New MacBook Air Detailed test

New Apple MacBook Air evaluation

Apple has officially released the new MacBook Air in its recent WWDC 2013, although it has almost no change in appearance compared to the old model, but the intrinsic improvement is not small. The new MacBook Air uses a new generation of intel® Haswell processors, faster, smaller drives and larger batteries, and the result is a further increase in battery life, with 11-inch MacBook Air up to 9 hours, The 13-inch MacBook Air is up to a staggering 12 hours. But does the new MacBook Air actually perform as advertised by Apple? Let's take a look at the assessments that the foreign media cnet brings.

In terms of appearance, the new MacBook Air, whether 11-inch or 13-inch, looks almost exactly the same as the old model (which this article refers to in the June 2012 release) and is a perfect piece of art. In fact, the look of the MacBook Air is perfect, and it's understandable that you don't adopt a new design.

MacBook Air is the only Apple notebook product to be upgraded on this WWDC. At first glance, the new MacBook Air upgrade is very small, mainly upgrade to the Intel fourth generation Haswell Core I series processor, in fact, compared to the most important upgrade of the old model is the significant increase in the battery life, this is the real selling point of the new MacBook Air.

CNET has also tested a number of laptops that use the Haswell processor, and overall, the Haswell processor can improve laptop performance while reducing power consumption, increasing user care. After switching to the Haswell processor, Apple says the 13-inch MacBook Air will have a 12-hour battery life and can be recharged almost all day. In CNET's Test, the new MacBook Air lasts even longer.

Another upgrade to the new MacBook Air, powered by the Intel HD Graphics 5000 graphics, has improved performance compared to the previous generation of HD graphics 4000, partly addressing the much-maligned graphics performance of the MacBook Air family. While the HD Graphics 5000 has a gap in performance with a discrete graphics card on the 15-inch MacBook Pro retina, today the steam and EA Origin game platforms are now supported for Mac platforms, so for game enthusiasts, The game will no longer be the Achilles heel of OS X.

In addition, the new MacBook Air, like the new Airport Extreme and airport time capsule, uses the 802.11AC wireless standard, known as 5G Wi-Fi, to provide users with a faster network experience. Although the network speed is not significantly increased under the network established by routers that only support the 802.11N standard, this upgrade is necessary with the gradual popularization of the 802.11AC standard. Apple also said the new MacBook was equipped with faster read SSD SSDs. On the price side, the starting price for the 11-inch and 13-inch MacBook Air was lowered to $999 (about 6125 yuan) and 1099 (about RMB 6750), and the hard drive capacity of the low-edition 11-inch MacBook Air increased from 64GB to 128GB.

Compared to the 11-inch MacBook Air, the 13-inch MacBook Air has a slightly smaller upgrade range, not only on the outside, but also in the high-resolution screen and HDMI interface, but considering the price of $100 (about 615 yuan), So the 13-inch MacBook Air is still one of the most worthwhile laptops to buy.

New MacBook Air vs sony VAIO Pro 13 hardware configuration

Design and performance

While the shape has not changed, the new MacBook Air is still thinner than the latest generation of ultra-polar books, such as Sony's newly launched VAIO Pro 13. The 11-inch and 13-inch MacBook have the same thickness, the thinnest 3mm, the thickest 17mm, the difference being that the 13-inch MacBook Air trackpad is bigger.

Sony VAIO Pro 13 (left) vs. new 13-inch MacBook Air (right) appearance

The MacBook air is an all-in-one aluminum body that still gives you a rugged feel and does not have to be fitted with a special case or protective sleeve during carrying. Although the Vaio Pro 13 's carbon fiber body is also very special and durable, the MacBook Air feels more reliable.

The new MacBook Air's multi-gesture trackpad has not changed, and while other manufacturers are trying to improve the trackpad design of their notebook products, there is no product that can rival MacBook Air yet. If you want to maximize the use of this trackpad, then you can go to System preferences will be all the touch function to open. Although the MacBook Air runs OS X Mountain Lion, OS X Mavericks released this fall will further improve the user experience and will also save power.

Unlike the 11-inch MacBook Air, the 13-inch MacBook Air is still not using a 16:9-aspect ratio screen, and does not use a full-bezel-covered glass like the MacBook Pro. As you can see from the comparison chart, the MacBook Air screen is slightly narrower than the Vaio Pro 13 and the border is slightly thicker.

The new MacBook Air has a screen resolution of 1440x900, which is slightly higher than the 1366x768 mainstream resolution used in 13-inch notebooks, but there are some gaps between the higher-end 1600x900 and 1920x1080. Of course, to ensure long enough battery life, screen resolution must be a certain compromise. The MacBook Pro retina and the ultra-high split-screen laptops from Toshiba, Dell and Hewlett-Packard will be a better choice if you have a unique feeling for high-split screens.

In practical use, although the MacBook Air does not use a matte screen, the reflective effect of this screen is not serious and does not affect the user's reading content.

interface, performance and endurance

13-inch MacBook Air body configuration at a glance

The new MacBook Pro's fuselage configuration and interface also retains its old design, including two USB 3.0 ports and a Thunderbolt high-speed interface for external displays and accessories. And thanks to the support of the 802.11AC standard, the new MacBook Air has a very fast network speed when combined with the new Airport Extreme and airport time capsule.

