New laptops introduced. ♥

Apple introduced a lineup of laptops that feature its aluminum unibody build, faster processors, and longer battery life, and lowered prices by about $300 on several of its portable computers.

Also, the company's lightest-weight laptop, the MacBook Air, at 3 pounds, now will sell for $1,499 with a hard drive, instead of $1,799. A model with a solid-state drive, which is less fragile than a hard drive, starts at $1,799. The hard drive will be 120 gigabytes; the solid-state drive, 128 GB.

Apple vice president Schiller also unveiled a 13-inch model MacBook Pro that is billed as having seven hours of battery life using its non-removable, lithium polymer battery. A "typical user," he said, will get about five years of use from the battery. Pricing on the 13-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,199.

Schiller said that Apple's unibody build, tried first in its 17-inch MacBook Pro, has been a great success. "Customers couldn't be happier with them," he said.

The unibody build will be used for the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pros.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro for $1,199 has a 2.26 GHz processor and 160 GB hard drive; another model with a 2.53 GHz processor and 250 GB hard drive costs $1,499.

The 15-inch MacBook Pro comes in three configurations: $1,699 for a model with a 2.53 GHz processor and a 250 GB hard drive; $1,999 for a 2.66 GHz processor and 320 GB hard drive; and $2,299 for a 2.8 GHz model with a 500 GB hard drive.

Apple's 17-inch MacBook Pro, which was unveiled in January, starts at $2,499, a $300 price drop.