Today Apple announced the death of the optical drive in its laptops | Hacker News Reader

Today Apple announced the death of the optical drive in its laptops

benmetcalfe.com

42 pointsdotBen80 comments

This move is consistent with Apple's corporate strategy; a transition away from desktop computing and physical media, to a range of thin devices accessing online media via the cloud. The elimination of the optical drive facilitates smaller devices, and further establishes the importance of connectivity and online media, where Apple is well positioned with its growing collection of cloud services: iTunes, the App Store, the new OS X App Store, and so on.

On a side note, this is further bad news for Sony and Blu-ray. The shift from physical to online video is happening much more quickly than most expected. Sony invested billions of dollars into Blu-ray to win the battle against HD DVD, anticipating at least a decade of future royalties. I am certain the expected returns on this investment will never be realized.

ehh, until we can stream blu-ray quality videos over the internet i doubt it's going anywhere soon.

The wireless Internet, no less. The Air doesn't have an Ethernet port and many devices in this category are commonly paired with (3,4)G data modems for mobility beyond the range of your own hotspot.

I don't think there's a decent way of getting 40 GB of movie onto an Air without plugging something in... and USB memory is still too costly in that range.

802.11g or n is faster than most consumer Internet connections. Nobody's suggesting streaming HD movies over the cell network... yet.

Blu-ray discs are 25-50GB, but they contain lots of stuff besides the movie (bonus material and other stuff). Dropping extra features, using newer codecs, and slightly decreasing encoding quality can pare a 720p movie down to 5-6GB. Over a 20Mbit connection, that's a 30-40 minute download. Definitely streamable.

In fact Apple, Netflix, and Amazon all do this already. They sacrifice some quality compared to blu-ray, but unlike blu-ray, you don't have to transport a physical disc to your home. Even though blu-ray is higher quality, you have to ship discs or travel to a store to get them. Video on demand is so much more convenient, and the quality is only going to get better as connection speeds and codecs improve.

Over a 20Mbit connection, that's a 30-40 minute download. Definitely streamable.

Unless you're in Korea, 20Mbit connections are far from commonplace. And in many countries download caps are the norm, which would preclude watching more than a handful of movies a month.

I used 20Mbit in the example because that's what I have. I'm on Comcast, which has a soft cap of 250GB/month. I'd have to watch a movie every day to get close to their limit. A 10Mbit connection would double the download time to 60-80 minutes, which is still fast enough to stream.

Here in the UK there's a large variance, but caps start at 10GB and those in the region of 40GB are commonplace (there is also a good selection of unlimited providers). And IIRC the average connection speed is 5Mbps, but again many people have 2Mbps or slower.

International internet infrastructure has a long way to go before optical media is anywhere near irrelevant.

That assumes that people really care whether something is blu-ray quality. I don’t think they do. (Also, technology progresses while blu-ray stays the same.)

Most people lack the bandwidth to be able to stream 720, yet alone 1080 video. I in fact struggle to stream even low-quality YouTube videos without having to wait for it to buffer for a few minutes. Blu-ray's investments returns will never be realised?

Blu-ray is far from dead. It is still the only universal way for users to watch high-quality hi-def video. Windows and Linux desktops/laptops will still have Blu-ray/DVD drives. PS3s and Blu-ray players will still be bought. There are vast back-catalogues of discs users will want to play.

The fractional market that Macbooks represent (and the even more fractional those with such bandwidth to be able to download and stream hi-def video with ease represents) is minimal. Sony won't even notice this. For those who want to watch Blu-ray videos, users will just have to fork-out for an external drive. And I'm sure Apple will price these fairly (not), and more than a few will be bought.

With Apple, the user always comes first.

Most people lack the bandwidth to be able to stream 720, yet alone 1080 video.

A 1080p Blu-ray rip is usually around 10GB for a 2 hour movie. Streaming 10GB in 2 hours requires a connection speed of around 12Mbit/sec. 720p rips are 5-6GB, so they'd require 6-7Mbit/sec. Apple only offers 720p right now, so most consumer broadband connections should be able to stream their shows.

I in fact struggle to stream even low-quality YouTube videos without having to wait for it to buffer for a few minutes.

Low quality YouTube videos are 480x360, with bitrates around 900kbps (that's kilobits, not bytes). So there's probably an issue with your ISP or YouTube's CDN. Anyway, back on topic...

