SCI FI PI

Whilst we were foolishly distracted waiting for the iPhone to come out, Apple have decided to annoy the heck out of all Macophiles by releasing a brand new Macbook - the Macbook Air. It's less than 2cm thick and weighs just over a kilo - but is still the size of a normal Macbook.


Based on the design of 13.3 inch wide screen Macbook, this new model has had its guts ripped out and replaced by ultra-light, ultra-small and, obviously ultra-thin technology.



Sleekness and thinness is the obvious goal in the design, with ports being hidden behind flip-top lids. The big difference, however, between the Air and the old Macbook is the absence of the optical drive. That's right - no disks can go in this laptop. It's a total commitment to the 'wireless' future, with Apple relying on wireless interconnectivity and internet downloading to replace round shiny plastic discs.





A Remote Disc feature allows you to 'borrow' the optical drive of setup computers within wireless range. For those who need the safety of backup, Mac are adding the Time Capsule to the mix, a wireless auto back up with up to 1 TB of space. (that's a terabyte, or 1000 Gigabytes).

It seems like the smart move - but are the consumers ready for a disc free world? For those who can't hack it - an external superdrive can be bought.

The standard 1.6 Ghz Macbook Air comes with an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB memory and an 80GB hard drive. Yours for $2499, and available for shipping in 2-3 weeks, says the Mac website.

A more powerful model, with a 64 GB solid state drive, comes in at $4338. Sexiness doesn't come cheap. Nor does living in Australia, apparently, with the base Air Macbook model in the US coming in at $USD 1799 - just under $AUD 500 cheaper, in real terms. Hopefully Apple will also renew it's Australian pricing policy in line with the new exchange rates.