hi I'm MJ with iFixit and today we got
our curious little hands on the latest
MacBook Air to do our very favorite
thing that's right you guessed it tear
it down and reveal its deepest darkest
secrets but before we reveal its
unmentionables let's talk about what we
already know the primary difference in
these MacBook Airs is the upgraded
processor this revision is using a dual
core Intel i5 processor with the option
of getting the i7 in the high-end 13
inch version performance benchmarks that
have been popping up all over the web
show that these MacBook Airs are
matching and even outperforming some of
the 2010 MacBook Pros which is an
impressive upgrade performance wise but
upgraded performance is no indicator of
repair ability and of course in
time-honored I fix a tradition we aim to
answer the question just how repairable
is this computer fresh out of the box
the first thing we noticed was the
addition of an SD card slot and
Thunderbolt Apple's magical new port
that seems to do everything and luckily
for us the same pentalobe screws that we
used in the previous generation of
MacBook Air were holding the bottom case
on so accessing its insides was a cinch
once the bottom case was off everything
looks surprisingly familiar a massive
and easily accessible battery as well as
removable SSD both score points for us
here at iFixit but a big drawback is non
user serviceable ram which is going to
cost you an extra 200 bucks if you
upgrade it from the get-go which might
be the best idea considering once you've
purchased it you're stuck with it once
you remove the battery and the SSD we
dug a bit deeper until we're able to
remove the logic board which looks
pretty similar to previous iterations
the big difference here is Intel's I 5
processor which is credited with
boosting this MacBook Airs performance
making it twice as fast as its
predecessor once we got the whole thing
disassembled it was pretty clear that
like with previous generations of the
MacBook Air the bulk of the computer is
made up of the logic board which means
that if something fails you're looking
at swapping the entire logic board
versus a single less expensive component
that may not seem like a big deal right
now but it's something to consider if
you're thinking of transitioning from a
retired plastic MacBook or a MacBook Pro
both of which are far more upgradable
and repair
Armel with our teardown complete and all
of the MacBook Airs unmentionables laid
bare for the world to see we can get
back to our original question just how
repairable is the MacBook Air whenever
we tear anything down we give it a
repair ability score between one and ten
one being the least repairable and ten
being the most repairable all things
considered we gave this version of the
MacBook Air or pair ability score of 4
out of 10 while the battery and SSD are
removable pentalobe drivers are still a
rarity in most folks houses making just
opening up the computer a chore and
though you can remove the SSD you can
only replace it with another Apple SSD
unlike most computers where you can put
in any brand hard drive that you want so
long as it's compatible non user
serviceable Ram might be a deal-breaker
for us but if you're someone that
doesn't fantasize about maxing out their
brand it might be a non-issue all things
considered this MacBook Air is
definitely a step up especially with the
upgraded processor and the addition of
Thunderbolt though we are sad to see it
replace these simple and serviceable
plastic MacBook she will be missed for
complete details and high resolution
images check out the MacBook Air
teardown on I fix it calm and to stay up
to date with all the latest tear downs
and repair videos subscribe to our
YouTube channel and follow us on twitter
at twitter.com/randymckown thanks