Saturday’s Apple: Bringing Your Mac With You On Holiday?

I know that many of you will be bringing your Mac with you when you travel for work or holiday this summer. In fact I’m writing this from Stockholm where we are for a few weeks for a combined business and vacation trip.

So what Mac is best for traveling? Even though the MacBook Air is the smallest and lightest Mac I’d probably pick the MacBook. It’s small and you can carry an extra battery which may save you in situations when you don’t have access to regular power. But it’s also powerful enough to do almost anything you need it to do.

An iPod makes the perfect companion for your Mac and obviously you want a portable device on which you can enjoy your photos, watch video and photos, and enjoy some music. The perfect device is the iPod Touch. You can sync photos from iPhoto or Aperture on your Mac, and videos and music from iTunes. With storage capacity of 16 or 32GB there’s enough space for all your media.

Chances are if you travel you will do it by airplane. You want peace and quiet on the flight and great sound quality, right? Get the Bose QuietComfort 2 noise-reducing on-ear headphones and the noise from the plane melts away and you end up more relaxed when you get to the destination. There was a review in a recent issue of Shuffle.

One of the best things that Apple has ever manufactured is the Airport Express Wi-Fi base station. Not all hotels have Wi-Fi but they may have an Ethernet connection. The Airport Express is the perfect traveling-companion. Just plug it into your hotel room’s wired connection and you have yourself an instant wireless network.

Whenever you travel with expensive gear theft is obviously a real threat you have to consider. Whipping out your nice Mac and expensive mobile phone when you’re at a cafe or airport can lead to trouble if you’re not careful. When you can, lock your Mac up with something like the Targus Defcon Computer Cable Lock. At least then no one can easily walk away with the computer. But remember that the best security is to behave appropriately. Don’t expose yourself to situations where you or your equipment could be in jeopardy and you will be okay.

With all the photos, video and other media you’re going to produce during your travels, an external 2.5” hard disk is a must I think. LaCie is a dependable brand and their 160GB USB 2.0 rugged hard disk has plenty of space for your media. It is also padded with rubber so it should be able to take tough action.

Even though you regularly take backups to the external hard drive, also consider online backup. Mozy offers unlimited online backup space for $4.95 per month. With clients for Windows and Mac, whenever you connect to the Internet the Mozy application will transparently copy data to the online account in the background.

And of course to protect all of this gear you need a bag. Since you also want it to be stylish Crumpler is a good choice. They make durable and good looking bags which protect your computer and more. If you want something that looks a bit less like a computer bag look at the bags made by Knomo.

So there you have it, a few suggestions for your travels with your Mac this summer. Whether it’s for business or for pleasure the Mac is a very useful and pleasant traveling companion. So make sure you protect it and your data as best you can. But above all enjoy your trips, let them reinvigorate your body, mind, and spirit so you can take on the coming challenges with renewed enthusiasm.

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