STILL FLYING
Most people would get new laptops every two or three years. Mostly, it’s because modern laptops break easily and repairs tend to cost a lot more than buying a new one. Even then, there still are laptops that can withstand the test of time. A prime example is the MacBook Air, which is what I’m using right now.
What I have is a 2013 model, which makes it five years old already. I’ve been using it since the second half of my college days but it still works like a charm. Startup is very fast – in less than one minute, I can get started working right away. That’s a full bootup, not starting from hibernation or standby. The Air’s solid-state drive (SSD), a vast improvement over the traditional spinning hard drive, allows it to blaze through tasks this quickly. That, coupled with its Intel Core i5 processor and 4GB of RAM, contributes to the Air’s excellent performance.
Other laptops slow down considerably as they age. Programs would take almost forever to open, the computer would take several minutes to boot up, and the overall experience with the device becomes very sluggish. However, the MacBook Air does not seem to have these problems. Based on my experience, it works just as well as when I first used it half a decade ago.
The Macintosh operating system makes the user experience even better. Macs are designed with user friendliness as a top priority, thus the software is not complicated at all. Even adjusting some settings does not require more than a few clicks.
This MacBook Air does not come without its issues though. As it is chugging along steadily for five years already, the battery is not at its peak. It used to last almost an entire workday; now, it can only power the laptop for less than five hours. The aluminum exterior, owing to natural wear, is no longer in pristine shape. Now, there are lots of noticeable spots and scratches around it.
Those problems aside, though, the laptop is still fully functional, and it gets me through all my work every single day reliably. It’s also very light and portable enough to take with me anywhere I go. It doesn’t strain my back as a typical heavier laptop would.
To anyone eyeing an Apple laptop and deciding which one to get, I highly recommend the older MacBook Air models. They may be outdated by today’s standards, but they still work extremely well.