I'd bet against Blu-ray in the long run. Video on demand has quite a few advantages. It doesn't require the purchase of a new player or optical drive. It offers a shorter time from when you decide, "I want to watch this." to when you actually start watching it. If you don't have the bandwidth to stream a movie, you can still download it faster than it takes to ship the Blu-ray disc. Even if you run to a store and buy/rent the disc (let's say 20 minutes round trip), in that time you could have buffered 1.5GB over a 10Mbit connection. Blu-ray beats streaming when it comes to video quality, but connection speeds and codecs are only going to get better.

>It doesn't require the purchase of a new player or optical drive.

To be fair, streaming video to a TV also requires the purchase of a player (AppleTV, etc).

This move is consistent with Apple's corporate strategy; a transition away from desktop computing and physical media, to a range of thin devices accessing online media via the cloud.

This was Apple's strategy well before the cloud, viz. deprecation of the floppy drive before most consumers even knew what the internet was.

I don't think it is bad news for Blu-Ray. When I want to watch a movie and I don't care how it looks, I'll go with streaming or torrents or Netflix or Blockbuster or Amazon. I get the movie but I don't really care about the quality or the medium. Maybe I watch it on my netbook, or my desktop, or maybe even my TV. That is a cheap throw-away experience.

When I buy a Blu-ray, I know it is something I want to watch on my HDTV with my surround sound going and with flawless quality. I probably want to watch it more than once in my lifetime. I bought a couple documentaries on Blu-ray before I even had a blu-ray player, becuase I knew someday they would be cheap and I'd want to have those films in high quality.

They're not exactly competiting. It is the difference between McDonalds and a real restaurent. Sometimes I'll stop in McDonalds for a snack, but if I want a steak I'm going somewhere that knows how to do it. That is streaming vs blu-ray for me.

Looking a little deeper one can only conclude that the launch of a desktop App store coinciding with the death of the optical media drive is no coincidence.

You don't need an optical drive because of the App store, and you must use the App store (and iTunes) because there is no optical drive.

Simply brilliant.

Edit: Downvotes? Perhaps the tone makes it sound too much like a conspiracy which is not what I meant to convey. It's a logical move for Apple and their customers (even if they might not know it yet).

You seem to have overlooked that CDs and DVDs aren't the main way to get programs now. You can download them from the internet.

And with respect, you seem to have overlooked that average users (ie. not people who read HN) still buy millions of dollars of boxed software/games/movies yearly.

Sure downloading software was/is the inevitable future, getting rid of the optical drive just gives the average Joe the little push he needs to get with it quicker.

None of my Mac-owning, non-programming, non-HN-reading friends buy software that comes on discs in boxes.

Anecdotal evidence. Irrelevant.

Edit: Truly confused about the downvotes (and upvotes for parent). Since when is anecdotal evidence a good supporting argument in a discussion on HN?

It's not good evidence, but it's definitely not irrelevant either. Don't be childish!

By the way, I can confirm that observation. Now we're at N=2.

the plural of anecdote is not data.

from 2003, http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-110814573.html

  Once the decision to purchase is made, 78 percent of the 
  participants said they wanted to use the product right 
  away and therefore choose to immediately download the 
  software. When purchasing CD-ROM versions, specifically, 
  46 percent requested delivery within a few days.

they don't mention sample size and perhaps have an agenda.

The plural of anecdote is not data indeed, and what was provided was anecdotal evidence. However, was there any evidence provided to the contrary (users do buy software on CD)? I think the reason the anecdote was upvoted was due to the lack of supporting evidence for the contrary conclusion. I'll give you games and movies (although Steam seems to be making great inroads toward making CD games obsolete), but I sincerely doubt that the majority of Mac software is purchased on CD and not through the internet.

Not even iWork, iLife and Mac OS X upgrades?

Well, even without the app store the majority of software I've bought in the last few years has been delivered electronically, which just strengthens the argument for getting rid of optical drives. I don't even mind replacing the HD with non-upgradable flash storage provided that there's decent external connectivity (for which neither USB2 nor FW800 qualify).

Even though vmware fusion came on CD for the mac, it was already outdated by the time I bought it. I downloaded a 200mb full install from vmware. In the age of internet, software CDs are always out of date.

Every MacBook now has an SD card slot and of course USB ports so removable media isn't going away when the optical drive disappears.

> you must use the App store (and iTunes) because there is no optical drive

What do you mean? You can still download and install whatever you want. The same distribution channels that have always been there are still there, and if you REALLY need it, you can attach and optical drive... just like how you can still attach a floppy drive if you need to.

