Top Reasons to Buy an Ultrabook or Macbook

The trend has been there. Laptops were getting thinner and thinner as consumers demanded products which are more lightweight and could comfortably fit in most of our bags .However consumers did not want machines that compromised performance over convenience, something two companies, Intel and Apple were able to achieve.

Intel developed the Ultrabook while Apple developed the Macbook and later the Macbook Air. These types of laptops can be considered to be notebooks, only slightly larger in size, thus named subnotebooks. Unlike Laptops, ultrabooks and the Macbook air do not have optical disk drives like the CD/DVD/Blu-ray disk drives and usually have only one Ethernet port and in some cases ,none. These features are removed to make the ultrabook and the Macbook as thin as possible. However, the performance of these subnotebooks is the same as of any laptop with most ultrabooks and Macbooks operating with i5 and i7 intel processors and with RAM reaching a maximum of 8GB just like most laptops. Ultrabooks and Macbooks differ in the sense that ultrabooks are manufactured by various manufacturers under the patent of Intel. The most popular ultrabooks are those of Samsung, Asus, Toshiba and Sony. Macbooks, now replaced by the Macbook Air are manufactured by Apple Inc. Although both machines run on Intel processors, the Ultrabook run on Windows while the Macbook use Linux.

There are several reasons why one may consider buying an ultrabook or a Macbook air:

Portability - This is probably the reason why they were invented in the first place. While laptops can be carried around in a suitcase, you can't toss most of the current laptops into your bag and even if you can, you only make the bag 6 to 7 pounds heavier. Most ultrabooks and Macbooks are only 3 pounds in weight and thin enough to fit in any bag.

Long Battery life - Most ultrabooks and Macbooks have at least 4 to 5 hours of battery life maxing out at 9 hours which is similar to the current battery life of most laptops. This is because today’s much smaller processors do not suck as much juice as previous versions.

Several concerns have been brought forward on whether ultrabooks and Macbooks can operate as fast as Laptops. This mainly depends on the kind of work being performed. For those into high end gaming, complex graphic design and editing movie videos, ultrabooks may not be up to par but for everything else, the ultrabook and Macbook will perform just as well as any laptop.

The absence of the CD/DVD drive is usually an upset to many. However, most of what we used to watch on DVD can now be streamed or downloaded from the internet and the storage of information has long since shifted to flash drives. However, for those who still love watching DVDs or Blu-ray Disks, there are external CD/DVD drives hat are thin and easy to carry around with your ultrabook or Macbook without adding any bulkiness to the subnotebook. As for the Ethernet port, most ultrabooks do come with a single Ethernet port, however if you intend to buy one which doesn't have one ensure that there is reliable Wifi in your area. An Ethernet port however other important functions other than cable internet thus it is usually recommended that one buys an ultrabook that has an Ethernet port.

Overall, if you want the speed and performance of a laptop without the bulkiness that comes with it, an ultrabook or a Macbook is a viable investment.


Harvey Norman Singapore offers great deals on Apple Macbook Pro and Apple Macbook Air models in 11-, 13-, and 15-inch sizes. They also offer a wide range of ultrabook models from top brands like Acer, Toshiba, Lenovo, Samsung, Asus, Sony, and HP.