The nice man in the video has no idea what he has just done. Google has pitched their Chromebook Pixel against Apple's MacBook Air and iPad. Now Jonathan Ive is paid lots of money for a good reason. Because he is one of the few designers who uses common sense to design products. The person who has designed the Chromebook Pixel does not have common sense.
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| MacBook Pro 13" i7 |
First off, the biggest flaw with this laptop is the name. The official name for this laptop is "MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2012 i7". This is because Apple launches a new MacBook every Tuesday or something. So it has to have a different name corresponding to the launch date to differentiate from it's predecessors. It's a bit like the Porsche 911. Just like the 911, the MacBook evolves generation by generation, never radically changing its design. And just like the 911, the MacBook has around billion variations. So it's a nightmare to pinpoint the version you actually want. Spell something wrong, or say some words in the wrong order, and you get a completely different laptop. However, Porsche figured it out. By giving codenames like '991', and '997', generations can be differentiated. And with names like Turbo, Carrera, and so on, models can be differentiated. The MacBook Pro 13" series has 3 models. 1 retina display equipped model, and 2 non retina ones. The one I will be reviewing is the non retina display one. The non retina display model has 2 variations. On standard configuration, one has 4GB RAM, Intel 2.5 GHz i5 processor, and other one has 8GB RAM, and Intel 2.9GHz i7 processor. Now to simplify the naming, Apple should have taken Prosche's lead and called the i5 model, "Standard", and the i7 model "TURBO V RACING ROCKET FAST TURBO!!!!!!". Because the i7 model is really fast. In a hypothetical laptop drag race, it will do quite well.
Formula 1 started 2013 with the first test in Jerez. With limited testing, every testing session is vitally important, and teams have to make use of every test opportunity they can get. Although it is impossible to judge how the teams have improved over the winter in a test, everyone still tries to make some sense of the lap times. Ferrari set the fastest lap time on soft tyres in Jerez, and Red Bull set the fastest time on the hards. This is the only important fact of the whole test session. Ferrari has recovered, and their car is not a catastrophic disaster as it was last year, and Red Bull is still very fast.
Jerez has an extremely abrasive track surface, so the long runs on a heavy fuel load also do not have relevance whatsoever. The soft tyres barely last for 5-6 laps. So tyre data collection was corrupted somewhat. The other headline facts of the test are,
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| Romain Grosjean in the Lotus |
Jerez has an extremely abrasive track surface, so the long runs on a heavy fuel load also do not have relevance whatsoever. The soft tyres barely last for 5-6 laps. So tyre data collection was corrupted somewhat. The other headline facts of the test are,
- Marussia, under technical director Pat Symonds now has KERS and the Coanda exhaust system.
- Caterham is trying to wing this year, and is going to divert all its resources to 2014. They probably want to simply finish in the points this year and keep ahead of Marussia.
- Torro Rosso looks quick, and this improvement is due to their new technical director James Key. Also, the Torro Rosso is called STR8, funnily enough. Torro Rosso might switch to Renault engines in 2014 so that they can use Red Bull mechanicals in the future.
- Sauber has made their smaller sidepods work, and hasn't had any cooling issues. Smaller sidepods mean less drag, so Sauber has had to package their internals very well. Yet. The real test is Barcelona, where the cars will really be driven in anger. But Sauber looks fast as well, and with Nico Hulkenberg at the wheel, they will challenge for podiums and wins.
- Williams ran their 2012 car, so no one knows how fast their 2013 car is. But Valtteri Bottas, another Kimi Raikkonen, had his first taste of how the team works in race simulations.
- Force India looks strong as well, and they have yet to confirm their second driver. It's definitely Jules Bianchi.
- Mercedes had bad time at Jerez. Rosberg had an electrical problem on the first day, and within 15 laps, the Merc was on fire. They had to fix a fundamental electrical design problem, and missed the entire first day of running. The second day, Hamilton binned the car at the fastest part of the track as his rear brakes failed on his 16th lap. Hamilton managed to slow down the car slightly by locking up his fronts, but still smashed the front wing and nose after crossing the gravel trap. And so another day wasted. Meanwhile in the pits, everyone at McLaren were rolling on the floor and laughing. But no one noticed them, as everyone else in the pit lane was also laughing quite a lot. Mercedes recovered on the third and fourth day of the test, clocking on an average of 145 laps each day. Thats a lot compared to other teams who barely did a 100 or so laps. Mercedes also realized that when Hamilton drove hard, the car took quite a beating. When he drove into the pits after along stint, the brakes were smoking, the engine was complaining, and so on.
- Ferrari has a good car, and Massa and Pedro de la Rosa drove it in Jerez. Interestingly Alonso did not opt for the Jerez test. As Massa completed lap after lap of aero test, engine test, and other such tests, he could not work on setup. When Alonso drives the car in Barcelona, the cars will be ready to use and Alonso can start work on setup right away, and won't have to do the boring work of checking all the systems and collecting data. Jerez is not a track that has similar characteristics to any of those on the calendar, so it's not ideal to setup a car, or even train on. So Alonso has cleverly opted to only run at Barcelona
- Lotus, under technical director James Allison also has a very fast car. Romain and Kimi, both seemed happy with it. Although they didn't run their passive DRS in Jerez, the car was relatively reliable as well. All teams will bring their final updates and new parts in Barcelona, so Barcelona will be a real test to gauge the speed of the cars.