These days, if someone doesn't have a fast internet connection, you can send them a DVD or a USB flash drive for a few dollars.

I really don't see the point of an optical drive in a laptop, not to mention optical media. All the software and media I consume comes in a digital download format. If it is your only machine and you absolutely need to burn a cd, then a simple USB external will do the trick. Also, you can always setup a bootable partition on a USB flash drive. Honestly, I have been waiting for this day to come for years. I can't wait until blu Ray and video games via optical media die too. Thank you apple.

Yeah, I really hate those non-digital optical media that all my software is on.

I expect this to also mark the beginning of what will in the future be seen as a hole in history: a time when software was downloaded on demand, and consequently lost to time, because companies were too ephemeral, and the software bits too centralized, to survive through redundant copies.

An interesting point. Although CDs are not archival media.

The old ones were. It seems the industry migrated to cheaper materials with time, or something with similar effect happened... I have problems reading some 2 year-old CD now, but a stack of disks from random newspapers from 1996 is working perfectly fine (found a big pile just a week ago).

I don't think the lack of optical or hard disk storage started the hole in history. Rather, perhaps IBM did when it invented the hard drive in the 1950s. Or maybe it was as early as Edison's phonograph in the 1870s. Whenever artifacts started requiring technology to interpret them (external dependencies, if you will) is when this hole in human history really began.

Perhaps future generations will see the digital revolution as a time of strictly furthering the bottom-line; a time when it became prohibitively expensive to print most data. Yet currently, we call this "being green."

How will future generations perceive this period in history?

Unlikely - I had 4 year old cds that I couldn't read because they had degraded too much.

So this is already an issue.

But not everyone keeps all their old software on the original CDs. This is the point: the decentralization of the distribution mechanism meant that everybody was free to use different methods of storing them. Even if everybody was restricted to keeping stuff on the original CDs, the chances of all CDs failing is a lot lower than any single one failing.

FWIW, I don't have any CDs (including cheap CD-Rs burnt over 12 years ago) that I can no longer read in any CD drive; some aren't readable by some drives, but they are readable by other drives. But I've since moved the small amount of data on them (and it is small, by today's measurements) to my file server, which is both RAIDZ and backed up remotely.

Not going to miss it. OSes should be distributed on USB keys anyway (goodbye, scratches), and Apple sells a solid external USB DVD-RW for $80 - more than worth it for the better battery life and cheaper, smaller, lighter laptops.

Microsoft did this for windows 7, you could purchase online, download, run a small program which would setup the usb stick with the required files + make it bootable. Worked flawlessly for me.

Will have to try that, it'd be useful for me. I still think the boxes should have a USB drive in them instead of a disk, though. Those things are huge.

Microsoft has had small download managers for their software when delivered from MSDN Academic Alliance for quite some time. Unfortunately, I could never get a copy of Windows to use, since I only had access to Linux and Mac computers. If it had been a normal download, I would probably have installed my free copy of Windows on some computer.

Last time I tried it worked in Wine with no problems.

Nice to know. Last time I tried (about one and a half years ago) it didn't.

For me it was about two years, but one aannoying thing I kind-of-remember was that the app demanded the IE control (somehow emulated via Firefox in Wine, but requiring additional install - automatically suggested by Wine, but still).

It definitely wasn't the most sensible DRM of all time. Even more annoying because of it's uselessness. I never had a problem with ordering additional downloads for MSAA software.

I'm amazed by the fact that Apple keeps neglecting the software side of "the cloud." New MBAs? Great; they look like fine little machines, perfectly suited for the transition towards server-side computing.

But MobileMe? An odd mixture of USB- and web-based syncing across devices? Come on, guys. You're not even trying.

I welcome it as long as external optical drives remain supported.

Fill the space with battery.

To be fair I have not used a CD or DVD since 2006! I use Windows which I installed from a USB flash memory drive which I made after downloading the Windows 7 (and before that Vista) ISO from MSDN. All software I need I download (Office, Visual Studio, etc.). I have not even burnt a disc since back then either. Like the floppy it just sort of became unneeded as there were easier ways to access the data (faster, greater capactity, easier to reuse). I used to backup to DVD every week but I bought two external HDD to backup too now. I keep one in a small fireproof safe and the other next to my computer. Easier than burning a DVD and gives about the same level of protection. My backups only ever get bigger as I add to them (holiday pictures, video, etc.) and HDD increase in size quicker than optical media, it may cost more actual cash (I have never worked it out) but it costs a lot less in time. Optical media has been dead to me for a long time.

