MacBook Air?

[KnottyGuy]

I looked at one the other day. A very sweet lil machine. It's a lotta money...

Will it last significantly longer than a Windows machine? Typically a Windows machines life is 5 years.


Knotty

 

[GGJstudios]

Will it last significantly longer than a Windows machine?

It completely depends on how well you take care of it. Many keep their Macs 5-7 years or more.

 

[Mrbobb]

If by last, you mean USABLE, and not necessarily being more sturdy...

They both last the same. Neither are readily scalable, and the folks making software will throw us more features we don't use, take up more space on our hard drives, or SSD, then of course increasingly more complex webpages, have you notice how many videos they have now? will surely obsolete ANY laptop you may buy.

Modern electronics are no longer like the olden days where you can expect to keep your Trinitron for 20 years.

 

[motrek]

If by last, you mean USABLE, and not necessarily being more sturdy...

They both last the same. Neither are readily scalable, and the folks making software will throw us more features we don't use, take up more space on our hard drives, or SSD, then of course increasingly more complex webpages, have you notice how many videos they have now? will surely obsolete ANY laptop you may buy.

Modern electronics are no longer like the olden days where you can expect to keep your Trinitron for 20 years.

Modern electronics are no longer like the olden days of 10 years ago either, where every year we got double the processor speed and RAM and hard drive space, and all of that was only barely able to keep up with cutting-edge software.

Processors haven't gotten a huge amount faster in the last ~4 years, RAM has only doubled in the last ~5 years, "hard drive" space has decreased significantly due to SSDs, and software in some cases is getting smaller (so companies can save on bandwidth costs) and faster.

I expect that any laptop purchased new today will be relatively current in 5 years, and far away from obsolete.

 

[Variant]

I'm on a 2011 MBA and the machine works perfect for all my day-to-day use, including web surfing, working on vector graphics, and word processing. My 2007 MBP just kicked the can this week. It was definitely slow, but was alright for surfing.

 

[Mac-lover3]

Well I have a MacBook Air from 2011 with 4GB RAM and 128 GB SSD and I have to say it is great laptop it use it everyday at home, at school, while traveling. And after all this time it's still very snappy and runs all the software I have to run very well (Word, Safari, iTunes, iMovie (long projects), watching movies (via thunderbolt), editing photos (with Aperture/Photos).

 

[gmintz09]

I've owned laptops that have run both Windows and OS X and I have personally seen Macs run much more smoothly long-term. After a couple years of owning a Windows laptop, it seems to slow down significantly and get bogged down with all kinds of things. Sure, it still works, but I wouldn't call it enjoyable. On the flipside, the experience I've had thus far with a Mac is much more positive. Runs just as well as the day I bought it. No noticeable lag or depletion in battery life (which is a far cry from any Windows machine I've owned in the past). So while both Windows machines and Macs might last around the same amount of time (depending on how you take care of them), the OS X experience is probably less frustrating and more consistent in the long run. At least, that is my opinion.

 

[pauljbax]

I am still using my MBP from 2011 and with a SSD drive it runs awesome.

 

[2ilent8cho]

last decade i was getting a new Windows laptop almost every year not because i wanted one, but because they were terrible and i had to replace. Fans would start being on all the time, over heat, battery would start to last 1 hour if lucky, freezing or instantly turning them selves off, all Acer, HP or Asus junk. My 2012 Air is still used almost every day, the battery is still great and performance wise , still as nippy as the day i bought it, the longest i have ever had a laptop in constant use. Seriously its the best laptop i ever bought, just go get an Air.

 

[Boyd01]

My 2008 MBP still runs fine although the battery went completely dead in 2014. It is easily removed and replaced, but just wouldn't be worth it. My 2013 MBA is 5 times faster at ripping a DVD in Handbrake for example, not to mention the substantial size and weight difference and much, much longer battery run time.

I still have my 2003 PowerBook G4 and fired it up last winter to use some very old software in "Classic" mode. Was having a lot of nostalgic fun playing with it, was actually surprised by how responsive it was. Stepped out of the room for a few minutes and the screen was dark when I came back. After that, all I could get was the "chimes of death" at startup, indicating some sort of RAM problem. Tried everything I could find with some Googling, but finally concluded it was just dead and not worth messing with any more. But 13 years isn't bad.

 

[jeddouglas]

Go for it. I got a 13" MBA 256GB a couple of weeks ago and am loving it.