+ Workmanship - I've never had a computer which such high quality, sympathetic, yes just feels good.
+ Mobility - so small and light can be a full-fledged laptop! Here, the MBA much more than the iPad and weighs just 600g more times!
+ OSX - without words! Simply good.
+ Speed (Office) - for office applications, browsing, mail, etc. is the MBA absolutely sufficient. Especially the starting speed of programs compensated here thanks to SSD for not quite as fleet CPU. It's fun to work with the Air. Even Logic runs on the Air, after all, so much that you can recorden 8 tracks simultaneously without problems. Lightroom is still OK, and here the browsing of images in RAW format before may take a little.
+/- Battery - although I never reach the specified 5h battery life, but in office applications or surfing to get quite a while without power supply from. But if one hangs an external 2.5 "disk and it images edited with Lightroom, the battery is sucked empty in less than an hour. So if you want go serve more than just Word, has the problem that he regularly use a power adapter and must carry around.
- Connections - as always with Apple, there USB3 and eSATA not for love or money. When Air now also lacks Firewire, instead there is the Thunderbolt port, for you shall not practical nor hardware. But who wants to buy an Air, knows that and can live with it.
- Wegend it I use small HD capacity often an external 2.5 "USB disk When the Air moves to standby and reawakened (the hard drive was not pluggable) always get the message that the hard disk was not ejected properly and passes data loss. could be. Despite an intensive search, it is I have not succeeded until now to bring OSX somehow to but then eject the disc automatically just before the standby and mount again on waking. The extremely annoying.
---- (GIANTS MINUS) speed of the graphics card - If you connect a monitor is the integrated Intel HD3000 graphics chip CPU but already much sweat. Even a more moderate 1680x1050 resolution ensures that the fan of the air is always audible -. Without any action on Air Worse it is with my new Dell 2711 - the fan is permanently on medium speed, even if the computer grade nothing to has to do. Lightroom comes with this Aufläsung with the edges of the RAW files no longer behind and needs a good 10 seconds per picture !!! What I can not understand: Apple advertises itself indeed with its Thunderbolt Display as an ideal partner for the MacBook Air, so I'm assuming that its native resolution of 2560x1440 also should make the air any trouble. This is unfortunately not the case.
Oh, to play HD video, the Air seems to be not suitable, even at 720p videos starts bucking the image, full HD content I therefore did not even try.
In short, the move the Air is great if you have a lot of writing hotel or the ICE. I did it primarily for Lightroom, what goes, but without an external drive, and also the battery life is so short that I always need a power supply. So I am then no longer compact or lighter than the road would have a 13 "MBP, which I also do not always power supply and drive on and unplugging.
Who wants to only read mails / write, chat, skype and surfing, is better off with an iPad, it is smaller, lighter, cheaper and grade on the couch or in the subway also handy.
At an external monitor, the Air has no place, full HD resolution acknowledged it with always audible rödelndem fan, even without load. Games should better not even try.