> I keep one in a small fireproof safe and the other next to my computer.

No off-site backups?

I have off-site backups of the very important things (personal documents, wedding pictures, etc.) at my mothers house (in their safe) and my safety deposit box with my bank. My bank is only 15 minutes away so adding to it isn't a problem at all, my mothers is a couple hundred miles away so whenever I go to visit (normally every other month) I take a backup. Again I use an external HDD (although a smaller 2.5" drive) for both my mothers and my SDB with photocopies of original documents, etc.

It all comes down to evaluating the risk and value of loss verses the effort. Would I be upset if my house burned down and my safe didn't protect my HDD well enough that I list my family holiday photos to Disney World in 2003? Sure but it wouldn't be the end of the world. People still lose everything when their house burns down who do not store things digitally/offsite which is probably >99% of people in the real world. However if my house burns down and my safe fails I have all of my really important things in two off-site locations a fair distance apart. Is it perfect? No, but it is as close as I can be bothered to make the effort for. With services like Flickr and Picasa Web things like pictures and video are easier to "backup" online, Google Docs for important documents, etc. Archiving things via Gmail/Hotmail, etc. This gives me a way to store copies of those holiday pictures at Disneyworld (albeit in a lower quality than I have backed up) as well as share them with family more easily.

This isn't the first MacBook Air released... The previous one didn't have an optical drive either. Little laptops never have them - EEE PCs, Librettos, etc. This article is complete non-news.

I suppose it's the inexorable march of technology moving forward, but in computers that I've used that have been without optical drives, it seems a little too easy to paint yourself into a corner.

If booting off a USB stick becomes common-place, I would have less to worry about. I know it's possible, but in the machines I've had to do it on, it's definitely non-standard. In those instances I've felt like I was back in the days of DOS. The talk of DRM-ed USB sticks is also disconcerting; dealing with DRM while trying to revive a machine is not something I look forward to.

I know it's possible, but in the machines I've had to do it on, it's definitely non-standard.

USB booting is pretty common in most modern bios's, however don't forget we're talking about Apple here, where they control the entire stack.

Booting off external drive on Mac (power on + option key) has been in place for many generations of their hardware. It's definitely patchy in Windows land, esp with net books.

It's going to be a very slow death. Still, I look forward to the day I can buy a MBP with no optical drive and an Air-sized Flash stick in place of the SSD.

In 1998, Apple removed the floppy drive from the iMac and extended to all their products.

In 2008, Apple removed optical drives from the MacBook Air. People concede this will extend to all their products.

The optical death will be faster than the floppy, that's for sure. I'm curious, what's next?

We'll find out in 2018 apparently.

I'm voting for keyboard.

Just because I don't see how they could do it while still keeping it nice to type on. And of all companies, Apple seems likely to do so successfully if anyone is even capable of doing so.

And if it is possible, I want to see what the heck it would be, and who would see it coming? I mean, heck, they already went to the opposite of what people kept saying they needed on their mice / trackpads - now there's no button.

Many many people do not use their optical drives. I used to use my optical DVD drive all the time, but in past 4 years I've barely touched it. It's use has dropped considerably. The keyboard no so much so.

I'm voting that keyboards will be around for as long as there is a physical input mechanism of any sort. The throughput and flexibility with keyboards is just too great to get rid of completely.

Precisely why I want to see someone successfully supplant it. We're so wired into thinking we need a keyboard, that it's nigh-ideal, that I really want to see something better because I can't think of what it could possibly be.

No, I think we found out today; it's hard drives. Hard drives are the new tape decks.

After that it's unclear.

How about a single plug for monitor/power/data and the death of all other ports? (Or maybe everything wireless for laptops and other mobile devices?)

The death of consumer-level computing where the user can actually get root? (Everything will be on a app store?)

I'd settle for a single plug for power (MagSafe) and a single plug for data (Lightpeak). If you want a data cable to provide significant amounts of power or power at significant distances, it will end up having to be thick and expensive, and so will the device providing the power.

