This tip applies to any widescreen mac, but it is especially useful for the 11.6” MacBook Air where the screen is only 786 pixels tall. The 16:9 aspect ratio is even wider than the traditional 16:10 screens found on other mac laptops.
Modern operating systems like Mac OS X and Windows 7 have very tall Docks/Task Bars, and they tend to eat into the vertical resolution of your monitor. Thus your usable desktop space is shorter and wider. On the Mac, you also have to accommodate the menu bar on the top of your screen, so the usable vertical resolution is further wasted. On a typical setup, the large dock and menu bar can easily occupy 90 pixel lines of vertical screen space. On a screen that is only 768 pixels tall, 90 lines is precious screen real estate you could be using more efficiently.
It may feel unusual at first, and will take so some getting used to. But it is worth the temporary inconvenience. You will be able to see more of a web page without having to scroll. Try it yourself.
How to do it
- Open System Preferences
- Click on Dock
- Under Position on Screen, select Left of Right
