HP Chairman Poses With Apple MacBook Air

[elusion11]

[citation][nom]vant[/nom]Just curious, if Apple laptops are such pieces of crap, why is everyone trying their best to copy it?Get your head out of the gutter. People don't need octo-cores in their laptops. They need portability, durability, and endurance.Guess who does best in all three? Guess which one the chairman of HP is using?I'm using a company provided Dell E5410 (only 3 months old), and my life couldn't be any more miserable. The quality is crap, my power button is wearing off, the top portion is flimsy, the track buttons look worn, the computer will turn off randomly during the month while walking to meetings, I've booted to an empty desktop before (scaring the crap out of me, it was not in safe mode, had to restart to get it to boot to my stuff), scrolling is a pain on webpages, and my 2-3 hour battery makes me nervous during back to back meetings. On top of that, it weighs over 5lbs.When I go home, you can bet your ass that the dell is sitting in my bag unused, while my MBA13 is roaring along with its 'inferior' specs, running perfectly. No, I'm not a fanboy who lines up for mac products, I just like things that work properly with little fuss. Things like waking it up from sleep only takes 5 seconds max even after a week. If I had to shut down, starting the computer takes a small fraction of the time that it takes to start my Dell. And scrolling on webpages? Back/Forward shortcuts on the trackpad? Makes browsing the web (something most of us do for the majority of our day) incredibly efficient. Macs cost more, thats obvious. But it is incredibly easy to justify the price, when you don't have to deal with the crap I listed above. If you still haven't tried a Mac, you are just blindly following your own cult. A cult of fanboys who cannot accept the fact that sometimes things change for the better.Think about this, a 997 right now costs a fortune, but it is one of the best sellers despite its lack of specs. Why? Because it is a better quality car and provides a much more rewarding experience. A $80k car that makes the same horsepower as a $30k one. Yet you will look like a fool trying to argue about how overpriced it is to any true car enthusiast. The same applies here, where the MacBook Air should be looked up upon as a game changer, the only product that spurred Intel to force the 'ultrabook' down every PC manufacturer's throat to stay competitive.My custom rig would be running OSX if I didn't get such lousy FPS on games.[/citation]

[citation][nom]260511[/nom]another Apple iFanboy[/citation]

 

[getreal]

[citation][nom]house70[/nom]tried them; still a POS.[/citation]
Sure you did.

 

[blaquito]

Really...this multi-millionaire went dumpster diving for a $1000 computer. Hahaha.... I wonder where you trolls come up with your crap

 

[legacy7955]

[citation][nom]agnickolov[/nom]@legacy7955: you do realize he's Meg's boss, right?[/citation]

@agnickolov:

He is part of the troubled HP board that needs to be sent packing.

He is only ONE of her "bosses", my guess is this guy will be sent packing after this stunt.

 

[eddieroolz]

As someone in that position it probably would have been a good idea to at least cover up the logo.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]legacy7955[/nom]The thing is that the Mac Air is a poor value, you can buy a competing HP laptop that does everything and more that the Apple for a LOT less, and contrary to the myth the quality of the hardware is not any better.[/citation]

There is no equivalent HP laptop when compared to the Macbook Air. In fact, there is no laptop full stop which can match it on all the specs, and equal it or better on price.

And by specs, I mean - extremely slim and light, SSD, i5 processor, massive 7 hour battery life.

There is no other laptop for the same price or less which combines all of these elements. That's just a fact. There are a couple which match the specs for more money, eg the Sony Vaio Z.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]260511[/nom]My wife has an 13" MBP, it is POS, the thing it can do is surf the net, thats it, and it is slow at doing that. one day in a fit of rage i chunk-noris kicked it across the room, and dented its display shell - whatever. but anyways, I swapped out pretty much everything inside SSD, Ram, HDD, optical drive, minus the CPU/GPU, even removed the OS X completely and turned it into windows-only machine etc. because it is a POS, and swapping everything was the only way to salvage it from turning into a completely useless piece of brick.[/citation]

MBP MBA

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]back_by_demand[/nom]The Toshiba Portege was an Ultrabook before the Macbook Air was an itch in Jobs nutsack, so who is copying who?[/citation]

'Ultra-thin, ultra-light and ultra-connected – Toshiba’s first-ever Ultrabook™ '

http://uk.computers.toshiba-europe.com/innovation/jsp/news.do?service=UK&year=NONE&ID=z830

Maybe you need to look up what an Ultrabook actually is.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]back_by_demand[/nom]Now you are just arguing semantics, I never mentioned build quality just the form factor, in my formative years I had dozens of these shoddily constructed POS's returned with various faults so I agree that the Macbook Air is better constructed.So in the same grain, if another manufacturer comes along and does better build quality than Apple what will they fall back on, because the "we got their first" line isn't true.[/citation]

Yes, lets ask what WOULD happen 'IF' some competitor managed to actually build a better product than Apple, rather than discussing the current reality that Apple made the first Ultrabook, by the actual definition of the word, and produce arguably the best Ultrabook currently available. I am typing on mine now, on Windows 7.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]lamorpa[/nom]Right! As far as I know, no manufacturer ever thought of making a laptop as thin as possible, fold like a clam shell, have a display on the top half and a keyboard on the bottom half. How was Apple ever able to come up with this?? I think, maybe, laptop, and computers in general were invented by Apple?[/citation]

Ironic that you say this but the Macbook Air was pretty much the first laptop where the focus was entirely on being ultra thin and light whilst retaining all the performance and battery life.

