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Comparing MacBook Air vs. MacBook Pro

So you’ve seen the latest Apple Keynote and found Steve Jobs quite convincing when he introduced his latest creation, the MacBook Air. You are amazed by its design, but you still doubt because beauty comes at a price (and high too) and with reduced functionality. MacBook Air or MacBook Pro? If you are still undecided, you have come to the right place to help you clear your mind.

With a 13.3-inch widescreen LED display, full-size keyboard, and large multi-touch trackpad, MacBook Air might look like any other laptop at first glance. But the impressive beauty of this product lies mainly in its incredible thinness (only 0.74 inches), which also makes it an extremely light laptop.

Does this device have any drawbacks? First of all, as I already mentioned, the retail price is pretty high (starting at $1799 for the base model, which isn’t exactly ‘cheap’). Also, the most notable missing feature is the absence of an optical drive that can be used to read/write CDs or DVDs.

How can you use a laptop without an optical drive, you’re wondering? Good Old Steve assured all Apple customers that while this seems like a radical and rather extreme choice, they won’t actually feel its absence at all. Apple succeeds (or tries to) by making the MacBook Air a device strongly oriented to wireless technology, using solutions never seen before. True, there’s no optical drive, but there are settings to ‘lork’ from any nearby wireless device and use your own optical drive. Could the ‘parasite’ strategy really work? Only time will tell, but the folks at Apple seem pretty convinced of what they’re doing.

The other minor drawback to using a MacBook Air compared to a more traditional MacBook Pro is its limited power. Through a close association with Intel that began many years ago with the transition from Mac OS X to the Intel platform, engineers from the world’s most acclaimed microprocessor company developed a chip designed specifically for MacBook Air that would meet the stringent Apple requirements. requirements on the thin side. The results are pretty amazing and should be considered great progress towards the goal of reducing chip dimensions, but even Intel had to admit that the MacBook Air’s dual-core engine had to be partially RPM-limited: just a duo of 1 .6 GHz for the base. model and 1.8 GHz for the advanced, the price of which is still outrageously high ($3098).

Given its features, then, the advanced model of the MacBook Air is aimed primarily at high-end and business-class consumers, leaving the rest of us with the entry-level model that still seems too high-end, at least for now. But given that it’s only recently launched, and given Apple’s usual marketing strategy, we should soon expect a substantial price drop on both models – not as substantial as the iPhone’s infamous 33% price drop, but still to a point in which its cost could be comparable. to that of the rest of the MacBook line.

Which is better for you then, MacBook Air or MacBook Pro? The answer may not be obvious, and in most cases both will likely serve you well, with the reliability and stability Apple products have become famous for in recent years. However, now you are entering the store and you know that you are going to walk out with one of those two jewels in your hands. What do you do for a living?

When presented with the choice, keep all the factors explained above in mind: if you are looking for a classy product, perhaps a bit expensive for its features, but with an impressive design and optimal battery life and never-before-seen wireless capabilities, then and at the same time you want to experiment and are ready to trust Apple because optical drives will not be lost after all, then you should definitely take the bold option and buy a MacBook Air. On the other hand, though, if you’re more of a traditionalist type, don’t mind a little more weight (or can’t afford a lighter laptop), and love to watch rented DVDs on the go, then you already know that a good MacBook Pro should be your first choice.