Man buys MacBook Air, pulls it apart, takes pics
Inside Apple's latest
Worried about changing the battery in a MacBook Air? Don't - according to one tech site that's taken the skinny machine to bits, opening the laptop up is "a surprisingly pleasant task".
Cynics will, of course, say the 13.3in notebook that's short on stature but big on hype should stay that way, but at least iFixIt's disassembly shows how straightforward the process is and what's inside the slimline shell.
Inside Apple's MacBook Air
Image courtesy iFixIt.com
And there are some surprises, like the presence of a Silicon Image SIL1392CNU HDMI chip. The Air only has a proprietary mini-DVI port. However, there's HDCP chippery on the motherboard too, pointing the way, perhaps, to future Airs with the ability to deliver protected hi-def content to HDTVs.
The touchpad's controlled by a Broadcom BCM5974, the same part used by the iPhone and the iPod Touch. Sound is fed through a Realtek ALC885 audio codec. The Air's 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi is mediated by Broadcom's BCM4321KFBG chip.
The Air's main circuit board
Image courtesy iFixIt.com
The Air's 2GB of 667MHz DDR 2 memory is clearly soldered onto the main circuit board, as 16 1Gb chips, eight on one side of the board and the rest on the other. In the picture above, the two main chips are, left to right, the Core 2 Duo CPU and the Intel integrated northbridge chip, which has the GPU on board.
Taking the Air's lid apart reveals the LED panel to be just 3mm thick fed by a single data and power cable from the motherboard.
But this is just a teaser - check out iFixIt's step-by-step disassembly here.
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COMMENTS
Ok ok misread/misunderstood!
No need for 8+ people to point it out! Can't you read the first comment where Arnold Lieberman corrects me. Just misread an posted hastily.
Memory chips are always quoted in Mb...
As far as I remember, memory chips have always been quoted in megabits, not megabytes. Hence why 1Gb is quoted, not 128MB.
Apple does not do miniaturization
@ Martin Huizing
You don't really believe Apple has real hardware factories of its own, do you? In the USA? And as to miniaturization; Apple is just riding on technology development in the Far East. Like all PC manufacturers.
@Auser
My Vauxhall has a wheel at each corner, One in front of the seat I occupy to help me get it round corners, an engine near the front , a speedo. OPG, temp gauge and odometer to display information to me - and some doors.
Seems like Vauxhall's engineers have successfully copied an 80 year old design, except for the LED odometer.
There are only a few ways you can do some thing (imho).
the real question is
Is every die hard Mac fanboy/girl missing a screw or two?
I just don't get it. Apple is always overprice, underpowered, nice looking, lock-in user to Apple only, treat its user like crap. Why do people put up with this Apple abuse? Same I couldn't understand why people put up with M$ crap.
You buy any computer using your head, think before making decision. Ask yourself what does product X do for me, and what I can do with it, AND who control this machine - myself or someone else.
