Another problem is that people use laptops on their bed, or in bed before going to sleep. They block off all the ventilation holes....manufacturers were forced to start sticking these on the side, whereas they used to use larger fans on bottom, which are useless when Mr. X slaps it on his 13.5 tog duvet ick and blocks up the fan vents !

Then the power adaptor can often be tangled up or stuffed in the aformentioned duvet. The bottom line is, hardware is probably at fault here, but people are so damn thick at the same time.

The whole idea behind the 'it just works' Apple thing, is they know stupid people expect stuff to work and that's it, cars, pc's, toasters, without ANY maintenance if possible.

Thank you Dave for the compliments, I try to help as much as I can. I guess my comments were rather throw-away ones. I've been doing a bit of research in to renewable energy and designing a modular turbine system. And the related circuitry, with shunt loads and the like and I've just become more concerned with charging batteries.

Any way's yes I didn't read the article to it's fullest and jumped to conclusions.

Just a pondering to the Apple saying it can be left on while doing the initial backup, perhaps this is because the laptop will be consuming power instead of potentially overcharging the battery. Just a thought.

In an odd way I'm glad my ludicrous comments have been of some interest