It seems like it was only yesterday that deceased Apple CEO Steve Jobs produced the first MacBook Air out of an envelope and changed portable computing forever. There has been a lot of speculation recently about the MacBook Air’s future as it hasn’t received any significant updates over the last few years. Apple’s event today was all about notebooks and while the company acknowledged that the MacBook Air is one of its most popular notebooks, it’s now directing customers who want one to the new 13 inch Macbook Pro that doesn’t feature the new Touch Bar.
Apple announced a revamped MacBook Pro lineup today. It comes in 13 inch and 15 inch sizes with a new retina multitouch display it’s calling Touch Bar. The Touch Bar actually replaces the row of function keys that we’ve all grown accustomed to on MacBooks over the years.
The company said that customers who are looking for a new MacBook Air will be better off with another variant of the new 13 inch MacBook Pro that doesn’t feature the Touch Bar. It’s the cheapest model in the new lineup, starting at $1,499.
It looks just like the Touch Bar model so there’s no difference in design. The notebook features a 13.3 inch Retina Display, a 6th generation Intel Core i5 processor with 8GB of RAM and 256 of SSD storage. It only has two Thunderbolt 3 ports while the Touch Bar models have four.
Apple’s language suggests that this is effectively the end of the line for the MacBook Air. It has been nearly two years since a major refresh was announced for that notebook and I don’t think one will be at any point in the future.
The 13 inch MacBook Pro sans Touch Bar is available for purchase starting today for $1,499. It also starts shipping today.
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