My launch day iPhone X that I gave to a relative still looks the same, over 7 years later
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OLED MacBook Air Could Be Delayed Beyond 2027, Claims Report
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Fair, but you don't pick the minimal needs of a group regarding port variety and cut off those who really wanted a thin and light but would be now left hamstrung, especially when ports cannot be added later and modern machines last more than a decade. IMO you give a full complement of port variety as to not require dongles, to enable those who love thin and light Mac laptops and desire to never need dongles, to love the Mac they wanted to buy to begin with and not feel forced up to MBP or over to Windows.
MBP should be a major step up, not in terms of basic port practicality, but niceness / intensity / power. So while on MBP you'd get those same shaped ports for that compatibility across the ecosystem (between Mac laptops) you'd get an additional one and they'd all be the faster Thunderbolt 5 (should be no base M4 chip option for a "Pro" machine). Like how both lines (MBA/MBP) get screens and speakers, but on MBP they are much better. Same goes for RAM, SSD size and graphics... both have them; MBP better.
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I agree that MBP should be a higher spec. I just don’t agree that MBA needs the ports, of which some may be near useless in 10 years. For example. A basic SD card slot being useless from 5 years ago as cameras go to SDHC, SDXC, Micro SD and CF Fast. A USB C (3.1) covers all of these with speed and functionality.
The card should be backwards compatible and kept up with the latest spec, for sure. The reason why these cards in the case of SD Cards are popular is because they are more handy than any cable. It's like a little cable inside the camera that you always have. Many people find cables annoying as an alternative to SD Card.
The issue with PC laptops is that there are a wide variety for multiple manufacturers, some are great and will last as long as you want, while other are absolutely garbage.
My experience from when I was working, is the company would get PCs from a different manufacturer each year. They buy a 100's of units in multiple configurations, for simple laptops to full-on workstations. Inevitability some years HP got the contract, and their machines (specifically, high performance laptops, light weight executive laptop, and high end workstations) were a POS. Huge infant mortality issues (broken out of the box or failed within 2 weeks), easily 1/4 of the machines. They where always replaced under warranty, but is was still a huge pain and logistic nightmare. Large number of failure continued for a year, until the remaining units seem to to settle down and be reliable. This was just HP way of doing business, cheaper to send out cheap junk and replace it instead of sending out quality hardware to begin with. This was not a one year occurrence, every few years HP would win the annual contract again and the pattern was repeated. And the was NOT as generic PC issue, these problem were never an issue when Dell or Lenovo supplied computers, only HP. The company I was working for didn't care, it was always low-bid and everything was fix under warranty. Of course all of us figured this out and avoided ordering new hardware if it was an "HP year", if it was feasible. It was better to live with dead lines on the display, display with dim areas, flaky keyboard, broken ports, noisy fans, etc, for a year.
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2 different perspectives. I find versatility and a few more dongles more useful than convenience of having a port that could be outdated during the useful active life of the computer.
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True, but having two Thunderbolt ports provides that versatility. HDMI and SD Card would be additional ports for users that like convenience.