I like my new-to-me MacBook because it enables me to create more stuff compared to my now almost 8 year old Thinkpad I had before, mainly due to battery and screen reasons. There is one thing about it that I cannot wrap my head around from a design perspective and it’s the sharp edges especially around the wrist area. On a flat surface it’s no problem at all, but low and behold a laptop will be frequently used on a lap, meaning the wrists will touch the sharp edge at an angle which is very uncomfortable.
I’ve found some posts online about people that have filed the edges off of their Macs before, like this nice one by Kent Walters. In my case however, almost no one freaks out about this because no one actually notices it. It went well, so I thought why not document the process.
Note I am absolutely not a good craftsman, so do not use this as a guide!
I thought along time about how to do it so as not to have it result in a wavy bezel. Although I really wanted to use this project as an excuse to buy a random orbital sander, I very quickly pivoted from this idea because I would probably cause more damage with it than I would with a hand file. Another idea was to 3D print some sort of chamfer to use as a guide, just to have the initial part cleanly taken off at an angle. I played around with this idea for a while but concluded that I could probably not get to the required level of precision I wanted, especially since it would have to hold the file/sandpaper. I ended up just using general purpose metal file I had at hand and progressive sand paper (in block form, strongly recommended).
Some tape helped me to mark the areas from below and above the bezel that I wanted to have file off. This worked really well. Of course I taped off the trackpad, the keyboard and headphone plug etc. to avoid any residue from getting inside. Additionally, I used very little soapy water that I applied to the sandpaper throughout to keep the dust contained somewhat. The initial filing with the general metal file was a bit scary, but it did not take off too much and the tape helped me to achieve an even level. The sandpaper blocks also helped with that, and I went up to 1200 coarseness.
The tricky part for me were these pointy dots on the little gap in the middle. I did not want to go too heavy here with the filing so I used some model making files very, very lightly and then just used the 1200 sandpaper until I was satisfied with the result. In the end, I was careful to remove any dust that had accumulate, for which this little air blower squeegy thing came in handy.
This is a “blue” M4 MacBook Air, so I’m curious how it will look over time due to the anodized aluminum. Another note would be to test it out a bit and see how it feels. I have quite large arms so when typing I also touch the corners, so I had to go back and file them too, but that might not be necessary depending on how you do it.
What I liked about the Thinkpad was that I could just chuck it anywhere without worrying about it. I made it a point when I bought this Mac to treat it just the same way. Ultimately, it is a tool and should be used appropriately. Even if it is nice and shiny, if modifying it would make it serve it’s primary purpose as a tool better, it’s worth a consideration. So I like this recent wave of encouragement around similar modifications, and it is also far easier and approachable than it seems initially.