M2 MacBook Musings -- July 16, 2022

The new M2 Apple MacBook Air: this is a game changer. This is getting back to Steve Jobs' original vision. Available as of yesterday, July 15, 2022, reviews for the new MacBook Air are coming in fast and furious. This is the biggest update for the MacBook Air in ten years. See this link.

When Jobs came back to Apple, Inc. after being fired some years earlier, he was quite unhappy with the direction Apple had taken. There were simply too many Apple computer choices available. Folks were delaying their purchases because they did not know what they wanted / needed. And, everything seemed to expensive compare to non-Apple products. 

Steve Jobs wanted to streamline the computer division to a "2x2" option:

• desktop
• for the professionals: Mac Pro (the tower)
• for the rest of us: iMac
• laptop
• for the professionals: MacBook Pro
• for the rest of us: MacBook Air

So that's easy. Does one want a desktop or a laptop? If that stumps you, well, what can I say?

Then, are you a professional or are you among "the rest of us"? That's it. Really, really simple. 

The only challenge is the configuration one wants for any particular computer which mostly has to do with memory.

My advice: unless you like spending money, buy the base model, the least expensive configuration, if this is your first Apple. You will know next time you buy an Apple computer what you prefer. 

It is interesting that:

• the MacBook Air got the M2 chip before the MacBook Pro (still with the M1)
  
• the MacBook Air is thinner and lighter than the MacBook Pro
  
• the MacBook Air is significantly less expensive than the MacBook Pro
• except for an ever smaller circle of "pro" users, the MacBook Air meets the needs of almost everyone
• the brand new M2 MacBook Air is no more expensive than its predecessor ten years ago
• the MacBook Air comes loaded with all necessary software at no additional cost (compare with non-Apple computers)
  

See the linked article above. 

My hunch:

• the MacBook Air is going to take away a lot of sales from the MacBook Pro
• Apple is really, really going to have to "up its game" with regard to the MacBook Pro if it wants to compete with the Air.

One last thought: apparently the color schemes have become an incredible success story for Apple. At the end of the day, that might epitomize the Steve Jobs vision more than anything else. 

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The Book Page

Just started this past week: Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death, Nick Lane, c. 2022.

Nick Lane is one of my favorite writers. This book is probably the most "difficult" of the books he has written of which I have read. I do not recommend it unless you are really, really into this "stuff."

The book is about the Krebs cycle. More on that later, perhaps later this week.

Earlier this week I finished:

Ken Kocienda, Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs, c. 2018. Amazon.

It's a deceiving title. I had expected a book on the development of Apple designs. But re-reading the "sub-title: it's about the "process" Steve Jobs used in coming up with designs for Apple products. It's a good read for anyone interested in Apple, but it's a must-read for high school juniors or seniors who want to major in software engineering in college and then work for Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and others in that sector. 

It's a book I would like to read again, but I simply don't have the time. I will mail it to my nephew, a "new" software engineer recently moved to Minneapolis, working as a software engineer. 

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Halloween

In the old days, when I was growing up, Halloween came once a year.

Now, here in Texas, it's year-round. Commonly seen: knee-length crochet Bohemian twists; peacock feather eyelashes; five-inch claws (no hyperbole); and, full-body tattoos. 

And that's just the guys. LOL.