The MacBook Air Is A Horrible & Misplaced Product

Apple’s MacBook Air has been met with much acclaim from the Blog-o-sphere and while it has been heralded as the true ultra portable Mac for the Road Warrior, it simply isn’t ready for prime time. Rather the Air is a compromised Mac that loses features as you indulge in it.

I’ll get out of the way the Mac Book Air does have some advantages compared to its competitors such as offerings from Sony and Lenovo in that Apple splurged quite a bit to obtain a speedier mobile CPU before every Taiwan Tech company and their mothers could get their mits on it. The end result, Apple only delayed the inevitability of 10 million billion MacBook Air “killers” a smart move since it’s not overnight you can pump out another Ad spot pounding on poor old PC. But what cannibalizes the MacBook Air won’t be produced by the likes of an overseas competitor or that one company whose name rhymes with swell, (their products are even less so) instead it’ll be the fierce competition between the MacBook/Pro.

If you’ve ever shopped at an Apple store then you clearly know that within a few feet of the door you’ve long deluded yourself into thinking that every Mac has a sad puppy dog face begging you to take it home because it get bullied by the other products that cost more. Sometimes you find a companion and other times your wallet is ready to beat you senseless and run off with your wife into a more secure financial relationship but this isn’t a quickly done process. It usually requires some thought power and insight from a sales clerk the usual questions being “what the hell does $200 buy me besides a color change” or even “what features does this more overpriced model have?” all being valid inquiries but sadly met with a negative response. In the case of the MacBook Air it’s not that spending more money gets you more in terms of features but rather what you lose in functionality. Sure you can get a very thin laptop the same size as a MacBook but in traditional Apple fashion it’s nigh impossible to upgrade the core Hardware to retain a slim profile not easily implemented by anyone else.

This causes the consumer to sacrifice more than is needed to have Apple’s first attempt at an ultra portable. For 300 dollars more than the high end MacBook you lose well over 100 GBs of Hard Drive space, the ability to expand beyond 2 GBs of RAM, a slower (although more power efficient) CPU and lack of expandability whether it be through traditional methods or even the tried and true Optical Disc. Did I mention you do shave off 2 pounds which plunks the MacBook Air down to the same weight levels of other Ultra Portables which miraculously have the ability to retain most of the Hardware sacrificed by the Air. It’s almost as if Apple tossed a MacBook into a cage and left it to starve for a weeks surviving on bare Hardware components and slapping a pretty box onto the now overly anorexic portable.

But Apple hasn’t left us out in the cold completely, instead they’ve given us a very thin blanket to patch things up. Sure you can buy a DVD addon that only works with the MacBook Air for $100 but never mind the fact that you’ll be lugging around more equipment which is dripping in irony considering you’ll be buying this Laptop to travel lightly (because shaving off 2 pounds makes all the difference in this case). To add salt into the wound, Apple overdoes it on convincing the consumer that they’ll never need to put a round disc near their MacBook Air ever (despite the fact that you’ll need to resintall the OS at some point or another but it’s much better to sweep that point under the rug) according to the Wireless features on Apple’s section:

“In redefining thin, MacBook Air has shed something you no longer need: the optical drive. That’s because MacBook Air is built for the wireless world. So instead of watching DVDs, you can rent movies wirelessly from the iTunes Store. And instead of backing up files to a stack of discs, you can back up files wirelessly using Apple’s new Time Capsule.”

ITunes is a great business model and I’m sure it’s something Apple has the right to shove into peoples faces now and again but it’s a little early to be claiming that renting movies will replace DVDs and that scraping the Optical Drive is sufficient reasoning for this. Hell, it could just be good advertising, Apple saves money and you give them yours for iTunes content or as Michael Scott would say a “win-lose situation.” What’s even more dismal is the battery itself. The battery life isn’t anything to be hollering about to all of your Twitter buddies, it lasts a mere 5 hours which happens to be roughly that of the Air’s grown up brethren despite packing faster Hardware. This wouldn’t be such a problem if you could replace the battery and while it’s doable it involves opening the bottom through the removal of quite a few screws. I can assure you this is as welcome as your in-laws during breakfast but design over functionality appears to be dominant in the MacBook Air.

