Background:
For the past two years or so I've gone through numerous brands/models in an incessant search to find a laptop that was easily portable and had enough horsepower to match or exceed the performance of a solid $500 desktop with enough battery life to last over four hours of real world use. In this time span I've gone through over a dozen laptops or netbooks that were eventually returned, sold, donated to family or friends, modded and repurposed, or are currently sitting collecting dust awaiting a similar fate. A short list of the more memorable laptops/netbooks that I've previously owned/used that I can remember off hand include: HP TM2T(Core 2 Duo); HP TM2T(Core i3), Asus T101MT, MacBook Air (2009), Acer 4820TG, HP Envy 14, HP dv7t Quad Edition, ASUS U36JC, MacBook Pro 13, and two lower cost laptop models made by Gateway and Acer that I won't mention because they really didn't fit the criteria I was looking for when I acquired them.
I can truly say the 2011 MacBook Air 13" is the most satisfied I've been with any laptop I've used. Although I do find some quirks with the 2011 MBA lineup they are passable and this product still deserves a full five stars. I will probably echo some of the same pros and cons that others have stated, but let's move on with my review so I can tell you my impressions of this.
HARDWARE PROS:
- Weight/Form Factor: I've always considered portability to be important in a laptop but I can't emphasize this enough. If you've never held and used a MacBook Air before you should be impressed by its weight and form factor alone. Mostly anyone could easily hold the 13" MacBook with one hand. It means I can be watching a video and if I need to move to another room in the house and can easily walk with the laptop in one hand. However, I don't think it is light/comfortable enough to hold while standing for prolonged periods of time. I've demonstrated how light it is to several people under 5 feet tall by stand and watch a YouTube video holding the MBA with one. So, if you're concerned about the 13" size because you're short you shouldn't let that deter you until you actually try it.
- Core i5 2nd Generation Sandy Bridge Processor/ 4GB RAM Standard: When I first got the 2009 MBA I was extremely impressed by its form factor and weight as stated above, but after trying to use the 2009 MBA for productivity and multitasking you realize that something is amiss in the hardware and this eventually leads to frustration. The 2009 and 2010 MacBook Air base models only included 2GB of RAM and missed an entire generation of Core i-series processors, and despite having a solid state hard drive and a dedicated graphics card their of value in price to performance was very underwhelming compared to what was available for much less at the time. I currently have 16 tabs opened across four windows in Firefox, 5 tabs in Chrome, two applications(Silverlight and Java) streaming live financial quotes, DropBox, iTunes and a P2P application running while I am typing this review. I haven't noticed any noticeable hitches in performance. I have read about others complaining about issues with various Adobe software (especially Flash) with the latest version of OS X Lion. I have only experienced some sluggishness once when resuming from deep sleep. For testing I used a downloaded Flash game. It took a little more than 10 seconds to re-render. However, this may have more to do with the integrated graphics and could possibly be corrected in the future with an update.
Lifetime 60012 Extra Large Deck Box
Makita 9227CX3 7 Inch Hook and Loop Electronic Polisher Sander with Polishing Kit
Husqvarna 125BVx 28cc 2 Cycle Gas Powered 170 MPH Blower Vac With Smart Start
For the past two years or so I've gone through numerous brands/models in an incessant search to find a laptop that was easily portable and had enough horsepower to match or exceed the performance of a solid $500 desktop with enough battery life to last over four hours of real world use. In this time span I've gone through over a dozen laptops or netbooks that were eventually returned, sold, donated to family or friends, modded and repurposed, or are currently sitting collecting dust awaiting a similar fate. A short list of the more memorable laptops/netbooks that I've previously owned/used that I can remember off hand include: HP TM2T(Core 2 Duo); HP TM2T(Core i3), Asus T101MT, MacBook Air (2009), Acer 4820TG, HP Envy 14, HP dv7t Quad Edition, ASUS U36JC, MacBook Pro 13, and two lower cost laptop models made by Gateway and Acer that I won't mention because they really didn't fit the criteria I was looking for when I acquired them.
I can truly say the 2011 MacBook Air 13" is the most satisfied I've been with any laptop I've used. Although I do find some quirks with the 2011 MBA lineup they are passable and this product still deserves a full five stars. I will probably echo some of the same pros and cons that others have stated, but let's move on with my review so I can tell you my impressions of this.
HARDWARE PROS:
- Weight/Form Factor: I've always considered portability to be important in a laptop but I can't emphasize this enough. If you've never held and used a MacBook Air before you should be impressed by its weight and form factor alone. Mostly anyone could easily hold the 13" MacBook with one hand. It means I can be watching a video and if I need to move to another room in the house and can easily walk with the laptop in one hand. However, I don't think it is light/comfortable enough to hold while standing for prolonged periods of time. I've demonstrated how light it is to several people under 5 feet tall by stand and watch a YouTube video holding the MBA with one. So, if you're concerned about the 13" size because you're short you shouldn't let that deter you until you actually try it.
- Core i5 2nd Generation Sandy Bridge Processor/ 4GB RAM Standard: When I first got the 2009 MBA I was extremely impressed by its form factor and weight as stated above, but after trying to use the 2009 MBA for productivity and multitasking you realize that something is amiss in the hardware and this eventually leads to frustration. The 2009 and 2010 MacBook Air base models only included 2GB of RAM and missed an entire generation of Core i-series processors, and despite having a solid state hard drive and a dedicated graphics card their of value in price to performance was very underwhelming compared to what was available for much less at the time. I currently have 16 tabs opened across four windows in Firefox, 5 tabs in Chrome, two applications(Silverlight and Java) streaming live financial quotes, DropBox, iTunes and a P2P application running while I am typing this review. I haven't noticed any noticeable hitches in performance. I have read about others complaining about issues with various Adobe software (especially Flash) with the latest version of OS X Lion. I have only experienced some sluggishness once when resuming from deep sleep. For testing I used a downloaded Flash game. It took a little more than 10 seconds to re-render. However, this may have more to do with the integrated graphics and could possibly be corrected in the future with an update.
Lifetime 60012 Extra Large Deck Box
Makita 9227CX3 7 Inch Hook and Loop Electronic Polisher Sander with Polishing Kit
Husqvarna 125BVx 28cc 2 Cycle Gas Powered 170 MPH Blower Vac With Smart Start
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