A pair of leading Apple Authorized Resellers launched early Black Friday sales overnight, offering up to $400 off new Macs, including $150 off white MacBooks, up to $270 off MacBook Pros, up to $180 off iMacs, and up to $100 off new Mac minis and MacBook Airs.
Apple's retail store deals for Black Friday have posted in Australia, indicating its discounts in the US will translate to around $100 savings on desktops and notebooks, and $25 to $50 on iPads and iPods.
Adobe's chief executive revealed this week that his company is currently testing an optimized version of Flash built specifically for Apple's newly released MacBook Air.
New retail sales data shows that Mac sales are up 20 percent year over year, putting Apple on pace to sell between 4.1 million and 4.3 million computers over the holidays.
Consumer Reports, the organization that caused a stir by not recommending Apple's iPhone 4 due to alleged antenna issues, has taken the opposite stance on the new MacBook Air, giving it top honors.
Monday's U.S. launch of Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 was mixed, with some stores selling out and others selling just a handful of units. Apple has released another Mac OS X 10.6.5 beta, and Adobe's CTO defended Flash battery performance, claiming that the test was flawed and that Apple is inciting "negative campaigning" against Flash.
Toshiba this week announced that its Blade X-gale SSD series — the same product first introduced in the new MacBook Air — is now available for mass market sales, potentially bringing up to 256GB of storage to devices like tablets and laptops, and allowing Apple users easier upgrades.
After initial demand for the Skyfire for iPhone app, a browser that converts Flash videos, overwhelmed the company's servers, Skyfire has announced that it will release the app in 'batches.'
Apple has stopped bundling Adobe Flash on new Macs, ostensibly so users could obtain the latest, secure version themselves, but vastly increased battery life seems to be another leading reason.
A memo allegedly leaked from Apple's internal company support system confirms display issues experienced by some owners of the new MacBook Air, and says that an upcoming software update will fix the problems.
Predicted to grow by "nearly 100 percent" year-over-year, Apple is planning to produce as many as 48 million iPads and 100 million iPhones next year, according to one analyst.
Early adopters of Apple's new MacBook Air are reporting a variety of issues, including faulty logic boards, display issues and kernel panics, after two weeks of usage.
Owners of Apple's new 11-inch MacBook Air will not have to remove the thin-and-light notebook from their bag at security checkpoints in U.S. airports, the Transportation Security Administration has announced.
Technology journalist Walt Mossberg has reviewed Apple's new MacBook Air notebooks, and has given both the 11-inch and 13-inch models high praise for offering the long battery life and instant-on capabilities found in the iPad.
New orders of the $999 11.6-inch MacBook Air are now estimated to ship within 1 to 3 business days, suggesting demand for the entry-level version of Apple's new thin-and-light notebook lineup has been greatest in the first week of sales.
Performance of Apple's new thin-and-light 13-inch MacBook Air is comparable to the notebook's 13-inch MacBook Pro counterpart, according to a new series of benchmark tests.
The first benchmarks on Apple's new MacBook Airs have hit the web, revealing that the 13.3-inch models trail the company's similarly-sized MacBook Pros by a small margin while the 11.6-inch models fall far shorter in processing power, and may be more appropriately categorized as a larger, faster iPad.
Apple's newly revised MacBook Air borrows design cues from iPad to deliver an even lighter and smaller design, with higher resolution displays and long battery life. The new Airs also have more ports that are easier to access and hit price points that make it difficult for buyers to choose between the new models and the existing entry level MacBook, and the faster and more expandable MacBook Pros.
Apple's new 11.6- and 13.3-inch MacBook Air models are expected to be a major boon for Mac sales this holiday season, with one firm forecasting sales of 700,000 in the quarter, and a Wall Street analyst anticipating gross margins of about 32 percent.
The inside of Apple's new instant-on, lightweight 11.6-inch MacBook Air has six separate lithium-polymer battery cells, accounting for most of the device's size and weight.
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AppleInsider Staff
Daniel Eran Dilger
Slash Lane
Josh Ong
Sam Oliver
Katie Marsal
