February 27, 2008
5 years = A laptop's lifetime

Just over five years ago, we bought a new laptop.

Today, Mira was sitting in the living room and booted it up. She said, "Dad, the screens messed up."

Yup, the screen is messed up. The LCD screen is cracked and there's no reasonable fix for this.

Five years is a long time for a laptop. I covered it with stickers and took it many places. The touchpad buttons broke 20 days after the warranty expired and the battery only lasts 30 minutes these days. But, even after five years, it still was good for surfing the net or watching a DVD in the house.

What to do next? MacBook Air with Vista on it? ;)

Posted by michael at February 27, 2008 08:56 PM



Comments

I have a Macbook after being a Windows only person since the early 90's, and I love it. I thought I would be using both Mac OS X and Windows on it, but I pretty much just stay in OS X land. It just works. Now I have to save up for a Mac desktop.

Posted by: Skippy [] on February 27, 2008 9:37 PM

Lenovo X300 w/ Ubuntu. :)

Posted by: alan [http://www.geekandproud.net/] on February 27, 2008 9:56 PM

Get a MacBook! Get a MacBook! Get a MacBook!
Get a MacBook! Get a MacBook! Get a MacBook!
That all I have to say on the subject!!!

Posted by: Mom [http://momonthealert.com] on February 27, 2008 11:45 PM

My Power book Turns 5 next month.
I have never had a piece of computer gear in daily use last nearly that long. It is remarkable.

I think you can do better than the MacBook Air, especially as an around-the-house internet appliance. The air seems fragile and under-powered. (though multi-touch is really really cool.)

Posted by: jmv [http://www.octopushat.wordpress.com] on February 28, 2008 10:19 AM

Mike, I give you permission to buy any new Mac laptop and just run OS X on it. I have Parallels with XP installed on my MacBook Pro and I rarely ever launch it. Whenever I get into a hard drive space crunch, the first thing I think about purging is Parallels and the XP disk. If I really need Windows (and never Vista, btw), I just fire up my XP tower and do my thing. Mostly that machine is off now except for the occasionally DVD Rip or game of HL2.

Posted by: Randy [http://6foot7.blogspot.com] on February 28, 2008 11:19 AM

Eh MacBook Air whatever, get an OLPC.

Posted by: Keith [http://overshadowed.com] on February 28, 2008 1:08 PM

I'd say 5 years is pretty good. My last one I got 2 out of it. The dell one I got I had to replace the entire mobo. Thankfully it was covered. I can't imagine getting less than 5 out of my MacBookPro.

bvllets

Posted by: Comedy Blog [http://www.wtfis.com] on February 28, 2008 3:14 PM

Hey I would not get a MAC. I used to a MAC user you can't get software plus they are twice as much money. And thats way to expensive for itunes and to get on the internet

Posted by: Ken [] on February 29, 2008 6:05 AM

A crack in the perfect shape of a small child's bottom? Is is evidence or just coincidence? You be the judge.

Posted by: jho [] on February 29, 2008 3:04 PM

Eh you've been wanting to get a new one for a while anyway I'm sure.

Posted by: Little Kenny [http://www.littlekenny.com] on February 29, 2008 10:16 PM

Buy a MacBook. Buy the extended warranty. Enjoy.
MacBook Airs look very cool, but you have kids. Kids are kids. Not a good mix.

Posted by: Matt [] on March 1, 2008 12:25 PM

Buy a MacBook. Buy the extended warranty. Enjoy.
MacBook Airs look very cool, but you have kids. Kids are kids. Not a good mix.

Posted by: Matt [] on March 1, 2008 12:26 PM
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