¿i need a new laptop? update:added lenovo x300
i had high expectations for apples new ultra-portable laptop, considering apple seems to be one of the few companies that puts the extra effort into designing their PCs.
and here it is, the macbook air:
it seems everyone thinks its a new gift from god, after the iphone…
but lets actually take a step back and notice there are non-apple products out there…
| macbook | macbook air | air ssd | sony sz740 | tz150 | toshiba r500 | r500 ssd | thinkpad x61 | x300 | toughbook Y7 | dell m1330 | |
| box volume | 123 in^3 | 87 in^3 | 87 in^3 | 174 in^3 | 99 | 94 in^3 | 94 in^3 | 123 in^3 | 103 in^3 | 220 in^3 | 153 in^3 |
| lid surface | 114 in^2 | 114 in^2 | 114 in^2 | 116 in^2 | 85 in^2 | 94 in^2 | 94 in^2 | 87 in^2 | 114 in^2 | 120 in^2 | 118 in^2 |
| weight | 5lbs | 3.0lbs | 3.0lbs | 4.0lbs | 2.7lbs | 2.4lbs | 1.7 w/o dvd | 3.6lbs | 2.5-3.17 | 3.7lbs | 4.3lbs |
| cpu | 2.2ghz/800 | 1.6ghz/800 | 1.8/800 | 2.5ghz/800 | 1.06/533 | 1.2ghz/533 | 1.2ghz/533 | 2.2ghz/800 | 1.2/800 | 1.6ghz/800 | 2.2/800 |
| cpu cache | 4mb | 4MB | 4MB | 6MB | 2MB | 2MB | 2MB | 4MB | 4MB | 4MB | 4MB |
| cpu tech | 65nm | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 45nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm c2d | 65nm |
| ram | 4GB | 2GB | 2GB | 4GB | 2GB | 2GB | 2GB | 4GB | 4GB | 3GB | 4GB |
| hdd | 120gb 5.4k | 80gb 4.2k | 64gb ssd | 200gb 5.4k | 100gb 4.2k | 120gb 5.4k | 64gb ssd | 120 5.4k | 1.8″ ssd sata | 80gb 5.4k | 160GB 5.4k |
| built-in dvd | yes | no | no | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | yes | yes | yes |
| usb ports | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 |
| sd card | no | no | no | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | yes | yes |
| expresscard | no | no | no | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes (34) | yes | yes |
| dvi | mini | micro | micro | no | no | no | no | no | no | no | hdmi |
| webcam | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | no | no | yes | no | yes |
| input | touchpad | touchpad | touchpad | touchpad | touchpad | touchpad | touchpad | trackpoint | both | touchpad | touchpad |
| keyboard | full-size | full-size | full-size | full-size | almost-full | full-size | full-size | full-size | full-size | full-size | full-size |
| screen | 13.3 | 13.3″ LED | 13.3″ LED | 13.3″ LED | 11.1″ LED | 12.1″ LED | 12.1″ LED | 12.1″ | 13.3″ LED | 14.1″ | 13.3″ LED |
| resolution | 1280×800 | 1280×800 | 1280×800 | 1280×800 | 1366×768 | 1280×800 | 1280×800 | 1024×786 | 1440×900 | 1400×1050 | 1280×800 |
| wireless | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT | abgn+BT+ GPS+WiMax |
abgn+BT | abgn+BT |
| wwan | no | no | no | option | option | no | no | option | option | option | option |
| wired | gigabit | none | none | gigabit | gigabit | gigabit | gigabit | gigabit | gigabit | gigabit | 100mb |
| os | macosx | macosx | macosx | vista hp | vista b | vista b | vista b | vista b | vista | vista b | vista hp |
| price | 1379 | 1799 | 3098 | 1800 | 2099 | 2170 | 2999 | 1340 | TBD | 2400 | 1520 |
issues with the air:
uses old 65nm cpu… what about penryn?
ram is almost free, yet its impossible to upgrade the air to 4GB
only 1 usb, no gigabit ethernet, no sd-card slot…
1.8″ IDE hard disk, so not possible to install a 7200rpm drive.
thin and light, sure… but a big footprint footprint, could have less unused space around the screen and keyboard.
A technically bigger laptop like the R500 will actually seem to be smaller in person since it’s more compact.
question: does it use UEFI 2.0 so one could install vista64SP1? other macbooks do not.
I think I’ll wait for penryn sff, and frankly the macbook air seemed large in person… thin yes, but has a large footprint, a 13.3″ display with a significant border around the screen.
I might go for another 12.1 like the toshiba R500, but again, I’ll wait for penryn.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 16th, 2008 at 18:16 and is filed under it. Find similar posts by selecting any of the following tags: it, laptops. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
on January 17, 2008 at 19:06 milo wrote:
Thanks for the comparison.
One note though, since the air tapers on the sides, it has a smaller volume than the 87 inches computed by just multiplying the three dimensions (the thickness being the maximum thickness of the box).
