It seems that more and more, people are clamoring for a MacBook Air with Retina display.
And for good reason. Retina displays are jaw-droppingly gorgeous, but at 3.57 pounds, the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display is a full 0.61 pounds heavier than the MacBook Air of the same size. At its thickest points, the Air is still thinner than its Retina-equipped cousin.
A thinner, cheaper MacBook Pro with Retina display just seems to fit the bill for most people.
I don’t think we’re going to see a MacBook Air with Retina display next month at WWDC, however.
Announced at Macworld in 2008, the original MacBook Air started at $1,799. A 64GB SSD added another $999.
In October 2010 at its “Back to the Mac” event, Apple re-vamped the MacBook Air adding an 11-inch model and re-vamping the 13-inch, which enjoyed a starting price point of $1299, with the 11-inch machine starting at just $999.
This pricing shift, coupled with the company discontinuing the MacBook, position the Air as Apple’s entry-level notebook.
While this was a radical shift from the “premium” product the Air was just two years earlier, customers flocked to the new thin machines.
For a while, the Airs set below the MacBook Pros, but in 2012, Apple added the awfully-named “MacBook Pro with Retina display.” Instead of killing of the non-Retina MacBook Pros, however, Apple kept them around. In fact, you can still buy a MacBook Pro today.
There are several reasons Apple did this, but I think the most important one is price. There is a $300 difference in the base model of 13-inch MacBook Pro and the Retina versions, with the 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display selling for $400 more than its non-Retina sibling.
Without the standard MacBook Pro in the middle, there would be a large gap in Apple’s pricing structure. More importantly, however, it’s vital to see that Retina machines simply cost more.
One solution to this would be for Apple to do with the Airs what it did with the Pros: offer a MacBook Air with Retina display and a MacBook Air. Doing so might even allow Apple to kill off the standard MacBook Pro, as it could still offer three groups of pricing.
Even if Apple did that, I still don’t think the MacBook Air with Retina display earns its wings at WWDC.
While the MacBook Pro with Retina display is thinner and lighter than the standard MacBook Pro, it’s still a good bit thicker (and heavier) than the Airs.
This is for several reasons, but the biggest is the battery. Just look at this monster:
While the MacBook Air’s battery takes up a similar amount of space, it’s much thinner, thanks to the Air’s tapered profile:
Famously, adding the Retina display to the iPad made it thicker and heavier, and my guess is that Apple’s doesn’t want to repeat that with its notebook line.
While the imminent arrival of Haswell means new machines will surely sip even less power than the Airs of today, I’m not sure it’s a big enough jump for Apple to keep the Air as slim and light as it is today. Like the iPad mini, I just don’t think the math adds up for a MacBook Air with Retina display quite yet.