The 2011 MacBook Air (11 & 13-inch): Thoroughly Reviewed
by Anand Lal Shimpi on July 28, 2011 3:25 AM EST- Posted in
- Apple
- Mac
- Intel
- Sandy Bridge
- MacBook Air
- Laptops
GPU Performance: A Step Back
There's no room for a discrete GPU in either the 11 or 13-inch MacBook Air, at least based on their current motherboard designs. Instead you're stuck with Intel's HD 3000 graphics on the dual-core Sandy Bridge die. For general use, Intel's HD 3000 is fast enough. As I mentioned earlier, even connected to a 27-inch display you get reasonable performance out of Sandy Bridge's GPU.
Where the HD 3000 falls short is in gaming performance, particularly at the native panel resolution of the 13-inch MacBook Air:
At 1280 x 720, the HD 3000 is fast enough for today's Mac games:
The HD 3000 is also a bit slower than the GeForce 320M used in last year's MacBook Air, at least in games that aren't largely CPU bound (basically anything but Starcraft 2):
While gaming is possible on both Air models, it's far from ideal. Apple definitely fixed the CPU performance with the new Air, but through no fault of its own failed to address GPU performance. Intel seems committed to taking GPU performance seriously, let's hope we actually see that in the coming years.
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ifyouwanto - Tuesday, August 2, 2011 - link
Hi Anandtech,In your review of the 2010 11" model you commented that the hinge felt a bit loose or weak. Wondering if it is any different on this years model?
Thanks
slatanek - Saturday, September 10, 2011 - link
i have a 13 inch Macbook air i5 2011 and its hinge is rock solid. it feels very assuring :-)cheers
Wskcondor - Thursday, October 13, 2011 - link
I read this review and also the 2011 iMac review. I have a couple of questions someone with the hardware in front of them or with more knowledge may be able to answer...My idea is to travel with the 2011 Macbook Air, with the 1.8G i7 upgrade and 256G SSD.
-I like the Thunderbolt display idea of a dock, because when I am "at home" I do a lot on the computer at the desk and I store a lot externally from the Air (movies, music, photos) and also still use an optical drive regularly. In effect, with a T-Bolt display, all of these things would be hanging off the display.
Then I thought: why couldn't I buy a 2011 iMac and use it as a "display/dock station" when at home?
1) Could I boot the 11" Air into TBolt target drive mode and then BOOT the iMac from the Air's drive, so all the "local changes" would be on the drive I take away on travel with me? The processor would be an i7 also in the iMac. BUT the configuration would be different, of course.
-will this jack up settings in the Air's hard drive when I disconnect and reboot the Air from it's internal processor?
-will this be too slow a configuration because the TBolt target drive mode has such slow throughput that the iMac will crawl along?
-Can I even boot an iMac off the Air's TBolt target SSD drive?
2) Can the iMac become a "Thunderbolt monitor" with drives, ports, etc if I boot the iMac into TBolt target mode? Or would it just be a blue screen with drives and ports, extending my Air's ports, but not acting as an external monitor?
Questions.
thanks to anyone who knows.
Wskcondor