The 2013 MacBook Air Review (13-inch)
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 24, 2013 12:01 AM ESTMore GPU Performance Numbers
The next set of benchmarks are taken from our 2013 Laptop Bench. Here we're comparing to HD 4000 and HD 4400, both using Acer S7s. Compared to HD 4400 the HD 5000 in Apple's 2013 MBA ends up being around 15% faster in most tests. Compared to Ivy Bridge/HD 4000 the gap ranges from lower single digits in thermally constrained environments to 25% or 40% in the best case scenarios.
3DMark GPU Performance
We close out our look at Intel's HD 5000 performance using a historical collection of 3DMark data. The comparison gives us some more data points to characterize Intel's HD 5000. The data here is all best case scenario for HD 5000 as there are no situations where we hit thermal limits.
On average, Intel's HD 4400 ends up being 18% faster than HD 4000, while Intel's HD 5000 is 31% faster.
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appliance5000 - Friday, December 20, 2013 - link
One word - tablets.mikeztm - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
Could that PCIe ssd works with Filevault2 without performance down?My 2011 MBA's SSD became much slower after enabling Filevault2.
|-8-| - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
>Five years after its introduction, the MacBook Air really has>grown into a very polished, mature platform. The 2013
>model is really the epitome of what Apple set out to
>build back in 2008, we just finally have the right hardware
>available to realize the vision. Nearly every component has
>been perfectly selected.
For a ultramobile working horse, there are still some substantial shortcomings: It's still a glossy display tying your work place to indoor use or cloudy weather. There is still no LAN, no VGA - this makes many headaches in business everyday life.
Maybe the author better leaves the marketing to Apple and concentrates on listing the Pros AND Cons of the product. It's a fine notebook, but definitely not perfect. ;)
weiran - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
You forget not everyone works in a corporation and has your requirements, especially considering this is a consumer device first and foremost. Apple looks to the future, which may mean minor pain in the short-term (having to use adapters for LAN and VGA), but realistically do you think in 2-3 years either of those will exist on any consumer laptop?|-8-| - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
It's not about having these or that requirements. The author is praising something to the skies, that has obvious short comings. (Every product has that.) What would be more 'neutral' verbalised: The components are perfectly selected. [...]. There are a few compromises, so the screen has good contrast, but isn't really usable outside, for example in a park. Further missing legacy ports force to carry adapters for using old legacy infrastructure like LAN networks or common LCD projectors.It's about writing a review - I don't want to read someones marketing arguments.
And by the way: Yes, VGA and LAN will be important in the future - most LCD projectors still have VGA and in contrast to HDMI or Displayport it really works reliable. I was at a conference a month ago - VGA saved me as Displayport wasn't working at all.
LAN is without alternative to share and synchronise big amounts of data.
Grennum - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
VGA is certainly dying. By the end of the year all of the projects in our boardrooms will be replaced with Smart Screens, which you connect to via Wi-Fi. We have wired HDMI as a back-up works perfectly.Wired LAN is not dying by why would you ever have large amounts of data on your ultra portable laptop? That is just be irresponsible. If you are working with large data sets best to do it on a remote system where you have the performance, and reliability.
This laptop would perfectly meet the needs for many of our business users, maybe not engineering, but then engineering wouldn't be looking at an ultraportable (remote engineering desktops notwithstanding)
|-8-| - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
Maybe I should switch to your company. ;) There are some new projectors here having HDMI (sadly no Displayport). But most projectors are quite old (still working), these are connected via VGA. There is some time left, till the last old projectors die.Honestly I don't see a bonus in digital alternatives. THE standard is still missing, as most notebooks have either HDMI or Displayport.
WLAN seems to have high signal latency between two computers. If you syncronise two big collections of many many subfolders and many small files in there, you notice a huge difference even between 100 MBit/s LAN and 300 MBit/s WLAN. I use WLAN for backups, but speed sucks.
Another problem is security of data in the private sector, these security guys don't like WLAN.
A5 - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
Then maybe don't work in a park? I don't know of any laptop with a bright enough screen and good enough battery life to actually work outdoors.|-8-| - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
Well, the Samsung Series 9 900X3C-A04DE or the Lenovo x220/x230 are two, that can be used outdoors. There should be more, some Zenbooks have also matte screens.darwinosx - Monday, June 24, 2013 - link
Well Samsung makes cheap junk that doesn't work and has no support.