Has the ultrabook killed the traditional laptop bag?

For years, we've hankered after the perfect laptop bag for every situation -- light enough for nipping across town to a meeting, capacious enough for business trips to the other side of the world, plus a spot of working from home on a Friday.

But the newest batch of small, light ultrabook laptops, with their tiny screens starting around eleven inches, mean that your next laptop bag might not need to be a slightly newer version of that ballistic nylon roll-aboard carry-on trolley or over-the-shoulder messenger bag you've been using for years.

With a smaller laptop, you don't need a behemoth of a bag either.

Most laptop luggage these days is created with a thirteen- to fifteen-inch laptop in mind. So, with a few inches either side for cushioning, that's how big the traditional laptop bag has been.

Of course, with a significantly smaller laptop, you can get away with a smaller bag. Your ultrabook will be rattling around inside the laptop slot of your rolling luggage, which makes that laptop slot seem a little superfluous.

Some MacBook Air owners don't even bother with a laptop bag of any kind...

Much more important in the ultrabook era is finding a bag that has the right spaces for your laptop, your power adapter and any other bits of kit you're carrying around -- that external DVD drive, perhaps, or a wireless router.

That might be a combination of bags, now that you can legitimately fit your laptop inside a bag that could qualify as a "personal item", which is often allowed in addition to your regular hand luggage.

Check our summary of the baggage rules for the major Australian airlines to find out what you're entitled to carry on for your flight.

We're noticing an increasing number of travellers skipping the traditional large roll-aboard wheeled carry-on bag in favour of a small over-the-shoulder bag containing nothing more than their ultrabook (or even just an iPad), plus a suit carrier or garment bag for clothes and a few necessaries.

Suit carriers aren't just useful for keeping wrinkles away from your clothes. They also give you more options on busy flights, since you can unfold them and lay them on top of a bin that wouldn't fit another 20-inch rollaboard -- or even ask the crew to hang them in a closet or on a coatrack.

How has your carry-on strategy changed with new, smaller laptops? Are you sporting a different laptop bag to carry your Ultrabook around? Share your tips and tricks with fellow AusBT readers in the comment section below!

John Walton

Aviation journalist and travel columnist John took his first long-haul flight when he was eight weeks old and hasn't looked back since. Well, except when facing rearwards in business class.