14 ms·
The 11" Macbook Air solved the laptop form factor. Thin, light, very portable, USB ports on each side, headphone jack and an external monitor port (in this cas
by rsync 6y ago
The 11" Macbook Air solved the laptop form factor.
Thin, light, very portable, USB ports on each side, headphone jack and an external monitor port (in this case, thunderbolt).
Could there be some refinements to my 2015 MBA ? Certainly - the two type-A USB ports could remain type A but be upgraded to USB3 ... you could add a USB-C port on each side in place of the magsafe and lightning ports and gain the ability to charge on either side.
But that's it. Great job, apple - you solved this form factor.
However, for reasons other than functionality or user-experience, Apple continues to fiddle and fuddle and muck around with laptops - making them weird and unwieldy in the best case, and totally unusable in the worst cases. In the case of USB ports exclusively on one side of the laptop, the only response can be merciless ridicule.
We need to actually coin a word to describe "company solved their use-case wonderfully and can't resist fiddling around with it for reasons that don't align with their user-base*.
"Special Edition-ed"[1] comes to mind ...
[1] https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/The_Star_Wars_Trilogy_Special_Edition https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/The_Star_Wars_Trilogy_Speci...
- pengaru 6y ago> Thin, light, very portable, USB ports on each side, headphone jack and an external monitor port (in this case, thunderbolt). Welcome to ~2004 in IBM ThinkPad X-series land, IBM "solved the laptop form factor" ~4 years prior to Apple's Air. And even before that Sony's PCG-Z505 delivered most of this in a robust and lightweight magnesium package.
- alliao 6y agoyou've reminded me of my lovely Panasonic Let's Note W series, thank you
- Retric 6y agoI liked the ~2004 Thinkpad’s, but sadly they had crap battery life by today’s standards. You could install larger batteries and swap them out if they started to degrade, but most people just treated them as needing to be plugged in 24/7.
- nonford150 6y agoThe Z was the ultimate - traveled everywhere with it. If it only could be updated a bit...
- ianai 6y agoTo some non-trivial amount, many laptops wind up being just a desktop with the lid closed 100% of the time in someone's office. It's the size of the commercial industry that makes manufacturers have little reason to actually make good laptops for laptop use.
- akulbe 6y agoCame here to say this. I've been working from home for ~6 years now. My work laptop sits vertical in a stand, and is wholly connected to external devices. I switched back to a desktop machine for my personal machine. It sits in a tray that's mounted on the underside of my desk.
- rsync 6y ago"Welcome to ~2004 in IBM ThinkPad X-series land, IBM "solved the laptop form factor" ~4 years prior to Apple's Air." No. What goes without saying in my original comment was the fact that the MBA has an aluminum unibody. Aluminum (or other metal) unibody cases represented a major step forward in aesthetics, substance and durability. I don't care how interesting the thinkpads are (and they are interesting) - I am not going backwards to plastic.
- dingaling 6y ago> I am not going backwards to plastic. And yet the aviation industry, obsessed with lightness and durability, is eliminating aluminium in favour of plastics with each successive generation.
- pengaru 6y agoIn case you're unaware, many ThinkPads use magnesium alloys quite extensively and just use plastic in areas like the keyboard keys and palmrest. The X220 I'm typing this on is built like a tank, and I'm quite appreciative the palmrest and keyboard keys at least aren't a thermally conductive metal like the rest of the machine. Doesn't your MBA use plastic keys as well?
- jasdine817 6y agoThe magnesium alloy ThinkPads and some Dells use is far more durable than aluminium because it's harder so doesn't bend on impact. It's also less likely to scratch. I've seen countless scratched Macbooks over the years. Plus unibody designs mean the whole laptop body needs to be replaced if there is damage instead of just replacing a single panel. High end Dell laptops are almost modular in comparison.
