Comments on: The MacBook Air's fatal wireless flaw

The laptop's lack of a 3G modem takes away from its skinny design.

[Penguinisto]

Err, you do realize that 3G, while common in Europe and parts of Asia, can currently only be found in only parts of the US, right? (and even then - it gets spotty in many areas).

I realize that y'all may think Silly Valley to be the center of the civilized world and all, but 3G (then, and mostly now) is not yet useful enough to be worth the effort.

See for yourself: http://www.wireless.att.com/coverageviewer/

[Goodbye Helicopter]

boo hoo.
who wants to trudge along at the speeds of US 3G?
and who wants a modem that does not work in other countries?
hmm.... maybe everything to everyone is not possible.

the fatal flaw is the individual who never read the specs before buying.

or maybe just the usual c|net using apple in a story title to drum up click ad sales...
seriously, you guys write more about apple than any other computer maker.

[AppleSuxLeo]

With Apple it has ALWAYS been about style not function. Pay a lot more...and get a lot less. But Mac-Tards say it looks cool , so it`s worth it.
Apple`s other laptops don`t even have express card slots or card readers built in ! What a joke.
HP and Dell laptops can be ordered with 3G built-in or you can easily add it on with an express card.
So glad to be a PC ! So many options.

[themainbreeze]

ignorance is bliss???

or in this case just pure - ignorance...

[echols85]

I have to agree with Helicopter: while 3G is just dandy on a phone, it still is slow for things like Flash or streaming video of high enough quality to look decent on a laptop screen. And with technologies like WiMAX (I live in Baltimore, so it is of interest) on the horizon I question why we are interested in keeping laptops on cellular networks and causing further bottlenecks when providers like AT&T were not even postured to keep up with 3G traffic from iPhones. I think the technology was probably left off because of the lack of benefits gained from having the 3G option. In this day in age, wifi hotspots are never more than a stone's throw away and for all those moments in between, isn't that what cell phones are for? And if AT&T opens up tethering to more phones (ie iPhone), this would seem to solve a lot of the anguish. Other providers could certainly offer similar arrangements.

The one final thing I would say about it is that people do not like service contracts: who here likes paying a cell phone bill? along with cable, satellite, power, etc. Adding one more contract for laptops, unless absolutely necessary, is just another headache to deal with.

[CyberBob859]

Why not get a 3G phone that allows you to use it as a modem and tether it via Bluetooth to your MacBook Air?

[Magicland]

Silly author, if you wanted 3G, you should have bought the mac air 2G, which will have all the features the air doesn't at half the price (subsidized by your 3G carrier of choice). Oh, wait, that was the iphone. No matter, something similar will happen with the air. Or not, doesn't matter, iDiots will buy them anyway, despite there being better and cheaper options available.

[mpitogo]

My Air runs just fine with a USB2.0 EVDO Rev A and mighty fast at that. In most places faster than my iPhone's 3G. Though not as neatly packaged as a built-in wwan card its more convenient since you can choose which vendor you want and you can move your wwan card among other computers.

[jragosta]

Why not simply get a USB 3G device?

Amazing that almost a year after the Air's introduction, you are STILL whining about limitations that are easily addressed with about 30 seconds worth of research. It's not as convenient as built-in, but it saves weight and cost for those of us who don't need it.

So how much does Dell pay you to write stupid, mindless Apple-bashing articles?

[giff1]

Bluetooth. 3G phone. Done.

Advantages: I can't think of a situation where I would need to be online and not also have my phone with me. I can add Phone as Modem plan to most any carrier. I can (and have) used a cheapie GSM phone with pay-as-you-go in Europe for 3G connectivity, while taking advantage of Sprint's cheapo prices here for their decent EVDO network.

At this point, built in 3G chips are more soon-to-be-outdated marketing ploys for an individual domestic carrier. If it wan't clear from the iPhone marketing plan, Apple tries to stay with standards that are globally deployable or simply leave them out. For the Air, a dedicated chip or swappable bit and pieces would be the sort of cumbersome additions that overcomplicate most tech products.

Bluetooth, phone, 3G. Wifi where possible. Done.

[Seaspray0]

The air not having 3G isn't a flaw, it's in the specs as not having it. You knew what you were getting when you paid for it. The flaw is in the author's desire to have 3G after the fact. Well? You can still use a USB wireless... along with the USB card reader, USB optical drive, etc, but that would sure add alot to your travel case.

[giff1]

Bluetooth. 3G phone. Done.

