"less battery is possible without less battery runtime" -> doesn't work with CPU bound software like Hangouts or external appliances that need to be powered. Fact is the battery is much smaller.

- Better display: granted

- Better sound: Nope, there's no substitute for bass response, all of which gets better the larger the speaker and enclosure is

- Lighter: Yes. This is a professional's priority number 2749 though.

- Structural engineering: It's half as thin. If you know mechanics, you'd need a material double as tough in order to make up for the loss in structural stability. Not gonna happen, maybe their most recent super duper aluminum alloy is 20-30% tougher. Overall, a thinner structure is ALWAYS more brittle.

All in all, OP is completely right: This simply isn't a professional machine.

I use my laptop in a professional capacity and weight is a huge factor for me. I carry my laptop everywhere.

Incremental yearly changes in weight have generally not been that impressive but in aggregate the difference is huge. Go pick up a 10-year-old laptop and you'll probably agree.

> Structural engineering: It's half as thin. If you know mechanics, you'd need a material double as tough in order to make up for the loss in structural stability.

I'm no mechanical engineer, but I don't believe that's correct. There are a number of factors that impact the structural stability of an item. The internal structure has a huge impact, which is why I-beams exist.

It's also not as if the space saved is the result of just milling out half of the original aluminum. The actual metal case is probably the same thickness or close.

So a lightweight/reasonable performance Macbook line and a little heavier/high performance Macbook Pro makes so much more sense.

Forever people have said that they would prefer a heavier laptop with a bigger battery and for better or worse, companies have generally ignored that. I don't think it's really a "pro" issue either way.

But basically, for a laptop to be half the thickness and equivalently strong it will need the structure to be twice as heavy, as the skins and webbing need to be twice as thick. That leaves even less room for battery, quiet fans and replaceable components, a high price to pay for something which is labeled "Pro".

It's far from clear that this is 'simple'.

I was going to rebut this statement as useless (my instincts were telling me that it should be under 10% of the total built-in battery), then I did the math. Your typical high capacity charging pack providing 15,000 mAh actually has almost double the capacity of a built in battery for the 13" MBP.

15,000 mAh * 5V / 1000 = 75 watt-hours

Compared to ~50 watt-hours for the MBP

I'll say that again. A sub $50 battery pack provides almost double the battery life of the one built into a $1,500 laptop.

It would be less, given the (dis)charging efficiency. Quick look at search results suggests about 80% (so ~60Wh), which is still nice for that price though.