Intel held a very interesting press event at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show, revealing clever ways to make laptops thinner, but as CultofMac points out, the real news is how Intel’s ideas might apply to Apple’s MacBook Air, showing how the popular notebook could potentially be made nearly two-thirds thinner, while improving battery life.
Ultra-portable notebook based on Intel’s Ultrabook spec are becoming more and more common as MacBook Air competitors, but most of these machines take shortcuts on build quality, substituting plastic for metal in portions of the casing.
Even without compromising their build quality, however, Apple could significantly reduce the thickness of the MacBook Air, thanks largely to impressive new improvements in battery technology.
As it stands, the battery is the thickest part of the MacBook Air, making up a significant part of the Air’s thickness, but a new ‘prismatic’ battery technology could change all that, effectively reducing the thickness of the MacBook Air’s battery to just 6.5mm – nearly two-thirds thinner than current models – without decreasing battery life.
Of course, the MacBook Air is already extremely thin. Considering that Apple may not want to make it a great deal thinner, they could instead use that extra space to achieve even better battery life, not only in the MacBook Air, but in all of their portable devices.
I see serious potential for battery life improvement in the next MacBook Air, or even Apple’s rumored ultra-thin 15-inch MacBook (which could be a MacBook Air or a MacBook Pro). Thinner MacBooks. Improved battery life. Sounds like a win all around.