If you’ve been following along with my iPad Pro vs MacBook Air dairy (day 7), you’ll know that two weeks ago I declared the iPad Pro as the more exciting device, and the one that I planned on keeping.

The week of Thanksgiving, I packed the MacBook Air and returned it to Apple.  I really tried not to do that though.  I looked for excuse after excuse to keep it.  My 2013 MacBook Pro even went up for sale for a while.  If I could sell it than I might be able to afford keeping it. Ultimately, I just couldn’t justify the cost of something that didn’t greatly improve upon my MacBook Pro.

So I said goodbye and took the MacBook Air back to Apple.

The Next Week

The next week, working from home, I ended up using my MacBook Pro more than I normally would.  I was writing my post in WordPress using Safari and things started to grind to a halt.

I would actually type a sentence and have to wait seconds before the first word I typed began to show up.  My system lagging, so I would click somewhere else to start a new sentence while the last one I wrote was finishing and the sentence would continue typing where I moved the curser.  

I couldn’t tell if my MacBook Pro was punishing me for putting it to the side for a while or what.  Immediately, I started to look for deals on Macs since my MacBook Pro – which had lasted me five years without much of a hiccup- was obviously dying.

Black Friday was just ahead and I knew I’d find some deals there.  If I could find a good enough deal, I would go get the MacBook Air again, since it was cheaper than the new Pros.  I could dip into my iMac savings to cover the cost for now.  

Using the iPad Pro

While I think the iPad Pro is a great device, and one that can replace many people’s standard desktops, I don’t think I can do it yet.  I feel like I still need a Mac  around for when I need to do something with a pointer device.

There are still things that the iPad can’t do that I can do on a Mac.  For example, finding a images URL is near impossible as far as I can tell on the iPad.  But really that’s not something that I think many people would be using an iPad for.

Still, the iPad was much more efficient when I was typing out longer posts.  It never slowed down like the Mac would.  

Still, I couldn’t imagine building some of the pages that I’ve written with my iPad.  Using the Mac to find and build links is just easier.  So things are also still easier to do with a pointer than with a finger.

Deals

Luckily for me, there’s a Micro Center in Houston.  I was able to reserve one of the MacBook Airs for $200 off, which as far as I had found was the best price.  

So for the second time in less than a month, I had a new MacBook Air.  I went through the set up this time by using the migration assistant.  It still took a few hours to get everything transferred over.  iOS still beats pretty much every system I’ve used at moving to a new device.  You can be up and running in minutes on iOS.

So, I quickly tore into the MacBook Air and started to work on it.  I even moved my stickers over from the Pro to the Air.  Once I started to work though, the Air was still lagging.

Turns out that it was the page and the extensions I was running on the page that was causing the slow down.  

I started to kick myself again. I was going to feel guilty for returning another MacBook, but I was going to feel guilty keeping a machine that I really didn’t need to be spending money on right now either.  

Sadly, I packed up the MacBook Air again and broke out the MacBook Pro.  Sure the Air preformed just a tab better on the page, but once again I want to stress that it wasn’t that much better than my 2013 Pro.  I would really rather save the money for a new iMac (hopefully coming next spring) than have a computer that is mildly better than what I have.

Wrap up

We are in an interesting point in computing.  I feel like we are on the brink of a couple of major changes, but we aren’t there just yet.  Yes, my iPad has become more of a workhorse, but it still has a ways to evolve.

Mostly, this post is just about my stupidity and the ability for Apple to make something shiny for me to desire.  

While I’ve taken 2 MacBook Airs back, I still think that it is the best computer for most people.  

So I go back to what I’ve said before about both devices.  The one that can fit your workflow, is the best one for you.  Right now, I still need both to get work done, but I’ve said that before too.