Agreed on the storage, but the RAM I'm not as sure about for her usage scenarios. I've been impressed with how well the 13 inch Air with 4GB RAM runs for a general user. OS X RAM compression, plus swap to a PCIe based SSD seems to keep the system pretty responsive, even with some gaming mixed in. It wouldn't suit my more technical demands of a system, but reading the Apple tealeaves, future OS upgrades for a bit seem aimed at efficiency over bloating up currently.


An alternative to forking out the money for a larger SSD is to invest in Apple's services. The new Photos app can keep all the original quality photos and personal videos tucked away in the cloud, while only downloading smaller versions to the laptop. iTunes Match can store all music in the cloud and stream it down.

Paying for iCloud storage/iTunes Match for a few years may come in well below the 1TB SSD upgrade cost. Definitely worth running the numbers here. The above services have me reevaluating my own storage needs for a future laptop and iOS devices. These do all need internet though, so for Doug's friend, it will depend on how often she's online with broadband quality internet.