MacBook Air – 2011 style

Apple MacBook Air, 2011 model, side views

2011 Apple MacBook Air

The online Apple store went down at around 7 pm tonight, and lo and behold when it reopened just after 10.30 pm there was a new MacBook Air on offer.

Packed into the still very slim MacBook Air, available in 11- and 13-inch screen sizes, is a little more grunt, and some new features. Firstly, processors. On-board are the Intel Core i5 and Core i7 dual-core processors, providing what Apple claim is up to twice the speed of the last MacBook Air model.



Both sizes also house the new Thunderbolt port, that allows 10 Gbps of throughput in both directions. That’s 20 times faster than with USB 2.0, and over 12 times faster than FireWire 800.

Left-hand side view of the 2011 Apple MacBook Air

Left-hand side view of the Apple Macbook Air…

Right-hand side view of the 2011 Apple MacBook Air… and the right-hand side

A very welcome new feature is the backlit keyboard. It might not sound sexy, but once you’ve used a computer with a keyboard that lights up in the dark you curse anything you use that lacks such a feature.

Apple MacBook Air, 2011 model, side views

MacBook Air pricing

The new MacBook Air is available to order online now, and will be on store shelves when the doors open today, July 21. The MacBook Air will be available in the following sizes and standard configurations:

1.6 GHz 11-inch MacBook Air

  • Option 1: 2GB of memory and 64GB of flash storage – AUD$1,099 RRP
  • Option 2: 4GB of memory and 128GB of flash storage – AUD$1,349 RRP

1.7 GHz 13-inch MacBook Air

  • Option 1 – 4GB of memory and 128GB of flash storage – AUD$1,449 RRP
  • Option 2 – 4GB of memory and 256GB of flash storage – AUD$1,799 RRP

Optional upgrades / configurations for the 13-inch MacBook Air include a 1.8 GHz Core i7 processor, additional flash storage, MacBook Air SuperDrive and a USB Ethernet Adapter.

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