I have to add a comment that personally I dislike Apple's aluminum slab design. I have friends with MacBooks who's legs are red from the heat transfer after it's been on their (insert irony here...) lap. Also I have never had a problem with a well designed "plastic" cased laptop standing up. The Thinkpad is generally considered one of the the toughest laptops around and it's in a plastic case.
The following are some of the changes that have been made to the ThinkPad line:
Added Magnesium-alloy chassis roll cage to reduce motherboard flex caused by holding the laptop one handed on a corner.
Added Magnesium-alloy lid roll cage for a sturdier lid while replacing the lid material from magnesium-alloy to plastic for better wireless signal reception.[12]
Added Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic to 15 in (380 mm) ThinkPad Models.*
I'm a fan of the aluminum body. My Macbook Pro is 4 years old and it's a tank. You're right though, it does get pretty hot, but most high-end laptops do. I burned the graphics card out of my old plastic Fujitsu many years ago playing video games. Heat's just the price you pay to have the current fastest hardware.
I use a laptop cooler on my desk and lapdesk on the couch.
Edit: ooh - feel the downvotes! Go to apple.com and count the number of mentions of 'notebooks' vs. the number of mentions of 'laptops'. The only place you really see the word 'laptop' is in quotes in the customer success stories.
