Apple tweaks its best-selling Macbook laptop

Apple has revamped its best-selling Mac model – the economical, entry-level 13-inch MacBook laptop – in time for Christmas.  Oooh they don’t miss a trick, do they?!

To give the new MacBook laptops a more appealing appearance, Apple had moulded the original polycarbonate plastic material into a more modern ‘Unibody’ enclosure. With no grayish surface implanted atop the laptop’s casing, the overhauled MacBook now boasts a consistent white color, and a smoother surface – minus the sharp edges of its predecessor.

Along with giving the MacBook a new look, Apple has also given it new innards; and has equipped it with a multi-touch glass touchpad, a non-detachable 60Wh battery.

Apple Market Share Drop Creates Calls For A Cheaper Netbook

According to research firm IDC, Apple has dropped from No.4 in laptop sales to No.5. The firm estimates that Apple has shipped 12.5 percent fewer laptops than the same time last year, even as it maintained its 7.6 percent market share.

Leapfrogging Apple to take the No. 4 spot is Toshiba, now estimated to be shipping 7.7 percent of all laptops in the U.S., thanks to system such as the Mini NB205 Netbook. IDG estimates that Dell remains No. 1, with 26.3 percent of the market, closely followed by HP, with Acer showing strong year-over-year growth to hit 12.6 percent of the  market.

As the news broke, another set of analysts revealed that Apple’s laptop sales were in fact rising, tho IDC stand by their research. Whatever the figures, most agree that Apple’s lack of a netbook is causing the company some serious issues.

Apple has no product in the netbook category, a sin of omission in the minds of most financial analysts. Its lowest-priced notebook is the £749 MacBook, a machine priced double or triple that of most netbooks.

“There may be a little pressure here for Apple from Wall Street,” said Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s quarterly PC sales tracker, who is one of few industry experts that believe Apple will be just fine with their current offering. “Does Apple have to have a netbook? No, they don’t. Apple is a very unique company in a lot of ways, and if you look at their whole history, people are always saying they have to do this, have to do that, but they’ve struck their own path.”

MAC Book

It speaks volumes that Apple have continued increasing its prices and yet still manage to rack up significant sales during a world hit with recession. Continually outdoing themselves year to year the 13-inch Macbook is no exception and looks to be the way forward with laptops. With a new design, technology and features this is certainly the one to beat. 

Until now all laptops were designed the same way, not any more. When you pick up the new Macbook you immediately notice the difference. It is thinner and lighter with a more sophisticated look. The up to date LED backlight technology creates instant maximum brightness and the edge to edge glass display causes less distraction from whatís on screen.

Many alternative laptops sacrifice graphics performance to get extended battery life. That’s not the case with the Macbook laptop. The NVIDIA Geforce 9400M graphics processer provides up to five times the performance of the previous model.

This enables you to encounter high performance graphics, ideal for those of you who enjoy playing 3-D games or for just watching videos. As with previous models there is no mouse button, instead you click the trackpad to select an item, so those of you moving from standard PCís may find it takes you a bit longer to get to grips with.

With 5 hours of battery life and wireless connection built in the web world is your oyster, whether itís simply surfing the net or sending e-mails. It even has a built in iSight camera for those all important video chats.

Macbook is iPod, iPhone , digital camera and external hard drive ready. The faster memory allows you to manoeuvre around large files and keep numerous applications open at once. 

For the environmentalists out there the Macbook laptop is also energy star compliant, meeting the government standard for energy efficiency. There are 3 models available ranging from £790-£1330 and they are available in stores and online now.

Apple to respond to netbook threat?

The sales of the super small, ultra portable Netbooks continue to spiral and the supply of these mini laptops is expanding to keep pace with the massive demand from the modern consumer.

The International Data Group announced last friday that worldwide orders for netbook laptops grew massively in the first quarter of 2009, and by the end of the year, IDC estimates that netbook orders will reach the heady heights of 22 million.

The modern laptop user has an ever increasing appetite for small, portable, low-cost personal computing on the go, and this new trend is having a worrying knock-on effect for some established players in the current market.

Sales of the Apple Mac fell last quarter, it’s first fall in five and half years, which could raise some concerns in the corridors of power at Apple.

The netbook sector dismissed in some quarters as a fad which would fade away as quickly as it burst on the scene, but this has not transpired and these mini laptops looks here to stay. Whilst netbook sales go from strength to strength, pressure is increasing on Apple to address the issue and do something about the netbook problem.

Jay Chou, IDC research analyst said: Vendors are waking up to the fact that people respond to so-called good-enough computing. They don’t really need all the power of a Core 2 Duo CPU most of the time.

Steve Jobs, Co founder of Apple and current CEO famously dismissed netbooks as ‘a piece of junk.’

Apple COO Tim Cook added: ‘Its not a space as it exists today that we are interested in, Nor do we believe that customers in the long term would be interested in.’

Whilst this may have disappointed the followers of Apple, this viewpoint could change once Apple releases its long-awaited touchscreen tablet computer.

The Apple tablet may be a much sought after item, but it will not retail at the £200 price tags of some netbooks and will therefore not reach the same markets for children, students and business travellers who want light-weight secondary computers in situations offering a keyboard and a wireless Internet connection. 

Apple may well respond to the growing netbook threat by cutting MacBook prices and if the current market trends continue may well consider dipping it’s own toe into the pool of the low-cost netbook market in the future.