{"id":20190,"date":"2018-01-15T14:58:06","date_gmt":"2018-01-15T19:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=20190"},"modified":"2018-01-17T09:19:24","modified_gmt":"2018-01-17T14:19:24","slug":"the-macbook-air-a-decades-worth-of-legacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2018\/01\/15\/the-macbook-air-a-decades-worth-of-legacy\/","title":{"rendered":"The MacBook Air: A Decade’s Worth of Legacy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stephen Hackett<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

A decade ago, we entered the current era of notebook design when Steve Jobs pulled the future out of an envelope.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

At just three pounds, it was a full two pounds lighter than the 13-inch MacBook, which was still wrapped in white or black plastic at the time.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

The base model shipped with a 4,200-RPM hard drive straight out of an iPod. This led to the MacBook Air feeling slower than other Macs of the era. A 64 GB SSD option was available for a whopping $999.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

In hindsight, it was clear that Apple was building toward a world without optical drives for some time. The media components of this plan were obvious, but the Time Capsule wasn't introduced until this very keynote.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Joe Rossignol<\/a>:<\/p>\n

A decade later, the MacBook Air remains a product in Apple's lineup<\/a>, but likely only because it is a lower-cost option. Beyond a minor speed bump last June, the notebook hasn't been updated since March 2015<\/a>[…]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

David Sparks<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

For early adopters, it was rough going with a very slow spinning disk (unless you paid a mint for the SSD) and a slow processor but even then it was clear Apple was rowing in the right direction. The original MacBook Air even had a hinged door for the USB port, making it feel more like a tiny spaceship than a computer.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

What’s striking to me is the huge improvement in size and weight compared with the MacBook of the time. There were a lot of compromises, but you were also getting a lot in return. The weight dropped from 5 lbs. to 3 lbs. (67%). The 2016 MacBook Pro<\/a> made similar compromises but for diminishing returns. It reduced the weight by less than half a pound<\/a> (about 10%).<\/p>\n\n

Tim Hardwick<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Apple currently has no plans to make any major upgrades to its MacBook Pro lineup in 2018, according to DigiTimes<\/a><\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

Update (2018-01-17): See also: Hacker News<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stephen Hackett: A decade ago, we entered the current era of notebook design when Steve Jobs pulled the future out of an envelope. […] At just three pounds, it was a full two pounds lighter than the 13-inch MacBook, which was still wrapped in white or black plastic at the time. […] The base model […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_is_hidden":false,"apple_news_is_paid":false,"apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_sponsored":false,"apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":"\"\"","apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[295,30,1155,1173,100],"class_list":["post-20190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-history","tag-mac","tag-macbook","tag-macbook-air","tag-macbookpro"],"apple_news_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20190"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20190\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20209,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20190\/revisions\/20209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}