Early reviews of the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pros (or is that MacBooks Pro?) gush about the crazy-stupid battery life afforded by the new machines’ larger, non-removable batteries, which Apple claims last seven hours. “This battery lasts forever,” writes Leander Kahney in his review of the “freakin’ awesome” 13-inch model; he got more than six hours in ordinary use. Anand Lal Shimpi can’t believe that he got more than “eight, freakin’, hours” from the 15-inch MacBook Pro; his multi-page review begins here.

Which is making me rethink my plans to buy a small, Windows-based netbook for autoguiding purposes (see previous entry). While the 10-inch Asus Eee PC 1000HE claims a battery life up to nine and a half hours and costs only $450, the fact is, it would only be used for astrophotography. A low-end 13-inch MacBook Pro, on the other hand, may cost $1,400, but it would certainly not be a one-trick pony — the Windows-only astrophotography software could be installed on a Windows partition, and I’d be much happier with a Mac portable when doing virtually anything else. (It’d be nice not having to wait to get home before processing photos taken on trips, for example.)

In other words, I’ve just rationalized spending an additional $950. Oh hell.

(Image courtesy of Apple.)