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MacBook Air 'Sandy Bridge' Update in June?

I bought one a week ago and honestly I'm not sure why people complain about the processor. The machine is very quick and responsive; I'm a designer and can happily say that Adobe CS5 runs great. The laptop boots in sub 10 second times (sometimes around 6-7)... I had a MBP right before the unibody switch and this machine is MUCH faster.

If you're even THINKING of getting one, just do it; it's an incredible machine. The whole constant need for a faster processor mentality is asinine.
 
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Is the new intel graphics engine comparable to nvidias?
 
This is clearly my fault: after three months of dithering, I ordered Tuesday, received it Thursday.

But it's a 4GB 2.13 and its like greased lightning compared to my old C2D. I'm not sure what I'd do that might require more speed, but.... damn.
 
Glenny2lappies said:
Apple will hate this announcement: will really affect the sales of the current model! Osborne 1 anybody?
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I disagree. A big segment of the MacBook Air crowd are the fashion conscious and those looking for a travel PC. They don't need the latest and greatest. I'd guess that the Sandy Bridge would be largely a lateral step. Assuming they go with a ULV Core i3 or i7, it may not offer much of an overall boost, but it would give them a readier supply of chips (those Core 2 Duos won't last forever now that they are out of production). Plus, it's probably cheaper for them to use the Sandy Bridge chip.

I like my "Ultimate 13" Rev D and don't see myself replacing it this June. That said, I'll need to take another look at the 11" if they come out with a revision. It's good to see this line go back to more regular updates.
 
LOL, just got my Air last night, typing on it now. Processor feels really fast, but I'm sure the synthetic benchmarks will show the next one being much faster.

I'll try to upgrade to the next revision if I can sell this notebook for only a couple hundred less, but otherwise, I really don't think I can complain about the C2D speeds. I mean, just 1.5 years ago, the C2D was "blistering fast" and it was "so pathetic" that the Air used anything less...

fwiw, this machine's main purpose is for programming iPhone/Android apps. I don't think the C2D has ever been viewed as "poor" for such tasks.
 
Eidorian said:
Some could say the about the boot time.
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This is true. Though the boot time was not a swaying factor for me... more importantly it was simply the SSD. The speedy boot makes the machine feel much faster and obviously aids in general usage speeds as well. The drive really offsets any reservations I had about the processor.

Of course you can get the same SSD in a similarly spec'd 13" MBP, but that raises the price substantially above the Air (over 400$). Not to mention the extra weight and lower resolution screen.
 
3goldens said:
That totally sucks for those of us who took the initial leap.
Apple has a lot on their plate right now, seems unlikely to come out 6 months after the initial release of the product.

MacRumors is usually is on the cutting edge of hear say and innuendo, so I'm not going to get to upset at this point.
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Are you seriously complaining that a new product will be released? Would you rather they not update the line for years at a time? I am tired of people complaining that they bought a computer and now a new one is coming out. It's life. There will always be a new product. Plus, if you really have to have the newest computer sell the one you have now on craigslist or eBay and buy the new one. Just stop complaining about how much it sucks. Get over it.
 
pmz said:
I'm most interested in seeing a DVD-less 15" MacBook Pro come to market with Sandy Bridge.

It doesnt have to be as thin as the MBA, but they can save lots of space and weight without that near worthless internal drive.
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I'm in total agreement. The optical drive takes up an absurd amount of space.

I'd like to see a "mobility enhanced" MBP without optical drive, without the glass screen (which is crazy heavy), and with 512GB of flash storage.

That'd be awesome. MacBook Air Pro. There, I named it. Apple, go build it!
 
orbitaljunkie said:
Of course you can get the same SSD in a similarly spec'd 13" MBP, but that raises the price substantially above the Air (over 400$). Not to mention the extra weight and lower resolution screen.
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Product update atrophy. Anyone that can use a screwdriver need not apply.

Back in my day 4 GB of RAM was a $700 BTO option.
 
3goldens said:
That totally sucks for those of us who took the initial leap.
Apple has a lot on their plate right now, seems unlikely to come out 6 months after the initial release of the product.

MacRumors is usually is on the cutting edge of hear say and innuendo, so I'm not going to get to upset at this point.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure why this "sucks." I just got my air yesterday. It does everything that I need it to do. If I'm so inclined I can sell it when the new Air hits. It will still command a fair price in the market. And I will have used the computer for 3 to 4 months. I really can't say that I feel slighted.
 
Hmm, I'll have to keep an eye on this since I had planned on getting a MBA for my Spousal Unit for our anniversary in April (to replace her aging hand me down 15" MBP C2D). sadly she will not want a hand me down 17" i5 2010 MBP, so hopefully they don't upgrade the MBP line soon. ;)
 
willgreene99 said:
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Is the new intel graphics engine comparable to nvidias?
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Only when you turn the graphics down to low quality mode. The graphics while better than the last generation of integrated chips is still sorely lacking. This is just Apple giving in to Intel's demand that they forgo putting separate graphics cards in their computers. I would much rather have the Core Duo/Nvidia combo than the SandyBridge chip with poor graphics.
 
If this happens then I will probably pick up an 11" one. I love the size, but I need just a little more processing power since I will be using it along side a 2.66 Ghz i7 in my 15" MBP.

My MBP will become my portable desktop then, since it is already hooked up to my external monitor 75% of the time.

I hope they can improve battery life on the smaller model, but maybe that is hoping for too much :)
 
3goldens said:
That totally sucks for those of us who took the initial leap.
Apple has a lot on their plate right now, seems unlikely to come out 6 months after the initial release of the product.

MacRumors is usually is on the cutting edge of hear say and innuendo, so I'm not going to get to upset at this point.
Click to expand...

It's pretty typical to see a 6 - 8 month refresh cycle for Macbooks. It's refreshing (no pun intended) to see Apple trying to get on a regular cycle with the MB Air.
 
Don't think this will happen...
Apple has backed OpenCL and OpenGL in their system, allowing the GPU to do a great part of the work in a modern OS and I've read that first generation Sandy Bridge GPUs are incompatible with OpenCL (only the CPU part is compatible completely missing the point ^^), which for a low performance CPU machine like the Airs is unacceptable.

This is one of the reasons Apple keeps C2D chips in the Airs combined with Nvidia GPUs, so the GPU can run all the animation and effects from Mac OS X, but also keeping their old machines ready for the technologies that they feel will be mandatory in future software, Grand Central Dispatch (last year WWDC Apple had session explaining why dev already should use it on their iOS apps) and OpenCL.
 
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