Gator,

I'm a long time Mac fan and I purchased a MacBook Air soon after they came out. I wish I'd waited ... for you non-Mac folks, the "Air" is the new light weight ultra thin (fits in an envelope) product from Apple.

- One of the ways they make it so thin and light is to not include a DVD drive. You have almost no choice but to purchase the Apple "Air" external DVD drive ($99 list price). Actually there are choices but ... (if you end up buying one, I have an extra, second, DVD drive I'll make you a good deal on).

- It also has no Ethernet (i.e. Internet cable in hotel rooms) port, I had to buy a USB/Ethernet cable (Apple list price ~$25). I was surprised it wasn't as easy as Apple's usual plug and play, I had to do some Internet searches to find a driver before I could use an Ethernet cable.

I'm using the Leopard operating system and all the p.f.c functions seem to work fine (disclaimer: I almost always do my expense reports while transiting a FDX facility and I'm not certain all the expense report links function properly). I also use VMWare Fusion w/Windows XP to access the old "green screen" functions, they work fine also.

One last thought ... I'm having trouble getting connected to the FDX wireless system with my MacBook Air (my old PowerBook still connects just fine). I know there was some sort of management communication saying they were taking the wireless access away but there are numerous guys (including Mac users) using it every night in the MEM AOC.

In retrospect, I wish I'd waited a few more months and purchased a 13" MacBook Pro (there wasn't a 13" MBP at the time. MacMall.com has them listed for $1114) and avoided some of the MBA issues.

Regards ... Mark