LightPeak has the potential to replace USB, Firewire, Ethernet, and all kinds of digital A/V cables, but it can only economically replace all of them if it doesn't have to provide DC power. I really don't want Intel to screw up this opportunity by trying to make LightPeak provide power under some circumstances but not others (like USB and eSATA), or by charging silly licensing fees (like Apple did for Firewire), or by crippling the controller performance to save cost (like USB's lack of DMA or low-latency transfers).

I cannot help but think optical is a BAD, BAD choice for miscellaneous small external devices.

It's about time. With Steam, iTunes, Netflix, and Amazon VOD all major reasons to use optical drives have become weaker. Even for backing up, it makes far more sense to use a hard drive than cd-r's.

You don't need the appstore even if you go driveless, you need an internet connection.

If this ends up becoming an industry trend it has some interesting repercussions for the music distribution industry. The combination of a compact disc's unencrypted contents plus an optical CD drive in almost every computer really helped push the ubiquity of digital music unencumbered by DRM. To consumers any DRM system seemed like a bigger hassle than dropping a CD in the drive, ripping the bits and then converting them to MP3s.

We're years away from this, but if a majority of computers don't have an optical drive to rip CDs then the average consumer loses this non-download path to digital music. That probably emboldens DRM advocates, helps Apple's music download business, and will effect countless other things that are hard/impossible to predict.

The only reason Apple would consider this is that iTMS is already such a large part of the music distribution market (and likewise iTMS+Netflix for movie distribution) that their user-base doesn't put real plastic discs into computers much at all any more. I bet the ratio for the average Mac user of iTMS songs+movies downloaded, to CDs+DVDs ripped, has been on a steady decline for years, and when they do this it's because they'll have decided that it's finally crossed some inflection point.

By the time Macs ship universally without optical drives, the idea of getting music off of a CD and onto your computer will be as backwards-seeming as getting video off of a VHS and onto a DVD. Sure, it's possible, and you might want to do it for things with sentimental value and out-of-print oldies, but in both cases it's way easier to just bring your old tapes (discs) to a media shop whose service include conversions, than it would be to find the equipment to do it on your own.

I replaced my optical with a 2nd hard drive a year ago and never looked back. The only problem it's caused me was having to jump through absurd hoops to get Boot Camp working, since the Windows installer only wants to talk to an actual disc on the internal ATA bus.

Is this on a Mac? I'm guessing it's a desktop, or how did you manage to replace the optical disk on an apple laptop?

Yeah, 2008 Macbook Pro, using this enclosure from iFixit: http://www.ifixit.com/Apple-Parts/9-5-mm-SATA-Optical-Bay-SA...

Couldn't you just as well say they announced the end of the hard drive, at least for portable computers?

Hard drive capacity has so far outstripped the needs of a portable computer user I'm surprised it didn't happen earlier.

My first laptop was an Asus and one of reasons I got it was the feature that you could remove the optical drive and put a second battery instead. I remember using the optical drive only 3 or 4 times. That was 6 years ago.

Honestly, I don't see the 2011 MacBook Pro refresh having optical drives anymore. Make way for even more battery space. Besides, if you really really really want to be stubborn about it you can also opt for one of their external drives. For the 2 times per year you may need one. Of course, even though I do tend to rip a lot of music CDs I buy, I'd still prefer just an external optical drive. The benefits of more battery in a MBP or maybe a second SSD/HD would be lovely.

I travel a lot and the space and weight saved by not having an optical drive would be great for me. In fact I'm shopping for a new laptop now (though not a Mac) and finding a reasonably-priced 14-incher without an optical drive is tough. Anyone have any recommendations?

My eee pc from two years ago doesn't have an optical drive. How is this news?

I don't know. The last MacBook Air didn't have an optical drive either. This is just nonsense.

A USB DVD writer/burner costs very little, sothat will always be an option.

Also: this might make MacBoks not be such a good choice for running Ubuntu in the future.

Ubuntu is most easily installed from USB stick already, so not sure why you would say that?

But even in the linux space I see people migrating from CDs. Just remember that diskless instant on small computers originally came with linux. My only problem with that is that it's much more easy to deal with isos than with imgs.

I said this somewhere else, but my Asus eee PC w/Ubuntu from 2008 does not have an optical drive and has an SSD. Apple's a little late to the game. Once again they do something that isn't new and the world thinks that it's innovative or earth-shattering.

You may want to check when the first generation of MacBook Air was released.

I can't tell you the last time I used a CD/DVD in my computer.

Maybe it was to install OS X?

I really couldn't be happier about this.

This wasn't sarcasm. :/

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