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The Road Warrior Mailbag And From The Archive - September 8, 2008

Laptop Desk Futura And 17" Laptop
From The Archive - The Environmental Irresponsibility Of Non-upgradable Computers




Laptop Desk Futura And 17" Laptop

From Arun

Re: your article on the Futura...

I see that you tried the Futura with a 17 inch laptop in the unfolded laptop mode. How does it fare in the folded desk-top mode? Is it really unstable or is it OK?

- Arun

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Hi Arun;

It's a bit of a gray area, so to speak. I wouldn't call it "really unstable," but the 17" PowerBook does overhang the folded Futura by about two inches on either side at the stand's widest point. For elevating the 17-incher to use with an external keyboard and mouse, I wouldn't anticipate any problem.

For hands-on typing and pointing, you might find stability an issue. Depends on how forceful your tactile interactivity with the machine is.

Charles

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From The Archive - The Environmental Irresponsibility Of Non-upgradable Computers

On March 15, 2004, I posted this The Road Warrior column, lamenting the "throwaway" nature of personal computers. Unhappily, more than four years later, while there have been some advances in making computers more environmentally-friendly, the sorry fact remains that a three-year-old personal computer is pretty much obsolete for serious users, and Apple's notebooks are in most respects less amenable to upgrading than they ever were. I'm still getting great, workhorse service from a somewhat hotrodded 2000 Pismo PowerBook for light to moderate duty use, but the Pismo was the last really seriously upgradable Apple 'Book. What we need is new laptop designs as upgradable as the Pismo, although Apple seems to be oriented in the opposite direction from that. As I concluded in the article republished below, C'mon Apple; you can do better.

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The Environmental Irresponsibility Of Non-upgradable Computers [Originally published March 15, 2004]

There is a prodigal wastefulness and environmental irresponsibility in building computers that have a useful primary service life of only two or three years due to the fact that they can be upgraded.

A new study by the <a href="http://www.unu.edu/">United Nations University in Tokyo</a> published last week in a book entitled <a href="http://www.unu.edu/zef/publications.html">Computers and the Environment</a>, has found that fuels used to make one desktop computer weigh over 240 kilograms, some 10 times the weight of the computer itself. This is very high compared to many other goods: For an automobile or refrigerator, for example, the weight of fossil fuels used for production is roughly equal to their weights. Also, substantial quantities of chemicals (22 kg), and water (1,500 kg) are used. The environmental impacts associated with using fossil fuels (e.g. climate change), chemicals (e.g. possible health effects on microchip production workers) and water (e.g. scarcity in some areas) are significant and deserve attention.

From this the editors draw the logical conclusion that product life should be extended as long as possible, making incremental upgrades more environmentally friendly than the 'toss it to the curb' mentality adopted by many shoppers."

Last week <a href="http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/03/05/BAGKI5ERJ61.DTL">The San Francisco Chronicle's Jane Kay reported</a> that "[California] State officials have designated discarded laptops and flat-screen computer monitors as 'hazardous waste' and are asking consumers to drop off unwanted products at proper recycling centers and not toss them in the trash.

"New state tests show that laptop computers and computer monitors with liquid crystal display, or LCD, screens contain copper and lead in the circuitry at levels that exceed regulatory limits.

"These products are barred from regular landfills and require special dismantling for reuse, according to officials at the state Department of Toxic Substances Control."

According to Computers and the Environment, "The average desktop PC and 17-inch CRT monitor takes an SUV-sized 1.8 tons of water, fossil fuels and chemicals to make,"

"As for energy use, a computer's lifetime energy impact is about the same as a refrigerator.

"Making a 2-gram memory chip requires 1.3 kilograms (1,300 grams) of fossil fuels and materials."

Nor is recycling the answer. Recycling managed by a monopolist concern, whose main interest is meeting simple recycling targets for a fixed fee, could result in an expensive system with relatively small environmental benefit. A multilateral concern aimed at maximizing profit and reuse across the life cycle presents a more promising picture. However, at best only metals are usually recovered while the high-tech components and plastics that take so much energy to make are destroyed. On the other hand, reselling or upgrading a computer results in five to 20 times greater energy savings than recycling.

"Extending the life of a computer is the most effective way to reduce its environmental impact," comments Computers and the Environment, co-editor Eric Williams.

See: Ruediger Kuehr and Eric Williams (eds.): Computers and the Environment. Understanding and Managing their Impacts, in: Eco-Efficiency in Industry and Science Series (ECOE 14), Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dodrecht/NL, October 2003, 300 pages
http://www.unu.edu/zef/publications.html

More on these topics at:
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,62562,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_6
and
http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/study_finds_upgrades_better_for_environment.php

Apple likes to profile itself as a socially and environmentally aware and responsible corporate citizen, but the last Apple laptop that could be processor upgraded was the Pismo PowerBook G3, and even with that machine Apple went out of their way to make upgrading inconvenient. And no Apple laptop has ever supported video accelerator upgrades. Since the metal PowerBooks and the dual - USB iBooks were introduced in 2001, the processor chips in Apple laptops have been soldered to their motherboards, which makes processor upgrades, if not technically impossible, so impractical that no one is likely to ever offer processor upgrades for these machines. Not only that, but all of these slim-profile Apple laptops, especially the iBooks, are a nightmare to open up and work on.

All this substantially diminishes the inherent value of these products, as well as being environmentally regressive and irresponsible. For example, The now four year old Pismo PowerBook can be upgraded to a 550 MHz G4 or 900 MHz G3, and possibly even faster with new IBM 750 series chips to be introduced later this year. Thanks to the Pismo's expansion bay, it can accommodate a variety of devices including a DVD-burning SuperDrive that just slides in and out. The early Titanium PowerBooks that came with plain - vanilla DVD drives can be upgraded to Combo or Super Drive support, but they have to be shipped off for the conversion, and you still don't have the option of multiple different types of expansion bay devices that can be slipped in and out in seconds. I have DVD, Zip, and SuperDisk (also supports floppies) modules for my Pismo, which has also been upgraded to 550 MHz G4 status.

Macs used to last a long time. My old 1993 Mac LC 520 still runs great at more than 10 years old and is still in use by my wife as a word processing platform. My WallStreet PowerBook is past its 5th birthday, and is running flawlessly. I would be tempted to install a G4 upgrade if Apple hadn't pulled the plug on OS X support. However, at least it CAN be upgraded, and is very easy to open up and work on to swap in more RAM or a larger capacity hard drive. It also has lots of expansion potential with two PC Card slots and two removable device expansion bays. I've always thought it outrageously absurd that something as expensive and complex as a computer could become "obsolete" in three years or less, and be discarded.

Consequently, while I appreciate their many virtues, especially their power, nice keyboards, and bright, high-resolution displays, I remain less than enchanted by the metal PowerBooks, and when I did buy a new Apple laptop a little over a year ago I opted for the cheapest iBook model. I find it hard to reconcile spending big bucks on a machine that will be as stale as yesterday's newspaper inside of 24 months with no upgrade remedy. It offends my sense of wanting to get full value for money spent, and in light of the revelations cited above, my sense of environmental consciousness as well.

C'mon, Apple; you can do better.



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cmoore@macopinion.com

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