Apple’s MacBook (hot)Air is causing a stir; but not in MY wallet…
OK, first Apple got the world to ignore the handful of really well-implemented UMPC products out there (did you even KNOW that there are full-blown Windows PCs to be had for under $1000 that are nearly the size of the iPhone?)… not long after convincing users on the cheap that their 12″ Powerbooks and iBooks just weren’t, well, LARGE enough…
Enter the Apple MacBook (hot)Air. I was hoping for a return to smaller (not thinner) — see for instance, the Fujitsu LifeBook P7230. Smaller would have meant more portability, more computing availability (how many users NOW have their MacBooks or MacBook Pros with them ALL THE TIME?), more customers, more face-time with potential Mac fans among the unwashen Windows heathen, and perhaps trading in only a few pixels in screen real-estate to pull it off. Instead, we got an overpriced ‘concept car’ with the safety glass traded in for non-functional style.
Yes, I said it, non-functional style. What about it is ‘non-functional’, you ask? Let me turn that around to you with another question: What do you get for your ‘Air’ money that you don’t get for much less cash in the form of a current MacBook? That’s right — NOTHING.
If Apple wanted something truly marketable to their real audience (not the 6-figure executives who will be toting this ‘Queer Eye for a Straight OS’ Wilma-Deering-wanna-be), they would have rolled us a 10-inch diagonal screen with 1024×768 pixels, longer battery life than the ‘standard’ MacBooks, an external ‘Air’-like optical drive, and a full complement of ports that don’t make me have to search around to figure out which Mag-Safe cord goes to which Mag-Safe computer.
I want something halfway between the current MacBook and the now-infamous OQO. If Apple isn’t going to be the one to deliver it to us, then I may end up tired enough to go try seeing what the Linspire folks have in the way of an Adobe Illustrator clone in their C-N-R (Click-N-Run) library.
Below are comparisons I just did on my optimal builds of both the ‘Air’ and the normal MacBook with SuperDrive, modem, AppleCare, etc. You’d have to be a lot worse than delusional to believe that Steve Jobs just pulled the sheet off an advancement in the marketplace (not to be confused with an advancement technologically; which I do not contest — but then, just what was gained other than bragging rights?).
Paul D. Cook carries much the same lamentation on Macintouch.com:
“I’d like to offer a contrarian opinion of the MacBook Air and notebook trends in general.The MacBook Air is an interesting, but not unexpected, product. I think some of my clients will likely buy one or two and I hope it sells very well for Apple.
However, it does NOT even come close to filling the hole felt by the absence of a 12″ MacBook Pro. I’d be far, far, more excited if Apple were announcing the world’s “lightest” weight, full featured, notebook, instead of the world’s “thinnest.” I purchased the 12″ PowerBook over the 15″ PowerBook because it was about *one pound lighter*! And since I have to cary it on my back, I’d be even more excited if the weight savings included the weight of the power *brick*.
And then there is the issue of fragility. Given all the bumps and twists that a laptop can be subject to, I’d pick stronger over thinner.
I haven’t seen the MacBook Air’s power brick, but the last few years seem to have had a trend of laptops getting smaller and lighter, while the power bricks get bigger and heavier. If you need to take the BRICK with you, the net change in weight and size is far less than the marketing specs would have you believe. (If there is any at all.)
MacInTouch notes that “it lacks an Ethernet, FireWire or an Express/34 slot, and its battery is not user-replaceable, nor is its memory expandable.” And the optical drive is an external option.
So, if I take my 12″ PowerBook and it’s power Brick out of my bag and replace it with the MacBook Air, the MacBook Air power brick, the MacBook Air Superdrive, the MacBook Air USB to Ethernet Adapter, how much space and weight did I save?
My ideal product would be a 12″ MacBook Pro with all of the features of the 15″ MacBook Pro, except with a lighter weight. (And if that requires a smaller, 12″, screen, that’s OK.) Now that would be a REAL innovation!”
