So I followed the various feeds of the MacWorld 2008 keynote to find out what’s new and count the “booms” (there was only one I believe), but mostly to find out about the new Apple laptop. I’m looking to replace my partners aging G4 iBook so I was particularly interested. But I’m afraid I’m not won over by the new MacBook Air.

Quite simply it is too expensive and featureless. It has nothing that the cheaper MacBook’s don’t have already. In fact it has less… less I tell you. The only thing going for it is teh sexy and that’s about all that the cube had going for it too. Of course, everyone loved the Cube, everyone wanted the Cube, but nobody bought the Cube. It’s possible Apple might have done it again.

Here’s what you don’t get when you buy a MacBook Air that comes with a MacBook:

• The ability to upgrade to 4GB of RAM
• The ability to upgrade to larger hard drives – the SSD option is insanely expensive
• About an additional 0.4Ghz of processor speed
• A built-in optical drive
• Wired ethernet
• An Apple Remote included in the price – unbelievable, they must cost all of five dollars to make
• A firewire port
• Two USB ports – I don’t fancy carrying around a USB hub?
• By the looks of things, a removable battery – because we know how much people appreciate not having one on the iPod/iPhone

Here’s what you get when you buy a MacBook Air that doesn’t come with a MacBook:

• A backlit keyboard
• Multi-touch trackpad

If that weren’t enough, then the pricing difference between the US and Australia is practically extortion. The US price is USD$1799, while the price in Australia is AUD $2499. At the current time that’s about $450 more expensive after conversion. Check for yourself at Google.

So I’m probably going to go and drop some cash on a new MacBook instead. They are faster, cheaper, do more and quite honestly are just as pretty.