News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

February 1, 2008

hardware

MacBook Air gets the iFixit treatment

Posted Feb. 1, ’08, 11:59 AM PT by Aayush Arya
Category | Hardware

MacBook Air insides.jpgWhat do you do when you bring your brand new Mac home? You take it out of the box, snapping a few pictures of the process if you’re into that kinda thing, then pop open the lid, connect the charger, and hit the power button. Admit it: you probably even light a few incense sticks.

But not if you’re iFixit. These people have taken it upon themselves to carefully rip apart every shred of their new Macs as soon as they receive them. And then, of course, they post those pictures online for everyone to enjoy. Generally, the pictures are also followed by some griping about the cheapness of the parts compared to the retail price of the finished product (which I think is just plain lame).

Being the hottest new kid on the block does not exactly exempt the MacBook Air from this intricate surgery. It’s barely started shipping and they’ve already gotten their screwdrivers and finished the job.

As was expected, they report that replacing the battery is quite an easy task, but it does require you to unscrew nineteen of those tiny buggers holding the thing in place—ten on the rear of the case and nine pinning the battery down.

Also of note is the fact that the control chip for the trackpad is the same as the one used for the iPhone’s multi-touch screen, which pretty much confirms that it is not possible to implement these features in existing Mac notebooks via a simple software update. Sigh!

Now, if you’ve steeled yourself for the carnage, you can go ahead and look at all those not-so-sexy parts that make up the insides of the world’s thinnest notebook and get your geek cred up to scratch. From the tiny processor to the MagSafe magnets, they’ve bared it all in what we assume is a total disregard for the poor notebook’s privacy. We express our heartfelt sympathies.


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