Can someone give me a good, solid reason why I should not buy a Powerbook G4 laptop?

[Mallow]

put the money in an IRA!

 

[slider64]

Why can't everyone just say that they both have advantages over the other one. They are both great, and you can do tons of stuff with each one. Macs excel in one area while PC's excel in another. I have a big truck, it works great for some things but there are problems in other areas, same thing for ferraris, Plain and simple. It's preference and what you want it for. I love both, I would love to have one of each. Other people may disagree, if you don't like both who cares?

 

[KevinH]

Deeko - What's the markup on laptops at CC? You get gear at a few % over cost right?

 

[xirtam]

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: The best way to accelerate a Mac is at 9.8 m/sec/sec.

That said, a Powerbook G4 laptop is not a Mac. A Mac was created by Apple. The Powerbook was created by God. Get a Powerbook.

 

[Mbonus]

I am oviously the idiot here. I read through almost all of the posts in this thread hoping to get some information to make a centrino vs. powerbook decision. Out of 100 plus there were only two or three that gave honest unbiased experience rather than bickering.

For whoever posted it, is it true that the speed of the laptops are dependent upon the HD rpm speed? If that were the case , it might not bother me as much comparing a 1.6 ghz centrino to a 1 ghz powerbook. The other question for me is graphix cards, the powerbooks seem to be lagging behind here. Maybe they are sacrificing graphics adapter power for battery life/heat.

BTW: The mac boards were not helpful either.

Best Regards,

Mike

 

[GizmoFreak]

Hey everyone, only got through about half the thread, so I apologize if this point has been raised already...

Obviously, everyone has seen more than one of these threads degenerate into petty bickering, where criticizing one's platform is akin to questioning one's manhood. So I'm curious as to why people who don't like macs, or more specifically, people who hate these pro-mac threads, come and post in these threads? Is it that much of an annoyance to just let it go and skip over the thread? You KNOW you will probably get lured into an endless, pointless argument. Why do it? Also, sure this is a PC-centric forum, but as far as I could tell, there's nothing wrong with putting up a mac thread in Off Topic. Maybe you guys just like to argue, but considering the venomous hostilities that tend to surface, I doubt it.

That said, I do enjoy reading these arguments. Pretty amusing. I'm just curious as to why people do it since I can actually feel blood pressures rising with each successive post.

Mac boys, Deeko is merely trying to point out that you have more software options on a PC and that is a valid point. Deeko, I think the (intentionally?) inflammatory inflection of your comments brought on the fury of the mac hordes.

 

[beer]

Originally posted by: Mbonus
I am oviously the idiot here. I read through almost all of the posts in this thread hoping to get some information to make a centrino vs. powerbook decision. Out of 100 plus there were only two or three that gave honest unbiased experience rather than bickering.

For whoever posted it, is it true that the speed of the laptops are dependent upon the HD rpm speed? If that were the case , it might not bother me as much comparing a 1.6 ghz centrino to a 1 ghz powerbook. The other question for me is graphix cards, the powerbooks seem to be lagging behind here. Maybe they are sacrificing graphics adapter power for battery life/heat.

BTW: The mac boards were not helpful either.

Best Regards,

Mike

Well, every single laptop I have ever used just 'feels' slower than a desktop PC of similar speeds. most hard drives in laptops spin at 4500 RPM; onl now are 5400 RPMers coming out, and they do kill battery life.

The Powerbook G4 is equipped with a mobile Geforce chipset. The question is, why do you need a fast video card? Do you plan on playing games on a laptop? For me, and for most users, battery life and form factor would mean more than framerate in a game. Besides, not very many FPS games are ported to the mac, anyways. So you could probably play most strategy games that are, like warcraft 3. Apple is thinking inline with me and is building their laptops accordingly.

 

[Mbonus]

For me, this next laptop will be a desktop replacement for the home. My wife is sick of the big clunky mid-tower and wants a laptop. I really can't argue either, since a lappy will be very convenient as we already have a wireless network set up at the house.

Having the option to game is important to me. I don't have or spend nearly the same of amount of time on gaming that I used to, but I want the option to still be available when I get the urge.

 

[speg]

The only reason I can think of is the reason Im not getting one. Im getting an ibook instead. It's $1000 cheaper ( CDN ) and I don't think I'll need all the power that the powerbook has in a portable. Although if you got the cash, then get the Powerbook.

 

[AznMaverick]

i have a LOT of software for the PC, can i use these titles on a mac? the main reason i wouldn't want to buy a mac is because i wouldn't want to go out and buy all these mac counterparts of software that i already have. but if macs are able to use pc titles i really wouldnt' mind a mac at all.