- fheld 6y ago>(in this case, lightning) I suppose you mean Thunderbolt
- karaterobot 6y ago> We need to actually coin a word to describe "company solved their use-case wonderfully and can't resist fiddling around with it for reasons that don't align with their user-base*. Can't help coin a new word, but Ralph Caplan described this phenomenon really well. I'm a (software) designer, and I think about this all the time: > When cuffs disappeared from men’s trousers, fashion designers gave interviews explaining that the cuff was archaic and ill-suited to contemporary living. It collected dust, contributed nothing. When the trouser cuff returned, did it collect less dust and begin at last to make a contribution? Probably no fashion designer would argue the point; but the question never came up. Designers got rid of the cuff because there aren’t many options for making trousers different. They restored it for the same reason.
- farss 6y agoTrouser cuffs do have a function. The extra weight helps the cloth drape better.
- paulryanrogers 6y agoCould extra fabric be folded on the inside for the same effect without the dust collecting?
- webmaven 6y ago> Could extra fabric be folded on the inside for the same effect without the dust collecting? Yes, but you introduce other even more annoying problems, like your foot catching on the cuff when you put the pants on, and weird-looking vertical 'breaks' at the cuff fold.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- HPsquared 6y agoIn fashion, "newness" is a function.
- chiefalchemist 6y agoThat word is: lack of market research. I recently finished up shopping for a Windows laptop. It took awhile, as I balanced price with features. You'd be shock how many otherwise decently config'ed offerings lacked a key and basic feature (e.g., backlit KB), or was deficient in some key way (e.g., mid-priced models with only 8 GB RAM soldered, no ability to upgrade). I agree. Some might not need backlit or more than 8 GB but if they do that machine - to them - becomes useless. Lack of sufficient RAM will cuts years off the usefulness of a laptop. I'm not sure how such small thinking helps the brand, loyality, etc. Do these companies not understand?
- jjeaff 6y agoI don't think it's that so much as the need to convince consumers to upgrade as often as possible even when what they have already works perfectly. I think they actually do a lot of market research. They know that people like you and I might buy a good product that meets our needs and keep it for 5 years or more. But the bulk of their profits are coming from people who have to buy the newest whizbang model - and it has to look different - or else how will everyone know that you have the newest whizbang model?
- WalterBright 6y agoIf they want to impress me, a better display would do it. I have an endless desire for more pixels and more resolution.
- LeifCarrotson 6y agoI'd argue too much, not too little market research is the problem. They just have wrong (ok, misaligned) objectives. Soldered RAM is invisible on the table at Best Buy, but the price savings to the manufacturer are very visible on their balance sheet. In fact, a laptop that becomes useless and you need to upgrade from 8 GB soldered RAM to one with 16 GB soldered RAM after 2 years is more than twice as profitable as one that a consumer stuck a new SODIMM stick in and used for 4+ years. Companies understand that very well, and the average consumer hasn't been able to prove that they are even aware of these problems.
- dmichulke 6y agoIn German you have verschlimmbessern - making something worse in an attempt to improve it
- raunakdag 6y agoHas anyone else noticed that when conversations about “we need x word for y concept” arise, the German language nearly always seems to be the one that has something similar or already present?
- jhoechtl 6y agoI can confirm that verschlimmbessern is a perfect fit to describe the situation. Englisch took Angst and Zeitgeist. Take that one too?
- bsanr2 6y agoAngst and zeitgeist don't decimate the American tongue. If you want us to adopt verschlimmbessern, drop one of the Ms and one of the Ses and get Muppets to sing a song about it.
- foundart 6y agoYes they have noticed it! To the extent that I have seen articles in which people explain in detail concepts for which they hope a concise German word exists. For example: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/concepts-for-which-i-suspect-germans-have-a-single-word https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/concepts-for-which-i-sus...
- WalterBright 6y agoMy neighbor has used TurboTax for 20 years or so. This year, they came out with an "upgrade" that revamped the user interface. She no longer has any idea how to make it work. She's switching to using a CPA.
- chrisseaton 6y agoBut like most people I don't want or need legacy USB or headphone ports any more - so makes sense to refine the model and remove them to simplify? If we took your advice they'd still have the old serial and parallel ports on them!
- ethbr0 6y agoThe best hardware targets are "what your users are using" + "extrapolated upgrades over the lifecycle of your product." E.g. why Steam regularly does this https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey I think it's fair to say that dropping the 3.5mm was way in advance of the user population. As was dropping function and special keys.
