I have been wanting to share my reasons for why I bought a laptop over a desktop the last time I went shopping for a computer. Earlier this year the HP laptop that I had been using for 6+ years (Curse you Windows Vista!) had reached a point to where it was virtually unusable and so it was time to look for something new. I knew that I wanted to go Apple for my next machine but wasn’t sure what I wanted specifically. Apple offers Macbook Pros & Airs, Mac Minis, & iMacs & they all have their pros & cons. I eventually settled on a 13″ MacBook Air w/ a 128 GB SSD drive, 4 GB of ram, & a 1.7 GHz Intel Core i5 processor. It has turned out to be perfect for my needs. With a few extra accessories I get to enjoy great portability on the go and a desktop experience at my house. Let’s start with the portability. When I leave the house the one thing I nearly always bring with me is my backpack. As a lover of technology I can’t bear to leave it all at home. The MacBook Air makes this easy on a person like me. I used to dread bringing my laptop & would avoid doing it whenever I could. But at just under 3 pounds & at only .68″ thick, I barely even notice the MacBook is in my bag compared to the HP I had previously. With it’s 5 hour plus battery life & the incredible speed of the SSD drive I can get quite a bit done in a short amount of time. It is also remarkably faster than my previous machine. It boots up super fast too, less than 15 seconds in most cases. As far as a laptop is concerned it is at the top of the class in my estimation. But what I have really come to appreciate is what a great desktop machine it can be at home as well. (Disclaimer – this does require some additional equipment.) When I am at home I use my MacBook Air completely different than I use it on the go. I hook up my Thunderbolt to HDMI adapter from my MacBook to my Sony 24″ 1920 x 1080 LED display, as well as connect via Bluetooth my Apple wireless keyboard & magic trackpad. I plug in the power to my MacBook & boom, I have a very capable desktop computer with a higher definition display & almost twice the screen real estate as well. Another advantage to having just one computer is that I don’t have to worry about which files or apps are on which machine, everything is just all together. I’m definitely not saying that this is the right decision for everybody but it has worked out really well for me. There are tradeoffs to having just one machine. If you want a machine that is always running as a media server for your house or need a lot of storage for video or photo editing & portability isn’t a priority than a desktop is probably the right choice for you. But if you are like me and are looking for something that is more than capable for home & on the go use, you could do a lot worse than a MacBook Air or similar Windows ultrabook.