[Nergol]

I have a first-gen Intel Core Duo white MacBook that's pushing five years old now, and have begun looking at a replacement. One option is the new 11" MacBook Air. It seems to have a C2D processor running at 1.4GHz. My question is: Is this more powerful than my current machine? If so, how much more so? If less, how much less? I don't do anything super-demanding with my machine, but I want to make sure the Air could play back video (nothing too high-quality - 720p at most) as well as my current machine can.

Thanks!

[AKcrab]

The air will play 720p just fine. I think you'll find it much faster at most things than your current MacBook, but my quick search didn't yield any direct comparison of your machine to a current MacBook Air.

Here is an example of 3d graphic performance for the Air:
2010 MacBook Air graphics tests

The 13" MacBook Air beats the 13" MacBook Pro in all but one test. That's surprising when you consider the MacBook Pro has the same integrated graphics processor as the MacBook Air and its Core 2 Duo is running at a higher clock speed.

Of course that's just graphics, but you can find some other comparisons on the site.

[SierraDragon]

Some comparisons

Mac Benchmarks