So, the Heathen Mother — who would dislike being referred to that way quite a bit — has a fancy new sewing machine that costs as much as a used late-model Honda. It’s an upgrade from the not-quite-so-spendy model she got just a year ago, and is said to count for many, many present-giving occasions this year. (I think it’s safe to say my stepfather adores her.)

Anyway, said machine has lots of capabilities best explored by plugging it into your computer. In true niche-market fashion, the software appears to be pretty poorly written (as has been the case for most of her quilting tools), but the real shocker is that this machine also appears to ONLY work with Windows 7. That’s kind of amazing to me, given the fundamental technological conservativism of 71-year-old grandmothers into high-end quilting. The market share of Windows XP is still only barely below 50%. It’s a dog and a pain, but it’s what’s out there in lots of places — not the least of which is the Parallels virtual machine on my mother’s 2006 Macbook.

This Macbook still works great for everything she’s needed to do so far, up to and including using the WinXP VM to connect to prior sewing machines and quilting accessories. XP’s great for this, too, because its needs are so modest — the whole VM is barely 6 GB on disk. That’s important because a 2006 Macbook comes with 2GB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive, and Mother’s down to about 15GB free. (She takes lots of pictures, too.)

Windows 7, on the other hand, appears to want at least a GB of RAM and 15-20 GB of hard drive space just to run. Oh joy.

I got her on a path to a stopgap with Amazon links to a Win 7 Home disk and a new external drive, but at the same time I went over to Apple to see what a replacement computer would cost. And that’s where the surprise crops up.

I figured the 13″ Air would be the right call for her. Small, light, and with a solid-state drive? What’s not to like?

Well, lots as it turns out.

This will be her only functioning computer once she gets it, so she needs an optical drive. An Air’s only option is the external one, which means something else to keep up with. Sure, my stepdad has a nice iMac, but we can’t be asking Mom to figure out how to share his optical drive.

She also needs materially more space. If you’re already almost full with an 80GB drive, going to a 128GB is a dumb move. That means the 256GB model is the only truly viable option.

So I did a comparison. Before Applecare, a kitted out 13″ Air with the 256GB drive is nearly $1,700.

On the other hand, a 13″ Pro with a 500GB drive is . . . $1,200. Add AppleCare, and it’s out the door at $1,448.

Moral: Tiny computers with flash-only drives are cute, but they’re not ready for prime time with even the modest needs of 71-year-old quilters, apparently. Who knew?

Also: We live in an age of miracles and wonders, wherein I am routinely called upon to help my mother sysadmin her sewing machine. How exactly did this happen?