Tag: macbook air

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What no 3G?

What no 3G?

Though you may think I am talking about the lack of a second generation iPhone with 3G, no I am talking about the lack of 3G on the MacBook Air.

Yes it has 802.11n, but how many 802.11n wifi hotspots have you seen on your travels? Also from an internet perspective, 802.11n is a bit of overkill for a typical internet connection. Not everywhere has wifi hotspots, they never seem to be available when I am out and about or they fall over a lot from too many clients.

So there you are with this beautifully thin MacBook Air and either you need to use a Bluetooth to a 3G phone, which kills the battery both on the MacBook Air and the phone, and a lot of mobile phone providers in the UK now no longer allow you to use your 3G phone as a modem (or they charge you a fortune) they all now seem to want you to use a USB dongle.

Now an USB  dongle though has less of an impact on battery life on your laptop (and no impact on your phone’s battery life) is a dongle and it dangles from the beautifully styled and thin laptop you just bought!

All of this could have been avoided if Apple had provided 3G functionality with their beautifully thin MacBook Air.

I’m not the only one thinking like this, as you can see here and here.

I think Apple missed the boat on this one, though maybe they didn’t want to get into bed with another phone provider!

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New Apple Stuff

Those who know me will know that I am a bit of a fan of Apple products, not exclusively, but I do like good design and stylish kit.

Yesterday in San Francisco at MacWorld Expo, Apple announced some new products and upgrades for the iPod touch and iPhone.

Key new product announced at the keynote was the MacBook Air, a small light MacBook.

I do like small computers, great fan of the 10″Sony VAIO laptops, however this is slightly bigger than I would like, and I can’t see how that would survive travelling by air or train.

Don’t get me wrong I think it’s very stylish, well designed, but doesn’t meet my needs for a small portable computer for use at conferences, on the train and in coffee shops.

No rumoured touchscreen, nor a Blu-ray drive either (actually no optical drive, though cleverly you can use your other Mac’s drive wirelessly, which is a very clever piece of software and something I would like to use with Windows UMPCs).

Nor can you can carry a spare battery, actually you can’t even replace the battery, it has to be sent to Apple to be replaced if it goes faulty.

There was also upgrades for the iPhone and iPod touch announced which provide additional applications, annoyingly free on the iPhone and a £12.99 upgrade for the iPod touch.

Huh!

Probably worth it for the e-mail and notes applications which make the iPod touch a more useful.

Also announced was a new Airport Extreme base station which comes with a 500GB or 1TB drive for Time Machine backups.

On the Americans get the opportunity to rent films, here in the UK we don’t, well not for a while.