Your link of the day: Ars Technica.

I’m not going to talk about the lack of an optical drive, ports, or the battery that is accessible only to the elite few who know how to use a screwdriver. We’re all aware of what the MacBook Air has and does not have. Instead, I’ll compare this to Apple’s last sub-notebook, the 12″ PowerBook.

Compared to the 12″ PowerBook, the MacBook Air is dramatically thinner and about 50% lighter, but the footprint is a significantly larger. I suppose the 13″ display size is nice, but I would gladly take a smaller display for a decreased footprint. However, I’m not going to discount the quality of the LED backlit display. As you can see in the above photo the screen on the PowerBook is terrible compared to the MacBook Air. Both screens were at full brightness in the above photo. The glossy screen is among the best LCDs I’ve seen, and it has convinced me that glossy screens are the way to go.

Okay, so it is a thin computer. So what. Well, it is kind of nice actually. The 12″ PowerBook seems rather brick-like compared to the MacBook Air. The 12″ PowerBook was never really a light weight, and this flaw is quite obvious when compared to the MacBook Air. Also, the lower position of the MacBook Air keyboard relative to the table top makes typing more comfortable. The keyboard on the MacBook Air and the 12″ PowerBook are both very nice, but the MacBook Air beats the PowerBook in this category.

Finally, who saw the Macworld Expo keynote? Well, the MacBook air supposedly fits inside an inter-office envelope. I happen to have a standard 10″ x 13″ interoffice envelope and here is the result:

That would be a big fail. The envelope would make for a great carrying case, but it looks like you will have to order a special Apple Inc. interoffice folder if you want to be like Steve.

Were you expecting a conclusion? Oh. Well, the MacBook Air is nice. It isn’t a good primary computer, but it would make for an excellent second or third system. In contrast, the 12″ PowerBook was and still is a great primary computer, as long as you also use an external display. Most importantly, the MacBook Air looks pretty, it is easy to carry around, but it does not fit in an interoffice envelope. In retrospect, I suppose I really should have compared it to the iPod touch, which fits in much smaller envelopes.

What is it?  

A 16 GB iPod with the touch screen interface from the iPhone (without the terrible Edge cellular connection or the somewhat obligatory AT&T contract).  Oh, and I have Cingular/AT&T mobile service, but the iPhone data/voice plans are ridiculously expensive.  What else? It plays h.264 video (high quality), it is an iPhoto viewer, it provides access to the iTune music store, it can access wireless internet for web browsing, and it plays music too.  The cost is approximately $400 for the 16 GB model and $300 for the 8 GB.             

What is the white thing next to it??? 

 That would be my 15 GB 3G (3rd generation) iPod.  I purchased this iPod in 2003 for the same price as my iPod Touch.  For both of you who don’t know what the original iPod is, it is a hard drive based portable music player.  While the iPod Touch is still an iPod, the portable music player aspect is, in my opinion, now just a side note.  By the way, I have another opinion: the 3G iPod has the best user interface of all of the “classic” iPods.  The click wheel iPods are interesting, but not an easy to use as the 3G.  The 3G also supports Firewire, something missing from current iPods.          

The Good:

• – Safari has excellent page rendering, a great UI with easy pan/scroll/zoom.  Safari is the single best (and most dissapointing) application on the iPod Touch.  It makes other mobile browsers look like web browser equivalent of a ’74 Ford Mustang II (read: crap).
• – Nice display, great video (h.264), very clear and very sharp with a great LED backlight.
• – Very nice keyboard.  This became very apparent when I switched back to the on-screen keyboard on my Tom Tom GPS.  Until I bought the iPod, I though the Tom Tom was pretty good.  I won’t compare the iPod keyboard to a Blackberry; I presonally can stand the Blackberry interface, but some seem to like it.  Oh, and after a week of iPod usage I can touch type; the predictive word completion works extemely well and significantly speeds up input if you use/trust it.
• – Touch interface is superior to the iPod click wheel, cooler than the 3G interface
• – 16 GB of flash storage is sufficient
• – WiFi works well (with my AirPort Express WDS network)
• – Impressive battery life: no problem watching a movie, a few short videos and a few hours of music on a transatlantic flight.

The Bad:

• – Safari crashes frequently (really annoying and disappointing)
• – .Mac webmail does not work
• – USB only (no Firewire)
• – Contacts data not completly sync’d  

Missing Software/Features: 

• – Email application
• – Editable calendar
• – 3rd party applications*
• – To do list/text editor
• – The ability to download photos from a camera directly to iPhoto on iPod (via USB)
• – Bluetooth

3rd party applications:

I’m not quite sure how this one should go.  While it would be nice to have the ability to develop applications that run natively on the iPod Touch and iPhone, it makes more sense for Apple to encourage web application development.  Why?  Well, I think it is pretty obvious that most applications are headed this way.  Look at Google Apps or anything with “Web 2.0” in the title.  However, don’t look at Microsoft Office Live.  This is a pseudo web application that completely misses the point.  While a true web application runs from a browser and requires no special software on the client, MS thinks you should have a $300+ version of Office installed on your computer before you can load their “web application”.  Anyway, I think Apple will get a lot of flack for not allowing 3rd party apps (if this is the route they continue to take), but in the long run it will be good for the iPod/iPhone platforms as well as any other mobile platform.       

Update: Apple announced that official support for 3rd party development for the iPod Touch and iPhone will be out February 2008.        

Conclusion: 

The iPod Touch is the best mobile phone on the market:  Better than the iPhone with no silly contract or monthly fees, plus no annoying “voice” service.  While many of the issues I discussed could potentially be addressed with firware updates, I would sit on that $400 and wait for the 2G iPod Touch.