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There’s the problem of feeling cheap however. If you make a laptop that’s thicker but lighter, you run the risk of having a laptop that feels weirdly light and

There’s the problem of feeling cheap however. If you make a laptop that’s thicker but lighter, you run the risk of having a laptop that feels weirdly light and cheap. Also thickness does matter! If you’re gripping a laptop in one hand, a thinner body is easier to hold. And it’s just plain beautiful. It feels futuristic. Which, yes, is nonsense. But it’s also how you make a product that people want.

tspiteri 7y ago
> If you’re gripping a laptop in one hand, a thinner body is easier to hold. Is it though? If you're trying to hold six closed laptops in the same hand, thinner might be better, but when holding one laptop in one hand, it's weight not thickness that matters.
jtcruthers 7y ago
Has the product not been thin enough to easily hold one handed for years? We're talking about shaving millimeters off a 1.5 cm thick product. Not inches off something a foot thick
- Izkata 7y ago
  There's a difference between thin/light and holdability. My prior Asus[0] actually had a part sticking out the back (where the battery was attached) that provided an amazing grip. Flat macbooks, like my current Asus, I'm more afraid will slip out of my grip (or, held from the side, flex and damage something), especially pushing against it with the other hand while using the keyboard. [0] https://www.asus.com/Laptops/U46E/ https://www.asus.com/Laptops/U46E/
Sohcahtoa82 7y ago
> a thinner body is easier to hold. And it’s just plain beautiful. It feels futuristic IMO, a thinner body feels fragile. It feels like they've chosen aesthetics over durability to a detrimental extreme. Thinner also means less room for cooling and a smaller battery. If I see a super-thin laptop, I'm going to assume it has low performance to compensate for inadequate cooling. > But it’s also how you make a product that people want. Is anybody asking for a thinner laptop? Or is Apple just creating a benchmark and advertising it? This whole thing just re-affirms my belief that Apple isn't a tech company, they're a fashion company. They have absurdly inflated pricing and over-emphasis on aesthetics over performance.
- _hardwaregeek 7y ago
  > This whole thing just re-affirms my belief that Apple isn't a tech company, they're a fashion company. They have absurdly inflated pricing and over-emphasis on aesthetics over performance. I don't disagree! If you don't understand fashion, you won't understand Apple. I'm always mystified at how people are seemingly disgusted at Apple's business model of selling products that look good. Well, yeah, people will want to buy products that look and feel good. That's why people buy expensive clothes. They don't buy clothes for the features. They buy it because it looks and feels nice. You can certainly wear clothes that have more "features" like cargo shorts or pants that unzip to shorts. But don't be surprised when people eschew them for clothes that are objectively less practical but more beautiful. It actually stuns me how other companies don't understand aesthetics at all. Windows laptops are shockingly ugly. Thinkpads are truly the cargo shorts of laptops. Sometimes they're slightly slimmer, slightly better cut cargo shorts, but they're still cargo shorts. Microsoft's laptops are probably the closest to beautiful, but they're still not that good. And when they're good, they're suspiciously close to Apple's products. That being said, Apple's laptops aren't as bad for the money as you'd imagine. Try finding a cheaper laptop with a unibody construction that feels as durable, as well built as a Mac. Try finding a cheaper laptop where I can speak to an actual, physical person about getting it fixed. Try finding a cheaper laptop with as fast of an SSD^[1]. Try finding a cheaper laptop with as good of a touchpad. It's not as easy as you'd imagine. [1]: https://www.macrumors.com/2018/07/13/2018-macbook-pro-fastest-laptop-ssd-ever/ https://www.macrumors.com/2018/07/13/2018-macbook-pro-fastes...

tspiteri 7y ago

> If you’re gripping a laptop in one hand, a thinner body is easier to hold. Is it though? If you're trying to hold six closed laptops in the same hand, thinner might be better, but when holding one laptop in one hand, it's weight not thickness that matters.

jtcruthers 7y ago

Has the product not been thin enough to easily hold one handed for years? We're talking about shaving millimeters off a 1.5 cm thick product. Not inches off something a foot thick

Izkata 7y ago
There's a difference between thin/light and holdability. My prior Asus[0] actually had a part sticking out the back (where the battery was attached) that provided an amazing grip. Flat macbooks, like my current Asus, I'm more afraid will slip out of my grip (or, held from the side, flex and damage something), especially pushing against it with the other hand while using the keyboard. [0] https://www.asus.com/Laptops/U46E/ https://www.asus.com/Laptops/U46E/

Sohcahtoa82 7y ago

> a thinner body is easier to hold. And it’s just plain beautiful. It feels futuristic IMO, a thinner body feels fragile. It feels like they've chosen aesthetics over durability to a detrimental extreme. Thinner also means less room for cooling and a smaller battery. If I see a super-thin laptop, I'm going to assume it has low performance to compensate for inadequate cooling. > But it’s also how you make a product that people want. Is anybody asking for a thinner laptop? Or is Apple just creating a benchmark and advertising it? This whole thing just re-affirms my belief that Apple isn't a tech company, they're a fashion company. They have absurdly inflated pricing and over-emphasis on aesthetics over performance.

_hardwaregeek 7y ago
> This whole thing just re-affirms my belief that Apple isn't a tech company, they're a fashion company. They have absurdly inflated pricing and over-emphasis on aesthetics over performance. I don't disagree! If you don't understand fashion, you won't understand Apple. I'm always mystified at how people are seemingly disgusted at Apple's business model of selling products that look good. Well, yeah, people will want to buy products that look and feel good. That's why people buy expensive clothes. They don't buy clothes for the features. They buy it because it looks and feels nice. You can certainly wear clothes that have more "features" like cargo shorts or pants that unzip to shorts. But don't be surprised when people eschew them for clothes that are objectively less practical but more beautiful. It actually stuns me how other companies don't understand aesthetics at all. Windows laptops are shockingly ugly. Thinkpads are truly the cargo shorts of laptops. Sometimes they're slightly slimmer, slightly better cut cargo shorts, but they're still cargo shorts. Microsoft's laptops are probably the closest to beautiful, but they're still not that good. And when they're good, they're suspiciously close to Apple's products. That being said, Apple's laptops aren't as bad for the money as you'd imagine. Try finding a cheaper laptop with a unibody construction that feels as durable, as well built as a Mac. Try finding a cheaper laptop where I can speak to an actual, physical person about getting it fixed. Try finding a cheaper laptop with as fast of an SSD^[1]. Try finding a cheaper laptop with as good of a touchpad. It's not as easy as you'd imagine. [1]: https://www.macrumors.com/2018/07/13/2018-macbook-pro-fastest-laptop-ssd-ever/ https://www.macrumors.com/2018/07/13/2018-macbook-pro-fastes...