(2023 ) Apple Air 11.6-inch and 13.3-inch Review

 Apple MacBook Air  2023

When the first MacBook Air 11 inch came out at the beginning of 2008, it was praised for being highly portable and super thin while still having a full-sized keyboard and 13-inch screen. But it was also criticised because it didn't do much, couldn't be expanded, and was pretty expensive.

At the end of 2008 and again in the middle of 2009, Apple responded to the Air's critics with design updates that improved the machine's processor options and graphics. The slow Intel GMA X3100 was replaced with the more powerful Nvidia GeForce 9400M, and the entry-level price was dropped from $1,799 to $1,499.

This year, Apple completely redesigned the 13-inch MacBook Air by adding an extra USB port, upgrading the graphics to Nvidia's GeForce 320M, increasing the battery capacity, increasing the screen resolution (from a "13-inch" resolution of 1280x800 to a "15-inch" resolution of 1440x900), and switching the storage to a fast, "instant-on" solid state flash drive.

Apple also made the 13-inch model a tenth of a pound lighter and two millimetres thinner. They also made a new 11-inch model with a 1366x768 screen that is an inch wider, almost an inch and a half deeper, two millimetres thinner, and weighs 0.7 lbs less than the old model.

The basic White MacBook costs the same as the 11-inch Air, but it has a faster processor and more storage space on its traditional hard drive. It can also be upgraded to 4GB at any time. With the new Air, you can only get more than 2GB of RAM if you choose that option when you buy it. The low-end MacBook also has a bigger screen, but it has about the same resolution as the 11-inch Air: 1280x800 instead of 1366x768. It is a little taller, but not quite as wide.

 comparision  iPads , MacBook air

Apple's decision to release the MacBook Air as a new kind of mobile computer at the same time it released the iPad as a new kind of mobile device is very interesting. The iPad is a new kind of mobile device that is smaller than a full-sized notebook but bigger than a smartphone or an iPod touch.

In fact, the new MacBook Air models, especially the 11-inch version, would probably be called Apple's new "netbooks" if Apple hadn't just launched the iPad with such an explosive, industry-shaking violence that blew up the "netbook" category and sent PC makers scrambling to make their own tablets.

Also Read : (2023) New Apple MacBook Air in 11.6-inch and 13.3-inch + Reviews

But unlike netbooks, Apple isn't trying to compete in the $400 market with a micro-sized notebook with a tiny chiclet keyboard, a low-resolution 10-inch screen (1024x600 is standard for netbooks), a weak Atom processor paired with a basic Intel GMA GPU, one gigabyte of RAM, and a limited version of Windows 7 that needs a $80 OS upgrade to work as expected.

Apple isn't likely to get many low-end netbook buyers with the MacBook Air, but the $499 iPad and $199 iPod touch have done well in that market because they have many of the same features as low-end netbooks at a similar price point. The Air models are clearly aimed at a market above netbooks, which is why they overlap with the lower end of the MacBooks and make it hard to choose between them.

MacBook Air vs iPad

Still, there will be some people who compare the MacBook Air to the iPad, especially the 11-inch model. In terms of hardware, the MacBook Air has a full-sized Core 2 Duo processor, a separate Nvidia graphics processor, and 2 to 4GB of RAM, while the iPad only has an A4 application processor and 1GB of RAM.

Even with these differences, both the Air and the iPad offer a good computing experience and a smooth, responsive user interface. This is different from most netbooks, which often try to force a full desktop operating system to run on cost-constrained hardware, like a "mobile" Intel Atom CPU and a slow GPU that is strangled by limited RAM.

The 11-inch MacBook Air has a screen that is about the same size and resolution as the iPad. Its display isn't quite as tall but is a little bit wider, and its vertical resolution is the same even though it is about a third wider. Because of these extra pixels, the Air is better suited to Mac OS X's multiple-window environment than to iOS's "one full-screen app at a time" interface, which is used by the iPad. The 11-inch Air's wider screen makes it slightly better than the iPad for watching widescreen movies, but it's not much better for looking at maps, documents, or web pages, which are all more fun to look at on the iPad's multitouch display and often need more vertical space than extra width.

