Mac Adorable

Last year I bought a RoseGold 12” MacBook. It was low stakes behavior modification flavored buy. I wanted to see if I could buy something I was interested in that didn’t fit my pragmatic “It must be the durable like a communist engineered produce” decree.

@hotdogladies (Merlin Mann calls it the MacAdorable, which is the best description I’ve heard given to it.

You could also call it one of the greatest in a long line of slightly flawed, but amazing computers that Apple has created over the years. That is a mouthful though and I don’t see it catching on.

“This is the computer you take in the field and on trips with you when you are a light packer, like to move fast and don’t want to feel the computer. *The Macbook* excels at this.”

The history of the retina, 12-inch MacBook is the story of Apple wanting to find a successor to the MacBook Air. Long story short though, the MacBook Air had such a cult following, people just kept buying it. At $999 vs “The MacBook” cost of $1299 people continued to buy the buy the MacBookAir in droves, The MacBook would never reached those heights.

The first problem with The MacBook was the cost. This is the end of the beginning of the story, if you get what I’m saying. In this fortune cookie I am proffering that if the The Macbook was $999 it probably would have been a more close second competitor to the MacBookAir and have achieved greater sales, despite the issues and there were issues. The question to ask though is “What was The Macbook meant to be and who was it meant for? On some level, like the glass shrouded iPhones The Macbook for all intents and purposes looks like a luxurious and delicate device. It was meant to seduce people who thinks computers are ugly and lack charm. The MacBook Air elevated the form, but The Macbook looks and feels impossible.

Were it not for the the issues of the second problem (that we talk about in a sec), The Macbook would have just been begrudgingly known as a computer that if you did have to service it outside of AppleCare it was going to be expensive. The reasons why are clear, to achieve the compact package of The Macbook very clever decisions and materials were chosen and repairability was not the priority.

Going into an Apple store though you were not greeted with good, better, best. The original MacBook was steeped in synthetic material design and was a humble computer.

One of the early affordable portables Mac OS laptops. The Mabook was not a “good” computer, it was a high concept, expensive computer, arguably-it was a “better” laptop with some “best” componetry.

For Apple though, it was going to be The Macbook then the budget MacBook Pro, and then the high end MacBook Pro. In that line up The Macbook made a little more sense, the MacBook Air screwed that up though cause people kept buying it and Apple will keep selling you something if it is popular, even if they want to walk away from it. So no, when you went into the store, The MacBook was priced splurgy, and for anyone who doesn’t Jetset, or isn’t a minimalist, it didn’t present as a practical buy, even though the MacBook Air at $999 was not actually a great computer.

This is a whole other conversation though; how much is a good Apple computer, versus what do computer buyers (parents, businesses, individuals) want to pay. In reality a well configured Apple laptop, regardless of it being the Macbook, Air, or Pro, really started at $1700, before tax, before apple care. And this was the industry standard for PC laptops as well. Yes you could buy some shit cheaper but a stalwart computer was around 2k and had been for years.

The second problem was the famous (mostly only to nerds and white middle classers) butterfly keyboard. The butterfly keyboard is a very shallow, (sometimes called “chicklet”), keyboard known to be prone to interference in operation; brought down by mere crumbs. They had keys falling off and you’d be stuck with white glowing orifices where fallen keys were and you’d sometimes have a letter that repeated or didn’t flow. It was a cluster fuck. If you’re a design company you’ll sometimes make a dude. The butterfly keyboard initially had a high failure rate, they interacted it on multiple times and it got better (The latter The Macbook is actually a pleasing and slightly more reliable keyboard experience, not all agree.

“I knew white people who ate over their Mac laptops, like it was a serving tray. They were totally ok with “living over” their computer. They’d have it a few years, just ruin it and get another. If I knew any black people who did that I’d tell you, but I didn’t. Ok I knew one guy (I wanna give a shout out to -redacted-!) who used his 12” Powerbook as a coaster for a beer and fucked it up. I traded him a 17” lcd for that one.”

It is also important to note that the butterfly keyboard affected every portable Mac, even the MacBook Air had it for two years. As for the comment about crumbs, its not an exaggeration, eating near any Mac with a butterfly keyboard was not smart, and if you could suffer through the oddly condom like experience of a keyboard cover you can dodge a lot of issues. Keyboard covers mostly suck though. This is a deep dive into the history of the butterfly keyboard.

Too good looking

The MacBook was also maybe too delicate and sexy looking. Hear me out. The MacBook oozes luxury and refinement. The MacBook Air is still iconic and mimicked all over, but the The Macbook was Apple making their version of a Japanese businessman laptop in the spirit of the Toshiba Protege series and the smaller Sony Vaio’s of the time. They achieved total success here; it’s just a small market of consumers who were interested in that. The Macbook was considered by many to be the coming out party for Apple applying the industrial design language of the iPhone and the iPad to a high concept laptop. As if they were saying “This is how small and elegant we can go with a super portable computer, which is not a performance powerhouse, but has a spectacular screen, great sound and fairly appealing keyboard.” And they succeeded at that.