Overall, the new 13-inch MacBook Air is not a big change, but the interesting thing is that the old one uses the Intel Core i5 dual-core processor at 1.8GHz, and after upgrading Haswell, it uses a slightly lower-frequency 1.3GHz core i5-4250u. The start price of the new 13-inch MacBook Air has been lowered to $1099 (about 6750 yuan), while the high-priced 256GB SSD sells for $1299 (about $7960).

In a number of performance tests, the new MacBook Air performance compared to the old model is basically the same, the improvement is not very obvious, even some of the results are slightly lower than the old model. For the daily use of MacBook Air for web browsing and multimedia playback of old users, the new and old in the experience of the use of almost no difference, the old MacBook Air has been able to meet the needs of mainstream users.

Thanks to the use of HD Graphics 5000 graphics, the new MacBook Air is much better at graphics performance than the older models that use HD Graphics 4000 graphics. When running call of Duty 4 on the new MacBook Air, the average number of frames per second in the 1440x900 resolution is 39.0, which is smoother, while the old MacBook Air can only reach 21.9 frames and slightly stutter.

From the operation of Portal 2, it can be speculated that most of the mainstream games in the new MacBook Air is still playable, but if you like a Mac and a player with a high demand for the game, then the 15-inch MacBook Pro retina is your choice.

Both the 11-inch and 13-inch MacBook Air are outstanding in the endurance test. The old 13-inch MacBook Air has been playing for 7 hours and 27 minutes, and the new play time has reached an astonishing 14 hours, 25 minutes, almost the same time, and is longer than the 12-hour Apple said. Although different test criteria will affect the test results, it is certain that the new MacBook Air life time has undoubtedly increased significantly.

It is worth noting that the increase in battery life is largely due to the incredible low power consumption of the Haswell processor. In fact, the same 13-inch Sony VAIO Pro 13 video playback time also reached 9 hours, better than the old 13-inch MacBook Air scores. Also, although the new MacBook Air has a much better video playback performance than the old one, the CPU frequency is maintained at a very low level when playing the video, and the Haswell is optimized for video playback, so heavy use For example, if you turn on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth or run a large 3D game, your battery life may drop dramatically.

Multimedia multi-tasking test (the lower the score, the better)

Adobe Photoshop CS5 Image processing test (the lower the score, the better)

itunes Audio transcoding Test (the lower the score, the better)

Video playback time test (the higher the score, the better)

Video conversion multitasking test (the lower the score, the better)

Conclusion

The 13-inch MacBook Air upgrade is commendable for a laptop that has no change in appearance compared to the old one, but the lack of new features (such as high-touch screens and NFC) and a little bit of performance improvement have been a little regrettable. But the use of HD Graphics 5000 graphics and the drop in prices make MacBook Air one of the most expensive laptops on the market.

In a sense, the amazing battery life is the most positive upgrade of the new MacBook Air, and the ability to maintain power throughout the day has indeed brought the MacBook into a new era, which is what Apple sees as the future of laptops. Although 14.5 hours of video playback time does not fully represent the new MacBook Air endurance, and in heavy use may have a greater degree of decline, but a day without charging does not power off should be feasible. Coupled with the Advanced OS X operating system and easy gesture operation, the new MacBook Air is a unique and difficult competitor in the market.

Advantages

-Upgrade to intel® fourth generation Haswell processor

-Extra long battery life

-Convenient and excellent multi-gesture touch panel

-100 USD (about 615 yuan) decline

Disadvantages

-Lack of high-touch screen and other large-scale upgrade

-The design level is gradually being overtaken by the super-pole.

Participate in test models and configurations

13-inch MacBook Air (released June 2013):

Os X 10.8.4 Mountain Lion operating system, 1.3GHz Intel Core i5-4240u processor, 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz memory, Intel HD Graphics 5000 graphics, 1024MB shared memory; 128GB Apple SSD.

11-inch MacBook Air (released June 2013):

Os X 10.8.4 Mountain Lion operating system, 1.3GHz Intel Core i5-4240u processor, 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz memory, Intel HD Graphics 5000 graphics, 1024MB shared memory; 128GB Apple SSD.

13-inch MacBook Air (released June 2012):

Os X 10.7.4 Mountain Lion operating system, 1.8GHz Intel Core i5-3427u processor, 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz memory, Intel HD Graphics 4000 graphics, 384MB shared memory; 128GB Apple SSD.

13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display (released October 2012):

Os X 10.8.2 Mountain Lion operating system, 2.5GHz Intel Core i5-3210 processor, 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz memory, Intel HD Graphics 4000 graphics, 768MB shared memory; 256GB Apple SSD.

Sony VAIO Pro 13 (2013 Taipei Computer Show released):

Windows 8 (64-bit) operating system, 1.6GHz Intel Core I5-4000U processor, 4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz memory, Intel HD Graphics 4400 graphics card, 1659MB shared video memory, 128GB Samsung Solid State Drive.