Thanks to everyone who commented. Following are some of my responses.
Portability is more important than a desktop. We had the desktop, but the way our house is laid out, it is not really conducive to accommodate a desktop station. The old Dell desktop that we had was stored in a closet and brought out to the kitchen table when needed to be used.
My kids have grown up around electronics. They each have an iPad and have had iPod's in the past. I have high-end speakers in my media room and they just know not what are toys and what are not.
Even though they have been lucky to have these items, they still appreciate them. Early on, they have lost items for a long time to help them understand they need to take care of them.
Yes, I couldn't believe it either when he asked me to download a Lua Programming book for him (it was through the Amazon Kindle app).
Actually, the largest age group for Lua programming are 8-14 year olds. Based on some research, it is a "gateway" language to others such as Java, C, etc.
My 9 year old is also programming and wants to be a software designer when he grows up. Once I told him everything that needs computer programming (which is almost everything now a days), he was super excited.
I'm a network engineer, so they have been exposed to various routers and switches and servers laying around the house over the years. I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
Thanks. I was hoping it would be for his needs.
The two reasons I chose the 13" MBA was because his current dying laptop is a 15" and the 13" MBA was only around $50 more than the 11" MBA.
I did a price comparison for each model with as close to the same configuration. Each one I chose the best processor and this was what I came up with:
- 11" MBA = $1927
- 13" MBA = $1977
- 13" MBP = $2177
- 13" rMBP = $2477
- 13" rMBP (maxed) = $3477
- 15" MBP = $3298
- 15" rMBP = $3427
- 15" rMBP (maxed) = $4127