You are wrong. I generally buy a new laptop every 3 years. I tend to buy a bit up the curve and get 1.5 years where the beast is fast, one year where the beast is "adequate" and half a year where the beast is "slow". To me, it is not about performance in laptops. It is about keyboard stability, robustness and weight. I have a blindingly fast desktop-computer and my laptop is for when I am not at home or when I want to hack code in the recliner. I don't need prime performance for that.

i can safely say that you, seeking not performance but "keybaord stability" in a laptop, are a market of one. its so sad to see the fanbois try to justify their iSlavery, almost like a battered wife telling the judge she reaaaallyyyy stiiiill loooooves hiiiim.

The advice I consistently give people when buying laptops is: Remember that you can't change the hardware. If you hate a trackpad, you will be stuck with it. If you hate the keyboard: though luck. Too slow a CPU? oh god, no chance in hell you'll be able to change it.

I write code and analyze problems for a living. Hence, my need for a fast CPU is not that important as I spend most of the time in emacs and use languages that can compile fast. Do we happen to be a minority? Perhaps so. Had I been a media executive, then my priorities would probably not be on the keyboard at all but on how much RAM i could cram into the beast.

Apple is selling a brand as much as they are selling a laptop and an OS. Notice that the marketing focuses on what you can do with an apple mac. They know how much you are buying an identity for your money in addition to a computer. The Apple marketing is primary recruitment unit for the "fanbois" you mention because what they can do with the Macs matter to them.

If you look at Lenovo's sales pitches, you will see an entirely different focus as they are targeting a different user base.

And for the record:

  jlouis@succubus:~$ uname -a
  Linux succubus 2.6.27-4-generic #1 SMP Wed Sep 24 01:30:51 UTC 2008 i686 GNU/Linux

  jlouis@succubus:~$ dmesg | grep thinkpad_acpi | grep model
  [   26.622322] thinkpad_acpi: IBM ThinkPad X40, model 23716EG

Do you like coming into Apple threads and trolling? Because it's really got no purpose, especially on a site like this.

I also look for a good keyboard in a laptop before I look at most other factors. This has kept me with Thinkpads until recently, and now I'm on a Fujitsu T2010.