Any PC laptops with the practical styling of the Air?

[ther00kie16]

So I'm starting to think about another laptop. I love the old Air's style, not just the slimness, but rather the curved edges and hidden ports. It makes it much more appealing and feel better. I have a Sony that has stealth bays and such but just can't get over my friend's Air's feel with the curved edges.

So my question is are there any PC laptops out there that take a minimalistic approach and has a curved edge as opposed to a plethora of unsightly and unnecessary (for me) ports on the side? Assuming it has bluetooth, all it'd have to have is video out, a usb and a headphone jack (like the Air).

Basically, I'd like something like the old Air but with more power. And no, the new Air doesn't qualify as its side is now flat and plagued by ports.

 

[fleshconsumed]

I think you're better off asking at some apple-centric forum where people have similar concerns to yours as opposed to "PCs" who think the more ports the better.

 

[CurseTheSky]

Nope. If you like the Macbook Air, get the Macbook Air. Otherwise you'll have to stick with something not as aesthetically pleasing, though quite possibly better functionality wise. The ASUS U / UL series comes to mind.

 

[corkyg]

Practical means useful. A lack of ports lowers useability. Seems like Apple realized this and added ports to the new Air to make it more practical.

If esthetic beauty is more important than practicality, buy the older Macbook Air.

 

[Emulex]

yeah if you like the mac trackpad nothing else will do. even in bootcamp the apple trackpad pwnz *.synaptics

 

[ther00kie16]

Well, by practical, I mean I don't need more than one usb port, esata, s-video, vga, optical, firewire, or other out of date ports. It's not just aesthetics but also easier to handle without ports and a curved edge.
However the Air has limitations: no bluetooth, 2gb ram limit, older cpu, etc.

I was hoping that once ulv i3 and the new Air were announced, somebody would attempt something similar like the with the first gen Air (voodoo envy was it?). But I guess I'll have to wait a bit more.

 

[Zap]

Well, by practical, I mean I don't need more than one usb port, esata, s-video, vga, optical, firewire, or other out of date ports.

You may not, but others may. For instance I would hate to have a notebook that only had one USB port. That would be a huge barrier against my purchasing dollars.

 

[Dice144]

Apple trackpad is the best I have tested out yet. I hate the 13" MPA and air using c2d but OSX with that trackpad is nice. I came home to fix my Moms PC she shipped to me to repair and found myself hating the cheap Acer trackpad.

Even my Asus "gaming" c2d that use to burn my legs trackpad was pretty poor. Apples your finger just glide over.

p.s. not a Apple fanboy I use Win7 on my 6 core beast and Linux on my HTPC AMD quad core.

 

[TheStu]

Apple trackpad is the best I have tested out yet. I hate the 13" MPA and air using c2d but OSX with that trackpad is nice. I came home to fix my Moms PC she shipped to me to repair and found myself hating the cheap Acer trackpad.

Even my Asus "gaming" c2d that use to burn my legs trackpad was pretty poor. Apples your finger just glide over.

p.s. not a Apple fanboy I use Win7 on my 6 core beast and Linux on my HTPC AMD quad core.

It's the glass, it is silky smooth, forever. My old MacBook's trackpad would get messed up after just a few months of use, though a swipe with a Magic Eraser returned it to stock for the most part. My roommate's unibody MBP is over a year old now I think, and the trackpad is still as smooth as the day he got it.

 

[ther00kie16]

I understand most people would rather have more than 1 USB port but for me, it's unnecessary as I'd probably opt for a bluetooth mouse and only use the USB for data transfer. It's all about portability and a bit of style. I mean, how often do you need to connect more than a flash drive and a mouse to your laptop on the go? Not very often, if ever.

 

[fleshconsumed]

I understand most people would rather have more than 1 USB port but for me, it's unnecessary as I'd probably opt for a bluetooth mouse and only use the USB for data transfer. It's all about portability and a bit of style. I mean, how often do you need to connect more than a flash drive and a mouse to your laptop on the go? Not very often, if ever.

More often than you think. 3G/4G wireless modems, external hard drives, mice (there are very few good bluetooth mice out there so many people like me go for 2.4Ghz mice), cameras to transfer photos, external DVD drives (rare, but sometimes necessary), USB->Ethernet dongle because MacBook Air does not have Ethernet port built it (which is pure lunacy IMO). If you ever need to connect more than two of those devices at the same time you're stuck. If you're sure that one USB port is enough for you, that's great, for most everyone that's a major limitation.

 

[corkyg]

. . . how often do you need to connect more than a flash drive and a mouse to your laptop on the go? Not very often, if ever.

All the time! My laptop is my travelling darkroom. On the road simultaneous USB devices used include mouse, media reader/writer, and an external data drive for photo storage. My laptop is a working tool, not a plaything.

