered by a custom-built 2.13 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, which provides an optimized, multithreaded architecture for improved multitasking performance. And it features the integrated NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor, which delivers outstanding 3D game play with up to five times faster graphics performance than the previous generation. Other features include 2 GB of RAM, Wi-Fi connectivity via 802.11a/b/g/n standards, Mini DisplayPort video output (for DVI and VGA connections), and up to a 5-hour battery life.

Amazingly thin at just 0.16 inches at its thinnest and 0.76 inches at its thickest point, the MacBook Air weighs just 3 pounds.

It comes pre-loaded with Apple's Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system--an operating system custom-designed for the advanced technology inside--and it also comes with the iLife '09 suite of applications, including iPhoto, iMovie, Garageband, and iTunes.

With the trackpad's Multi-Touch technology, you can pinch, swipe, or rotate to adjust an image, zoom in on text, or advance through a photo album.

The MacBook Air includes a vibrant 13.3-inch LED-backlit display and a full-sized keyboard (see larger image).

Design
The thinness of MacBook Air is impressive, but even more impressive is that fact that there's a full-size notebook encased in the 0.16 to 0.76 inch of sleek, sturdy anodized aluminum. This svelte, 3-pound laptop has a vibrant, energy efficient 13.3-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display, and its spacious trackpad offers multi-touch gesture support for pinch, rotate and swipe--making it more intuitive than ever to browse and rotate photos or zoom into web pages in Safari. It also features a full-size keyboard that's backlit, making it ideal for dimly lit environments such as airplanes, studios or conference halls. It includes a built-in ambient light sensor automatically adjusts the brightness of the keys as well as the display brightness for optimal visibility.

One of Apple's most celebrated innovations is the MagSafe power adapter connector, which offers a magnetic connection instead of a physical one. So, if you happen to trip over a power cord, you won't send the MacBook Air flying off a table or desk--the cord simply disconnects, without damage to either the cord or the system.

Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
Custom-built to fit within the compact dimensions of the laptop, the MacBook Air is powered by a 1.86 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with a super-fast 1066 MHz front-side bus (FSB), and an enormous 6 MB of Smart Cache, an L2 cache that can be shared between the cores as needed. (An L2, or secondary, cache temporarily stores data; and a larger L2 cache can help speed up your system's performance. The FSB carries data between the CPU and RAM, and a faster front-side bus will deliver better overall performance.)

The Intel Core 2 Duo's 128-bit SSE3 vector engine handles 128-bit computations in a single clock cycle, accelerating data manipulation by simultaneously applying a single instruction to multiple data. And its two execution cores are designed to share resources and conserve power, helping it to achieve higher levels of performance since it uses fewer watts. And with 4MB of shared L2 cache, the MacBook Air is a multi-tasking monster. With such substantial L2 cache, data and instructions can be kept close to the two processor cores, greatly increasing performance and allowing the entire system to work more efficiently. And, because the processor cores share the L2 cache, either can use the entire amount if the other happens to be idle.

Video Processing & Output
Whether you're working on a Keynote presentation or watching a movie before you catch a flight, every document, video, and photo on your MacBook Air will look sharp on the glossy 13.3-inch widescreen display. With the new NVIDIA GeForce 9400M integrated graphics processor, the MacBook Air changes the game and just about everything you do with it. The 9400M provides up to an amazing 4x performance boost over the original MacBook Air. Photos appear in iPhoto quickly, transitions in Keynote are seamless, games play more smoothly, and movie and video playback is better than ever before. The 9400M graphics processor shares 256 MB of DDR3 SDRAM with main memory.

The MacBook Air now includes a next generation Mini DisplayPort, which delivers a pure digital signal that can drive up to a 30-inch widescreen display. The Mini DisplayPort is ultra-compact at just 10 percent the size of a full DVI connector, and is compatible with Apple's 24-inch Cinema Display. Adapters are also available for using VGA, DVI/HDMI and Dual-Link DVI displays

Hard Drive and Memory
For storage, this MacBook Air comes with a 128 GB solid-state hard drive. Faster and more reliable, solid memory provides a rapid boot-up and quicker access to applications while improving battery life. It's also more reliable than a hard disk drive because there are no moving parts. Since data is written to stationary memory instead of a spinning hard disk, you have less risk of hardware problems with the hard disk when you're on the move. The 2 GB of PC3-8500 DDR3 RAM (two SO-DIMMs of 1024 MB) has an industry-leading 1066 MHz speed, and it maximizes the capacity for this laptop.