When I look at a computer like The Macbook, I am struck by its beauty and then I am weighed down, like a father holding his newborn for the first time, I want to be delicate with it, no… I am compelled to respect it.

Chrome

Look elsewhere friend. Google Chrome is the modern day version of Internet Explorer 6. If you can’t use Safari, Brave, or Firefox-in that order, this isn’t the laptop for you, unless you’re a person disciplined about tab usage and proactive rebooting. I won’t linger here with more unnecessary words.

Repairability

I mean… outside of the butterfly keyboard this is your traditional Apple hardware, very reliable. That said, repairing this computer isn’t impossible, but the industrial design that managed to achieve this beautiful hard is very integrated. Who knew glue and tape would be in laptops and phones.vifixit gives The Macbook a repairability score of 1 out of 10. But if you look at the build out you’ll understand, this is a tiny computer. It is nearly all battery, the mother board is maybe three fingers wide. The miraculous retina screen is so thin. This is a computer that has depreciated to a level that a major repair puts you in the same vicinity of being able to buy a well heeled used model.

Proactiveness Buy one! This is such a great piece of kit. As long as Apple supports it I’d buy it. After Apple stops supporting it I’d still buy it. There is also linux traction

As of early 2023 the last MacOS that supports The Macbook is Ventura. I am personally on Catalina and will eventually do a backup and then try Ventura. I’m just afraid the upgrade will sap my performance.

In 2023 a 1.3ghz Dual-Core Intel Core i5, with 8gb of DDR3 aka MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, 2017) will cost you between $300 to $650 for a decent specimen, you can find these all over. Ebay, Amazon renewed, Backmarket, they’re out there. The advice though is to buy one in “A” grade condition. I went with a 8gb/500gb configuration. 8 is great. I love 16, but this laptop is Bobby D in Heat, “Walk away”, you probably won’t be repairing it if it breaks, for most people that won’t make financial sense unless you hustle to find someone who can do it affordably, a shade tree mechanic as it were. But say you ruin the keyboard or display and aren’t going to fix it. Buy a keyboard and mouse and monitor and make The Macbook a kitchen computer, or a bedroom computer. Or mount it on the wall with a floating keyboard and make it your kiosk computer.

I can’t overstate that this is a worthy computer to own and take a chance on. Think of it as a used high mileage luxury car. You’ll love it, but one day you won’t want to fix it and that’s ok.

Deleted scenes

Depreciated computers are fascinating. My buddy uses his computer as a coaster and I trade him for an lcd screen. We’ll call that $70 in used computer hardware for a tarnished and broken Mac. I then commission a restoration. New aluminum skin, new motherboard and a fresh glowing apple logo. I used that computer for maybe two years. I always hit the performance ceiling, and it was always frustratingly slow and, surprisingly dense, but also small, delicate but not. So many damned contradictions. I know I was in it at least $350, if I’m to be true with myself the number is more like $415. It doesn’t stop there though. I eventually went on to trade it to a buddy, in turn he cobbled together a Canondale Caad 8 from Ebay for me. I have that bike today, it is amazing. Four years later I traded him a 17” lcd for the 12” PowerBook and it is back in the collection. For him this 12” let him wet his feet with Apple. He went on to get a slow Mac mini for his old lady, and then he eventually got something speedy, even a slow Mac is better than a zippy PC in some circumstances.*

_College kids and non programmer / non graphic design corporate employees were issued MacBook Airs. Programmers and graphics people got MacBook Pros, iMac Pro’s and the occasional desktop machine. A few executives in the office had enough juice to break company hardware guidelines to get_The Macbook_._

This style of laptops were called “subnotebooks” during the Windows 2000 to Windows XP era. They eventually were relabeled as ultraportables which really translated to “If you want a pc that looks like a knockoff MacBook AIr you’re in the right place.

Subnotebooks never lit the American market on fire. They were for a breed of business men (no shade intended,) who weren’t really overheating the processor. If you imagine a single tasking boomer, mid fifties, travels a lot. Check email, Looks at spreadsheets, but doesn’t really work on spreadsheets, if you get my drift. Again, just a guy who was able to become successful enough to get the IT department to get him a tiny useless laptop, that was always slow, but just so damn tiny. And he always wanted a new one cause the current one “I love it but its really slow…”

_And that’s the real problem with any computer._The Macbook_was accused of being dog slow, but the reality is it is still a fairly brisk computer. You can edit 1080 video, even 4k if you want and you have time. You can run photoshop on it, but it isn’t a workstation. This is the computer you take in the field and on trips with you when you are a light packer, like to move fast and don’t want to feel the computer._The Macbook_excels at this._

Part of me wants to buy a second laptop and I lean in two directions. Do i get one that is cheap enough that I’m comfortable treating it like a computer and not delicately either, yazzzz please, crumbs and fuckery is what I’m proffering to you. Or do I get the most maxed out model, and it becomes my precious and this very beautiful laptop I’m typing on now becomes my beater, again the crumbs and fuckery would happen on this computer then. This isn’t a computer for children and teens, it is a splurge for someone who just wants to have this very pleasing and decadent experience with a computer. This computer is like going on a date with someone way outside your league.