 

[CurseTheSky]

I understand most people would rather have more than 1 USB port but for me, it's unnecessary as I'd probably opt for a bluetooth mouse and only use the USB for data transfer. It's all about portability and a bit of style. I mean, how often do you need to connect more than a flash drive and a mouse to your laptop on the go? Not very often, if ever.

Let's see... things I use USB 2.0 for:

- USB flash drive
- USB external hard drive (for quick, convenient transfers)
- VX Nano mouse
- Logitech V20 speakers (to fill a room with sound, when needed)
- Charging my phone (for days when I'm on the phone with customers for hours; who wants to carry a bulky phone AC adapter around?)
- To connect various peripherals for other people to test them
- etc.

If I had only one USB port, I'd go nuts. Sure, I could get a Bluetooth mouse (find me one that's as good as the VX Nano and I'll consider it), but then what happens when I have USB external speakers plugged in to play music for everyone, and someone asks me to check out a file they have on a flash drive?

2x USB ports is the absolute minimum for me, and I'd prefer 3 or more. On another note, eSATA is out of date? For what reasons? USB 3.0 still isn't wide spread enough to make eSATA "old."

 

[ther00kie16]

Ok, this isn't a thread about what you hook up to your laptop. I'm just wondering if there are slim profile pc laptops out there. I'm sure hoping someone will come out with one. Something curved, or at least flush like the voodoo envy (or envy 13), would be great. What were the other companies' answer to the Air? I know Dell's was Adamo but that's not really a workhorse.

And I did google for Air-esque notebooks without any relevant results.

 

[CurseTheSky]

Like I said, nothing else is like the Air. The Envy 13 (and superior Envy 14) are roughly the size of the MacBook Pro 13 / 15, in both width and thickness. The Adamo is thin like the Air, but also has worse specs and mediocre battery life. The ASUS U / UL series are kind of close, but have their shortcomings as well. The Sony Vaio Z is close in some ways, but far more expensive.

If you like the MacBook Air, buy the MacBook Air.

 

[stlcardinals]

Not that I have any experience with this laptop at all, but you might look at the Lenovo IdeaPad U260. It is supposed to come out tomorrow.

http://shop.lenovo.com/us/products/l...260/index.html

 

[ed21x]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PiVOzFPV4I

 

[Eug]

Apple trackpad is the best I have tested out yet.

Yes, yes it is.

However, one thing that really concerns me about the 11.6" Air is the mediocre battery life.

I just bought an Acer 1810TZ 11.6". CPU-wise it's similar, with a 1.3 GHz Pentium SU4100... but it comes with a 63 Watt-hour battery. I can use this thing (light usage) all day long without having to charge it. It's really impressive.

It doesn't look as nice as the Air, but then again it has more ports (arguably ugly, yes), including built-in HDMI and VGA. But then again, you don't need to pay extra and carry around the annoying Apple dongles. I have to, and I'm constantly afraid of losing them. And of course, the battery life is way better than the Air. It is 0.8 lbs more, but I wonder how much of that 0.8 lbs more is due directly to the extra battery cells. To put it another way, if it meant adding 0.4 lbs to the Air to get the extra battery life, I'd want that.

Back to the trackpad... The one on my Acer is OK (Synaptics), but it's just too small and of course it doesn't include the integrated click of the Mac laptops.

I was looking forward to getting say a Core i3 Air in 2011 or something, partially because it runs OS X, and partially because it has a nicer trackpad (and I don't have to remap keys to get around the annoyances of the Acer's bilingual keyboard), but I'm now thinking I won't unless Apple somehow manages to increase the battery life.

I would hope that any PC maker that tries to mimic the Air's styling doesn't go to the extent Apple has, which is so much that it seriously impacts battery life.

 

[vbuggy]

Apple trackpad is the best I have tested out yet.

Some people are too dumb / lazy to

a) compare like for like (i.e. a machine of equal calibre)
b) take a look at the trackpad settings

Admittedly that's most people. Which is probably why it's become 'common knowledge' among the tech-lite-ignoramus types.

I have no particularly strong opinions on the superiority of the Apple trackpad, simply because many others offer equivalent function to all practical intents and purposes (I do not use the useless gimmicky gestures beyond two-finger scroll) when set up for my liking.

As for smoothness, I suffer from very dry skin which results in my fingertips cracking in winter, so there's quite a bit of additional wear on my trackpads - and the most ancient of my SZ's are still perfectly usable. And they won't crack at the drop of a - oh I dunno, a large set of keys, etc.

And personally when thumbing the pad, unlike the 'I type with my tongue out' types who take their hands away from the keyboard to mouse every time, I canwork better with the pad size more commonly to be found on most Windows notebooks. It would be good if we could have the large pad with the control of a good Windows touchpad+driver, but in OS X the speeds which experienced users can handle can only be accessed through Terminal or third party utilities, true to form for the nanny-state computing experience that OS X is - and even then, you can't adjust the acceleration profile to anything particularly usable.