What's new about the way the MacBook Air is made: screen ad body

How are the new MacBook Air models different from the ones they're replacing? They're a little bit thinner and lighter, have easier-to-reach ports on both sides (two USB ports instead of one), have higher-resolution screens, and, while they don't have the original Air's backlit keyboard, they now have the same glass trackpad as the rest of the MacBooks. Like Apple's other consumer products, the 13-inch model now has an SD Card slot, but the smaller 11-inch model does not.

The screen on the MacBook Air doesn't seem as bright or vivid as the screen on the MacBook Pro, but it doesn't look broken when you're not comparing it to the MacBook Pro. The screen is bright, clear, and sharp, and colour gradients look smooth instead of choppy or blurry.

The Air models have a matte, metal frame around the inset screen, while the Pro screens have a black border and are all covered with a single sheet of glossy glass. Even though the Air screens are also shiny, the solid grey frame makes them look less shiny than the Pro models (as shown below).

 performance: CPU

In raw benchmarks, the new MacBook Air scores about the same as the older models, which had the same clock speeds. Our benchmarks were a little bit better, but the newer, high-end Air also had 4GB to work with. Even though the new Air is not nearly as fast as a Core i5 MacBook Pro, it is only slightly slower than the entry-level MacBook, which has a much faster CPU (2.4GHz compared the 2.13GHz high end option on the Air). The slowest Air CPU option gives up a lot of raw performance to meet the model's price, efficiency, and design requirements.

Using benchmarks that look at overall performance rather than just the CPU, the latest MacBook Air models show significant performance improvements over the previous design. This is partly due to a better graphics chip (nVidia's 320M vs. the earlier 9400M), but it's also due to the faster disc access of the new SSD, which improves both disc reads and virtual memory performance system-wide. In a test of copying files, the Air was just over five times faster than the previous Air, which had a 1.8-inch, 4200rpm conventional HDD.

Macworld's tests showed that the new SSD flash storage on the Air made it possible for the 13-inch, 1.86GHz model to get a Speedmark 6.5 score, which was better than a 13-inch MacBook Pro with a 2.4GHz Core2 Duo processor. The Core i5 options on the 15-inch and larger MacBook Pros, on the other hand, are about a third faster than the Air.

 performance: Memory and Power

Mac OS X needs more RAM to run well, even though the SSD in the new MacBook Air seems to be less affected by virtual memory paging than a regular hard drive. Because of this, most Air models' 2GB limit seems kind of low. You can now order the Air with 4GB of RAM, but you can only do this when you buy it. Since the memory chips are soldered onto the logic board, there is no way to upgrade a RAM module later.

Compared to other MacBook models, not being able to upgrade is a big problem. However, Apple used to not let you upgrade the memory on the MacBook Air past the standard 2GB. If you want to do more than just browse the web and edit simple emails and documents, it makes a lot of sense to pay the extra $100 for the 4GB upgrade when you buy the device. If you do this, you won't be able to return a "build-to-order" model, but the machine will be worth more when you sell it.

Review of the New MacBook Air

Apple did a great job of making the MacBook Air live up to the idea that it would be a combination of its notebook and iPad skills. The overall design of the Air shows how much better it is to use customised parts instead of just putting together stock components. The Air is a good product because of how well all of its parts work together. It's not just the SSD, the battery, or the operating system that makes it so. Few other manufacturers work so hard at tight integration and customization and invest in the technologies needed to make these composite innovations in such a forward-thinking way.

The new MacBook Air 11 inch models build on Apple's original goal of making a light, highly portable notebook that could be used like a full-sized computer. Apple's innovative unibody construction was first seen on the first Air. Since then, Apple has added it to the rest of its MacBook line. The latest Air has a tweaked version of this unibody design, which still makes for a very thin, light, but strong and rigid case with better access to the ports.