My Thoughts On The Apple MacBook Air
So, they did it. Apple managed to day to announce a super-thin laptop. So what? That’s cool. Well, there’s some things you should keep in mind before you consider spending $2,000+ on one.
- It’s yesterday’s technology… today.
- The hard drive is 4200 RPM PATA (unless you blow $999 on the solid state drive with a skimpy 64GB of storage). Even then, it’s probably still parallel ATA.
- The processor options are 1.6 GHz or 1.8 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo chips. Sure, they got Intel to make them micro-sized, but 1.8 GHz? My laptop is over 1 year old and it came with a 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo standard!
- Remember there is no built in Ethernet, modem, optical drive. You can get them all externally, for an additional $177.
- One USB port. This may or may not suit you… but I often need at least 2 or 3. And with the previous bullet… you might want to get yourself a hub.
- It’s overpriced, in my opinion. My direct comparison would be to a Dell XPS M1330. For $1,650, you get an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2 GHz processor, 3GB RAM, 200GB 7200 RPM SATA hard drive, nVidia Geforce 8400M GS 128MB RAM video card. The M1330 also has a webcam built in, as well as 2x USB ports, a FireWire port, a fingerprint scanner, HDMI and VGA ports (no adapters needed), and an 8-in-1 media card reader. You can also get the M1330 with mobile broadband built in. Add on a Dell CompleteCare warranty and all accidental damage is covered. Apple has no such protection plan.
- There’s bound to be premature problems. When the horror stories start popping up on the web in coming months, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
So, before you make this overpriced heap of yesterday’s technologies your next laptop, think again. It seems pretty foolish to me to choose this over a Dell XPS M1330. Oh, and did I mention you can get that with accidental damage coverage?