I'm bitching about how stupid people are to pay for a machine that has so many drawbacks. So stop being Apples bitch and paying out the ass for their products.

Are you one of the non-technologically inclined idiots that Apple has gotten to? Thats what it sounds like to me.

The above is a comment from a TechCrunch posting by the famously pro-Apple MG Siegler. It's always funny how the spectrum of Apple lovers/haters plays out. People either REALLY love them or REALLY hate them.

The posting itself brings up some good points about Apple's eventual killing of the optical drive in most of their laptops. I can count the number of times I've used the optical drive on my laptop in the last two years on one hand yet it's persistently there taking up valuable space and weight. When I owned a MacBook Air, I bought the external superdrive and probably used it 3-4 times, as well. Would I buy a laptop without a built-in optical drive but have an external one handy? Absolutely and that's what I think Apple will do in its next refresh of the MacBook Pro line.

Speaking of new MacBooks, I just ordered the latest 13" MacBook Pro via Amazon. Arrives on Monday - no tax and free shipping via Amazon Prime. Early benchmarks show that the lowest end MacBook Pro 13" released on Thursday performs as fast as the highest end MacBook Pro 17" released last year. Crazy!

Windows Phone 7 or WinPho7 (sounds like a tech noodle restaurant) launched today. A definite step up from Windows Mobile but still not enough to make people jump from Android or iPhone. Microsoft is definitely looking for the portion of the population that hasn't made the move to a smartphone yet but unfortunately for them, so is Google and Apple.

What gives me pause about this phone is not the interface. I haven't played with one yet but it looks intuitive and has some innovative features. My issue is the hardware which interestingly enough comes from the same manufacturers of Android phones. Samsung, LG, HTC, etc. just don't make amazing phones. They all make good phones but nothing earth shattering which is what it'll take to overtake the likes of Apple. Every Android phone I've held feels cheap, big, clunky, etc. It'll probably be the same with the new WinPho7 models. The bad part is that because the operating systems need to support multiple models, there will be compromises made to the least common denominator. A recipe for making a mediocre product.

Microsoft and Google have more than enough resources to throw at great industrial design. If this is truly a key market for them then they need to develop their own phone. The money is not in software alone. Google gives away the operating system and makes money on app sales and ads. Microsoft will most likely charge a nominal licensing fee for a WinPho7 license. Apple makes nearly 60% in gross margins on the iPhone because of hardware and software. That's about $300+ per iPhone but it's not all about the money - it's about building a phone that will blow away the competition.