Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
65,600
34,189



mbaback.jpg



Photo of original MacBook Air by kimb0lene
The backlit keyboard will reportedly be making a return to the MacBook Air with the new 2011 models that are quickly approaching release. The seemingly minor feature omission for the 2010 MacBook Air has generated a good bit of backlash on Apple's own support forums.

AppleInsider claims that the imminent MacBook Air refresh will bring back this popular feature:
According to people familiar with the matter, backlit keyboards will join the string of hardware enhancements planned for the new 11.6- and 13.3-inch notebooks, which are also expected to adopt high-speed Thunderbolt ports, an upgrade to Intel's Sandy Bridge architecture, and possibly high-speed 400MBps flash memory.
The backlight provides illumination to the keyboard in the dark (as pictured above). The feature is also present in all of Apple's current MacBook Pro notebooks.

The MacBook Air is expected to be released soon with part numbers already leaked on Monday. Apple is rumored to have delayed the MacBook Air release until OS X Lion was ready and shipping.

Article Link: Backlit Keyboard to Return in New MacBook Air?
 

Jobsian

macrumors 6502a
Jul 30, 2009
853
98
Never been a major concern for myself but I'm glad if it does return as a quick glance at opinion polls will tell you it'll make a lot of people happy!
 

talkingfuture

macrumors 65816
Dec 4, 2008
1,216
0
The back of beyond.
Never been a big concern for me as I have never used one before. Though seeing how highly rated they are by the people that have used them they must be pretty good. I just hope it doesn't push the price up too much as I always associate the backlit keyboard with Apple's more expensive laptops.
 

Illumination

macrumors regular
Jul 6, 2011
196
0
Georgia, USA
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

I'm sold! I need a new Mac anyway.
 

MacNico

macrumors newbie
Jun 18, 2011
8
0
Holland
Will the new MBA's with ThunderBolt also support flickering and black outs on 24" ACD'S?

The seemingly minor feature omission for the Thunderbolt port's has generated a good bit of backlash on Apple's own support forums.
And also on the MacRumors forum.
 

wrkactjob

macrumors 65816
Feb 29, 2008
1,357
0
London
Wow! These newest Airs are going to sell like hot cakes!

Not that I have ever bought a hot cake, nor do I really know what a hot cake is?....in fact most of my favourite cakes are cold ones.
 

bchreng

macrumors 65816
Jul 26, 2005
1,063
348
Queue the 'I-don't-need-it-because-I-can-type-in-the-dark-so-no-one-else-should-either' know-it-all in 3... 2... 1...
 

HiRez

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
6,265
2,629
Western US
Fantastic if true, it's a feature I would use all the time. Also, I doubt it affects battery life that much, it just uses a few small LEDs, the same type used in keychain flashlights which last for years and are tiny. Although if they can make it a software preference to turn it off, so much the better.
 

Duke15

macrumors 6502
May 18, 2011
332
0
Canada
Wow! These newest Airs are going to sell like hot cakes!

Not that I have ever bought a hot cake, nor do I really know what a hot cake is?....in fact most of my favourite cakes are cold ones.

They are pancakes, which sell like crazy here in canada lol
 

rmbrown09

macrumors 6502a
Jan 25, 2010
942
0
USA
I just hope that it has a decent GPU, battery life, backlit, and i5's and i7's.

I also want a flush glass screen but hey.
 

Duke15

macrumors 6502
May 18, 2011
332
0
Canada
This is going to tempt a lot of the ppl who said they probably won't buy one because of theHD3000 graphics
 

bchreng

macrumors 65816
Jul 26, 2005
1,063
348
I'm surprised you are not also arguing about the extra weight.

The "inefficiency" will be negligible.

The .1% it could've added to battery life and performance would've have made his day! How could you be so insensitive?!
 

akm3

macrumors 68020
Nov 15, 2007
2,252
279
I LOVE my iPad. I even sold a 15" Macbook Pro and bought a 27" iMac instead, because the iPad replaced my mobile computing needs.

I would *Really* like to see an Air with built in 3G (and while I'm dreaming, with data plan prices the same as the iPad)

Anyway, I know it seems trivial but the backlit keyboard (and the less bitched about lack of an ambient light sensor) which were on the A/B/C Air's I really liked, and miss on my wife's 11" Air. I hope they bring both back, it would seriously tempt me away from the iPad and back to an Air (+tethering iPhone I suppose) as my primary portable.

But I guess what I would really want is for the iPad to be buffed up even more. At least the iPad has a backlit keyboard :p
 

Heilage

macrumors 68030
May 1, 2009
2,592
0
It wouldn't have been a dealbreaker for me, but if the backlit keyboard shows up again, it would be the final little thing that would worry me about the Air.

I want one.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.