The MacBook Air is morphing into my primary machine

In anticipation of the Air’s arrival, I said the following:

For me, the Air will be a secondary machine — a complement to a blazing-fast Mac Pro — and that, I think, is how it’s being positioned (if not explicitly); indeed, the dearth of ports almost demands the conclusion.

That equation has changed a bit for me since taking delivery of the Air a month and a half ago. I now think that, given enough time, the Air will become my primary, and indeed only computer.

This revelation is informed mostly by how little I’ve used the Mac Pro since the Air came into my life; and when I say “little,” I mean only a handful of times, and even then only for Lightroom and Photoshop. While I don’t think I would like using the current Air for the sometimes complex and processor-intensive stuff I do with those applications (and I’ll admit I haven’t tried), something tells me that two or three revisions from now, the Air will be wholly sufficient for all of my needs (and surely it’s presently adequate for most everyone else).

Relatedly, and unsurprisingly to me, I’ve yet to use any of the available peripheral ports, much less need any of the ports it doesn’t have.

In other news, I picked up a Time Capsule earlier today, and will likely say something about it here within the next few days (if I don’t relegate all of those thoughts to Twitter).

Razer mice, a survey

When it comes to most things electronic, I’m kind of odd in that I have no qualms about buying everything available in a particular product line — until I find the right/best thing — and mice are no exception to this insanity.

With respect to pointing devices, I’ve been using Razer mice since the dawn of time; indeed, since the days of the original Boomslang (which they recently re-released). As far as I know, they produce (and have been producing for years) the best, most advanced mice in the world.

Over the course of the last month, this little “problem” of mine has been in full swing — I bought the Razer Lachesis (their flagship model), DeathAdder, Copperhead, and finally the Diamondback 3G (I was using the original Diamondback before this buying spree began). That’s every mouse Razer currently sells, save the Krait.

Before getting into the very cursory summaries of my experiences with these mice, I have to point out that my opinion of the Lachesis and DeathAdder was colored strongly by Mac OS X’s broken mouse acceleration,¹ which has been a known issue for quite some time; fortunately, it doesn’t seem to affect all mice. Essentially, the acceleration curve is not so much a curve as it is a steep incline that abruptly plateaus.

Even with the tracking speed turned all the way up, the Lachesis and DeathAdder were barely able to traverse my 23” monitor without me having to lift my hand. It’s kind of hard to explain, but basically the mice acted differently depending on how fast I was moving them, and in a weird way it kind of felt like I was exerting force or effort to make them behave how I wanted. It was work.

For example, if I was moving slowly over the tabs in my browser, the pointer would move slowly, but if I moved from those tabs to the bottom corner of my screen, I was likely to hit the “plateau” velocity, after which the pointer would take off. I was constantly fighting the mice, trying to get them to move the way I knew they should. It was an incessant, overriding annoyance.

And now, without further ado, a few completely irrelevant thoughts about each mouse.

Lachesis

The Lachesis did not fit my hand at all. In fact, my hand actually started cramping and throbbing within 10 minutes of using it. I tried to convince myself that I was holding the mouse wrong, but when you start making excuses for something that should be second nature when using a computer, you realize that the problem probably isn’t with you. Moreover, the scroll wheel was recessed so far back (toward your palm), that it required a very uncomfortable motion to use it.

DeathAdder

I generally don’t like mice that aren’t symmetrical and that are designed to support your entire palm, but I figured I’d give the DeathAdder a shot given how long it’s been since I’d used such a mouse. Well, I was immediately reminded why I stopped using them — they’re draining and require a lot of entire-hand movement to control (unlike a “fingertip” mouse, which allows you to cover a greater area without having to lift your wrist). Another big problem for me was the scroll wheel; it was nearly impossible to scroll up without engaging the wheel’s built-in button.

Copperhead

A great mouse, and very similar to the Diamondback [3G], save one annoying design issue involving the side grips. On the Copperhead, the side grips came to a very distinct point throughout their length, and as such, didn’t allow me to get a firm grip on the mouse; I couldn’t figure out if my thumb was supposed to go on top of the rubber, beneath it, or straight to the side.

Diamondback [3G]

As far as I can tell, this mouse is perfect for me and suffers from none of the drawbacks listed above. Oddly, it’s (I think) the cheapest mouse in Razer’s lineup (though the low-end Salmosa may take that prize when it’s released later this year).

Finally, for those wondering, I use the Razer eXactMat mousing surface (surprise!). Yeah, it’s large, but I like it besides.

Publishing makes you think differently

It’s an odd phenomenon, but one I’d bet is shared by others like me, that no matter how many times I read a post before publishing it, I always notice something that should be changed after it’s actually been published. Stranger still is that these must-edits present themselves immediately after the post goes live and are always painfully obvious, even though, before publishing, I may have read over the completed piece 10 times (and this after it’s already gone through myriad iterations).

Curiously, the changes usually have nothing to do with grammar, but rather phrasing, tone, transitions, etc. Frequently, post-posting edits involve the title; I’ll decide on something and like it beforehand, but after seeing it at the top of my index page I’m often compelled to change it, despite the fact that I mimic the look and feel of my index page when previewing in MarsEdit.

The point I’m trying to make is that it seems my brain can’t pick up on these certain things unless I know others are reading the piece. It’s almost as if the knowledge that the world has access to it unlocks some other thought process that empowers me to improve(?) it. Weird, I know.

Working Class Heroes MacBook Air ENVELOPE

Anyone that knows me probably knows that it was love at first sight with the MacBook Air ENVELOPE from Working Class Heroes (did I really just say that?). In fact, when I e-mailed the link to my girlfriend, she laughed because it was “so [me].” Indeed, the sleeve’s design is a perfect conspiration of my stylistic predilections; it’s minimal, svelte, somber, understated, etc. The dark grey wool felt and leather “badge” give it a militaristic quality that I really like.

Though it doesn’t quite feel as substantial as it looks, I think that’s the point — restrained pragmatism. The construction of the sleeve is rather simple — it is, after all, mainly just two pieces of felt sewn together — but, and as expected for $120 (including shipping), it is hand-crafted with a transparent eye toward detail. There’s something very bespoke about it, which I eat up.

The one thing I was particularly worried about from the images, and probably the reason I didn’t order it right away, was scratching the Air on the metal buttons. I think I convinced myself that this maybe wouldn’t be an issue as long as that portion was flexible enough to bend away from the center when loading/unloading the Air, or at least heavy enough to stay splayed at my insistence.

It turns out that it’s neither of those things, yet the buttons don’t touch the computer. It’s kind of hard to explain how this works, and even harder to determine whether it was done on purpose (surely some of the credit must go to the Air’s thinness), but once you begin sliding the Air in/out, the whole thing kind of puffs out (the shape at the opening looking like a compressed circle), and the button pieces move away from the center. Long story short (after I made you read the long story), the buttons are a non-issue.

Finally, for those of you who are thinking about getting one of these, keep in mind that the top portion (i.e., where the buttons are) is about an inch long, which means that the effective width of the laptop is ~14 inches; as such, your sheathed Air may not fit into bags that are specially designed for 13-inch notebooks.