The MacBook Neo just came out. It looks great. Fun colours, low price. It’s objectively better in every way than my M1 MacBook Air.

I could use it for Xcode, but I’m going to have a nicer experience for everything else on an iPad with Magic Keyboard. The non-touch, non-convertible laptop is a dated form factor - it will always feel crippled in basic HCI terms vs an iPad. I feel measurably more comfortable having the ability to between input methods as I use my computer. I don’t want one of these 2010s-era laptops in 2026.

I still can’t justify buying a computer just for Xcode, and that’s immensely frustrating. I’m a coder! I love building tools. So I find myself considering other options more and more:

  • Maybe a Surface or Linux tablet would let me build apps and have a nice form factor. 🤔
  • Compose Multiplatform could let me build apps in Android desktop mode via the Linux subsystem and have them run on iOS too. 🤔

Why would I buy a sucky laptop for coding, when there’s so many innovative options to try out there?

Apple should see this inability to escape macOS and the laptop form factor as a serious problem.

They launched a whole new platform recently. Vision Pro. An AR workstation computer! A Mac-like approach, floating windows.

What did people do with it? They used it as an expensive monitor. For their Mac laptops.

This is a massive waste of potential, and a massive amount of money left on the table.

But to the contrary, I feel like so many ’tech enthusiasts’ are buying into the idea that Apple doesn’t need to innovate - the laptop form factor is the holy grail for ‘getting work done’, ignoring that many professionals’ needs are simply not met by old-style laptops, and not all professionals sit at a desk. Shudder to think we could try making incremental improvements to the status quo.

People say just ‘get a Mac and an iPad’ or even ‘just get a Mac’ as if obviously you should buy the same hardware a second time, or accept compromises.

Almost no-one in the UK outside of tech uses iPhones, or Macs. I wonder why. Are they well-made? Yes. Are they powerful? Yes. Are they making innovative new products that redefine how people use computers? Not by a long shot.

Are they saving me money?

Should normal people care about, and empty their wallet for, powerful and well-made but totally boring commodity products?

Somewhere along the way, we’ve lost ‘Apple’. Now we have a new ‘Apple Computer, Inc’ - big and corporate, and stuck in the past.