Photo of Prototype 13" MacBook Air

[MikhailT]

I don't like the sound of this SSD card. It will likely be non user replaceable or cost a bomb, most probably both.

Other than that, it looks very interesting, even smaller than the outgoing model.

It doesn’t appears to be SSD cards (like ram sticks), it’s soldered onto the motherboard.

The SSD onboard can be much cheaper than the 2.5” SSD and the cards, you’re just sourcing the chips itself from the manufacturers than to source a complete product with higher markup from the device manufacturer.

It’s like ordering parts yourself than ordering a full computer, you pay less for the parts because you don’t need to pay for the “builder” fee.

It is likely to be not a user-replacable part and if the chips die (not likely for a long time if Apple source high-end excellent chips), the entire logic board would have to be replaced.

That would be great. It may not make any difference with this upcoming MB Air because the read/write speeds of the SSD are unlikely to saturate the SATA-2 bus. But in the next couple of years hopefully SSD's will be faster than the SATA-3 bus.

Whatever Apple picks now is likely to be much faster, cheaper and higher in capacity from the previous Air model. It would be awesome if Apple sourced the ONFI 2.1 NANDs and hook it up with a SF-2000 controller, it’s capable of pushing 500MBps of data both way.

SF-2000 controllers (SandForce) with ONFI 2+ NANDs are already capable of pushing 500MBps both ways. SATA 6Gbps maxes out around 600MBps, it’s not long before we’ll max out SATA 6Gbps already and SATA 6Gbps hasn’t reach the mass adoption yet which is sad.

 

[notjustjay]

While I understand that the built-in SSD and RAM make the machine more portable, I'd be afraid that would also make the computer essentially disposable.

I'm working on a 2007 MacBook Pro right now. It came with 2 gigs of RAM and a 120 gig hard drive. I have already upgraded the RAM, and I've been banging up against the 120 gig limit repeatedly over the past year or two. Had it been any other computer (including a more recent MBP) I would already have upgraded it myself with a new 750 gig or 1 TB hard drive. Unfortunately the 2007 MBP is one that requires you to take the whole thing apart to replace the drive, so I'm waiting until I get some downtime so I can bring the machine in to get it professionally done. But at least I know I can do it.

My computer prior to this was a 12" PB G4, and again, I upgraded the RAM and the hard drive (it came with 256MB and 40 gigs!) after a few years, and that bought me a few more years of use.

With this new computer, Apple is essentially stamping an expiry date on the back. Eventually the battery will die, eventually you'll decide that you need more RAM or storage space, but this time there's no way to upgrade anything, so you'll have no choice but to dump it and buy a whole new machine.

One might consider that a brilliant marketing move, but I would look at that short shelf life and, especially given the premium price tag we know it'll have, that would be a huge incentive NOT to buy one.

 

[Brinkman]

Okay, so no conventional harddrive.. that worries me. Something is going to limited here.. You wont be able to upgrade the ram or the harddrive or both.

Not sure if I like that.

 

[SirOmega]

Ram

If this is a prototype from April, 2Gbit DDR3 chips weren't as prevalent back then. Now they're far more common and cheap. So I wouldn't write off this as only having 2GB.

Also, I'd venture to say that the blue thing in the image seems like the SSD and it looks elevated off the motherboard. It should be removable if the mb dies.

 

[Rocketman]

I assume the reason we have not seen flash chips in Macs sooner is they are slower than alternate technologies. They certainly have had enough capacity, production ramp, cost reduction, and ease of integration with a wide variety of devices.

Perhaps the solution is a form of RAID with perhaps 4 banks of chips, physical or virtual, allowing I/O at 4x the speed or thereabouts as a standard set-up.

The mass, volume, and cost savings by eliminating a HD/SSD mount area, case, dedicated power management and dedicated board are substantial. But the main benefit should be to make it better in some way and I/O speed should be on the top of that list.

It will already be considerably cooler, quieter, lower power. Perhaps we will see one with a Core i7 to make up for all that?!?

It will have the biggest hard drive ever . . . the cloud.

Rocketman

 

[MiBook84]

Why exactly are people hung up on the fact the MBA must have more than one USB? When I traveled daily for work I had my rev B MBA and a few flash drives. I don't ever recall having a need for 2 USB ports at once. Are people using the MBA as a desktop replacement because they think it's cool and can't afford a real desktop machine after buying the MBA? Makes no sense, it's an ultraportable, not a gaming machine, it's not for college kids that actually want a full featured gaming machine that they can hook up external monitors, keyboards and mice.

Buy a machine that suits your needs vs a machine made for a specific market. That's why Apple makes several different MBP's. Buy what you need not what you want. Issue solved.