I think the chart shows it comparing very well considering the users it is intended for. It is the smallest unit in overall volume, and the only ones that come close are ones with 10-12 inch screens. The other units with 13 are double to triple the size.
on January 17, 2008 at 20:34 Stephen wrote:
keep in mind all laptops are thinner in some area’s than others
, for all of them i used max thickness to compute box volume.
on January 17, 2008 at 20:38 dsb wrote:
I have to agree with milo. Air looks very good compared to the rest. Only the Sony look as good to me on price and CPU/FSB speed, which is really the most critical, and its not aimed at the same market being significantly heavier and larger. If you looked at the Air its because you want a very thin/light system. All of the ‘thin’ ones shown are the 1-1.2 GHZ/533 FSB.
on January 17, 2008 at 20:56 Sam wrote:
I am really glad that the Air used a “real” Intel core 2 duo processor and not one of those ULV 1.06ghz POS. Although it would be nice to futureproof, I don’t the target demographic for this laptop are really going to need 4GB of RAM anytime soon.
I am really disappointed that they didn’t throw in a Firewire800/400 combo port, and that they didn’t offer a cheaper 32GB SSD as an option. I also would have liked to see an <= 12″ screen.
on January 18, 2008 at 07:57 Peter wrote:
Would you consider including the Dell’s XPS 1330 into the list. It has similar specs with 7200 RPM disks.
on January 19, 2008 at 00:26 joe wrote:
A few nits to pick with your table. The information (reviews) I have seen on the X300 ( a 4 year old machine) consistently show it as weighing 2.9 lbs, the DVD is in an external bay, the keyboard is not full size, and it has a 12″ screen. Are we talking about the same Dell machine? Maybe you are talking about the new Lenovo X300 which is not out yet, thus we don’t have many of its specs including size, price and other features.
Second, I priced the Dell m1330. Starting price before rebate was $1598 with a standard 2MB of ram. I assumed the table was comparing base standards (4MB of ram is an additional $400 for the 1330)
Disregarding any comparison of operating systems (which I don’t think help the Windows machines. I know, I know big acrimonious discussion), considering the “Air” doesn’t make out too badly. Looking at machines of the same or lesser weight, there is no real competition. The best competition may well be the Dell m1330. However, it’s almost a pound and a half heavier, and also larger. For some this may not be a problem, for others it will be. At any rate it doesn’t seem like the Macbook Air is a machine which should be dismissed as unworthy of serious consideration, or as all style and no substance.
on January 19, 2008 at 01:27 Stephen wrote:
this is the new yet-unreleased lenovo x300 that should be officially released soon…
just about all is known except for price and release date…
the prices include 4gb upgraded via newegg, if systems support it ,, which is $79 for 4gb (2×2)
i did not use the 4gb upgrades offered by the manufacturer which are usually total rippoffs.
on January 19, 2008 at 06:41 jack wrote:
Hi,
you could add the HP NC2400 or the Santa Rosa updated model 2510p to the list. They are 12.1″ WXGA starting at ~2.7lbs with a 3-cell and come with a built-in DVD, 1.2GHz ULV C2D and have a volume and lid surface of about 90″.
Sam, please enlighten me what the heck is wrong with ULV CPU’s ? 1.2GHz is more than enough for ultra portables! And do you think that Apple Air’s extra 400MHz will give you so much more?
Check them out Steve and good list there btw!
on January 19, 2008 at 08:40 KenB wrote:
Regarding the m1330 (which I currently have): the hard drive options include a 200GB@7200RPM, the screen can be 13.3″LED, and it does support internal WWAN (I have it with Sprint).
Regarding the X300, where is your evidence for the following: SD card, ExpressCard, and DisplayPort? Slide 2 at Gizmodo lists those three things on the right under the heading “Not supported,” along with 2.5″ HDD (the X300 uses a 1.8″ form factor) and 9.5mm ODD (the X300 uses a 7mm ODD). I’d love for you to be right, but I don’t yet see it.
on January 19, 2008 at 15:20 Stephen wrote:
thanks for the correction Ken.
yes the m1330 i priced out actually includes an LED screen.. i just forgot to type LED… fixed.
all of the 2.5″ hdd laptops support a 200gb 7200rpm disk drive… usually cheaper to buy from a 3rd party… hitachi 7k200 is currently (by far) the best 2.5″ sata disk drive.
as for the x300, the not supported page is strange… other websites state it does have display port/expresscard.. but ill remove that feature from the list..
according to that not-supported page the x300 also doesn’t support windows xp/2000 and vista64… lol… obviously can’t be true.
on January 22, 2008 at 12:09 Xeno wrote:
I think it’s fairly obvious that the Air is a crippled first attempt at a small laptop. The only areas in which it doesn’t get beat down are thinness(helpful how?) and huge footprint.
on January 23, 2008 at 13:15 David wrote:
I’ve been looking to put together a portable office for writing on the road – this table is great, it’ll definitely help with that. That x300 is looking better and better, although you’d think they could have found a spot to put an SD card reader.
on January 23, 2008 at 13:26 David wrote:
Also – (Sorry for double post) have you considered adding a section for the sub-notebooks that are coming out of the One Laptop program, like the Asus Eee PC and the soon-to-be released Everex CloudBook? For many travelers, those are looking to be ideal roadbooks (at least, once you replace the shipped Ubuntu with the version that Linux hackers have had a chance to update).