 

[kami333]

You could run VirtualPC and emulate Windows, not my perferred solution since I take quite a performance hit (G3 400 running OS10.2, yeah I need to upgrade) but I've heard that newer ones will run them better, even to the point where you can play games with it.

 

[jonmullen]

Originally posted by: Deeko
Oh, and about stability. My XP box has been running for 12 days straight now without restarting. My last restart was because I installed new drivers. I don't think it has crashed in about 4 months.

And I have setup file servers both *nix based and Windows based that have been going strong for years with no restarts, heck I even had a win98 box as a file server that has not crashed in 3 years, in fact its still in a law office closet surving up pleadings. The point is almost any OS, with the excetion on Windows ME can be set up stable given you know what your doing and don't have newbies messing with it.

 

[Wolverine27]

I'm thinking about getting a Powerbook also. Are there any good file sharing programs like Morpheus for Mac?

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: Wolverine27
I'm thinking about getting a Powerbook also. Are there any good file sharing programs like Morpheus for Mac?

There's Limewire(and it's ad-stripped version, Acquision), which is considered one of the best Gnutella clients. There's Neo for interfacing with Kazza, but it's not a full client. I've seen a couple of OpenNap clients, and there's at least 1 DirectConnect client availible. Are you looking for a specific P2P network?

Oh, and Mbonus, the graphics are somewhat lackings, but as others have said, the PowerBooks don't really seem to be geared for gaming in the first place. The 15" comes with a Radeon 9000M, whereas the 17" and 12" use GeForce 440's and 420's respectively.

 

[Indolent]

I'm just curious about why mac fans are so vocal about an opinion hardly anyone cares about.

 

[Chau]

i don't know too much about file sharing programs for macs.. but..

pc's = free software easily 😉

macs = not even sure if u can find "free" software for it, or just more difficult to find

 

[kermalou]

i will tell youa reason to get the Mac. my uncle has used PCs all the time. He wasn't that techno saavy, but used AOL for email and the like. Now, a couple months ago he got a powerbook. since then he got an ipod and uses it religiously. he has his own CDs that he makes MP3s from and also borrows a couple of MP3s. he now also has a digital camera and digital video camera that he also uses. for god's sake he put his kid's birthday picture on the webusing iphoto, which is saying alot. the reason he uses them---->IT IS EASIER TO USE THEM ON THE MAC. i set up his house with wireless networking for his kids and it look a long time to configure everything correctly on each computer. with his powerbook, i didn't even have to tell him what to do, it configured it by itself.

he uses his Mac all the time now, instead of sparingly using his PC. he still has to use PCs in his work (auto body shop), but he would switch them all to a Mac if he could.

for a non-techno saavy person, the Mac is the clearcut winner hands down. if i didn't buy my inspiron from Dell a while ago at a crazy price, i would be typing this on a powerbook right now. with virtual pc working better, i think next year will be a mac year for me, since there is no software in my field that works on Mac.

 

[Wolverine27]

Originally posted by: ViRGE

Originally posted by: Wolverine27
I'm thinking about getting a Powerbook also. Are there any good file sharing programs like Morpheus for Mac?

There's Limewire(and it's ad-stripped version, Acquision), which is considered one of the best Gnutella clients. There's Neo for interfacing with Kazza, but it's not a full client. I've seen a couple of OpenNap clients, and there's at least 1 DirectConnect client availible. Are you looking for a specific P2P network?

Oh, and Mbonus, the graphics are somewhat lackings, but as others have said, the PowerBooks don't really seem to be geared for gaming in the first place. The 15" comes with a Radeon 9000M, whereas the 17" and 12" use GeForce 440's and 420's respectively.

Thanks for the info ViRGE! I wasn't looking for anything specific. I use Morpheus/Kazza and WinMX on my PC now and was just wondering what some of my alternatives were if I decide to get a Powerbook.

Are there any websites or forums you recommend for Mac info?

Thanks again!

-Wolverine

 

[ViRGE]

Wolverine, for news, the best sites are Macslash, Apple@Slashdot, and MacNN. If you're looking for software, VersionTracker is your one stop shop, it basically lists every piece of Mac software out there.

Chau, Mac users tend to pay for their stuff more than PC users. The shareware community is alive and well on the platform, and Microsoft trusts the users enough that Office is a drag and drop install(or the converse, a drag and drop steal). You'll see Mac users with pirated software, but it definately more rare than with the PC.