I for one think more than one usb-port would be more than a good thing. Im glad that you can cope with only one usb-port. I sometimes wants to use a flashdrive and charge my iPhone at the same time. Or transfer files from different external drives on the go. Gaming has nothing to do with the amount of usb ports. And why sould people not connect their computer to an external display? The computer supports it and you can use a usb-hub at your desk but not on the go (at least not as easily).

I also travel a lot and I think one more usb-port would be very useful. I own a MacBook Air and I also own a P7120-laptop (lighter and smaller than the MBA) it has a superdrive, three usb-ports, ethernet and so forth, very useful for me that uses my computers alot everywhere.

Of course it is possible to use adapters but they get lost and you have to make space for them in your luggage. More ports and smaller computers is a good thing.

 

[MisterEd]

Has anyone noticed that the photo of the screen isn't glossy? So looks like they're keeping the same anti-glare display...

 

[KnightWRX]

With this new computer, Apple is essentially stamping an expiry date on the back. Eventually the battery will die, eventually you'll decide that you need more RAM or storage space, but this time there's no way to upgrade anything, so you'll have no choice but to dump it and buy a whole new machine.

As long as the RAM is upgradeable, it's fine. It's 2010. Storage is out on the network. I haven't thought about getting a bigger hard drive in years. Storage is what my home NAS is for. And if you're into giving up a little control (I'm not), there's Internet based cloud storage.

I don't need my multi-terabytes of data in my laptop where it can easily be lost/damaged. I want them safe, backed up, and made highly available through mirroring/parity.

The drive in a laptop is a temp buffer and a OS install disk. Going that route means never having to worry about the specs of included storage and it also means you can make do with a small but very fast SSD drive.

 

[Rocketman]

More ports and smaller computers is a good thing.

I agree. I wish more emphasis was put on portable computers having a primary task of I/O between devices and storage. It needs to compute too, display media too, but one of the key features of portability is you venture into pockets of odd form factors connections to injest or spew results or content. At least if it really is a "productivity tool".

Rocketman

 

[Salavat23]

I don't know how the article writer sees 2 USB ports. From the picture, only 1 is visible on the left side, not 2.

 

[macgrl]

appleinsider have an article that seems to suggest that there will be 2 usb ports, one on each side

http://www.appleinsider.com/article...e_on_apples_next_generation_macbook_airs.html

 

[couto27]

this is fake

the serial number in chipmunk bv shows this

Serial number: W8017027FX3
Group1: MacBook
Group2: Air
Generation: 4
ModelCode:
Production year: 2000
Production week: 17 (April)
Production number: 75 (within this week)
CPU speed: 1.83GHz
Colour: Please tell us what colour this MacBook is.
Factory: W8 (Shanghai China)

 

[AidenShaw]

As long as the RAM is upgradeable, it's fine. It's 2010. Storage is out on the network. I haven't thought about getting a bigger hard drive in years. Storage is what my home NAS is for. And if you're into giving up a little control (I'm not), there's Internet based cloud storage.

I don't need my multi-terabytes of data in my laptop where it can easily be lost/damaged. I want them safe, backed up, and made highly available through mirroring/parity.

The drive in a laptop is a temp buffer and a OS install disk. Going that route means never having to worry about the specs of included storage and it also means you can make do with a small but very fast SSD drive.

It would be very useful to have a µSDXC slot, though, for copies of BD and DVD movies, to save photos and videos from the camera, etc. (An internal slot, so that you don't occupy the USB port with a dongle.)

 

[Thomas Harte]

I don't know how the article writer sees 2 USB ports. From the picture, only 1 is visible on the left side, not 2.

Per the speculation, the other is on the right. Left top-to-bottom: mini displayport, USB, SSD. Right top-top-bottom: power, USB.

It's just people guessing based on the shapes though, I think.

 

[iZac]

...The prototype unit is said to have been discovered in April 2010 and retains a 13" screen size form factor.

So ... perhaps a prototype for a product that was intended to be introduced next to the mid 2010 Macbook upgrades, but for some reason or another was held back (bugs, glitches, specs)? That would explain the same internals and the 2gb of RAM? Incidentally, hasnt Intel and Nvidia kissed and made up?

 

[pr5owner]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

Its sad that anyone would ever use 3 USB ports at once on a mobile device.

uhh well, i had 3 on my previous laptop and i needed to copy 1x 1TB worth of info onto a new 2TB drive so the older 1TB could be sold off, also i had to make a call but my phone was near death so i plugged the phone into the 3rd usb port to charge and call at the same time (basically to call the guy to tell him where i could meet him)

if i didnt have 3, i would not have been able to make the deal, 1TB takes a long time to copy

 

[brdnboy]

So ... perhaps a prototype for a product that was intended to be introduced next to the mid 2010 Macbook upgrades, but for some reason or another was held back (bugs, glitches, specs)? That would explain the same internals and the 2gb of RAM? Incidentally, hasnt Intel and Nvidia kissed and made up?

