Jason Snell:
If Gurman’s reports are accurate, this new model pulls the MacBook Air line away from the MacBook Pro. In fact, it returns the MacBook Air to its roots—as a product full of choices that we consider crazy at first, because they’re out of step with conventional computer design, but that will appeal to a target audience that doesn’t actually care about those de rigueur features.
Some good thoughts in here.
True. But please have a magsafe so it doesn’t die from crashing to the ground every-time someone walks past one!
Does the speculation the new MacBook Air will have a Retina display jibe with the speculation it will have a Core M processor? Does the higher processing needed for the Retina display require a better CPU or GPU (and I thought the GPU is integrated in these Intel chips…)
Maybe they got the battery life to the point that, like your phone, you typically don’t have it plugged in while using it?
If they have indeed removed the clickable trackpad, I hope they have something better than “tap to click”.
Maybe they’re using an Apple Watch style charger?
Maybe they’ll use an Apple Watch style charger?
@disqus_t4wYtrzt2h:disqus @thegrandmoff:disqus both valid points. I guess inductive charging is the answer, because a battery, no matter how advanced, has a limited amount of charging cycles until it dies. And sometimes you need to use an external device while you’re about to run out of juice, having to unplug that thing and wait until it’s charged enough to be able to continue working is a very bad idea.
But inductive charging with like 30W (roughly a MacBook Air at full power with a BlueRay burner plugged in) is a bit farfetched if you don’t want to build in giant antennas and have the person put the entire Laptop on a plate as big as the laptop itself. Or has that gotten more elegant lately?
And how much energy is lost in transfer? It used to be a significant 10% to 50% depending on angle and distance. With an AppleWatch that altogether charges like 300mAh that’s basically irrelevant, but it adds up too. I guess, because the AppleWatch charger touches the watch it only looses like 7%, but still it isn’t as efficient as a plug.
Tap to click is the first thing I touch on every time I touch a mac. I really really loathe clicking physically. But I guess to each their preference – just something Apple doesn’t agree on, they think that making these kind of decisions for you is their job.
They used to be focused on energy efficiency and that kind of charger looses – if done really well – about 7% as em radiation. Waste of energy, but likely their choice of charger…
IMHO it would be a major mistake not to include a Lightning port, even if there is a USB-C. Apple has a 3-year advantage on the USB committee and arguably a superior design (even though USB-C had the advantage of seeing Lightning in operation; to give that up would be madness.
Could do both?
Though note that exactly zero Apple “computers” have a Lightning port now.
AFAIK, Lightning has never yet delivered over 12 watts of power; we don’t know what the limit is (because Apple won’t say).
Apple is clever and thinks ahead, but I wouldn’t put money on Lightning handling, say, 30 watts as it stands…