Apple MacBook Air unibody 11-inch Mid 2011 Pro Reviews

If you need a super portable laptop that is still pretty capable, get the 11-inch MacBook Air. If you need something that offers a bit more power and a smidge better resolution, go for the 13-inch form factor. You’ll be getting a great operating system in the form of OS X Lion, and a lot of amazing built-in software, such as iMovie. OS X is no longer remarkably better than Windows since Windows 7 came out, but the free apps like iMovie, iPhoto and GarageBand have no match on Microsoft’s side. If Windows is *absolutely required* for your work, and you can’t virtualize the OS, then you may want to look elsewhere. While the MacBook Air offers a package experience that’s hard to beat, it doesn’t run Windows quite as well as some of the competition - for occasional booting it’s just fine, but I wouldn’t want to use it on the Air as an everyday OS.

There's a lot to like with the new MacBook Airs; the last update was good, but performance was still often lacking. The MBA 11 in particular is now much more useful, and the 13 rightfully spells the end of the line for the old MacBook. While pricing is higher than typical 11" to 13" Windows laptops, you really can't find a competing Windows laptop with all the features the MBA offers without paying a similar price premium. You get a nice chassis with excellent build quality, decent displays that trump every budget laptop we've looked at, and reasonable battery life. If you like thin and light ultraportables, the MacBook Air continues to be one of the best options around.

When's all said and done, to my surprise – my expectations being set by years of Mean Santa withholding features – it's an absolutely outstanding piece of kit. Design and execution are so professional that it's the sort of review where you start with 100 per cent, and knock off the odd one here and there. The overall experience is superb, and while the smallest Apple MacBook Air comes at a cost, it is a real advance in user expectations of how much a computer should weigh and what it should do.

The MacBook Air has never been a laptop for everyone. It began as a niche laptop for a tiny sliver of the population, but in the intervening three years there's been a sea change. Today, most people in the market for a Mac laptop should seriously consider the MacBook Air. Sure, there are some people for whom it's a poor fit—but I suspect they are increasingly the exception, not the rule. (There's a reason Apple's marketing slogan for this version of the Air is "The ultimate everyday notebook.")

Added to all this is a fundamental advantage of ULV technology, which is often overlooked: the notebook is for the most part absolutely silent and yet also remains at a comfortable temperature. And the icing on the cake: you can get around 4-5 hours of battery life from the 35 Wh lithium polymer battery in realistic working conditions, with a total weight of barely a kilogram and a price tag starting at 859 euros – now the cheapest model in the Apple portfolio after the departure of the MacBook White.

Since the company has discontinued its popular white MacBook, the Apple MacBook Air 11in (Mid-2011) now stands alone as the most affordable Mac portable. At £849, you get 2GB memory and 64GB of solid-state drive; another £150 doubles both those specs to a decent 4GB and 128GB storage. Whether you’re a student or business professional, it’s a great carry-anywhere laptop with more power than we’d imagine was possible at this size, yet still providing decent battery life.

We have no hesitation in recommending the 2011 11-inch MacBook Air, but before spending £1,399 on this expensively customised model, you should ask yourself if you really need the extra power and storage. If you want your Air as a convenient portable Mac to supplement to your main machine, you might be better off with an entry-level model.

A strong boost in CPU power puts the MacBook Air in the performance zone of the more expensive MacBook Pro, floating it well above its ultraportable competition.

If you want a slightly larger screen and more battery life, the 13-inch MacBook Air is the best choice; if you want something that's small enough to slip into a bag and take everywhere with you, this is best laptop you can buy.

The Apple MacBook Air 11in (mid 2011) is clearly a machine for the well heeled, with a starting price of £850 and desirable configurations coming in over £1,000. Nonetheless, it is far from a frivolous purchase. Its styling and build are unrivalled, it has plenty enough performance for everyday computing, it'll at least half a working day on battery, and the improvements to MacOSX make it a lovely system to use. It does lack connectivity right out of the box (even eshewing the SD card slot of its 13in sibling) but, thanks to its ThunderBolt port, it can actually connect to just about anything you desire with the right adapter (once they become available). Many competitors are getting close but right now the Air is still flying high.

Ultrathin, effortlessly elegant, and now with genuine power, Apple has fixed most of the flaws in its little marvel

The already impressive Apple MacBook Air 11-inch (Thunderbolt) gets Apple's OS X Lion, a speedier processor, Thunderbolt technology, but for this price other laptops offer more features.

You really have to look at the 11-inch MacBook Air in two ways to evaluate it: First as an ultraportable and next as the most affordable laptop Apple offers. As an ultraportable, the Air is superior in almost every way. It offers a bright display with wide viewing angles, good sound, a comfy backlit keyboard, a large and intuitive touchpad, and a processor that's fast enough to handle most tasks. And while we wish there were more Thunderbolt peripherals on the market, having that port on board future-proofs your purchase. The one sticking point of the 11-inch Air is its battery life; a little less than 5 hours is decent, but that's a half hour less than its predecessor and not nearly as long as other laptops in this class.

This year's 11-inch MacBook Air improves on last year's model in several significant ways and is by far the fastest ultraportable you're likely to find, though some users will consider the limited flash storage space to be a hindrance.