What's the current consensus on the Macbook Air??? Will it be too slow for my needs??

With all the hooplah surrounding the new MBs and MBPs, it seems the Air is getting the short end of the stick.

I'm thinking of buying my first Mac and am tantalized by the idea of an ultraslim ultralight. I'm looking for something to take to school and the local coffee shops everyday. I don't game, but I have a ton of music and like to watch the occasional video.

I was thinking of getting a previous gen MBA but was a bit turned off by the idea of a 1.6ghz processor and a 4200rpm HD. 80gb is enough but sheesh! With these specs will iTunes load within a minute?

And is it true that the previous gen MBAs suffer from overheating issues?

What's the general consensus on these notebooks?

Thanks in advance!

 

MBA should do what you need it to do.

As for overheating, I'm not sure, and I thought tht the newest airs come with a faster harddrive? maybe I just read something wrong somewhere. Either way, youll still be able to use it in the daily tasks you want it to do perfectly fine.

 

Get the previous model with SSD or the new one with SSD.

I do not recommend 4200rpm drives unless you're patient. I owned the 80GB Air.

 

Well the new models come with a 120GB HDD so it'll be faster due to increased density.

The processor has actually changed. Even though it's still at 1.6GHz, the FSB now runs at 1066MHz up from 800MHz and is supported by dual channel DDR3-1066 up from dual channel DDR2-667. The new processor is also a low voltage 17W TDP model instead of the 21W model that Apple used before so heat issues should be reduced.

And the 9400M is a large upgrade from the GMA X3100 of course.

I haven't seen any performance reviews on the new Airs, because I don't think they ship until November so we'll have to see how much this translates into performance improvements. I think the difference will be noticable, but the Air will never be as fast as a MacBook much less a MacBook Pro.

 

Transfer rates have improved because of the increased data denisty true. Transfer rates on the 80GB weren't bad anyway.

It's acces times of 4200rpm disc that are the problem. Especially with booting and launching applications.

There are many benchmarks available online about the Air with SSD vs. HDD.

 

I got my hands on the (1st Gen) air for a while during the weekend just gone, and I have to say its very thin, but the frame is massive compared to my Vaio Z series, I think its because the thick borders around the Air. So thin and light - True, small footprint - no.

Speedwise, its about 25% faster than my Vaio G series, so for my needs its a poor performer, IMO its cause of the slow HDD (both the air and G uses 4200 1.8inch HDDs), no heating issues though.

 

There might be a 120GB 5400RPM drive that fits the Air. My Dell XT has one and it is 1.8".

 

They do exist, even 160GB 5400rpm. But Apple uses a 4200rpm.

 

I love my MBA. Its very sturdy, thin, and light. It has just enough power and capacity for everyday mainstream use. Its slower booting and loading programs than a MB but not enough to make it annoying, and once things are up and running there not not a significant difference.

You only notice its limitations when you try and do MORE THAN ONE disk intensive or CPU intensive operation at once. You try and rip DVD's or image backups while you are also trying to do other work and you'll notice a difference.

I find the current 80gb limit of the current version the most limiting but rumors of compatible 120 and 128gb drives soon to be commercially available are curculating.

You might also look at something like the Asus EEE 1000 running Linux or XP. It'll take mainstream 7200rpm large drives and 2gb Ram for about 1/3 of the price of the MBA.