For those on the fence about MBAs based on processing power:

[SmoothJ]

If you're only doing that, I think you effectively fall into that "average consumer" category and, in that case, any baseline Mac Apple sells will be more than enough for you.

I understand your philosophy but, in this setting, I think you're overspending a bit.

Yes, I do have the tenancy to over think specs. Just like the car I used to have:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOf2bRgLdok

Like Tim Allen said in Home Improvement - "more power".

Anyway, we will see how the MBA plays out for me, but as of right now - its a joy to use.

 

[KnightWRX]

Like Tim Allen said in Home Improvement - "more power".

Of course, then the thing he applied "more power" to would usually just blow up in his face, not quite the example I'd use to justify a spec addiction.

 

[SmoothJ]

Of course, then the thing he applied "more power" to would usually just blow up in his face, not quite the example I'd use to justify a spec addiction.

Good point...lol

 

[iSayuSay]

......
The Air fits the bill perfectly. The iMac kinda lags in the "drag around with me" part.

Yes. It's the very reason why I need an Air too, I only wish I don't need to because it was another $900 leakage for me .. and it was just for fun to run games altogether .. but I use Parallel quite often on OSX, so that power helps a lot to me .. I edit and convert video quite often while running Illustrator or Photoshop to get my job done, so I'm not exactly idling my CPU 99% of all time .. and same as OP said, I feel my MBA get quite hot for just converting a 30mins video, not the case with iMac

But if Air fits your needs, who am I to argue .. it was just my side of story

Not just processing power, but electrical power. I bought a 2011 MBA from Amazon (still waiting for shipping) because I feel the MBA probably has the most processing power for the wattage it uses. I am tired of being on my desktop (which uses 300 watts of electricity) to just browse the web or check email. Once I get my MBA I am going to only use my desktop for gaming (I rarely game anyways since I work a lot)

Having 300watt PSU not necessarily it uses 300 watt all the time, when idling an iMac can consume 80 - 90 watt of power, and also Sandy Bridge CPU get aggresive TurboBoost, so when I only browse or listening to music, 3.4GHz i7 auto clocked down into 1.6GHz to save power too. 300Watt is the peak, not the typical power usage.

Maybe Air act the same too, having 45watt Magsafe doesn't mean it use that all the time, it's just the peak. But you have your point, Air use 5 - 8x less energy than desktop

 

[mrdm]

I use my 13" 1.7Ghz Air as my primary machine. It handles every task with ease and is very fast. Faster in daily use than the 2009 and 2010 macbook pro's I've used in the past.

No issues with the processor speed and I can't tell any difference (gaming or otherwise) between the integrated HD 3k GPU and the Nvidia 320M.

I've owned countless mac's through the years and have to say that this air is probably the best computer I've ever used.

 

[flynz4]

Home NAS and centralized storage is where it is at in 2011. All my stuff I keep on a NAS, my MBA's storage is for current work only.

I also have a number of NAS boxes... but I would generally disagree that they are the best solution in 2011.

One of the biggest problems I have with NAS boxes is that they do not integrate well into my backup strategy. I am a very strong believer in having redundant backups of my data... and at least one of the backups needs to automatically be offsite. Generally... the consumer priced cloud backup services will not backup data that is stored on the NAS... only data directly attached to the computer.

I own three home NAS servers... but in day to day use... they are simply turned off and not in use. Two of them have been completely decommissioned, and the last one is almost never used. I wouldn't replace it if it broke. All of them support some level of redundancy which protects them against drive failures. However, this does nothing to protect against theft, fire or natural disasters. Hence... while they may not need local (in the house) backup... they still need an automated continuous cloud backup.

Two of my NAS boxes support RAID 0, 1, 5, 10. RAID is a great technology for enterprise... but it is really a lousy technology for consumers. The issue is that RAID systems are very temperamental on having matched drives. Almost all that I have seen require all of the drives to be the same size. Many also require the same brand, model... and in some cases, even the same firmware revision. This is not a problem for an enterprise because they procure and keep enough spares to last the expected lifespan of their RAID systems. This does not work very well for consumers. I have found that in my use... once a drive fails and I am running with no RAID redundancy... the only option is to write all of the data to different storage location... replace all 4 of my drives with new ones, then copy the data back to the RAID array. This is expensive and not in line with a good consumer experience.

I also have a Windows Home Server... which overcomes those problems by letting you mix and match any sized drives using their Drive Extender technology. They do not use RAID... but for consumers, DE is actually superior. It only uses "data duplication" which is not as efficient as RAID... but overall, it is much easier to manage and recover from HDD crashes. Furthermore, even if the server itself was to fail, you can mount the individual drives on any computer that supports NTFS, and just copy the data. All you your data will be on at least two of the drives. The big problem is Windows Home Server is that Microsoft has abandoned Drive Extender. I have stopped following it... but I believe the consumer response is very negative and the general consensus is that Microsoft ruined WHS.

Finally there is Drobo. Like WHS... it allows you to mix and match drives. The only problem with Drobo seems to be if the actual Drobo box fails... you cannot get your data back unless you acquire a replacement Drobo box. I am not sure that is a fatal problem, but it could be an inconvenience.

Still... for me... the Achilles heal of all these solutions is their difficulty to integrate into an automated offsite backup strategy that is priced with consumers in mind.

What I have done instead is to use a 2TB i7 iMac as my "home location" for 100% of my data. I keep it on 24/7, and I have it dual backed up to Time Machine/Time Capsule locally in the house... and with Crashplan+ to the cloud. In the case of a HDD failure, I would do a local restore from my TC. In the case of disaster, I would buy a new iMac and recover from the cloud (actually...CP+ would send me an encrypted drive with all my data.

Having the i7 iMac also gives me a very powerful machine with a huge screen for heavy duty tasks such as video transcoding, Aperture 3, or even just editing web pages with multiple windows open side by side. It also connects to both my work PC (Lenovo X201) and my MBA as a large screen monitor.

I have considered buying a ACD or ATD to compliment my MBA collection... but I find that having an iMac is a better solution because it can function as my home server holding 100% of my data... plus as a powerful workstation... plus as docking monitor for my MBA.

My $0.02.

/Jim