Optical Drive
Because of the amazingly thin design of the MacBook Air, an optical (DVD/CD) drive was not included. To install software from a disc, you can wirelessly use or "borrow" optical drives on remote PCs or Macs using the Remote Disk feature. This allows you full access to an optical drive without having to haul one around. If you want to have an optical drive for burning CDs and DVDs, you can purchase the optional MacBook Air SuperDrive (sold separately). This multi-format CD/DVD read/write drive is powered by the MacBook Air's USB port, eliminating the need to carry a separate power adapter.

Networking
The MacBook Air doesn't include wired Ethernet networking, and instead relies solely on Wi-Fi to connect to your home network as well as wireless hotspots. The built-in 802.11n wireless networking provides up to five times the performance and twice the range of 802.11g, but it's also backward-compatible with 802.11a/b/g routers, enabling you to communicate with the a wide variety of Wi-Fi resources. It works seamlessly with the optional AirPort Extreme base station as well as Apple's Time Capsule Wi-Fi base station/hard drive--both of which include 802.11n capabilities. If you don't have access to a wireless network, you can use an optional USB Ethernet Adapter (sold separately)

Use the built-in Bluetooth 2.1+EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) wireless technology to connect to your PDA or cell phone, synchronize addresses, or download pictures from your cell phone. You can also use a wireless headset for iChat audio chats and VoIP calls as well as quickly share files with a colleague.

Video Conferencing with Built-in iSight
Artfully placed in the display bezel is an iSight camera, which enables easy video conferencing as well as allows you to snap pictures of yourself and create video podcasts. Using the iChat AV application, video conferencing is integrated into your iChat buddy list, so initiating a video conference is a breeze. iChat also lets you hold audio chats with up to 10 people and provides high-quality audio compression and full-duplex sound so conversation can flow naturally. For video podcasting, you can record a short clip using the iSight camera, then use iWeb to create a video blog entry or post your GarageBand-recorded podcast.

Other Features

• Mini DisplayPort compatible with DVI, VGA, and dual-link DVI connectors (all optional)
• Analog audio output/headphone out (minijack)
• Built-in mono speaker and omnidirectional microphone
• Integrated 37-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery provides up to 5 hours of battery life
• Built-in full-size keyboard with 78 (U.S.) or 79 (ISO) keys, including 12 function keys, 4 arrow keys (inverted "T" arrangement), and embedded numeric keypad
• Supported resolutions: 1280 by 800 (native), 1152 by 720, 1024 by 768, 800 by 600, 800 by 500, 720 by 480, and 640 by 480 pixels at 16:10 aspect ratio; 1024 by 768, 800 by 600, and 640 by 480 pixels at 4:3 aspect ratio; 720 by 480 pixels at 3:2 aspect ratio

Designed with the Environment in Mind
Apple has worked hard to eliminate many of the toxins that are a common part of computer manufacturing. Apple engineers removed the majority of brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) from circuit boards, internal cables, connectors, insulators, adhesives, and more in the MacBook Air.

Because Apple makes both the hardware and the software for the MacBook, they're designed to work together to produce a smarter product that uses less electricity. For instance, to reduce energy consumption, the hard drive spins down automatically when inactive. MacBook Air also decides which processor--CPU or GPU--is best suited to efficiently perform a task. The processor even throttles down to save power between keystrokes as you type. The LED-backlit display in MacBook Air is another feature that plays an important part in conserving energy, consuming 30 percent less power than conventional LCD displays. And the display is designed to dim when you enter a darkened room.

The MacBook Air meets the stringent low power requirements set by the EPA, giving it ENERGY STAR certification. MacBook also meets the latest efficiency requirements of ENERGY STAR Version 5.0 Specification for Computers before its July 2009 effective date.

The MacBook Air has also earned the highest rating of EPEAT Gold. The Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool, or EPEAT, evaluates the environmental impact of a product based on how recyclable it is, how much energy it uses, and how it's designed and manufactured.

Pre-Loaded with Mac OS X Snow Leopard and iLife '09
Every Mac comes with Mac OS X Snow Leopard, the world's most advanced operating system, and iLife, Apple's innovative suite of applications for managing photos, making movies and creating and learning to play music. Snow Leopard builds on a decade of OS X innovation and success with hundreds of refinements, new core technologies and out of the box support for Microsoft Exchange. iLife features iPhoto, to easily organize and manage photos; iMovie with powerful easy-to-use new features such as Precision Editor, video stabilization and advanced drag and drop; and GarageBand which introduces a whole new way to help you learn to play piano and guitar.