For the OP, I also concur with the comments above that if you want something with the styling of the Air, you should buy an Air - the inability to fit many USB peripherals due to the overhang, the overheating + instability, the utterly shyte wireless performance, the short battery life, the tendency to bend practically on demand, etc notwithstanding.

 

[Winterpool]

Remember that the MacBook Air has something like a real graphics chip (nVidia GeForce 320M), which I'm sure helps to run down the battery a bit more quickly. The difficulty of fitting both an 'Arrandale' cpu and an nVidia graphics chip on the same tiny board has kept Apple from using the Core i3/i5 in their smaller MacBooks.

If the cpu were a touch more powerful, I'd say the trade-off was worth it in terms of gaining the graphics capability of the GeForce chip, but the 1.4 GHz 'Penryn' seems a tad too weak from what Anand has observed. One might also say that in an ultramobile platform like the MacBook Air, Apple should have sacrificed the GeForce for the greater general-purpose capability of 'Arrandale'. Mac OS X does seem to emphasise graphics-processing, and no Mac comes with anything less than the GeForce 320M, but the bigger MacBook Pro models are capable of switching to the integrated 'Arrandale' graphics to save power which suggests they're not too weak for Mac OS.

I too chose the 11.6-inch Acer/Gateway CULV option for the time being, but when the MacBook Air goes 'Arrandale' / 'Sandy Bridge', I will definitely give it another look. There is just no comparison when it comes to Apple's aesthetics.

 

[Eug]

Be careful though. The two 11.6" Airs I checked out in the Apple Store had weak hinges. Pick up the computer and move it, and the screen angle changes. Very irritating. This is not an issue with my MacBook Pro. I wonder if it is due to the zillion people playing with it in-store, but the MBPs in store don't have this issue either, and they've been there longer than the Airs.

But vbuggy, IMO yes Apple's no-button trackpad is by far the best. In fact, I would say I have never come across another trackpad that's even in the same league in terms of practical usage. No comparison. The integrated "no-button" single button makes a humungous difference in functionality. Furthermore, IMO, the two finger click for contextual menus comes makes much more sense than two button trackpads. ie. You get a much bigger trackpad (since there are no separate buttons) and you can click from anywhere on the trackpad, both for left click (1 finger) or right click (2 finger).

I have never used my MacBook Pro in Windows though, so I don't know if the same trackpad functionality in OS X is fully replicated in Windows with the BootCamp drivers.

** Despite my love of the Air's trackpad, this message has been posted from my Penryn netbook.

 

[erikistired]

Well, by practical, I mean I don't need more than one usb port, esata, s-video, vga, optical, firewire, or other out of date ports. It's not just aesthetics but also easier to handle without ports and a curved edge.
However the Air has limitations: no bluetooth, 2gb ram limit, older cpu, etc.

I was hoping that once ulv i3 and the new Air were announced, somebody would attempt something similar like the with the first gen Air (voodoo envy was it?). But I guess I'll have to wait a bit more.

all of the airs have bluetooth.

All the time! My laptop is my travelling darkroom. On the road simultaneous USB devices used include mouse, media reader/writer, and an external data drive for photo storage. My laptop is a working tool, not a plaything.

the air isn't marketed towards someone using it as a travelling (sic) darkroom. it has bluetooth built in, and there are some really nice bluetooth mice out there. you can easily get a usb hub if you really need all of those things plugged in at the same time, however, this laptop isn't for you anyway. chances are you are going to want a higher resolution screen as well.

many folk do work that doesn't require all of that expansion, and obviously lots of people like the size and weight of the air, because it sells. it's not really fair to call it a plaything, because their work is just as important as yours.

 

[Eug]

all of the airs have bluetooth.



the air isn't marketed towards someone using it as a travelling (sic) darkroom. it has bluetooth built in, and there are some really nice bluetooth mice out there. you can easily get a usb hub if you really need all of those things plugged in at the same time, however, this laptop isn't for you anyway. chances are you are going to want a higher resolution screen as well.

many folk do work that doesn't require all of that expansion, and obviously lots of people like the size and weight of the air, because it sells. it's not really fair to call it a plaything, because their work is just as important as yours.

They can be configured with 4 GB as well.

BTW, vendors are selling 11.6" Core i3 laptops with long battery life, 500 GB HD, and 3 GB RAM for under $600 now.

 

[erikistired]

They can be configured with 4 GB as well.

BTW, vendors are selling 11.6" Core i3 laptops with long battery life, 500 GB HD, and 3 GB RAM for under $600 now.

the original was capped at 2gb was it not? soldered onto the board? i believe he's looking for a first gen.

 

[Eug]

Yes. I forgot he was talking about the original one.