Advantages: I can't think of a situation where I would need to be online and not also have my phone with me. I can add Phone as Modem plan to most any carrier. I can (and have) used a cheapie GSM phone with pay-as-you-go in Europe for 3G connectivity, while taking advantage of Sprint's cheapo prices here for their decent EVDO network.

At this point, built in 3G chips are more soon-to-be-outdated marketing ploys for an individual domestic carrier. If it wan't clear from the iPhone marketing plan, Apple tries to stay with standards that are globally deployable or simply leave them out. For the Air, a dedicated chip or swappable bit and pieces would be the sort of cumbersome additions that overcomplicate most tech products.

Bluetooth, phone, 3G. Wifi where possible. Done.

[s. maller]

The Air has USB and Bluetooth, which gives users the flexibility of using any existing solution. The "all-in-one" thing is a waste of money, motherboard space, power and UI complexity. I've been using my Blackberry as a modem (with Sprint) for years, and it's perfectly acceptable in a pinch. Between that and my free roaming AT&T Wi-Fi account (which works at most Starbucks, for example), I can get online 99% of the time. I would not appreciate having to pay for a crappy, carrier-specific built-in modem.

Good call, Apple.

[professionaladventurer]

I use a Sierra wireless 882 3G USB with my 17 Macbook Pro. Is there some sort of magic that prevents you from using this with the Air?

[whiplash55]

The poor little Mac Nazi's can't handle the truth. The Air is an overpriced, over-hyped piece of crap. The 12" Powerbook was far superior and robust computer. The Lenovo Thinkpad X300 walks all over the Air, with it's lack of usable ports, and now pathetic battery life. The touch pads new right click "feature" looks spastic and stupid. As usual the fanboys line up to buy them despite the obvious faults of the all style no substance computer.

[parasubvert]

I didn't think it was possible to make oneself look like a fool but also raise the quality of posts around them to such a degree. Calling a group fanboys, nazi's, and a piece of equipment spastic, and stupid, I think you've done nothing but prove your complete lack of taste and judgement.

In any case, I owned a Macbook Air SSD for 2 weeks early this year before I exchanged it for a Macbook Pro (and got $750 back !). The SSD model cost way too much, obviously, but I wanted to see if it would make a difference. And it was damn fast .. certain things took about as long as a regular book, but a few things were blistering. For the most part, the air was a fine machine: fast, extremely light, great wireless performance.

And 3G didn't even enter into the equation. 3G phones generally suck so personally I don't think it's a required feature, and frankly when I need email or web access in a pinch, I just use my phone.

The thing that killed the Air for me was the original embedded Intel graphics performance. The shared GPU would eventually overheat the machine if you tried to play a game.

Fortunately, this has been fixed with the NVidia 9400M in the latest model, but I've already bought my Macbook Pro. Tempted to get the next Pro with the new clickpad and dual GPU setup. (But not that tempted ;-)

[Inconnux]

This 'flaw' can't be as bad as the dell/hp/pc etc.. flaw... they run Vista

[ltullos]

Maybe you've heard of power and battery life? If you were Jobs, which would you rather have people complaining about - a few who can't get 3G connection without tethering (to their separately powered phone) or many more that can't keep enough charge to do anything useful? And didn't you say something about already having less than one hour battery life? Oh yeah, you wanted ultra-sheik thinness.

[jasonaorr]

In what sense is this purported flaw a "fatal" one? Are MacBook Air sales tanking on account of their lack of an internal 3G modem? If so, it's news to me. The MBA is not advertised to allow you to have internet access whereever you go; it does advertise to offer wireless capabilities in nearly all of its functions. I don't see that it fails to deliver this; you can transfer and back up files, read discs, and use Bluetooth devices without a single wire. You can access wifi connections for internet, where they are available (which is increasingly common). Call the MBA overpriced, or say that its features are inconvenient, but 3G? If anything Apple has made it clear that it is conservative about adopting new technological trends (see: netbooks). Apple wants to perfect proven technologies and innovate the user experience of them. Sure, you could criticize this as a company strategy, but that discussion should reach outside of the MBA and warrants a longer, better researched article.

Sometimes I feel like CNET just forces its staff to write articles that can have the word "Mac" or "Apple" in the title, only because it gets visitors to click on them.

[KillersDad]

Not only has the writer confused his options but if he's killed his battery in 10 months, he hasn't learned how to operate his computer. It's easy to get 2 years out of an Apple battery. I routinely run my battery all the way down, then charge it completely. My original iPhone purchased on the first day it went on sale still gives me 18 hours of service before charging and my MacBook battery purchased in August 07 still lasts in excess of 3 hours.