- amelius 6y ago> We need to actually coin a word to describe "company solved their use-case wonderfully and can't resist fiddling around with it for reasons that don't align with their user-base. Apple can only serve so many people well. Apparently, you are not the "average" customer. I'm in this exact situation every time I go shopping for shoes and find out I'm not within 1-sigma from the mean. It sucks, but it's how mass production and mass integration works. Choice becomes very limited, and no company will rise to address a specific shortcoming for a specific group.
- bryanrasmussen 6y ago>Apparently, you are not the "average" customer. So supposedly the average customer needs USB ports, but only on one side of the computer?
- chrisseaton 6y agoI would guess the average customer rarely needs USB ports. Most people use Bluetooth and WiFi. Needing to plug in a physical device seems pretty niche to me these days? The only exception is the charger and monitors. I guess it helps them reduce costs, which customers appreciate, to only have the bus going to one side of the laptop.
- samatman 6y agoI'm by no means the average customer, which is why I have a Pro model, but every time I setup at the desk I use three ports: one for a dongle to my keyboard and trackball, one for the monitor, and one to charge. I could in fact run the charging through the dongle as well, but then I'd be SOL when I plugged in a hard drive, which I do at least weekly. I think the two ports but on one side is an aesthetic disaster, but it does have one upside: there are 'mega-dongles' which plug into one half of a MacBook, and those work with both the 2 port and the 4 port models.
- r00fus 6y agoThe average person is agnostic to which side they’re on. The desire for any given feature is balanced by other features and overall design/usability. I’m not crying a river about my new M1 MacBook having ports only on one side. Very much offset by amazing battery life.
- timvisee 6y agoWhat about the performance though? I believe these older models can be unbearably slow, just to browse the web with. For some of my friends this is a problem just because of the limited RAM, but you won't be able to upgrade it because it's soldered on.
- watermelon59 6y agoThings are slow because of garbage bloated software. If devs stopped piling on ever more crap on existing systems and switched to optimizing their code, things would at least stay at the same performance or even gasp run faster.
- timvisee 6y agoTotally agree. Especially with al the Electron crap and such. But, I'm afraid you won't be able to change that, and that it'll only be getting worse.
- jamesrcole 6y ago> The 11" Macbook Air solved the laptop form factor. That's weirdly-specific. Some people would prefer a larger screen size, for example. > Could there be some refinements to my 2015 MBA ? I upgraded from a 2015 (I think) MBA to a 2018 model (both 13" ones), and two actual improvements that I like are: larger trackpad size, and smaller overall dimensions (so there's a smaller bezel around the screen, for example).
- silverpepsi 6y agotrackpad was nice until I realized the trade-off was worse than the gain, it took a few days to notice the undeniable excess of unintended clicks and moves sure enough, it had been right the first time and now is a mistake imho
- kayodelycaon 6y ago> That's weirdly-specific. Some people would prefer a larger screen size, for example. And some people need a larger screen because we don't run the highest resolution possible. I run my 24" 4k monitors at high-density 1080p. My 16" laptop screen is at 1536x960 or 1344x840. Anything smaller than a 16" MacBook Pro doesn't leave enough screen space to work with.
- fastball 6y agoWhat is it you're doing that 13" can't cut it?
- krageon 6y agoSmall screens have small letters, small icons, etc. My eyesight is very good, but working on such a screen is uncomfortable after an extended amount of time (unless you lower the resolution significantly).
- flagrant 6y agoYou can have a small screen with large letters and a big screen with small letters. You're conflating screen size and feature size. If you have a 4K screen and the features are too small, increase the UI size, don't decrease the resolution. If you're running a 4K screen at 1080p all you've done is waste a lot of money.
- foobar1962 6y agoFunny you mention that machine... I just finished a development contract that I did on an early 2013 MBA 11 inch. That little machine made me about $50K. I'm disappointed it cannot run Big Sur but keeping it anyway.
- samatman 6y agoI gave mine a second life as an Ubuntu machine. 2GB is... tight, for almost anything, and I'm a bit concerned about the wear all that swap puts on the SSD. Loved the form factor though, and yeah, that machine was my bread and butter for a solid year.
- jseliger 6y agoThe author is also a journalist, which means he probably works primarily with words. For video editing and even some image editing, modern machines do make a difference.