Installed software

• Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard (includes Time Machine, Quick Look, Spaces, Spotlight, Dashboard, Mail, iChat, Safari, Address Book, QuickTime, iCal, DVD Player, Photo Booth, Front Row, Xcode Developer Tools)
• iLife '09 (includes iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb, iDVD)

What's in the Box
MacBook Air, 45W MagSafe Power Adapter, AC wall plug, power cord, Apple USB Ethernet Adapter, cleaning/polishing cloth, install/restore DVDs, printed documentation

Macbook Air
It is a pretty cool Macbook.
It really prevents wonderful how thin it is.
I would recommend.

Was pleasantly surprised
First of all this will not be comparison between PC and MAC. I use both as well as a few different flavors of Unix (Linux, Ubuntu, BSD) and I also own a current generation 21.5 inch iMAC that is maxed on it's hardware and 15" MacBook Pro that is also maxed out on it's hardware.

So why did I buy this and why did I buy it from Amazon. That's easy, I'm lucky enough to have a large Apple store 20 miles from my house so I have been "playing" with the Air ever since it's release but until now I could not justify owning one but secretly always wanted one. I will admit that I have not played too much with this particular setup until now. I bought this from Amazon because I received lots of Amazon gift cards for Christmas and needed to use them and now with the 90+ dollars off Amazon was offering, let's just say my cost out of my pocket was down in the $800.

The reason I bought this was the ability to travel lite. My 15 inch is not that much heavier but I found that I just do not use all of it's features when I travel. I very rarely need more than one USB port and if I do with the Air, I'll have a small USB hub in the case. The lack of a DVD player is also not an issue for me. I can count on one hand how many times I used the one in the 15 model and that was only to install some software. I use the one in the iMAC a lot as I create video and DVD's for myself and others.

I thought the smaller screen and lack of ability to add memory would be an issue but so far I have not even worried about more memory. I went into buying this Air knowing exactly what it could do and what I expected from it, but like I mentioned the ability to add more memory would be nice.

Would I recommend it to someone, yes I would, but only after that person understands what it can and cannot do. If all you are going to do is run the occasional program like Office, or any of the iLife or iWork products then you will be in good shape. Start adding in most Adobe products like Photoshop CS4 and the like and you will see a performance hit as the machine is not built to do that kind of work. It will work, but it will be a bit slow. I read another review were the person says the Air is in-between a Netbook and a full fledged laptop and I'd agree with that to a point. While much more powerful than any Netbook I looked at, it is still a full fledged laptop, just toned down.

As far as the price, with the 91 dollars off right now and the gift cards I got a steal and them some. I suspect that the normal price reduction is based on what Apple is suppose to release on Jan 27, 2010. This actually made me wonder if I should wait to see if a new generation Air was coming, but the price was just to hard to pass up. I doubt seriously if they do announce a different Air I would be disappointed, I like mine way too much

What will I do with the 15 inch, I'm going to place it in the spare bedroom for my overnight guests to use and only allow it access to the internet and not the rest of my network, they will have access to the other software on it but I'll do what the Apple stores do and make it so that a reboot literally restores the machine to a just installed setup. I've seen how they do this and it's not that much different than using the Kickstart program that comes with just about every version of Unix nowadays, this way my guests can configure it any way they would like and a full restore is jsut a reboot away

Great for traveling!
Super light, very user friendly... overall good price for what you get.

Love MAC OS X, it is all about the ease of use and seamless software and hardware integration.

Not recommended for desktop replacement!!

One of Apple's Best Ever
I'll say it straight away: I love the MacBook Air (MBA). I am a PowerBook collector, and have been using Apple's portables for many years, so I have some solid background in relation to their portable computers.

You may not know this, but in 1997 Apple had what, at the time, could be considered as a MBA. It was the PowerBook 2400c. What a machine it was. Small (10.4" screen) and light (4.4 lbs.). It came sans floppy drive: floppies were built into many laptops around the time the 2400c hit the streets, although they were on there way out. It also had reduced ports, but still included 2 PC Card slots. Strangely, it has a sort of unibody case, a landmark in design at the time. Underneath, you will find no interruptions in the case: it's all one, and the case wraps up and around smoothly. Released only in Japan, with just a handful of the units making it to the US, it is a rare machine indeed.

