Apple last refreshed its ultra-thin MacBook Air family at the annual developers conference last June, adding Intel’s power efficient Haswell processors for all-day battery life, the latest 802.11ac Wi-Fi networking, faster graphics and SSD, lower prices and more.
Now, we recently heard rumblings that Apple is going to refresh Airs soon with a small speed bump and now a French blog is citing reliable sources as claiming that updated ultra-portables are just around the corner, allegedly launching as early as next week…
According to MacGeneration [Google translate], the new Airs will still come in 11 and 13-inch flavors, though the blog stopped short of giving us the hardware specifics. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Apple will be likely replacing the fourth-generation Haswell chips from last June’s refresh with their updated counterparts.
According to Intel’s processor roadmap recently leaked by VR-Zone [Google translate], the upcoming low-power 15-watt chips – the 1.4 GHz i5-4260U, 1.4 GHz i5-4350U and 1.5 GHz i5-4360U – are likely prime candidates for new Air CPUs.
Currently, MacBook Airs utilize 15-watt 1.3 GHz i5-4250U or 1.7 GHz i7-4650U processor, depending on the model. These processors use Intel’s much improved Iris 5000 integrated graphics and offer remarkable power savings that help achieve all-day long performance.
Specifically, current-gen Airs have 12-hour battery (previously seven hours) on the 13.3-inch model and nine-hour one on the 11.6-inch version (previously five hours).