Apple's MacBook Air 13-inch (Ivy Bridge) Review, The Air Versus Ultrabooks

So here it is, the mid-2012 refresh of Apple's trend setting MacBook Air line. It's been four long years since Apple first introduced the MacBook Air to the world, which at the time was almost considered a luxury item, with a comparatively steep price tag versus other ultralight machines. That changed a couple of years later, and in the process of making the MacBook Air more affordable, Apple helped shift the mobile market away from chunky desktop replacements, to a trend where competent computing power exists within thin and light profiles. In all likelihood, the MacBook Air inspired Intel's Ultrabook specification, created so that Windows users would have access to the same overall experience on their platform of choice.

The MacBook Air is the real McCoy, so to speak, and though technically not an Ultrabook, the newest models cross over to Intel's 3rd generation Ivy Bridge Core processor microarchitecture. In fact, Ivy Bridge is at the heart of Apple's mid-2012 refresh, bringing with it not only greater processing power, but a graphics speed bump from Intel HD Graphics 3000 to Intel HD Graphics 4000, topped off with DX11 compatibility and improved power efficiency to boot. Simply put, Intel obviously benefits by remaining platform agnostic, so long as both platforms buy their weapons from the Santa Clara chip maker. Apple left the Power PC architecture what seems like an eternity ago for X86 and they're obviously not looking back, at least on the desktop and mobile side of the house.