MacBook Air as a Mobile Device

The MacBook Air is really not very far from some handheld devices in total mass, and for that matter in price. It's still more than most in both categories, but it's in the ballpark. On the other hand, it's also not very far from my MacBook Earth in the same respects.

A MacBook -- any laptop computer, really -- is an excellent tool for creating things. You have a keyboard, a full operating system enabling you to store and retrieve any sort of document you want, an open-ended array of software tools, networking of various sorts, and often both a camera and a microphone. Compared to some of the better devices in the handheld class, including the iPhone, the Blackberry, the N95, and the Nokia E90, laptops are clearly more capable creative tools. That's why people bother to carry them around; it's a lot easier to slip a mobile phone into your pocket than to bring your laptop case.

The MacBook Air is getting some criticism for its somewhat different mix of capabilities. Let's see if these would matter to me. No Ethernet port -- this wouldn't be an issue for me; my MacBook connects wirelessly 100% of the time anyway. No optical drive -- might be an issue; I sometimes use my MacBook's superdrive (or combo drive or whatever the heck it is). But only occasionally, and I'm not sure I've ever really needed it, since I also have desktop computers with any kind of drive I need. The non-replaceable battery might be an issue, but this might not be a current thing. In the past I've carried additional laptop batteries. But not with any machine since Li-ion batteries arrived; now that I think of it. I don't have a spare MacBook battery now, and don't anticipate ever obtaining one. No Firewire port -- this is pretty personal because I'm not really a camera/media guy, but I don't even own a Firewire cable. If I'd been able to save a few bucks on my current MacBook by omitting the Firewire port, it would have been a pretty automatic choice.

The MacBook Air is slower and has less storage than my MacBook Earth. This could be an issue for sound, as I use my laptop for music and podcasts, but I suspect sound will be just find on the AirBook. Video might be an issue too, but other than TedTalks, I don't do much video. So as mostly a writing and sometimes graphics machine, an AirBook would be fine with me. Of course, looking at it this way the AirBook probably ought to cost less, not more. I spent about $1100 on my EarthBook, and frankly it includes a lot of things I don't use. So an Airbook in the $500-$750 range would be an easy choice for me. Well, I mean, not now; I already have an earthbook!

That's an area of mobile device design (and production and distribution) that's never been well served: the smaller, less capable, and less expensive unit. Given the realities of miniaturization and, frankly, marketing, smaller and lighter usually means more money, not less. And by the time the industry has progressed to the next stage, companies drop the old stuff instead of keeping it around and reducing the price. Too bad. When I was at Apple I suggested a lower-cost, lower-performance laptop line, particularly for students (and even ruggedized). Clearly I wasn't persuasive enough!