Obviously there has been a downward trend in size in general, but that doesn't take anything away from the fact that Apple was able to engineer a laptop which was thinner than anyone else could. You try to portray the design Apple came up with as simple, yet nobody else was able to match it at the time, and nobody can match it even now for the same price of less. You ask 'how was Apple ever able to come up with it' - I ask you, 'why haven't the competitors been able to come up with it'. And the answer is because you're entirely misguided in assuming that just because an idea is obvious, that the implementation is also obvious. And it's the implementation of ideas which makes money.

Nobody is talking about 'inventing' anyway, the original comment was that if the Macbook Air was bad, it wouldn't be copied. It's arguably the chief driver behind the whole ultrabook trend we're on now.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]getreal[/nom]Back by demand is a troll that just bashes Apple in every article here, despite knowing nothing about its products or ever really using them, so you're wasting your time responding to her. This moron outed (and really embarrassed) herself in the GPU accelerated window system patent article a few days ago, so her opinions on Apple are really irrelevant.Best to just ignore her.[/citation]

+1

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]house70[/nom]tried them; still a POS[/citation]

Because.... what happened when you tried to use it?

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]watcha[/nom]There is no equivalent HP laptop when compared to the Macbook Air. In fact, there is no laptop full stop which can match it on all the specs, and equal it or better on price.And by specs, I mean - extremely slim and light, SSD, i5 processor, massive 7 hour battery life.There is no other laptop for the same price or less which combines all of these elements. That's just a fact. There are a couple which match the specs for more money, eg the Sony Vaio Z.[/citation]
The ASUS UX31/UX21 are about the same size and weight as the equivalent MacBook Air, has an SSD, an i5 CPU, about the same battery life, and it's cheaper when we compare it to the same spec MacBook Air. The only thing that is missing is the backlit keyboard.

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]watcha[/nom]Ironic that you say this but the Macbook Air was pretty much the first laptop where the focus was entirely on being ultra thin and light whilst retaining all the performance and battery life.Obviously there has been a downward trend in size in general, but that doesn't take anything away from the fact that Apple was able to engineer a laptop which was thinner than anyone else could. You try to portray the design Apple came up with as simple, yet nobody else was able to match it at the time, and nobody can match it even now for the same price of less. You ask 'how was Apple ever able to come up with it' - I ask you, 'why haven't the competitors been able to come up with it'. And the answer is because you're entirely misguided in assuming that just because an idea is obvious, that the implementation is also obvious. And it's the implementation of ideas which makes money.Nobody is talking about 'inventing' anyway, the original comment was that if the Macbook Air was bad, it wouldn't be copied. It's arguably the chief driver behind the whole ultrabook trend we're on now.[/citation]
How about the Mitsubishi Pedion? It was released in 1998 was thinner than the original macbook air and at the time had very good specs. Of course it's price tag made it a gimmick that no one bought.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]The ASUS UX31/UX21 are about the same size and weight as the equivalent MacBook Air, has an SSD, an i5 CPU, about the same battery life, and it's cheaper when we compare it to the same spec MacBook Air. The only thing that is missing is the backlit keyboard.[/citation]

Incorrect. Battery life is worse.

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph4985/41852.png

Graphics:

http://cdn-static.cnet.co.uk/i/c/blg/cat/laptops/geekbench.jpg

The price isn't much cheaper either:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook-Dual-Core-1-6GHz-Graphics/dp/B005DY7A6U/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1322206787&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Asus-UX21E-KX004V-Notebook-Intel-Webcam/dp/B005XGZ17I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322206810&sr=8-1

In other words, £15 cheaper.

You would typically pay more than £15 to configure a laptop with a backlit keyboard, then we factor in the better screen on the Air, better battery life, and better performance.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]How about the Mitsubishi Pedion? It was released in 1998 was thinner than the original macbook air and at the time had very good specs. Of course it's price tag made it a gimmick that no one bought.[/citation]

Battery life didn't match current definition of Ultrabook.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]The ASUS UX31/UX21 are about the same size and weight as the equivalent MacBook Air, has an SSD, an i5 CPU, about the same battery life, and it's cheaper when we compare it to the same spec MacBook Air. The only thing that is missing is the backlit keyboard.[/citation]

In actual fact, just found that the Macbook air is £768 with free delivery.

http://store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/shop_mac/family/macbook_air/select

So it's much cheaper too 🙂

 

[watcha]

Oh and the touchpad is better on the Air.

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]watcha[/nom]Battery life didn't match current definition of Ultrabook.[/citation]
Of course it didn't match, it was launched in 1998. Battery life of Apple laptops launched in 1998 didn't came close to today laptops. Does this mean that they aren't laptops just because the ones being sold today have a much higher battery life? Please.

 

[watcha]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]Of course it didn't match, it was launched in 1998. Battery life of Apple laptops launched in 1998 didn't came close to today laptops. Does this mean that they aren't laptops just because the ones being sold today have a much higher battery life? Please.[/citation]

No, as I said, it means they aren't ultrabooks.

Learn what Ultrabook actually means.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrabook

'Long battery life – 5 to 8+ hours[8]
Mainstream pricing – around $1,000 USD [9]'

And learn to read original comments, when posting irrelevant drivel:

To quote myself:

'the Macbook Air was pretty much the first laptop where the focus was entirely on being ultra thin and light whilst retaining all the performance and battery life.'

keyword - battery life.

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]Does this mean that they aren't laptops just because the ones being sold today have a much higher battery life? Please.[/citation]

Again, your failure to read surfaces. Did I at any point say that they weren't laptops? Don't be ridiculous. Learn English before you try to logically debate anything.