2010 MacBook Air: Lose weight, and nothing else

Now that I've had a few weeks (with one slight interruption) to get to work with the MacBook Air, I thought I'd share my findings.

I bought the top-end 13" Air with the intent of replacing my early-2008 15" MacBook Pro as my sole personal computer at home and work. Here are the specs:

• Pro: 2.6Ghz Core2 Duo, 4GB RAM, GeForce 8600M GPU, 7200RPM HDD
• Air: 2.13GHz Core2 Duo, 4GB RAM, GeForce 320M GPU, 256GB SSD
  

One of my biggest concerns was performance — I wondered if the Air could live up to the level of the Pro. Here's what I found out:

The screen is physically smaller, but the resolution is the same (1440x900) so the actual real estate is unchanged. The GPU is comparable, and both 2D and 3D graphics are snappy. The mini display port interface on the Air is superior to the DVI port on the Pro since it can support higher resolution displays and can carry both audio and video.

The CPU is slightly slower but the memory is faster; the new Air has a 1066MHz bus compared to the 800 MHz bus on my '08 Pro. So far this more than makes up for the CPU speed reduction in my estimation; response time in all applications (even graphically-intensive apps like iPhoto) seems to be the same or better.

There's no comparing disk performance — the Air blows the Pro away due to its use of solid state drive technology. Since the Air doesn't contain a 'disk' at all, but instead stores all of its data in memory chips, the access time for reading files is lightning fast and writing files is also faster. Even better, the Air has a 56GB storage advantage over the 200GB drive in the Pro.

The Air's audio is better, with a new under-keyboard speaker system that sounds fuller and less tinny than the speakers on the Pro.

The battery on the Air is delivering about 6-8 hours of normal use. This is double the amount of time I would get on the Pro.

At 2.9 pounds, the Air is 2.5 pounds lighter than the Pro. Considering the Air's smaller power adapter, the total carry package is about 50% lighter.

Peripheral connectivity options favor the Pro but, with two USB ports and a built-in SD card slot, the Air is more than adequate. However, the lack of a FireWire port on the Air may be a problem for cinematographers.

So, all in all:

• computation and graphics capability are about the same
• audio is a little better
  
• data storage and retrieval is much better
• battery performance is twice as good
• carry weight is halved
• lacking a FireWire port (not an issue for me)

At $1799, the Air turned out to be a good value for me and I've totally transitioned to it as my only personal computer.

Customer Service: One Reason Why Apple is Awesome

Last weekend I bought a new MacBook Air. Rationally, I did it because I wanted to reduce the weight of my travel bag; actually, I did it because it looks cool and I wanted a notebook with solid state storage.

After spending a day with it and getting it all set up for my office and home networks, installing software, and copying files from my older MacBook Pro, I decided to take it in to the office. As I was walking from my car into the building, the strap on my bag somehow unfastened and the bag and all its contents (the new Air and also my iPad) crashed onto the concrete floor.

I unzipped the bag to look inside; the iPad seemed OK, but the Air had a big dent in the corner of the case. Opening it revealed damage to both the top lid that contains the display and the bottom that contains the keyboard and logic board. Miraculously, the thing still worked and there was no damage to the screen. I probably could have lived with it, but the bent metal was keeping the top from closing completely on that side and I was afraid that the display would eventually get damaged from flexing.

So I made an appointment with the Apple Genius Bar at my local Apple Store in Tampa, and took the machine in. I was expecting that the lid and bottom case would have to be replaced and that it would cost me a fair amount of money.

The employee there looked at it, confirmed my view of what had to be replaced, and said that they would fix it — for free!

I was floored. I know that it is going to cost them at least a few hundred dollars in time and materials for this repair. In addition to this, they thought it would take 5 days to get the parts since the machine was so new, but three days later they completed the repair.

So now I'm on the way to pick up the computer and definitely thinking that I am going to be a loyal Apple customer for a long time. Way to go, Apple!

Why the Volt is a Great Idea

General Motors has had its share of bad ideas over the years, but I think they have a really good one in the Volt.

The Volt is a new electric car that will be released this fall in the USA at a price of $41,000. After government tax credits, that price will be effectively reduced to $33,500.

What's interesting about the Volt is its practicality. First of all, from the outside you would never know it was anything special. It looks like a normal car. It has four doors and a roomy hatch. It has room for four people and their luggage. It has a radio, air conditioning, GPS, and OnStar service. You can fill it with gas, just like an ICE (internal combustion engine) or hybrid car. You can also plug it in to charge the battery, just like a pure electric car.

Yet compared to ICE cars, hybrid cars like the Prius, and pure electric cars like the Tesla, the Volt is very unique. Unlike an ICE car, the Volt is driven by electric power, not a gas engine. Unlike a hybrid car, an electric motor drives the wheels at all times; there is no complex transmission that connects the gas motor to the electric motor. Unlike a pure electric car the Volt has a gas engine in addition to a battery.

