Apple MacBook 13" Review

The first thing you notice about the new MacBook is its sleek aluminum shape. The tight corners of the old MacBook are gone, replaced with the softly rounded edges of the MacBook Air. Like the Air, the subtle curve makes picking up the MacBook easier, and it rests quite comfortably in the lap for typing.

Lifting the lid reveals the contrasting black glass screen and black keycaps. Instead of the traditional plastic or metal bezel surrounding an LCD panel, a single glass face covers both, extending all the way to the edges of the lid. The effect is even more striking here than in the iMac which introduced the style.

The MacBook has the same love-it-or-hate-it chiclet-style keyboard as its predecessor. (The more expensive model adds backlit keys to sweeten the deal.)

The aluminum MacBook's redesigned trackpad is huge, and the button is gone: instead, the trackpad itself is the button.

The new MacBook is visually striking, bringing the design of the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air to Apple's consumer price point.

And the beauty of that sleek chassis is much more than skin deep. Traditionally, laptops have combined internal framework and external body panels in an intricate assembly with dozens of screws and hundreds of components. The MacBook's main chassis isn't assembled from parts this way — instead, a single block of aluminum is machined into what Apple calls the "unibody" chassis, carved like a sculpture. The computer's circuit boards are mounted to the underside of this chassis, and a thin, light bottom plate closes it up.