engadget macbook air review

Engadget just published their much anticipated review of the MacBook Air. I think they are straining a bit giving Apple’s sub-notebook a good review…

Good points: Screen is great, keyboard is full-size for an ultraportable

I won’t mention the bad points as these have been extravagantly covered everywhere including this blog. Engadget wraps up thus:

Given its stripped down, one-piece design, some are calling the Air the iPod of laptops. The point is debatable as to whether this machine could have the same appeal to computer users, but if there is one clear upshot to the Air, it’s that Apple’s learned to take the next step in miniaturizing their portable computers. While not all Mac users are going to stand in line to get this latest machine, Apple is doubtless welcomed back into the ultraportable laptop market by the technology world. Perhaps the largest side-effect of the Air won’t be ditching optical drives, though; for the rest of Apple’s consumer base it’s now just a matter of time before other Mac laptop lines benefit from the technical and engineering advances that made this thing so thin and light. Give us the lovechild of the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro, and it’s all over.

The last sentence is not even the worst of it. This is: “The Air is a tough call. On the one hand it proposes to be a no-compromises ultraportable, but on the other hand it compromises many (but not all) the things road warriors want.”

Ouch! Worse yet are the comments from Engadget readers. The predominant view is that MBA, though light and very thin will not be very useful. It’s a fashion laptop, not a business laptop, not a laptop for road warriors. We should see Paris Hilton and Olsen twins lugging one some time soon. At least the folks at the Today Show like it: