I would personally place the blame squarely at Intel's feet. They no longer allow nVidia to make chipsets for Nehalem onwards, so instead of having a chipset with integrated graphics, you now have to have an additional chip on the motherboard for standalone graphics. In this form factor, that's just not an option.
I guess Apple could also be faulted for wanting to standardize on decent graphics, but I just can't bring myself to see that as anything but a good thing!
It will be interesting to see how this changes with time. Sandy Bridge, Intel's upcoming CPU release, has graphics on die, but it will still be vastly outclassed by the nVidia 320M that's in the new Air. Unless Intel comes along with vast improvements with their 22nm refresh, Ivy Bridge, Apple's still going to be in the same bind - in 2012.
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I would personally place the blame squarely at Intel's feet. They no longer allow nVidia to make chipsets for Nehalem onwards, so instead of having a chipset with integrated graphics, you now have to have an additional chip on the motherboard for standalone graphics. In this form factor, that's just not an option.
I guess Apple could also be faulted for wanting to standardize on decent graphics, but I just can't bring myself to see that as anything but a good thing!
It will be interesting to see how this changes with time. Sandy Bridge, Intel's upcoming CPU release, has graphics on die, but it will still be vastly outclassed by the nVidia 320M that's in the new Air. Unless Intel comes along with vast improvements with their 22nm refresh, Ivy Bridge, Apple's still going to be in the same bind - in 2012.