Apple, why the optical drive, why not double the battery life?

[thobie]

As everyone can see from ifixit tear up pictures, the historical optical drive takes a lot of space inside a modern Apple notebook.
( http://s2.guide-images.ifixit.com/igi/LSFYwJsYbisy2IIm.large )

Even as an option Apple could allow to drop off the optical drive from it's notebooks, and expand the batterypack to the room which was used by the drive - result as a double or even a triple the batterylife.

Has anyone done this as a diy aftermarket mod? Should be possible to replace the battery with a bigger one, at least if the inside charging logic is willing to charge a bigger batterypack?

Any ideas? At least i haven't used my MacBooks optical drive for a year or two, and would really appreciate a true state-of-the-art mobile computer with a whole day lasting battery life.

 

[rowsdower]

I suppose the MacBook Air is an option. Although I agree that I would prefer a larger battery to the optical drive in my MBP.

 

[djellison]

Even as an option Apple could allow to drop off the optical drive from it's notebooks, .

Buy an MBA.

Steve's OCD on exterior product design eliminates the option of having a swappable bay with optical drive or battery bay.

 

[rowsdower]

Steve's OCD on exterior product design eliminates the option of having a swappable bay with optical drive or battery bay.

It wouldn't have to be swappable. It could be a point-of-sale option.

 

[FOXEO]

There was a time when CDs/DVDs were the only financially viable option to transfer large amounts of data to customers or friends.

However, I have always felt that optical media is annoying, inefficient, and prone to damage. How often do you find a scratched disc inhibits your ability to use it properly? It's common. How about the loud sound of the DVD-ROM in a desktop that sounds like a jet taking off every time you pop in a new disc? Too common. How about the excessive drain on a laptop battery to run the DVD-ROM drive? That's a common issue, too.

Oh, and don't get me started on how slow and inefficient it is. Pop in a USB drive and you're ready to roll almost instantly, reading and writing. Pop in a disc and you have to wait for it to load and start spinning. Then, while it chugs away making noise and draining battery life on laptops, it reads the data. Writing? Oh, that's a process in and of itself that has required a variety of programs and methods, and often ends with unreadable discs, depending on how you try to read them and with what.

Yes sir, I hate optical media. I see how viable it is to put games on it and then buy them in the stores, but after I install from disc I don't want to ever have to use it again (unless I reinstall). I cannot *stand* it how they force you to pop in the disc every time you want to play your legally purchased game.

So I go online, get a crack, and crack my own legal game, just so I can enjoy it without arbitrary and unnecessary disc games. Ridiculous. Oh, and I haven't found a single game that doesn't have a relatively easy and available workaround to the disc in the tray "security feature." I either use a crack, or Daemon Tools for a virtual drive, or a combination of both. Even SecuRom hasn't stopped me from cracking each and every one of my legally purchased games.

So guess what? That means I could just have easily done it to an illegally acquired game.

Yes sir, I hate optical media and believe it should die as quickly as possible. Downloads offer an excellent alternative, as even relatively large files can be downloaded quickly.

 

[NC MacGuy]

Remember all the wailing and gnashing of teeth when the Air was introduced? It wasn't all that long ago.

I'm a firm believer in whacking the optical myself. W. SD & USB drives getting larger and Remote Disk, what's the point?

I removed the optical in my MBP and replaced it with another HDD. Love it and haven't looked back.

The Air has done that but I think if they just made it thin all over and stopped with the wedge look they could get a 2.5" SSD in there and a bigger battery without totally killing the aesthetics.

 

[MTI]

Way back in the "old days" Dell had the Inspiron C300, a Pentium III notebook that didn't have any built in optical or floppy drives, but it was small and light with built in wifi and decent lithium ion battery: most of my older P3 Thinkpads had ultrabay battery pack options that replaced the optical drive with a second battery.

 

[Kristenn]

How about remove the optical drive... make the battery a little bigger and use the space where the battery check light is.. put the battery check light on the other side.. and put 1 or 2 more USB ports on the left side in place of the old battery light? =D

Okay, I might be dreaming. But, also what about software and things that need disks to install? I only use a flash drive on the battery. I never use the disk drive... its like my PSP all over again!

 

[FX120]

Way back in the "old days" Dell had the Inspiron C300, a Pentium III notebook that didn't have any built in optical or floppy drives, but it was small and light with built in wifi and decent lithium ion battery: most of my older P3 Thinkpads had ultrabay battery pack options that replaced the optical drive with a second battery.

Thinkpads still support the slim ultrabay battery. It's about another 20Wh, not a huge gain, but it can make a small difference. I've got one that I used in my T60 kicking around, couldn't tell you where it was however, I've only used it on long international trips to allow swapping of the primary 9-cell batteries without having to power down. I've also got a second hard drive adapter that fits in their as well.

Anyway, I still use my optical drive all the time on my laptops. I watch DVD's while on the road, burn CD's for clients, client hand me CD's with presentations on them so they don't have to worry about getting a thumb drive back afterwards, oh and installing software.

But then again that's why I've always been a big believer in modularity and function in design instead of just bare-bones function and looks. Probably the reason that the last Apple laptop I owned was a Powerbook G3 which also had swappable media bay...

 

[iMacmatician]

I'd take a bigger battery and a second hard drive over an internal optical drive any day.

 

[dmmcintyre3]

I don't even use my optical drive for OS reinstalls anymore, I just have the installer on a partition on the computer I want to use it on

 

[ThirteenXIII]

since the MBA and Mini Server have options to use the external superdrive...itd be nice to have new uMBP with an extended battery and since 2.5drives you could essentially if done right fit two right where the optical bay would be. essentially creating a nice option for high end mbp with raid or a secondary storage unit.
since these are suppose to be supreme portables (and apple's disinterest in porting over bluray and pushing HD Media) i would really never carry any optical media considering i use mainly all external harddrives or remote drives and only use the optical drive to install or make cdrws or import old cds..

so for me atleast i wouldnt miss it internally...but a external option would be perfectly fine.

for a 17" with 8hours plus the little extra space could ultimately make it last a bit longer.

 

[djellison]

Downloads offer an excellent alternative, as even relatively large files can be downloaded quickly.

No they don't. End of argument.

 

[CyberBob859]

Pro feature

If Apple really wanted to differentiate the MacBook Pro line from the MacBook, give us an option to have a second hard drive instead of the Superdrive. It doesn't have to be swappable - just give me the option when I purchase the computer.