Apple slashes MacBook Air prices & boosts speed, starting at $899

Apple’s new MacBook Air configurations promise more speed for less money.

Apple dropped its prices on the laptops this morning. It’s now selling the cheapest 11.6-inch MacBook Air model for $899, rather than $999. The entry-level 13.3-inch Air also saw a $100 price drop to $999 from $1,099.

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Apple fans in the U.K. get an even sweeter deal: £100 price cuts across the Air line. The 11.6-inch Air now starts at £749, while the 13.3-inch model starts at £849.

Those entry-level models come with 128 GB of flash storage and 4 GB of memory. The higher-end versions, which come with a 256 GB solid-state drive, also got $100 price cuts in the U.S. and £100 price cuts in the U.K.

All new Air models now come standard with a faster 1.4 GHz Intel Core i5 processor, rather than a 1.3 GHz chip. It’s a minor performance upgrade, but the fourth-generation Intel Core Haswell processor may be more efficient in other ways — like power efficiency or cooling — thanks to manufacturing improvements.

Other than the price cuts and processor bump, the MacBook Air line remains unchanged. But there’s speculation that we’ll see a majorly redesigned Air later this year: NPD, DisplaySearch, and others foresee Apple releasing a thinner, 12-inch MacBook Air model with a Retina display.

Until then, a processor boost and price drop sound pretty good to us.