11.6 inch MacBook Air 1.4GHz or 1.6GHz ?

[ccsicecoke]

I placed my order for 1.4GHz - 4GB ram - 128GB immediately after the online store is up, but now I got little hesitated on whether to cancel this order and have a 1.6GHz upgrade

How much differences in performance?

 

[miles01110]

Depends on what you're doing. Since you're asking it probably doesn't matter.

 

[hcho3]

Instead of processor upgrade, I would do ram upgrade.

 

[0007776]

Like the other poster said, it all depends on what you're using it for, since you didn't say I'm guessing you will be fine with the one you ordered.

 

[Jaymon]

I'm also pondering between these two. I use Photoshop, InDesign (CS3) and iMovie occasionally and will go for 4GB for sure. Any idea of processor?

 

[zub3qin]

Anyone have any idea if MBA 11.6" would run MS Office 2011 well?
How about parallels and windows XP?
How about OS 10.7?

This 11.6" MBA at first glance seems grossly underpowered and if all it is really good for is browsing and emails, and light work type activities, you may as well get an iPad. Am I wrong on this?

 

[animatedude]

Anyone have any idea if MBA 11.6" would run MS Office 2011 well?
How about parallels and windows XP?
How about OS 10.7?

This 11.6" MBA at first glance seems grossly underpowered and if all it is really good for is browsing and emails, and light work type activities, you may as well get an iPad. Am I wrong on this?

i second this Q too.

 

[kingsal]

i second this Q too.

Anyone have any idea if MBA 11.6" would run MS Office 2011 well?
How about parallels and windows XP?
How about OS 10.7?

This 11.6" MBA at first glance seems grossly underpowered and if all it is really good for is browsing and emails, and light work type activities, you may as well get an iPad. Am I wrong on this?

Office 2011 - Yes. It has 2GB of RAM. More than enough for word processing.

Parallels and XP - It will run it. If you're going to use visualization a lot, go for the quad-core processors (Core i5, i7 in 15" MBP) and at least 4 GB RAM.

10.7 - Of course it will. Why would you even ask that?

 

[ditosou]

Battery issues

The 11" MBA model has 5 hours of battery.... in practice maybe 2.5 or 3 hours? What do you think?

(this is the only point that makes me hesitate in going to the 11" model)

 

[saniko]

Real-time? I'm guessing 6. With the size of the batteries in here, I think they figure they can win a few points by going over their estimates.

 

[Ace134blue]

I'm also pondering between these two. I use Photoshop, InDesign (CS3) and iMovie occasionally and will go for 4GB for sure. Any idea of processor?

Anyone have any idea if MBA 11.6" would run MS Office 2011 well?
How about parallels and windows XP?
How about OS 10.7?

This 11.6" MBA at first glance seems grossly underpowered and if all it is really good for is browsing and emails, and light work type activities, you may as well get an iPad. Am I wrong on this?

To answer all of the above questions, id say the newer 2.13ghz process is 50~% faster than the older 2.13 version. They Doubled the L2 Cache from 3MB to 6MB which does make a difference.

It will run office and parallels, but probably not very smooth unless you have 4gb of ram

 

[ditosou]

hummmm

Real-time? I'm guessing 6. With the size of the batteries in here, I think they figure they can win a few points by going over their estimates.

hummm.... I would love that... but I don't believe that the 11" MBA battery lifetime surpass the announced by apple.... I fear that real battery lifetime in 11" MBA will be something like 2 or 3 hours.... and only that makes me hesitate between 11" or 13"

 

[drjsway]

The 11" MBA model has 5 hours of battery.... in practice maybe 2.5 or 3 hours? What do you think?

(this is the only point that makes me hesitate in going to the 11" model)

Jobs made a point by saying Apple is using new more stringent battery tests. He says the 13" version is double the battery life of the old model, not just 40% more like the specs would have you believe. So yes, I would expect 5 full hours of real world usage.

 

[racer1441]

I went down the list of things I do with my current AIR.....word, internet, e-mail, remote desktop and decided that the 11.5 at the base specs were fine for that.

Powerhouse is the 17inch or the imac. Couch use is the ipad. Everything in between will be the two AIR's.

 

[Cat5e]

Office 2011 - Yes. It has 2GB of RAM. More than enough for word processing.

Parallels and XP - It will run it. If you're going to use visualization a lot, go for the quad-core processors (Core i5, i7 in 15" MBP) and at least 4 GB RAM.

10.7 - Of course it will. Why would you even ask that?

Parallels should run fine. I've used VMware desktop (similar to Fusion) on a 1.3ghz C2D with no problems.


FYI, there are no quad-core MBPs, just hyper-threaded dual core. Paralells and Fusion can't take advantage of multiple threads, just cores.

 

[0007776]

Anyone have any idea if MBA 11.6" would run MS Office 2011 well?
How about parallels and windows XP?
How about OS 10.7?

My current air runs office, and windows XP in vmware. and 10.7 will run perfectly fine on it, they introduced them at the same event, there is no way they would discontinue support for all computers that are over 6 months old when they release 10.7.

 

[Jaymon]

Thanks for the answers! I'm already on order button, but still can't decide. Does 200Mhz increase make any difference in iMovie video editing and Photoshop & InDesign usage?

