[citation][nom]boiler1990[/nom]It's about time though. I think Ultrabooks are having issues because A) a lot of people still have netbooks, B) Ultrabooks are expensive compared to most computers, and C) the MacBook Air attracts more people since you get a better user experience for the same price as a Windows-based Ultrabook. Intel really needs to push the price angle if they want to really sell well against the Air and AMD's offerings.[/citation]
a) people have netbooks because they cost $300, not because they 'want' them... it is simply affordable
b) all new platforms are super expensive at first. Laptops use to cost 3-5x a similarly fitted desktop, then notebooks came out and they were 2x the cost of a comparable laptop, even netbooks started in the $500+ range when they first came out with absolutely terrible processors, 256MB or ram, and winXP. Even smartphones have seen dramatic price drops with huge performance improvements over the last ~5 years they have been arround. So ultrabooks are still in their first year of existence, and will drop in price dramatically over the next year before they hit their $700 bottom and start selling for a price point and just upgrade hardware per price point just like every other hardware platform has done.
c) Macbook Air is something between a glorified netbook and a gutted laptop. They are clearly more powerful than a netbook, and thinner than most netbooks, but also with a larger screen than most netbooks. However, if you compare them to a traditional 13" laptop they are absolutely gutless trash. What you are paying for is something that has the screen real-estate of a 13" laptop, but the footprint of a netbook, and all of the performance sacrifices that come with that. Ultrabooks try and take the 13" Air form factor, and cram a real laptop in there for a smaller price range.
For example, a base model 13" Air with an i5, 4GB of ram, and 128GB SSD goes for $1200. While a similarly spec Ultrabook from Acer goes for $1000, Dell is $980, and there is an HP is on sale now for $800 with a bigger SSD. On the 13" laptop side you can grab a $1000 laptop that has a 32GB SSD, 500GB HDD, a real i5 cpu, 8GB of ram, and much more connectivity and higher buss speeds between devices.
If you upgrade to a real processor and useful sized SSD (512GB) that same Air jumps up to $2100, while the 'competition' crams much better hardware in an Ultrabook while still near the $1500 range. And again, if you stick with a laptop form-factor you get a full on Desktop preplacement.
In short, saying that PC Ultrabooks are expensive, and that macs are somehow not expensive is dumb. There is always a $2-400 price difference per hardware spec on the low end, and a $500-1000 difference in the high end between PC and Mac. I'm not saying that the macs are not worth it, because much of that price difference (on the low end at least) goes into the case, keys, mice, display, and webcam; but when it comes to what you pay, compared to what the machine can do, the PC will win every time.