Time to go way back.....
Remember 1998? When Apple came out with the iMac?
Techies all over the world were foaming at the mouth about how monumentally stupid Apple was about introducing a computer without a floppy disk drive. Many pronounced the iMac DOA. How would people install software? What about all that precious data saved on floppy disks? Why the arrogance and impudence of LORD Jobs knew no bounds! Every one waited for the iMac to implode...... Still waiting.
The Macbook Air (no optical drive) , the Mac App Store, and the last two versions of Mac OS X make it clear that you can go without an optical drive and still have an advanced computer experience-including installing and using powerful software tools.