Apple does it again

Oh come on, like you are surprised. Steve Jobs has done it again. This time in two big tech announcements at MacWorld. (Ok there were several, but these are the two that got me tweaked). The first is, the new Apple Mac Air (not to be confused with Adobe Air). This has taken the laptop and really pushed the envelope. Speaking of envelope, lets start with that. This thing is so small (0.75" x 14") that it can fit inside an envelope. It weighs 3 lbs. and has the latest in wireless tech. It has a battery with 5 hours of life. The processor is as thin as a dime and as big as a nickel, but it runs at 1.8 ghz! The display is a 13.3" LCD which means less power and instant on. The ports are retractable on the side which is a great space saver and makes this look really sleek. Heres the best part - it starts at only $1800.00.

I can go on and on and geek out til my fingers go numb, but you can check it out for yourself, including the great commercial at Apple's website. This is going to really spark some great competition with other manufacturers and I am looking forward to seeing someone try to top this.

The next item stems from user complaints. The great Time Machine feature in Leopard is handy when you work on a tower and have a hard drive handy to plug in when needed. However, laptop users, like myself, found it cumbersome to drag around an external to run backups when working on-site. Now Apple has given us an answer. And it is called Time Capsule.

Time Capsule works in conjunction with Time Machine allowing you to make wireless backups. The key to this is the wireless 500GB or 1TB hard drive. Time Capsule can synch, back up and store files for each Leopard-based Mac on your wireless network.

Time Capsule can also be used as your wireless hub since it has a full-featured 802.11n Wi-Fi base station built right in. No need to go out and buy an Airport Base. You can find out more at Apple's website. Time Capsule retails at $299 for the 500GB model or $499 for a 1TB hard drive. Both will be shipping in two weeks.

I get the impression after watching the MacWorld Keynote, that these two items will really become the next gen benchmark for other tech. Now I just have to save up so I can go out and buy all of these toys!!