Apple is reportedly beginning production this month on a new line of MacBook Airs that use the new Sandy Bridge Intel Core i5 and i7 processors. The processors are rumored to run at speeds below 2Ghz, with suggested speeds of 1.5 and 1.7Ghz being most likely. This is to ensure the machines remain energy-efficient and run with minimal heat and optimum battery life.
We can reasonably expect that these new MacBook Airs will also include the new Thunderbolt ports in the place of the traditional Mini DisplayPort connector. Additionally, Apple may be using a slightly less powerful graphics card in the newer models, although this is currently unconfirmed.
The new Sandy Bridge MacBook Airs will supposedly support a maximum of 8GB of DDR3 SDRAM, up from the previous maximum of 4GB, though it is unknown whether Apple will offer an 8GB option in the first iteration of this model. The new processors will also house between 3 and 4MB of Smart Cache.
Sources stated that 400,000 of the new model MacBook Airs have gone into production, with 209,000 of them being the smaller 11-inch model, which has become the more popular model with buyers.
Article Via TUAW
Photo Credit: Adam Jackson
