Commentary--We are Tiring of Waiting for an Apple Ultraportable

What, you say? Apple makes the terrific 12" PowerBook G4, doesn't it. Yes, we know that and we agree that it is terrific and its speed at 1.33 GHz is finally up to par for a PowerBook. But it has one huge, serious failing and one modest one that keeps us from using it where we need an ultra light-weight portable laptop. More on that in a minute but let me assure you that we are in no way thinking about giving up on our main traveling companion, the fabulous 17" PowerBook G4. Why, we even use it more than our desktop PowerMac G5 when we are working around Macs Only!'s global HQ, now located permanently in sunny, and always ice-free, San Diego, CA.

So why do we need another laptop? Well, we attend a lot of all-day but partially relevant meetings and conferences, travel through a lot of airports and sit through a lot of long conference calls in odd places. We need to be able to take notes and to get on the web to keep up with our email that numbers in the hundreds per day and maybe do a little interesting surfing for information and, quite frankly, to keep from being bored stiff. We need a small, light and unobtrusive laptop with a PC card slot.

The PC card slot is essential for wireless broadband internet (see Sprint or Verizon) in places where there is still no WiFi or the host has it set up to prevent access except via a long and tedious confab with one of their IT mavens or it fails to work with our PowerBook due to software login issues. The latter happens only occasionally but almost always when we encouter ATT as the service in certain airports. Wireless broadband internet is fairly common now and it is even exceeding the speed of WiFi these days. Yes, we can go through our GSM cell phone using Bluetooth and GPRS but that service has proven to be disappointingly slow except for POP text email, which is getting pretty rare these days.

Also, many times our 17" PowerBook is too obtrusive as the seating in meetings or conferences is too close. A 15" PowerBook is also too obtrusive in those situations. A 12" PowerBook would fill the bill but guess what? Through several generations of this little gem Apple has continued to fail to include a PC card slot. We find it hard to believe that Apple continues to cripple this otherwise excellent road warrior by leaving off a PC card slot. There are USB PC card adapters but no Mac OS X drivers. Technology is changing rapidly, Apple! Relying on WiFi and cell phones does not get the job any longer.

Besides, at 4.6 pounds, the 12" Powerbook G4 is too heavy and too large. We'd probably have to give up toting our 17" PowerBook G4 on trips which we are not about to do.

What we need is something really thin and light and small. It should weigh no more than 2 pounds and preferably less. It should have a footprint no larger than a 10" screen, i.e. smaller than a sheet of paper. And it should be very thin (less than an inch) so it can easily fit into the bag with our 17" Powerbook G4. Guess what? There are at least two such laptops in the Wintel world and both have PC card slots.

Our favorite, at 1.73 pounds, is the Sony Vaio x505. A slightly heavier U.S. model at 1.85 pounds is now available but at $3,000, more or less, it's a very expensive email reader/surfer. And it doesn't have a trackpad. Only slightly behind the Sony at 2 pounds is the Sharp Actius MM20. The Actius sells for a more reasonable $1,400 and has a trackpad.

Of course, both Wintels are severely handicapped with the Windows XP operating system. But how long can we wait?