Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

store.apple.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 197 posts

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#141

Post by robin_reala »

srgseg wrote: post #102
colin_jack wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen it discussed but I'm not sure its as clear cut as that.

The UK HMRC charges no customs duty or import duty on imports of computers, but does levy 20% VAT (sales tax). Using today's exchange rate of 1.6149, here are the UK like-for-like premiums for several Apple products in the UK: 7.6% - ipad 2 13.4% - ipod touch 14.4% - mac air 11 64gb 12.1% - mac air 11 128gb 13.9% - mac air 13 128gb 13.5% - mac air 13 256gb 12.1% - mbp 13 21.1% - thunderbolt display Note: these premiu…

The Thunderbolt display is somewhat different - I believe HMRC count displays with digital inputs as 'video displays' instead of 'monitors' and subsequently levy a 14% customs duty:

http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPort...

That would bring the price hike down to the same level as the computers.

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#142

Post by BillSaysThis »

Space constraints or not, the 4GB limitation is annoying. I'm using a two month old 13" MBA, which will go to replace the wife's 2007 white MacBook once I get to the Apple Store, and the dashed hope of getting 8GB has dampened my enthusiasm. But not cancelled it completely ;)

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#144

Post by bergie »

w1ntermute wrote: post #58
bergie wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm using the 2010 11" as my primary computer, and have been really happy with it. But then again, I mostly hack CoffeeScript and PHP with vim on Linux, so how much power do I need ;-) http://bergie.iki.fi/blog/11-macbook_air-the_best_computer_i...

Do you use an external monitor at home/work, or always just the built-in display?

Just built-in, and no external mouse or keyboard either. I want my working environment to be the same regardless of whether I'm at the office or in an airplane

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#145

Post by ascendant »

crazygringo wrote: post #127
joshklein wrote: post #108

I'm going to be purchasing the 13" MBA, and I'm trying to decide between the baseline version and the maxed out version. I would pay the $100 to upgrade to the i7, but one can only do so by also paying $300 for the 256GB of memory. Honestly, the 256GB memory vs 128GB isn't important to me (most of my stuff is small files or in the cloud), so I'm finding it hard to justify $400 for the better processor. Any advice fro…

For regular computer stuff, my 2nd-gen Macbook Air works like a dream, and in day-to-day use it's the SSD that makes it so much faster than my work computer with a normal HD. In the SSD era, if you don't use videogames or do video rendering, I don't think processor speed matters that much anymore. (Cue mobs with torches...)

The pragmatist in me realizes I don't need a core i7 to edit text files and run unicorn_rails in the background...but the geek in me punched the pragmatist in the face and said "yes you do".

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#146

Post by bengl3rt »

ionfish wrote: post #17

There's a bit of sleight of hand on their Thunderbolt Display page [1]. The first image is of a MacBook Air hooked up to one of the new displays, but when they talk about "The ultimate docking station" they show a MacBook Pro. This is because the Thunderbolt and power ports are next to one another on the MBP, but on the Air they're on different sides of the machine, which is going to make it a lot less elegant. [1] h…

Yeah. The new Macbook Pro can obviously drive two displays in daisy-chain off a single TB port... does the Air not do it? Can it only run one?

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#147

Post by ascendant »

lispm wrote: post #90

Now the questions are: * how warm will the MacBook Air get with the Thunderbolt in use / not in use? Will the fan kick in more often? * what effect has the i5 or i7 wrt. to heat? * will the average battery runtime be better or worse? Are the Apple numbers realistic? From what I hear, the Thunderbolt MacBook Pros are using the fans to cool the machine more often.

I have a current gen MBP with a core i7 and I don't really hear the fans that often, and I'm usually running a lot of stuff at once.

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#149

Post by ascendant »

justinchen wrote: post #41

For anyone else confused by the lack of DisplayPort: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20043524-263.html

From the article: "The new port is backward compatible so it can still be used to connect to DisplayPort devices; however, only the new port can be used to connect to Thunderbolt devices."

Re: New MacBook Air Now Available on Apple Store

#150

Post by kieranyo »

jolan wrote: post #36
kieranyo wrote: post #25

Dammit, just bought a MacBook Air a month ago. Is there much difference between the 1.4 core 2 duo and the 1.6 i5?

Yes, quite a bit: http://ark.intel.com/compare/54617,54618,56858,36697

Win! Spoke to Apple, they are going to refund and take away my 16 day old MacBook Air so that I can order the new one :) Excellent customer service once again.
Post reply on HN