This was followed closely by another reader on the same page wondering why it took Apple so many years (Steve Jobs says they worked on this concept for five years) to come up with so many mistakes:
“No doubt the MacBook Air is a beautiful machine, and dropping two pounds off the weight is wonderful. But if the thing is targeted at hard core road warriors I’m afraid it falls short of even MacBook functionality.No ethernet port? I’ve stayed in lots of hotels that offered wireless, but the signal was so lame I couldn’t connect. My MB has ethernet as a fall back, or I can use my Verizon USB720 cellular modem. Not sure if it will work with the Air, though, as the USB connector on the 720 is short and comes right out of the device’s body, possibly interfering with the side of the Air’s case. And I wonder if the ultimate fall back, Apple’s accessory phone modem, will work with the Air. Of course, we’re supposed to be able to buy an ethernet adaptor at some future date, but that’s yet another added cost accessory to lug around.
Next fault: no replaceable battery! I haven’t been on many airplanes that have a power port in the seat arm, and any coast to coast flight (especially if there are connections) lasts longer than 5 hours. So much for quiet, productive time on the plane. What were they thinking?
What road warrior would leave home without a way to troubleshoot and reinstall the OS? I always carry install/diagnostic CD/DVDs, and have had the misfortune to need them more than once. It really seems foolish to consider the Air for trips that last more than a day or two (the time you can afford to be without a laptop). Oh, but wait! For only $100 I can buy another brick with a SuperDrive in it. Kinda defeats any weight loss benefit, don’t ya think?
Only one USB port? Seems like if I have to read files off my thumb drive I’ll have to drop my ethernet connection, or quit using my SuperDrive, or even disconnect my travel trackball. Maybe my little, unpowered USB hub would work, depending on how much juice Apple supplies to that single port, and how much each attached device needs. And now we’re up to three or four extra widgets to lug along.
I’ve been living comfortably with the 160Gb drive in my MB. There’s enough space for most of my music collection, all of my business applications, a partition for a modest XP/Parallels installation, and even a movie or two ripped to the hard drive. But with the Air I’d have to figure out how to cram all that into half the space, even less if I wanted (and could afford) the more robust solid state drive. And not only is the Air drive small, it’s *slow*.
And speaking of small and slow, these days 2 GB of memory isn’t enough for photo/movie processing or running Parallels. And there doesn’t seem to be any expansion path offered.
What’s up with the lame processor spec? 2.33 GHz on a MBP still provides pokey XP/Parallels execution. With only 2/3 the speed, we’d be back to VirtualPC performance levels, which is to say, barely useable.
Most painful of all, though, is the price point. It seems truly a case of “less for more”. Less in terms of weight, yes, but far less in terms of functionality. And much, much more in terms of cost ($1100 for a MB, vs. $1800 for the Air). For what’s actually being delivered, this thing should sell for less, much less, than a bare bones MacBook.
The iPhone was a tough act to follow, but the MacBook Air does little to bolster Apple’s image as a technology leader, leaving most business users wondering why once again the stylist’s need to “think different” has triumphed over a user’s need for useable functionality. No wonder AAPL’s price was down almost 10 points (5%) in today’s trading.”
Apple would have done better to have brought back the iToilet Seat. I have decided that Steve Jobs has just fallen to the grey hair that broke the camel’s back, and is pulling a ‘George Lucas’. Remember, when we all thought that George was a genius for what he came up with in the first three Star Wars movies, and then he went back and screwed them all up with fresher cinematic technology because he had absolutely no comprehension of what magic he had stumbled into earlier in his career?
Steve Jobs has apparently been running on a fragile stroke of luck, that just ran out. Better put him out to pasture, like Microsoft has Uncle Bill, and start the next project without cc’ing him on the dev notes.
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Wishing the mockups were actually leaked photos…
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Fujitsu continues to do a good job leading the industry in subnotebooks (see their PDF white paper, ‘No Corners Cut’); where is Apple?
Fujitsu P1620′s 8.5″ touch screen has 1280×768 pixels in same price range [PDF data sheet]
