MacBook Air 2011 is what geek dreams are made of

MANILA, Philippines - There’s now an ultraportable computer hotter than Apple’s 11-inch Macbook Air. It’s the new 11-inch Macbook Air.

Introduced only weeks ago, Apple’s new 11.6-inch and 13.3-inch Macbook Airs feature faster second-generation Intel Core i5 processors and Apple’s brand-new operating system, Mac OS X Lion.

These updated models come less than a year after the first Macbook Airs debuted last October. Many who already own the sliver of computing beauty that is the 11-inch Macbook Air might find it unsettling that it has gone old too soon. Or they could make a beeline to the nearest Apple Store as real fans do.

As far as looks go, the new Macbook Airs hardly changed at all. There are some few welcome additions such as a backlit keyboard, Thunderbolt I/O port for high-speed data transfer, and HD audio/video. The all-metal body and thin profile have been preserved, giving this computer a powerful yet minimalist, expensive “air” about it.

Unfortunately, the 11-inch model still has no SD card reader. It will also cramp the style of any user with a voracious need for storage as it still offers a limited 64GB flash storage space and 2GB onboard memory for the $999 model or 128GB flash storage with 4GB for the $1,199 model. This limitation may not be an issue though for those who do lots of cloud computing or have huge external storage devices on hand.

The obvious and inexcusable omission of a tiny slot for an SD card reader, something that even the most low-priced netbooks have, might prompt others to go for the 13-inch model. The Macbook Air 13-inch model, which offers an SD card slot and fixed 4GB onboard memory, is priced at $1,299 for the model with 128GB flash storage and $1,599 for the unit with 256GB flash storage.

A lion’s touch

The new Macbook Airs come with an OS X Lion. Those who bought a Macbook Air only two months ago can still avail themselves of a free upgrade, but others must spend $29.99 to upgrade from Snow Leopard.

The OS X Lion takes full advantage of the Macbook Air’s sizable multi-touch trackpad. It offers Macbook Air users the same multi-touch gestures found on the iPad, with additional gesture-based shortcuts and “natural” scrolling in which content follows the movement of the fingers. The new gestures also enable users to pinch to zoom in and out of a page, or use two fingers to scroll up and down a page.

The OS X Lion features a new Launchpad that puts all available applications on multi-screen menu that makes finding and launching programs easy. The new Launchpad also has an iPad look and feel to it. The two other viewing modes are called Mission Control and Expose.

A feature called AirDrop enables the user to send files to other Lion users within 30 feet wirelessly, without having to set up a network. Just drag the file to the person’s name and wait for him to accept it.

Lion also enables users to resume work quickly. Applications that were closed will reopen right where they were left of, and installing software updates no longer requires closing any active program before the updates take into effect. Lion’s Resume feature will restart the Mac after an update and return to the active programs immediately. This brings to mind one of Macbook Air’s coolest attractions: a super fast start-up and shutdown process that can be counted in mere seconds.

The 11-inch Macbook Air is now Apple’s entry-level laptop computer and the cheapest when compared to all its other Mac cousins, though configuring for more memory would make it costlier.

Even as it is, however, the 11-inch MacBook Air is a surprise in both quality and performance, making it one Apple that’s too tempting not to bite.