I think the reason Apple confined it to the Asian market was because the keyboard is 87% the size of a full-sized keyboard: it's a netbook size keyboard. People are larger in other parts of the world, so they may have thought that users wouldn't take to it in those areas. Overall, the 2400c could be considered as a netbook: Apple's first and only netbook to-date.

But what about the MBA you say. Isn't that a netbook? The MBA is a ultra-portable laptop, rather than a netbook. It's a full featured laptop. Apple never meant it to be a netbook. It makes hardly any of the compromises that netbooks make. You get a full-sized, backlit keyboard. A 2.13 Ghz Core 2 Duo, with an Nvidia 9400M, 256 MB graphics card, the same one found in Apple's MacBook and entry MacBook Pros. Some compromises are lack of a firewire port; 1 USB port; no ethernet port; no DVD-drive...

But with things like Remote Disc, etc. I don't need any of these things that are missing on the MBA, especially since this is a companion computer to my Mac Mini and MacBook Pro.

This model is much improved over the first generation MBA: better graphics chip, faster processor, and cheaper. Combining these specifications with such a thin, light design is impressive. What about its performance? It performs very well, I am happy to report, after 5 months of use. iWork, HD playback, web surfing... It's the SSD that really helps things along. Shutdown times, application launches, everything is speedy because of the SSD. It's actually faster for many tasks than pretty much any MacBook/Pro that is running a standard platter hard drive.

But things like converting audio and video... the MacBook Pros will outperform the MBA because of their faster processors and ability to use more RAM. This leads to the following question: Can the MBA be used as a sole machine? My answer to this is yes, depending on your needs. It is capable of being a sole machine. But if you are someone working with video, audio, and the like, you would be wise to go with a MacBook Pro (i.e. 15"). But still, this machine is capable enough that you can throw pro apps at it and it will work for you.

Here is the caveat with the MBA though. Don't have too many applications open at once, because it only has 2 GB of RAM. There are a few service providers out there who will unsolder the RAM from the MBA's motherboard, and solder back on 4 GB of RAM. If I were using this a a sole machine I would probably go for that service. But you can still get by using it as a sole machine with 2 GB of RAM.

Here is one piece of advice: get click-to-flash. It shuts down flash in Safari, or whatever browser you are using, and makes internet surfing more manageable on the MBA. It's not that flash makes browsing on the MBA impossible, it's just that it frees up resources and speeds things up. With flash heavy sites like YouTube, playing flash videos, for instance, can cause this model to heat up some, and then, by default, the video will become a bit choppy. This will only really happen if you are obstructing the air vents on the MBA. So if you are not using click-to-flash, make sure your MBA's vents are clear and free of any obstructions when web surfing.

But, mind you, flash in Safari causes even the MacBook Pros to heat up...

Let's now get back to what really sets this unit apart from anything on the market: it's super light and super thin. I did an in depth comparison to the Dell Adamo, and determined that the MBA is actually much thinner overall than the Adamo, even though the MBA is thicker than the Adamo at its thickest point. It's just that more of the MBA is significantly thinner than the Adamo, so overall it's much thinner, and it shows. Not only this, but the MBA is much more powerful: better processor and better graphics.

It is a joy to use and carry such a small, thin and light device, especially in comparison to lugging around the MacBook Pro 15.4". And for those of you who are switching from the venerable PowerBook G4 12.1", you won't be sorry. This machine makes it look antiquated, and its speed leaves it in the dust.

Other things I like about the MBA specifically: the screen is great. The best screen Apple has ever done. Somehow it is less reflective than my 15.4" MacBook Pro. The trackpad is nice and large, too. The retractable ports are really cool, and battery life is decent as well.

For those contemplating a netbook, I was too. I finally decided that netbooks just made far too many compromises and opted for the MBA. I guess my logic went exactly along the same lines as Apple, since Steve said during the MBA Keynote that netbooks make too many compromises and aren't worth the trouble. But if you want something diminutive for very light computer use, netbooks might be your ticket item. For me though, I couldn't live with the paltry processing power, small keyboards and trackpads, and tiny screens.

Lastly, one thing to keep in mind is that this machine, because it is so thin and light, is a tad fragile. It's still rugged, but you have to be more careful with it than, say, a MacBook. I wish the screen would open up more, but other than this, and the heat issue as described above, it's pretty much a perfect product.

Apple, well done.

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