Macbook Air 13 $1,048
Acer Aspire S7 $899
I love Apple products, but $149 is a nice discount for a similar machine. Anyone have a solid argument for one or the other, or does it just come down to personal preference and how you feel about the OS?
The Acer Aspire link is broken.
However, as I could figure out, we are talking about these two laptops:
13-inch Apple MacBook Air: Intel "Haswell" Core i5 1.3 GHz, 4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD, 1440x900 TN screen, 2.96 lbs.
13-inch Acer Aspire S7: Intel "Ivy Bridge" Core i5 1.8 GHz, 4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD, 1920x1080 IPS screen, 2.87 lbs.
In my point of view, these machines are not similar. They are very different machines. As I can see, the Acer has only the following advantages over the MacBook Air:
- the Acer is US$ 149 cheaper than the Air;
- the Acer has a better screen, with a higher resolution (1920x1080), than the Air (1440x900);
- the Acer is slightly lighter than the Air (2.87 lbs vs. 2.96 lbs);
- the Acer has a touch screen while the Air does not (you should have in mind that OS X does not support touch screens, though, so it is not really an advantage).
The MacBook Air, on the other hand, has several advantages over the Acer, and it is clearly a better computer in my opinion:
- the Air uses a more recent processor, Haswell, which has advantages over the processor in the Acer laptop (an Ivy Bridge);
- the Air has a better integrated video card (which comes with the more modern processor);
- the Air has much better battery life than the Acer (some tests put the Haswell Air battery life at 12-15 hours, which is the best among ultrabooks, while the Ivy Bridge Acer Aspire S7 has about 4-5 hours of battery life, one of the worst among ultrabooks); this is in part due to the battery-saving capabilities of the Haswell processor;
- the keyboard of the Air is better than the one found in the Acer;
- the trackpad in the Air is stellar, while the one in the Acer is not;
- the Acer looks and feels much more fragile than the Air.
You can always find Ivy Bridge ultrabooks for sale, as they are outdated. A Haswell Acer Aspire S7 will be of course more expensive. But an Ivy Bridge Aspire S7 will certainly be cheaper. You will also be able to find a MacBook Air, or an Asus Zenbook, or a Dell XPS 13, or a similar machine, with an Ivy Bridge processor for a lower price. It's because it does not represent the last generation.
