Given that Apple still charges a $125 premium for black MacBooks, it’s hard to take seriously any argument that people aren’t willing to pay for style. The Air’s technical deficiencies are irrelevant to a large swath of users, and its aesthetic appeal is undeniable.
As is the way with computers, the car comparison is made. The MacBook Air being a sporty coupé or a modern Mini. Not a lot of room inside and not the best choice for everything but then not everyone needs 5 seats and a cavernous boot/trunk. The Macbook Air does make some performance compromises but it’s got the same dual-core CPU as in my “POWER” Desktop at the day job. Sure, the disk will be slower but there’s no way the performance could be worse considering the extra “POWER” in that machine.
People never learn that numbers are not enough. Her indoors opines that my car wasn’t “fast”. That car, and the current one, can both exceed 70 mph which is the fastest you’re permitted to drive in this country. Some people want PCs for the cavernous cases you can get so they can install dozens of cards and drives. Most, on the other hand, don’t install anything like that. It just sits empty.
I’ve broken with the “lust” of computers. My laptop (a current generation 17″ MacBook Pro) is a desktop replacement. It has compromises but then everything has compromises. It doesn’t do a lot of work these days due to it being a communications machine rather than a processing machine. My needs have changed.
The MacBook Air appeals to me but it falls short on some specifications I require. I use FireWire for one thing. And that, along with the need for an actual graphics card, makes all the difference to me.
But it’d be perfect for Her Indoors.