Apple unveils mobile-inspired Macs

Apple unveiled a new line of Macs on Wednesday, upgrading the notebooks and laptops with features inspired by its popular mobile devices, the iPhone and iPad.

"We asked ourselves: What would happen if a MacBook and an iPad hooked up?" CEO Steve Jobs said in unveiling the new devices at an event in San Francisco.

The new generation MacBook Air models use flash drives instead of hard drives, allowing them to turn on almost immediately. The larger version, with a 13.3-inch screen, boasts seven hours of battery life, while the smaller version with an 11.6-inch screen is rated to last five hours. Both have a claimed standby time of 30 days.

"MacBook Air is the first of a new generation of notebooks that leaves behind mechanical rotating storage in favour of solid state flash storage," said Jobs.

"We've taken what we have learned with the iPad solid state storage, instant-on, amazing battery standby time, miniaturisation and lightweight construction, to create the new MacBook Air.

With its amazing responsiveness and mobility, it will change the way we think about notebooks." Both devices also feature the Multi-Touch trackpad, a built in FaceTime camera for video chats. They will cost between 999 dollars for the smaller notepad with 64 gigabytes of flash storage to 1,599 dollars for a larger model with 256 GB of storage.

Photo : Apple CEO Steve Jobs speaks at the Apple headquarters in Cupertino, announcing a new version of iLife, Apple Inc.'s programs for managing photos, editing videos and other tasks.

DPA