- McLaren has a very fast car, and Jenson set the most important lap time of the test. He set a very fast lap time on a relatively green track, on the first day on hard tyres. So the McLaren is quick as it was last year.
- Red Bull was running different array of tests throughout the session, and so neither Vettel nor Webber pushed the car hard. But they are definitely quick, and more importantly, very consistent. Their longer runs were the most consistent of any team. So they remain favourites.
Only at Barcelona will we know how fast the cars actually are, and how they have coped with the new faster wearing Pirelli tyres.
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| Lotus E21 |
2013 will be one the most competitive years in the history of Formula 1, no question about it. The best part is that 6 or 7 teams will be fighting for podiums, and perhaps even wins. What makes 2013 also unique is that it will be an end of an era, the V8 era, forever. With 2014 switching back to Turbo V6's, and bigger electrical energy recovery systems, 2013 will be a tricky year. All teams need to direct a majority of their resources toward 2014, to ensure that they remain competitive. So most of the updates and development of the car will take place quite rapidly towards the beginning of the year, and will tail off midway, and most teams will shift almost all resources to develop the 2014 car.
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| Red Bull 2013 |
This is the launch Formula 1 has been waiting for. What sort of speed machine has Adrian Newey and his merry men designed and built this year? The Red Bull livery is already part of Formula 1 folklore, and you just know that the blue and red colours are now part of history. So looking at the car evokes a similar sort of reaction to what you would experience if you pre-2008 Ferraris. The feeling of domination. For 2013, the already iconic red and blue colours are now mixed with a snazzy purple courtesy of their new title sponsor, Infinity. It looks simply fantastic and now definitely looks very different from a Torro Rosso.
Now the important technical bit.
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| Sauber C32-Ferrari |
Sauber's online launch was quite a surprise. First off, the colour scheme looks superb, and it is one the best looking cars in 2013. As it says on the tin, the Sauber uses Ferrari engines. Now Nico Hulkenberg might have signed up for Sauber so that he might get noticed by Ferrari, and could potentially replace Massa in 2014.
Sauber has made quite a few changes to the new car.
A screenshot of Paul Di Resta's Twitter feed shows that he welcomed Bruno Senna to Force India. The tweet was deleted minutes later. However, one smart Twitter user, @nismoroger took a screenshot, and if Force India did indeed hire Bruno Senna, it would've been a catastrophic decision. Bruno Senna was a fast driver. Until his mother forbade him to continue his racing career in his formative years of karting. after the deaths of both his uncle, Ayrton and his father. He started racing again at the age of 20. So missed on the crucial time to hone his skills, and thus lost his speed. So Bruno Senna could've been a world champion by now, matching Ayrton Senna for speed and maturity. But unfortunately, he missed out. So hiring Jules Bianchi, or even Adrian Sutil, both of which are fast drivers makes sense, and at the launch of VJM06, Force India claimed that they would make their driver decision on the basis of a long term strategy, so I think they did actually hire Bianchi.
UPDATE: Bruno Senna signed for Le Mans and World Endurance Championship with Aston Martin. So obviously, this screenshot is either a photoshop or a misjudgement by Paul Di Resta.
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| Ferrari F138 |
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| VJM06 |
Ferrari and Force India both launched their 2013 cars today, and there is a unique link between the two teams. Ferrari is pushing Force India to give Jules Bianchi the second race seat alongside Di Resta, and if Force India oblige, they might just get a good deal from Ferrari if they decide to switch to Ferrari engines in 2014. Jules Bianchi is a part of the Ferrari Driver Academy, so quite naturally, Ferrari will want Bianchi to get some vital F1 experience before he probably replaces Massa in 2014. Force India hasn't revealed the identity of the second driver yet, so it remains to be seen what will happen. But I think Force India might opt for either Jules Bianchi or Adrian Sutil.
Luiz Razia has apparently signed up for Marussia, replacing Timo Glock who left via mutual consent, as, to put it bluntly, Marussia is barely able to make ends meet and they desperately need paying drivers.
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| McLaren MP4-28 launch |
Today's McLaren launch gave the outside world a good look into McLarens preparation for 2013. This year McLaren celebrates 50 years of its existence, and I suspect they will have a fantastic year. Jenson Button drove into the McLaren Technology Center in the P1, their new road car, and he was simply oozing confidence as he stepped out of that car and into the glare of the cameras. This the Jenson whom we saw back in 2009. Now that the team, and crucially the car is his, he knows he has a fantastic advantage, and a good chance to win the championship. He stressed on the fact that the new car is not only more consistent but also faster than last year. And McLaren did end the 2012 season with the fastest car.