I have no idea why they're still so popular. I can only assume people don't think about it rationally. I don't know anyone who drags DVDs around with them, so why drag around the drive?
Frankly, I haven't needed an optical drive in a laptop since booting from USB drives became practical a few years ago. (happy MacBook Air user here)
It'll be interesting to see if Apple fleshes out its Cinema display into a combined docking station and screen using the Thunderbolt port's potential. Add a DVD drive, HDD for Time Machine, USB/Firewire controllers, ExpressCard slot, whatever, using the PCIe channel in the Thunderbolt.
So, honest question, would you not trade the internal CD-Rom for better battery life, more ram, lighter weight or some other tangible advantage?
The only situation where I could imagine an external CD-Rom to get in the way would be for watching DVDs on the go. But afaik even for that most people copy the movie to the harddrive beforehand - to prevent the drive from sucking the battery dry while watching.
Instead of the above trade off, I think I'd buy two machines if needed.
I see the MBP as a laptop to use plugged in a socket and with a lan cable at home, work, a client's place or a library, and only need decent portability and battery life. For all other uses I'd prefer the ipad or the Air(wish I get the $$ for it).
Last night, to rip a DVD from Netflix. Before that, I didn't use it often, to be fair, but I've still used it to install Office, to install OS X, and to burn a DVD with the complete audio _Ulysses_ on it.
Do I use it as often as I did, say, 10 years ago? No, but I can imagine why Apple would leave it.
Comments
unless you sacrifice [...] optical drive space
What they really sacrificed here was the opportunity to make a compelling product. It's 2011, when have you last time used an optical drive?
I have no idea why they're still so popular. I can only assume people don't think about it rationally. I don't know anyone who drags DVDs around with them, so why drag around the drive?
Frankly, I haven't needed an optical drive in a laptop since booting from USB drives became practical a few years ago. (happy MacBook Air user here)
It'll be interesting to see if Apple fleshes out its Cinema display into a combined docking station and screen using the Thunderbolt port's potential. Add a DVD drive, HDD for Time Machine, USB/Firewire controllers, ExpressCard slot, whatever, using the PCIe channel in the Thunderbolt.
It's 2011, when have you last time used an optical drive?
I see where you're standing. But actually I receive two DVDs per week in my mailbox, so last time was today. And I still buy CDs, yes.
I think what you really want is the next iteration of the Air with whatnot is missing from the current model.
So, honest question, would you not trade the internal CD-Rom for better battery life, more ram, lighter weight or some other tangible advantage?
The only situation where I could imagine an external CD-Rom to get in the way would be for watching DVDs on the go. But afaik even for that most people copy the movie to the harddrive beforehand - to prevent the drive from sucking the battery dry while watching.
Instead of the above trade off, I think I'd buy two machines if needed.
I see the MBP as a laptop to use plugged in a socket and with a lan cable at home, work, a client's place or a library, and only need decent portability and battery life. For all other uses I'd prefer the ipad or the Air(wish I get the $$ for it).
Last night, to rip a DVD from Netflix. Before that, I didn't use it often, to be fair, but I've still used it to install Office, to install OS X, and to burn a DVD with the complete audio _Ulysses_ on it.
Do I use it as often as I did, say, 10 years ago? No, but I can imagine why Apple would leave it.
I'm curious why they didn't put in a Blu-Ray reader/writer, if they're going to put in an optical drive at all?
Because it costs more.
When I updated the system to Snow Leopard.
Given the Air's recovery thumbdrive, I think Apple can start sell the next OS X version in thumbdrive form =).
1st thing I did when I receive my Snow Leopard DVD is to RIP it to my firewire HDD.