Sadly, Apple has attempted to position its hacked up attempt of an ultra portable outside the budget of those who want an extra lappy to kick around and not worry about it being high maintenance. But in an idiotic fashion, Steve dicked up the move by trying to combine the best of both worlds resulting in something that acknowledges its physical limitations and shies away hoping some rich, kind but mostly rich person will give it a good home with 3 meals a day. Sure it may be light to carry and sympathetic with those of weak backs and scrawny arms but that does not excuse the fact that 13.3 inches is still 13.3 friggin inches, that does not fit into a purse easily whereas an EEE PC can, that does not go into a backpack as easily as an Everex Cloudbook would and it certainly does not make it that much fun to tote around. Coupled with the fact that Apple had the audacity to promote a portable aimed at road warriors without being able to remove the battery is the equivalent of me selling a sword without its hilt, sure its functional in some odd, disproportionate manner but not the greatest solution. With a 2 lb reduction in weight one would assume that loss in mass could be compensated with an extra battery but unless you’re willing to pull a Mac Guyver without opening the bottom casing, you’re stuck with what you’ve got, and that portable generator tacked onto to your back.

However tempting it may be for Apple to taunt its competitors through the smug hipster some have come to despise as Justing Long, they could really take a design cue on what an Ultra Portable should be. Many companies have already achieved the concept that an ultra portable should be well, portable not only in weight but also size and not have the prima donna guise tagged on. What has staved consumers from jumping onto the Ultra Portable bandwagon is the high prices that put these computers on equal footing with higher spec’d machines that would easily devour them for breakfast and demand you cook toast for it just to satisfy its hunger. Dell and MSI seem to be the only one with a friggin clue on attracting consumers and instead of making a lappy as thin as a Katana they’ve actually shrunk the little bugger and made it reasonably priced to boot. Perhaps even Asus can bludgeon some design sense into every house brand PC manufacturer and their no name copy cats that selling a cheap Laptop is the key to penetrating the consumer market and sacrifices must be made or else you run from the ultra portable scene into the land of bargain bin laptops. Of course to tell Apple to adopt a smaller form factor and sacrifice some functionality would be the equivalent of playing Polo with a broom whilst riding a small child, it just will never work.

I do realize that I’ve been harsh with the MacBook Air, it’s almost as if I’ve woken up in a grumpy mood, channeled my aggression towards a consumer gadget and wrote this Blog post to diffuse my frustration and apparent hate towards an overpriced hunk of aluminum. Much to your delight I’m actually finished here, my personal vendetta has ended rather short but that doesn’t mean everything is well in laptop land. Instead of leaving the target of my sole disposition to tend to its wounds I thought it fitting to further reduce any positive aspects it might’ve retained but don’t take my word for it, the MacBook Air is more than a jumbled mess in a confused product line, its ass was handed to it before being conceived, before it was introduced and after its over the top appearance in typical high glamour Apple fashion. The fierce competition between computer manufacturers puts Apple’s anorexic excuse of a portable out of place. Years before Apple even had the idea that a super thin lappy might appeal to their user base if nothing more than looks, Sharp introduced a razor thin ultra portable running very close to the thinness of the Air itself, all in 2003. Well before that a joint venture between HP and Mitsubishi produced a radical ultra portable for its time coming in at 0.71 inches, slightly smaller than what Apple cooked up but done a decade earlier in 1998. Both ultra portables match up very closely to the MacBook Air’s physical dimensions (10.4 and 12.1 inch screen) and weight running in at 2 pounds. While almost imitating the same qualities of the MacBook Air with what was considered decent during their respective eras, they still lacked the smallness of today’s UMPCs.

The current trend for an ultra portable is something along the lines of a 7-9 inch screen, reasonable price at above 300 dollars and not sucking. The MacBook goes above and beyond that which shows the weak point in Apple’s intentions, that they are afraid to experiment with this market segment despite everyone and their mom wanting in on the action. Asus was one of the first to successfully pull it off with the EEE PC by cutting down on components but utilized Linux’s high level of customizability to be tweaked for such an underpowered lappy. The end result was a speedy portable that could do many of the less CPU intensive tasks laptops do today. The price was welcoming as well, who could pass up the 300-400 dollar range? Even Everex’s Cloudbook is looking to give the EEE PC a run for its money with their gOS based look-a-like sporting spacious storage capacity and a low price. HP itself is looking to bring high-end looks to a relatively low wend market with their newly introduced 2133. Although it runs a bit high in the upwards of $700, it manages to include enough luxuries and not compromise its intended purpose of being ultra portable.

This sets the MacBook Air in an odd place being the way overpriced one of the bunch. Until Apple can learn to trim back, way back, they won’t stand a chance against their new rivals in the ultra portable space.