5 Minutes With: the Multi-Touch MacBook Air

´Five Minutes With´ is a new series, edited by Tom Baker, and contributed to by the TB Tech team.
Sometimes it takes a while for us to be eligible to receive a particularly popular new product for review, so we´ll hit the stores and spend some time with a revolutionary new device.

This weekend it was the Apple MacBook Air - another Apple wonder or just another ultraportable?

The first thing you notice is the thinness. It is thin - I was somewhat skeptical at first as to how thin a notebook can actually be. It is like the new Apple keyboards; they sit flat on the floor. It is as if nothing is supporting the touchpad and keyboard of the Air - it is truly amazing.

Using it is very comfortable; the full-size keyboard is very easy on the fingers and the split design leaves only the MacBook Pro with the old-style Apple board. Of course, the keyboard is backlit, but we didn´t get a chance to see how accurate the ambient light sensor is.

The touchpad is far larger than the version on the MacBook or MacBook Pro; it accommodates Apple´s Multi-Touch control which makes zooming, rotating and panning a real pleasure.

The multi-touch really works. In iPhoto rotating images is amazing; you just take two fingers on the pad and turn them clockwise or anticlockwise. Zooming in documents and images works really well, as does skipping through slideshows with the new three-finger swipe.

Other than these new distractions, the Air is much of the same. Itś a well-built, light, thin and stylish Apple machine; there are obvious shortcomings - one USB port won´t satisy most users, no FireWire port is an annoyance, and anywhere out of the U.S. (where WiFi is bountiful) the lack of Ethernet is unacceptable.

However, I´m left without no doubt that the Air will appeal to thousands; if you are looking for an ultraportable with Mac usability and style, and you have a good wireless setup at home and at work, you won´t miss the missing features at all.

So then, our first impressions of the Apple MacBook Air are good. We will delve deeper into this model when we are able to secure a review machine sometime in the next few months.