Everything runs smoothly with my current 2Ghz MB unibody (4GB) and I don't want to take huge leap backwards in performance. Everything is ok as long as those softwares will run ok So, 1,4ghz or 1,6ghz?

 

[joelypolly]

I am hoping there will be a patch or hack to take the CPU to the 1066Mhz so the CPU will be 1.8GHz.

 

[drummerlondonw3]

Thanks for the answers! I'm already on order button, but still can't decide. Does 200Mhz increase make any difference in iMovie video editing and Photoshop & InDesign usage?

Everything runs smoothly with my current 2Ghz MB unibody (4GB) and I don't want to take huge leap backwards in performance. Everything is ok as long as those softwares will run ok So, 1,4ghz or 1,6ghz?

Are you going to be running these apps on an external moniter? I did my first photoshopping on my 800mhzz ibook and although possible not great!

Personally I would defo go for the base 13 if these are your needs. 1.4 is not great for todays standard.

The SSD will seem like a massive increase in the short term but for imovie and CS you will need raw power at time.

Can I ask why you would be going for the 11 over the 13?

 

[Jaymon]

Are you going to be running these apps on an external moniter? I did my first photoshopping on my 800mhzz ibook and although possible not great!

Personally I would defo go for the base 13 if these are your needs. 1.4 is not great for todays standard.

The SSD will seem like a massive increase in the short term but for imovie and CS you will need raw power at time.

Can I ask why you would be going for the 11 over the 13?

Yep, I will run them on an external monitor. The reason to go for 11" is that I will do a huge amount of traveling during next 12 months. I will have laptop with me most of the time, so weight is everything. First I was planning to buy iPad along my MB, but new Air changed my mind. Now I just want to get rid of MB and buy MBA to all my needs

Just to be clear, most of my usage is internet, mail and office. PS use is weekly, ID and iMovie more sporadic.

 

[happyslayer]

Simple answer... which is actually more of a question.

Can you afford the extra $100.00? If so, get the 1.6, if not, don't.

$100.00 is a pretty minimal price for a CPU upgrade on most any manufacturers product. So, if you can afford it, do it.

Will you need it now? Maybe not. But who's to know with future apps?

But on the other hand... 1.6 vs 1.4 is only about a 14% increase in speed and that is only if the CPU is actually running at the full speed. In most cases - at least what I have seen on my Rev B air (1.86 GHz) - is that it spends most of its time running at 900 MHz so it might be a moot point.

On the other, other hand I went ahead and ordered the 1.6 since it was only an extra $100.

Good luck with your decision!

 

[M87]

My problem with upgrading the 11.6 is that if you up the processor, storage and ram it costs almost the exact same as a 13 with a faster processor (1.8 vs 1.6), bigger screen and sd slot. That seems like the sweet spot the more i think about it.

13"
1.8GHz C2D
4GB RAM
128GB SDD

IMO that compares very well with the 13 inch pro.

 

[gman901]

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Yes, I have a M11x R1 with the same CPU running at 1.3 Ghz stock speed with a very good video card. If the 320 m is any good, it should handle all the heavy lifting and keep battery life high. I get about 9-10 hours on integrated graphics with the same CPU and about 4-5 hours with it in graphics mode. I would for the 11.6" model because the CPU really does not matter much compared to the GPU and my experience viewing my M11x 11.6" screen has been wonderful.

 

[MacModMachine]

Office 2011 - Yes. It has 2GB of RAM. More than enough for word processing.

Parallels and XP - It will run it. If you're going to use visualization a lot, go for the quad-core processors (Core i5, i7 in 15" MBP) and at least 4 GB RAM.

10.7 - Of course it will. Why would you even ask that?

why...?

quad core is absolutely not a requirement for virtualization, dual core is plenty.

apple does not make a notebook with a quad core in it.

1.4 Ghz - Good for virtualization (wont be lightning fast but will do it fine, will depend greatly on cooling)

1.6 Ghz - Also good for virtualization but i doubt will make much of a difference being a 200mhz increase, memory will be better.


Most people these days do not need much cpu for what they do its always an over purchase for most.

i used to have a 1.86 and 2.13 macbook air and i would have stayed with them if they could have handled imovie better, but unfortunately i ultimately had to take a MBP 13", but i miss the MBA alot.

 

[KnightWRX]

This 11.6" MBA at first glance seems grossly underpowered and if all it is really good for is browsing and emails, and light work type activities, you may as well get an iPad. Am I wrong on this?

Yes, you're wrong. Machines sold since about 2000 have been grossly overpowered for most tasks users do.

I ran VMware first on a Pentium II 333 mhz with about 128 MB of RAM. It ran on a Linux host with a Windows 2000 guest. I was using Office on Windows back on my AMD 486 DX4-100 with 8 MB of RAM. What does 10.7 bring anyway ? GUI enhancements ? All GPU accelerated anyhow. The 320M is a solid GPU.

Even accounting for Bloat, the MBA will be my main and only machine and will be overpowered for that. And yes, I use some Photoshop and Illustrator. Of course, those ran back in the 90s on computers much less powerful than this MBA.

Some people are overestimating their computing power needs.