Mac fans have weighed in on a variety of forums and blogs, with some lauding the cool factor, others wanting more differentiation for those two Ben Franklins. I'm with the latter camp. Black is indeed cool. But it'd be cooler with a 100GB 7,200-rpm hard drive and 1GB of RAM standard.

One other note on the matte-black finish. The oil from your fingertips shows more easily than it does on the white models, although it's easy enough to wipe clean with a damp cloth.

Looks aside, the MacBook has other noteworthy changes: Its hard drive, accessible from beneath the battery cover, is easy to replace -- though Benjamin said novice users might still want a certified Apple professional to do the upgrade if they're unsure of what they're doing. And he recommended that users looking to boost the stock 512MB of PC2-5300 (DDR2-667) memory included in all MacBooks use matching pairs of RAM.

The integrated 64MB of video RAM works better that way, he said. "It enhances graphics performance nicely. If you think you're going to want more memory it's advantageous to buy it that way so you don't end up swapping it out later."

Bumping the MacBook's RAM to at least 1GB is indeed a smart move. Buying that extra RAM from Apple may not be, as the company charges more than most major third-party suppliers. In this case, you'll pay an additional $100 to double the memory from 512MB to 1GB. If Apple simply shipped the MacBook with a single stick 512MB stick of RAM, you could get a matching stick for about $45.