Apple MacBook Air (80GB)

The good: Incredibly thin yet surprisingly sturdy; new trackpad gesture controls are very useful; remote optical drive makes living without a built-in drive much easier.

The bad: Very limited connectivity; slower than other MacBooks; SSD hard-drive option is ridiculously expensive and standard hard drive is small; battery is not user replaceable.

The bottom line: The design is revolutionary, but Apple's MacBook Air will appeal to a smaller, more specialized audience than the standard MacBook, thanks to a stripped-down set of connections and features.

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Description: This configuration of the Apple MacBook Air is a 3-pound, ultra light notebook computer. Compared to other ultra portable notebooks on the market, it is relatively inexpensive at around $1,810. Has Wi-Fi (wireless connectivity) built-in.

Pros: Has only a 3-pound weight, which is somewhat lighter than some similarly priced notebooks. Also, this notebook has 2 GB RAM, which is more than some similarly priced notebooks.

Cons: Has only a 80GB hard drive, which is smaller than some similarly priced notebooks. For example, the Sony VAIO SZ491N/X , a 3.7-pound notebook at around $1, 955, has a 200GB hard drive. The Apple MacBook Air comes with entry-level word processing software -- serious business or academic writers may want to upgrade to a more powerful office suite . Shared video memory has a negative impact on system performance which may be okay for users with more modest graphics needs. Users with more demanding needs should look to a graphics solution that brings its own muscle.

Suitability: Suitable for those who consider weight the most important feature. Develop your digital darkroom technique using the photo editing software bundled with this notebook. If you have a wireless network at home, wirelessly browse the Web from any room in your house with this Wi-Fi enabled notebook.

Value: In general, this notebook's features seem a bit weak, even for its relatively inexpensive price. However, if you were to judge strictly by how large the screen is, the average price of ultra portable products with a comparable screen size is considerably more -- in fact around $2,455.

Suggestions: (1) Given this device's Wi-Fi capability, you may want to get a wireless access point for your home, so that you can browse the Web more conveniently from any room. (2) To get the most out of this computer's Bluetooth capability, you could have a Bluetooth-enabled headset, PDA or other device, and be able to link it wirelessly to your computer within a range of 20-or-so feet inside the same room.