Checkout the "Update" at the end of the article. Unfortunately this agreement not help anyone who wants and NVIDIA chipset with an Intel Core ix processor.

 

[pr5owner]

It would be very useful to have a µSDXC slot, though, for copies of BD and DVD movies, to save photos and videos from the camera, etc. (An internal slot, so that you don't occupy the USB port with a dongle.)

do you expect apple to have the latest tech and standards in their laptops?

 

[Bluisnblklungs]

Maybe Apple will offer the MacBook Air in two sizes 11.6 and 13.3 and just do away with the plain old MacBook?

 

[feflower]

If you are looking at power the Air should never be considered.
I hope the Air is kept as a streamlined computer--the portable for people don't need much.

I see it about right for undergrad, grad students in the humanities (if they can afford it).
The business traveller.
The writer.
Maybe even the songwriter.

Others should just consider the Pro series and not try to make the Air what it should not be.

 

[headfuzz]

While I understand that the built-in SSD and RAM make the machine more portable, I'd be afraid that would also make the computer essentially disposable.

I'm working on a 2007 MacBook Pro right now. It came with 2 gigs of RAM and a 120 gig hard drive. I have already upgraded the RAM, and I've been banging up against the 120 gig limit repeatedly over the past year or two. Had it been any other computer (including a more recent MBP) I would already have upgraded it myself with a new 750 gig or 1 TB hard drive. Unfortunately the 2007 MBP is one that requires you to take the whole thing apart to replace the drive, so I'm waiting until I get some downtime so I can bring the machine in to get it professionally done. But at least I know I can do it.

My computer prior to this was a 12" PB G4, and again, I upgraded the RAM and the hard drive (it came with 256MB and 40 gigs!) after a few years, and that bought me a few more years of use.

With this new computer, Apple is essentially stamping an expiry date on the back. Eventually the battery will die, eventually you'll decide that you need more RAM or storage space, but this time there's no way to upgrade anything, so you'll have no choice but to dump it and buy a whole new machine.

One might consider that a brilliant marketing move, but I would look at that short shelf life and, especially given the premium price tag we know it'll have, that would be a huge incentive NOT to buy one.

This.

Pretty much what I wrote in the other thread yesterday.

 

[flopticalcube]

Maybe Apple will offer the MacBook Air in two sizes 11.6 and 13.3 and just do away with the plain old MacBook?

Given that the MacBook is probably Apple's biggest seller by a fair margin, I don't think that will happen.

 

[Bluisnblklungs]

Given that the MacBook is probably Apple's biggest seller by a fair margin, I don't think that will happen.

Really? I almost see no one around campus or town with the white MacBook unless its one of the older ones before the unibody when they came in both black and white. Practically everyone I see has the the 13" MacBook Pro, I just don't see it being that big of seller. On top of that every time I've been in an Apple store I've seen plenty of people buying the MacBook Pro's and I think one person buying the MacBook.

 

[elppa]

Really? I almost see no one around campus or town with the white MacBook unless its one of the older ones before the unibody when they came in both black and white. Practically everyone I see has the the 13" MacBook Pro, I just don't see it being that big of seller. On top of that every time I've been in an Apple store I've seen plenty of people buying the MacBook Pro's and I think one person buying the MacBook.

I think the white MacBook is there to have a education option and psychologically having a sub $1000 dollar option may be something which Apple thinks is important.

But I can't see a compelling reason to choose a plastic white MacBook over a Aluminium Pro. I know the specs are almost identical (save Firewire, SD slot and illuminated keyboard) and you save a bit of cash, but the MacBook Pro is as far, far nicer computer. It's thinner, lighter, more compact uses better materials and better looking.

 

[AisEv]

I can bet that Apple will have built-in SSD for all its portable within two years' time. Instant-on notebooks. Sounds awesome rite?

Personally, I don't like how Apple builds its products to a point that they don't want you to meddle the insides of the product. Good and bad. Bad mainly for the consumers. If you need to upgrade something, you basically have to buy a new one. Data is the most important thing in computing. If these built-in SSD notebooks are stolen, good luck. What's worst is your repairman steals your data when you send in for repairs. User removable SSD HDD is my preference. Well, there's good and bad too. Bad is due to my carelessness. Good is it counters most of the bad points of built-in SSD.

Strangely, why Apple hasn't adopted USB 3.0? Once you experience eSATA transfer speed, FireWire 800 feels like a donkey cart. Where's FW 1600 or 3200? Wish Apple includes at least two FW ports in every Mac.