The battery in a Volt has more power than the battery in a hybrid, but less power than one in a pure electric car. When fully charged it can carry the car for about 40 miles of normal driving. After that, the gas motor starts up and generates the power to drive the electric motor another 300 miles per tankful.

This resolves the key dilemmas of hybrid and pure electric cars. Hybrid cars run mostly on gas so even on short trips gas is consumed and pollution is created; in the end they are only slightly more efficient than normal ICE cars. Pure electric cars run solely on battery, but when the battery is drained it takes hours to recharge, making the car impractical for long trips and causing a persistent fear of unplanned detours and the possibility of being stranded. But the Volt allows the driver to go as long as they want, stopping for just a few minutes every 300 miles to refill the gas tank.

This key capability will be what allows people to finally embrace an electric car as a practical vehicle. Though most trips and daily commutes are fairly short, we all make long trips from time to time and most of us can't afford to have a different car for those longer trips.

I drive about 40 miles to work and back each day, so on weekdays I will use almost no gasoline. Since the price of electricity per mile is radically lower than the price of gas per mile, I will save a lot of money. I will also generate a lot less pollution. Electricity from the grid has the added benefit of being generated from multiple different fuels (coal, natural gas, oil, nuclear) or even renewable sources like wind and solar power. Much of this power can be generated domestically, eliminating dependencies on foreign energy sources.

This is why I can see the Volt becoming a very popular car, and the first really practical electric car to ever be mass produced. Kudos to the engineers at GM for coming up with such a brilliantly simple concept, and kudos to the management for embracing the concept and getting it to market.

'Net Neutrality, Take Two...

Two companies, that is. Google and Verizon, the behemoth of Internet content and the leviathan of US mobile and fiber optic broadband.

Today they announced a proposed "legislative framework" around 'net neutrality. If you're not sure what this all about, here's a brief overview:

The Internet is a collection of networks that carry data between computers. This data is transported in the form of packets, where one logical communication, a video for example, is broken down into a series of packets that are carried from the sender to the receiver. This is a core feature of the Internet, and makes it very resilient because packets can be sent along many paths to get to their destination, so if in the middle of a transfer a cable gets cut somewhere the packets can immediately be re-routed over a different connection to get to the destination.

Now all of this is fine until there are more packets waiting to be sent than can be carried over any one segment of the network. When this happens, packets are delayed, like cars in a traffic jam, and the result is a slower download or choppy video. This can and does happen when there is not enough bandwidth or when bandwidth is shared across a number of users. To solve this problem companies can add more bandwidth by adding cables and equipment to the network; mobile companies might add more cell towers and backhaul circuits.

Another approach to solving this problem is to prioritize traffic, so that some packets get sent with a higher priority than others. Imagine a highway with bus or carpool lanes; while most cars sit in rush hour traffic, carpools and buses zip by at full speed. The network can be just like that, with certain bandwidth reserved for specific types of packets.

Where this gets interesting is that many of the companies that provide Internet connections and carry packets also provide data services. Consider your cable TV company — you can buy Internet service from them but they also provide video and voice services. What would happen if they protected the quality of their video and voice services by reducing the quality of Netflix and Skype? Would that be fair to these other companies?

This is the core argument for 'net neutrality; companies that carry Internet packets should not be allowed to prioritize some traffic at the cost of other traffic. If you prioritize, you are not neutral because you will make that prioritized service better than the non-prioritized service.

The concern is that without rules that require network companies to treat all packets equally, they will eventually resort to prioritizing their services and throttling those of competitors. The cable company wants you to use their video on demand, not Netflix or Hulu. The phone company wants you to use their voice service, not Skype or Fring. Thus, in the end, these alternative services won't get a fair chance because the network companies will choke them out and stifle competition.

I agree with a general policy that would prevent traffic prioritization, and think there ought to be a clear delineation between companies that transport packets and companies that provide data services like email, video, voice calling, and social networking. Without this, the Internet innovation engine will stall and we will return to the bad old days when a few big companies controlled all the information and communication services available to us. Even though there is no longer a telecommunications monopoly, over 97% of the US population gets mobile service from just four companies (Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile) and a very large portion gets fixed line service from Verizon, AT&T, and a small number of major cable companies, so a small number of large companies have an awful lot of power.

However, in this announcement Google and Verizon take it upon themselves to define a framework where some traffic can be prioritized to allow broadband service providers to offer "differentiated services" whose packets could be prioritized over others. I think this loophole would be exercised to the maximum extent possible by the consumer fixed and mobile broadband companies in order to preserve their revenues at the expense of competitors.

What do you think?