- dayofthedaleks 6y ago“Gilding the lily.”
- aksss 6y agoAn idiom rather than a word, but that’s exactly it. “Lilly-gilding”, then, might be the “word” that meets the requirements.
- GavinMcG 6y agoNah, that means adding unnecessary adornment. "Gilding" is explicitly about form. It would be a stretch to use that for a change that worsens something's substance.
- sershe 6y agoThere is/was a trope that an average Apple user only uses Safari so there's no need for this or that feature (starting from when Jobs was against having an appstore for the first iPhone), that's the only way I can think of that this statement is correct. My laptops serve 2 purposes - first, the actual laptop that I use for travel with no monitor, and can use for work, photo processing, movie watching, gaming or whatever with some compromises. For that, 11" is utterly useless; it might have been acceptable in 2005 for checking something online, reading or sending an email, but these days a phone can do that so there are literally 0 uses cases for an 11" laptop imo. The other use case is a portable desktop that I always plug into a (27-38") monitor for serious work or gaming; for that MBA is woefully underpowered. I used to work for a company where you could choose if you get an MBA (mostly salespeople/PMs/etc.) or an MBP (mostly engineers); there were always jokes about how you could immediately tell who never actually does any work ;)
- rsync 6y agoI think you're missing a very common power-user workflow which is: browser + terminal. For many people, all serious work happens in a near-zero resource application (the terminal) and the MBA is, of course, just fine for that.
- sershe 6y agoFair enough, although I wonder how big this niche is compared to people using IDEs or various editing software from powerpoint to photoshop, or even just playing games (or using that browser for smth like metrics dashboards that require more space, for that matter). In any case, being about to use a browser and a terminal hardly qualifies as "solving" laptop form factor much more than just being able to use a browser IMHO.
- bsanr2 6y agoMore like ruined. Manufacturers chasing that form factor, even for mobile workstations, has allowed them to justify a pivot away from user serviceability, and has also introduced major thermal/battery issues which have hobbled machines used for anything more serious than checking email (and, if you're using Chrome browser, maybe even that). I don't want a phone with a large keyboard and screen. I want a mobile desktop. If it's a little heavier, thicker, and louder, that's fine.
- marcandre 6y agoLoved my 11" MBA. I needed more RAM and I could switch to any laptop I wanted for free, so I got a used MB 12" because it's the only Apple laptop with a similar form factor.
- pjmlp 6y agoActually the Asus 1215B solved it for me, not Air.
- ardy42 6y ago> However, for reasons other than functionality or user-experience, Apple continues to fiddle and fuddle and muck around with laptops - making them weird and unwieldy in the best case, and totally unusable in the worst cases. In the case of USB ports exclusively on one side of the laptop, the only response can be merciless ridicule. Those reasons are marketing and profit-seeking. Modern society has this false assumption that new = "improved." So even if Apple perfected the laptop form factor, the next model will be regression that's marketed as an improvement and believed to be one by undiscerning users. If they didn't do that, customers wouldn't buy it because it would be an old = "unimproved" design. Though, a confounding factor here is there's a lot of personal preference with something like a laptop, so there's probably no one "objectively best" design. So some fraction of regressions are just catering to a different preference set.
- baumandm 6y agoThe problem with this line of reasoning is you are using a specific outcome to criticize an entire process: Apple failed to produce an iteratively superior product, therefore their process is "fiddle and fuddle." Their process of innovation and iterative improvement brought us the Macbook Air and so many other great products. It seems very short-sighted to claim a particular model is the pinnacle of design and user-experience and they should quit now. Will they always succeed? Certainly not. Should they keep trying? Definitely.
- vram22 6y ago>fuddle and muck swap(f, m)
- Lio 6y agoDell's XPS 13 fills a similar role for me as a Linux user (also have a MacBook Pro but I'm using it less and less). The XPS13 is the same size as the MBA11; I'm using an 11" MBA case for mine. It has a larger, 4K screen though and faster 4 core/8 thread CPU and better GPU. USB-C on both sides and a MicroSD card. The trackpad isn't as good as a Mac yet but it is acceptable to me and is improving all the time.