MacBook Air i7

POSTED BY DANNY CHOO On Mon 2011/10/24 20:23 JST in Mac
Thanks to your feedback on my Twitter and Facebook, I went for the MacBook Air i7 instead of the i5. Have no idea what the speeds of the i5 would have been but the MacBook Air i7 is incredibly fast - so fast that I became confused at why it was faster than my 17" 2.8 Ghz (Intel Core Duo) MacBook Pro (late 2009) with 8GB's of memory.
BTW, this wallpaper and others can be found in the Culture Japan End Card Wallpapers post which is updated weekly after each episode.
I went for the upgraded MacBook Air 1.8GHz dual core i7 with 4GB's of memory and 256GB SSD. This is my first machine with an SSD and am wondering whether the speed boost is because of the SSD or processor or both?
SSD's are still a bit pricey over here. Folks in Japan looking for some would go to Kakaku.com as they have the cheapest listings available for any electronic item.
At the time of writing, a 512GB SSD costs 57599 yen. Are SSD's any cheaper in your neck of the woods?
The MacBook Air comes with media based software. If you want to re-install Lion then you can do it from the Disk Utility application which can be found in Lion - I think it grabs it from the Internet so you need to be connected if you want to re-install.
So why did I pick up this machine when I've already got a MacBook Pro 13" that I take on business trips? The main reason is that lugging around heavy stuff does by spinal hernia in which does not seem to be getting any better ToT
However, to my surprise, after discovering just how fast this machine is, I'll probably end up replacing my 17" MacBook Pro with it.
One of the things that I practice as part of Time Management is to invest in stuff that enables me to do things quicker and smarter - whether its getting a faster machine, paying for an online service which saves me time in some way or another, or whether its buying a load of cabinets which help me keep organized better so that I can find things quicker.
Time is running out for all of us. We cant buy time but the next best thing we can do is save time - and thats fine even if it costs money because money is no use when one is 6 foot under.
I had a feeling that tactile keyboards were going to be replaced by a touch screen one day and there already have been a few manufacturers doing so. It would mean that I could switch to a Korean keyboard without the stickers anymore ^^
When I get a new Mac, I usually clone the drive over to the new machine but this time round I tried the Migration Assistant feature. I start the app on the MacBook Pro 17" and authenticate the MacBook Air to access the machine. I choose what settings and files I want to be transfered over and wait.
An hour later - my MacBook Air is pretty much a copy of my MacBook Pro with all my settings and passwords, software etc so I dont need to reinstall anything. Lovely.
Tis a lovely machine with a resolution of 1440 x 900 px.
Still cant get over how the MacBook Air kicks seven shades of poo out of my MacBook Pro 17" which is only 2 years older ToT. Have just ordered a Mini DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort cable so that I can use the iMac as an external display in Target Mode.
Just wondering how many of you are Mac users?
If you are a Mac user, what is your main machine?
Think I mentioned it before, but I used to absolutely hate Macs because I was forced to use one at work. When I was at Amazon, I couldn't understand what my staff used a Mac for and thought it was only for mail and Internets ^^; Anyway, I need to write up my history of Mac usage soon.
BTW, the girls in this post are from Prima Stella illustrated by Choco Chip sensei.
My wife uses a Mac and so do my daughters.
As we start planning for Culture Japan Season 3, more Mac equipment will start to flood the office - but I need somebody to join me in using them! Info on internships soon.