> It's also an indictment of this era of both hardware and software that nobody else produces a more compelling option.

They were way ahead of other laptop makers in basically every way but upgradeability, so they could afford to screw up like 1/2 of all the things about their laptop (all at once, which is pretty crazy), badly, and still be way ahead on the other 1/2, such that switching isn't an unequivocal win.

I often think that Apple fans have Stockholm syndrome. They're constantly repairing their Apple products while simultaneously claiming that Apple stuff is the best-built stuff in its class.

Meanwhile, I still have a Dell Latitude 10+ years old that's chugging along on its original battery (now down to about 30 min battery life), an HP consumer convertible laptop (early precursor to the tablet laptop era) that's almost as old and still chugging along. Keyboards on both still work great and have survived pizza, crumbs, and numerous spills--and both still infinitely more comfortable than the punishingly thin keyboards on their Apple counterparts of the time and since. My Surface Pro 3 has survived being dropped multiple times from heights that have killed my coworkers' iWhatevers.

Oh... and the real kicker? Each of these laptops cost several hundred dollars less than comparable Apple laptops with the same or better specs. Pretty much the only category Apple had them beat was in (subjective) appearance.

I switched relatively late (2011 or so) after about a decade of Windows and Linux laptops. The actually-usable trackpad that didn't make me want to carry a mouse everywhere if I actually wanted to use the computer on the go, the battery life that didn't have me looking for outlets everywhere and carting my power supply all over the place, the screen quality, and all the hardware actually working the way it was supposed to (including all sleep modes, with no fiddling and crashes- or hangs-on-wake pretty much never happening!) were all like entering a new world. "You mean I can just close the lid, unplug, and walk away, without taking other stuff and without babying the sleep process? What is this madness?"

Ugh the trackpad that doesn't work when too hot, the constant fan noise, oddly specific hard drives. I've had to fix Macs. I have an entirely different experience, except the battery life which was generally okay depending on what one was doing. We just had insane WiFi issues, screens failing, and tons and tons of fan noise complaints. It wasn't worse than Windows machines but it certainly wasn't better. The aluminum was nice though because it prevented a few cracked screens.

I hate to plug a Microsoft product as mainly Linux user, but do checkout the surface line.

Tried one at a previous workplace ~1.5 years ago (IE/Edge test machine, convenient for carrying around to show people stuff rather than using a VM on your main machine for all Windows testing). Maybe with Linux or a BSD and if you ignore touch it's tolerable? The touch + Win10 experience was janky and lag-tastic. Battery life so-so, can't imagine that'd improve under a *nix unless you disable or forcibly throttle half the hardware. Maybe the high end machines are better? I'd assume that was the entry level one. I was actually surprised at how bad the touch interface experience (and experience generally) was since I remember everyone raving about them when they came out.

>It really makes one wonder how they missed this one.

Well, people keep on buying the darn things even though they know what they're getting into.

Switching to Windows is easier and less awful than it used to be. The short term pain of switching is still high enough when I have lots of work I need to get done and kids to raise etc... that it has to be hugely compelling vs. sucking it up and overpaying Apple a bit.