thankfully it has never taken off ... (Score 1)

If buying laptops components was anything like buying the components to put together a PC then we would be stuck with bulky beige laptops for life.... PC case design has only gotten worse over the years .. I am glad this never happened in the laptop world.

So go a buy a nice Ti Thinkpad .. or a Sony Viao, or even a pretty little iBook and remember that style counts.