Apple Considering 14-Inch MacBook Air to Focus on Asian Markets?

[David085]

Love the idea of a 14" MBA is abit bigger

 

[Val-kyrie]

What makes Apple think it's only the Asian market that would like a 14" MacBook Air. I imagine a 14" might offer the feel of a larger 15", which preserving much of the compactness of the 13" -- particularly if Apple can do what HP did, and extend the screen more to the edges of the lid, rather than having a large edge margin.

I prefer the form factor of 14" laptops, as well.

Would this be only sold in Asain markets?

Either way it makes no sense to have 11", 13", 14", 15", and 17" options.

I said a while ago that I thought Apple might go with new sizes for the new MB range:

12" & 14" MBA
16" & 18" MBP

If they eliminate the border around the screen and go with an edge to edge screen instead they should be able to increase the screen size without increasing the overall footprint of the machines.

The addition of a new 14" form factor seems out of place unless Apple is going to consolidate the notebook line into a single line of "MacBooks" and changes the lineup to distinguish more precisely between models with integrated graphics (current MBAs) and models with discrete graphics (MBPs). A 14" form factor would provide enough space for a low-end, discrete graphics chip and retain portability with the 13", while also avoiding confusion with the 13" model which would provide less graphics processing power. Thus I could envision the following line-up:

11" & 13" MBA (integrated graphics)
14", 15", & 17" (dedicated graphics)

I am, however, very dubious about this story.

 

[Patrick J]

Some might see this as Apple starting to lose FOCUS.

 

[afawcett]

That's going to make for a very small keyboard on the 13" MBA.

I didn't see that you quoted me.
They can reduce the bezel in 2 ways:
1. Make the screen larger, keeping the same form factor
2. Reducing the form factor, but keeping the same size screen and keyboard. You can seen in this image that the screen lines up nicely with the keyboard, creating "whitespace" around the keyboard:
http://images.apple.com/macbookair/images/design_multitouch.jpg
Therefore it is possible to reduce the form factor without affecting the size of the keyboard (although the tackpad might take a hit).

Although I'm a fan of the first, I doubt Apple would pursue either option.

 

[thephatp]

I don't care much what the size of the screen is between 13" and, say 16". Just give me an option with 1600+ by "y" and I'd be thrilled. I need more space to work than just 1440x900.

Any of these:
1600 x 900
1600 x 1200
1680 x 1050
1920 x 1080
1920 x 1200