I wouldn't say 21% thinner is "a lot", considering all the space they saved by going with a laminated glass display, no optical drive, no 2.5" hard drive and no removable standard RAM. Those are all things that couldn't be applied to the MBA, so it's not clear how you could fit a bigger battery in a MBA enclosure.
The MacBook Air certainly has no optical disk drive or HDD to be removed. But I guess the space may be used a little bit more efficiently. Not going to make a big difference, though.
Sure, then a 13" MBA with Retina display could be a little thinner than a 13" rMBP. You still couldn't get the kind of battery life you get in the current MBA with a Retina display without improving battery capacity though. It would have to be in between a 13" MBA and 13" rMBP.
Using today's technology, you're right.
If Haswell promises to be as efficient as Intel is announcing, then Apple may be able to get the same battery life in the MacBook Air with the retina display.
You can't rule out Sharp's IGZO technology as well. Intel, Apple and Foxconn are reportedly interested in saving Sharp so they could make use of this very power-efficient display technology. It has been widely announced in the media that IGZO displays may be the perfect companion to Haswell.
Intel always promise wonders. Let's wait for actual benchmarks before drawing any conclusion from their marketing. The current MBAs could get a slightly better battery life without having a Retina display. The 11" is especially disappointing in that regard.
Well, not always. In fact, this time I kind of believe in Intel (with a grain of salt, of course).
It may not appear so, but Intel is struggling for survival right now. ARM is a much more dangerous competitor than AMD has ever been. And ARM processors are beginning to step into Intel's territory, promising much more power-efficient solutions. Microsoft has developed a Windows version that runs on ARM processors. Apple is rumored to be considering ARM for Macs. And Android-powered ARM tablets are becoming increasingly powerful. Well, I guess Intel won't wait until ARM processors are powerful enough, or Windows RT turns into a viable option, to take action.
Haswell is, IMHO, Intel's answer to ARM. It has to be powerful enough to show everybody that Intel will be relevant in the mobile future. Intel was in a very comfortable position fighting AMD. Now, I think it will really have to show up something. And, by the noise it is making with Haswell ("the notebook reinvented", says one of the mottos), Intel has better deliver it.
Yes, that's what I'm saying. MBAs may get Retina displays in 2014 with Broadwell. Not before.
Suppose Haswell is power-efficient enough to drive the battery life of current form-factor MacBook Air to 10h (and it may well be). When Broadwell is released, it won't represent so much of a jump in power-efficiency as Haswell did. So, if Apple puts a retina display in MacBook Airs in 2014, it may see the then 10-hour battery life of the MacBook Air reduced to, say, 8 hours.
If the big bump in power efficiency is coming with Haswell (and not with Broadwell), then I see no reason why Apple won't put a retina display in the MacBook Air in 2013.
1920x1080 is quite far from 2560x1600. It's half the number of pixels, and closer to the current MBA's 1440x900 resolution than to 2560x1600.
1440x900 = 1.29 million pixels
1920x1080 = 2.07 million pixels
2560x1600 = 4.09 million pixels
You were quoting the overall battery life of those devices, so that's why I pointed out they used CPUs with lower TDPs. I know the displays themselves don't require less power (except for the fact that they're smaller).
Yes. The power consumption of these displays is the closest I can think of for comparisons.
Intel was also expecting ultrabooks to account for 40% of notebook sales in 2012. How did that work out? Marketing is just that, marketing.
Well, that a different story. Those are marketing projections, and Intel has no control on what people chooses to buy (they wish they had). When Intel predicts such high resolutions in laptops, they may or may not happen as well. But Intel only makes these predictions because it knows that its products will be able to allow such screen resolutions. The ultrabook specification is made by Intel itself. Intel would have to be incoherent to promise technology it can't deliver.
I guess retina displays are coming to ultrabooks in 2013. As for the Samsung Series 9 ultrabook, why would it even bother to show off the prototype with a 2560x1440 display if it wasn't capable of mass-producing it one year later?
