The MacBook Air Is Cool, But I'll Take an Eee PC | Maxim Stuff, Apple, Iphone, Ipod, Mac, Mac world, MacBook Air
he MacBook Air Is Cool, But I'll Take an Eee PC
Posted 01/15/2008 10:45 AM by Stan
Filed under: Apple, Iphone, Ipod, Mac, Mac world, MacBook Air
Macbook_Air.jpg
If the MacBook Air was a human baby, the doctor would still be wiping amniotic slime off of it, but that hasn’t stopped just about everyone from passing judgment on it. I hate feeling left out, so I’m going to get in on this action by making this statement: The MacBook Air is not as cool as the Eee PC.
Now, I’m sure many design enthusiasts and Apple, ahem, fanboys are eager to disagree with me, but hear me out...
It’s too expensive for a machine that can’t be your only computer
I understand the point of having a tiny machine you can carry with you. I would’ve loved to have one in college so I could take notes without lugging a giant laptop with me to class. Hell, it would’ve been great out at CES, but for $1,800 I could buy an Eee PC and a really solid desktop, or even another laptop to keep back in the dorm. Then I could even play games or, gasp, watch DVDs and listen to CDs!
Go solid state or go home
With the upgrade to SSD costing a butthole-puckering $1,000 on the Air, the 4 GB and 8 GB drives in the Asus machines seem pretty appealing. They don’t have as much storage as the 80 GB HDD in the air, but they’re tougher and faster.
Hackability
OSX is great, but open source is where it’s at. If there are more die-hard tech fanboys out there than the Apple contingent, then it’s the cult of Linux (don’t be offended Linux people, I mean that as a compliment). The idea of paying extra money for OS upgrades for my ultra portable is less than appealing. And since we’ve established that it’s not going to be anyone’s main PC, all of the stuff built into the Eee should be sufficient for a carry around. Plus, the Air’s specs aren’t exactly blazingly fast, which means it might not be able to take full advantage of all the beautiful elements everyone is getting a boner about in Leopard.
Portability
The Air is definitely thin and light, but so is the Eee. The chubbier form factor of the Eee seems like it would fare better jangling around in my messenger bag, too. After all, it only takes one bad interaction with the door of the subway to turn the world’s thinnest laptop into the world’s most smashed laptop.
Douche factor
It’s only a matter of weeks before every Starbucks in the country is littered with the slick MacBook Airs. If you pay that much for a computer that pretty, you don’t just sit at home typing on it. You take it out and wave in front of people until some idiot gets impressed by it. I’ve used the Eee in public and no one bothered to ask me about it, which left me to actually get some friggin’ work done.
No SD card slot
When traveling, the ability to upload digital photos is key and for a computer that’s supposed to eliminate wires, it kind of sucks to have to carry around a card reader with you.
It’s total mugger bait
Around here, smaller just means easier to steal and the cooler something looks, the better the chance it’s going to get swiped. It’s one of the reasons I don’t park my BMW on my street. The other reason is because I don’t have a BMW.
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