I've got an opportunity to order one or two new Macbook Airs at a good discount (more than 10% off msrp). I've never used an Apple other than tinkering with them in the stores a few times. I'd like to give it a try and I'm extremely attracted to the lightweight, compact design for travelling. So here are the questions for the active travelling Mac users:

Question #1: Is a 1.4 ghz 11" MBA with 4 gb of ram enough. Alternatively I'm looking at the 1.8 ghz 13" with 4 gb of ram. The Harddrive size isn't that important. I'm comfortable swapping on and off what I need and I don't hoard albums of music and video on my laptops. Obviously I'm making an assumption that the required harddrive upgrade to get to the larger processor, isn't worth it, in my case.

My normal use will be Word, Excel, PowerPoint, a drawing program for graphics and maybe a little database work (Access). I may also tinker around with some custom coding (java). I am also excited to play with the movie maknig programs and photo editors. I've never done the later before and it's one reason I want to dabble with a Mac. I think an MBA could be a good introduction. I need a very light machine to travel with my corporate brick (lockdown and monitored machine), potentially to travel light, and to take on vacation without the wife complaining much.

Question #2: I tend to travel in first class about 30% of the time. I do a lot of short domestic flights in small planes without first class. Is the 13" small enough to open up. My 16" is fairly akward in economy, but if needed I can do it (bad screen angle). Is the 11" that much of an advantage? I alsohave an older 14" laptop and it's at that annoying level that it can get trapped in the latch of the forward seat reclining. I can see where the 11" MBA is absolutely perfect on a flight. But that screen just seems "clipped" (shorter than I can handle for much more than reading e-mail. Seeing a full page can be important for me. Or at least a good part of a page (either PowerPoint or Word).

Question #3: I could buy both machines and afford to try them both for a month or so before selling one. Do you think the resale on a slightly used MBA would be equal to or greater than 10% off MSRP after a month or two. Alternatively, I can probably put in an order with similar pricing ever 6 months to a year. Could I buy one, try it and sell it for what I've got in it after a year or less? I realize I'm in a fortunate situation to be able to take advantage of a large corporate purchase and get prices like this. I have no idea what the Mac resale market is like, but I get the feeling there MSRP is fairly well enforced (to the extreme) and the machines tend to hold a fairly high value. Is that correct?

Thank you fo any insight you have. I'm quite a rookie to the Mac world, but excited to try it out. I absolutely love the size and weight the machine. That alone is a winning proposition (11 or 13").