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New PowerBooks

H

HermDogg

Golden Member
My fellow Mac aficiando AT brethren (all 3 of you), I officially guesstimate that the new PBs will be announced this week! But why, you ask?

Check the listings at BestBuy. Notice that EVERY SINGLE PB is out of stock! Yet, all the iBooks are in...
So I checked CompUSA, and to my disappointment, they had some available. But wait! A quick check of several stores for pick-up (NYC, other big cities) showed them to be all out of stock as well! I am extremely hopeful the PB speedbumps that have been rumored will be making an appearance this week!
 
Probably monday or tuesday. I'm not too excited as the rumors suggest just a faster G4 and Bluetooth2.

My PowerBook G4 is still going strong. I won't be tempted by the new PowerBooks until they have either a G5 or a 1.9 GHz G4 (50% faster CPU than mine) and either Mobility Radeon X800 or GeForce 6800 Go.

1.25 GHz G4 and Radeon 9600 is still plenty fast for Halo, WoW, and UT2004. I won't really "need" a faster notebook until the next generation of games (which I usually play on my desktop PC anyway) or until I start working with higher resolution photos and videos. Right now I onlyl have a 5 Mpixel digital camera, so those photos are very fast to work witih in iPhoto and Photoshop CS. Also, for the MiniDV home videos, my PowerBook is nice and fast. This may change if I get a 8 - 9 Mpixel camera and / or a HDV camcorder.
 


If they put a 1/2 way decent screen on the 17" and dropped the price by $500 I would be all over it.

Surprising they did not announce the speed bumps or whatever at mac world.
 
Originally posted by: trikster2


If they put a 1/2 way decent screen on the 17" and dropped the price by $500 I would be all over it.

Surprising they did not announce the speed bumps or whatever at mac world.
Click to expand...

That and a better GPU and I am sold.
 
Originally posted by: trikster2


If they put a 1/2 way decent screen on the 17" and dropped the price by $500 I would be all over it.

Surprising they did not announce the speed bumps or whatever at mac world.
Click to expand...


Speed bumps are merely incremental and there are whispers of a 128 MB 9700 GPU, but they are insignificant compared to Mac Minis and iPod Shuffles.
 
Originally posted by: HermDogg
Originally posted by: trikster2


If they put a 1/2 way decent screen on the 17" and dropped the price by $500 I would be all over it.

Surprising they did not announce the speed bumps or whatever at mac world.
Click to expand...


Speed bumps are merely incremental and there are whispers of a 128 MB 9700 GPU, but they are insignificant compared to Mac Minis and iPod Shuffles.
Click to expand...


Not to some 😉

I am anxiously awaiting for better PB to arrive, I can get a lappy in September of this year and I want to switch but only if I get some good bang for my buck.
 
As soon as YOU buy one, they will be upgraded. I guarantee it.

My 1.5 Ghz PB 17" will be happy until you buy one 😀
 
Yeah, this will mainly be a speed bump to keep the PowerBooks alive until WWDC (or Apple Expo at the latest). It's highly likely at that time that we'll see either G5s or dramatically improved G4s (the MPC8641 has a much faster system bus, more cache, etc.).

Like many here, that's what I'm waiting for: PowerBooks with enough kick that, while not necessarily the fastest, are good enough that you really can run demanding tasks on them.

And as far as the graphics go, it's highly doubtful that either the Mobility Radeon X800 or the GeForce 6800 Go will end up in the PowerBook G5 - if only because both chipsets are really intended more for "desktop replacements" (read: 2" thick laptops that weigh 8+ pounds) than the thin-and-light models that are PowerBooks. A more likely candidate is the Mobility Radeon X700, which was just announced recently.
 
My 1.5ghz G4 is plenty snappy for now. I definitely feel that is was more than worth the money I paid for it (though I did have an ADC discount). My next powerbook will be a rev B 15" G5 assuming they keep the current sizing. I'd like to see: faster super drive w/ dual layer, 2 firewire ports and 3 usb ports, faster GPU just b/c it makes sense, much better LCD, 7200rpm or faster drives (who knows maybe we'll see a 10,000rpm notebook drive by the time the rev B G5s come out... I would easily pay $3000 for a powerbook like this, believe me they are worth every penny... 🙂

I might have to buy a mac mini soon though... or a dual G4 tower 🙂
 
If you're a member of ADC (the Apple Developer Connection), you can get a special one-time mega discount on a Mac. I think there may also be sustained (if much smaller) discounts like those that educational customers get.
 
Depending on your level of ADC membership, you may get more than one 'token' to purchase hardware at the ADC discount each year. Some levels of membership only get one a year, or some get none the first year, but one the second year.

If you are a Student, you can join the ADC student program and get a one-time-in-your-lifetime discount for only 99$ as opposed to the much higher fees for normal membership.
 
I was considering waiting on the new G5 to come out so I could get a G4 for cheap. However, I just decided to go with the Dell 700m because of the nice screen. I really hate windows, but most of the 700m drivers seem to have been converted over to linux.
 
Apple almost always announces new hardware on Tuesdays. There are exceptions, of course, but as a general rule you don't expect anything on a Monday.
 
Originally posted by: Commodus
Apple almost always announces new hardware on Tuesdays. There are exceptions, of course, but as a general rule you don't expect anything on a Monday.
Click to expand...

So no upgrades at all this week? Maybe next week 😉
 
The Mini's got a little bump in the SuperDrive department (quietly of course), and a bunch of price drops on made to order. *sigh* Maybe next week.
 
I'm waiting for the G5 PB and hopefully they'll move the 12" or make a new 13" or thereabouts a widescreen and make it a lot lighter 😀

Koing
 
Originally posted by: Koing
I'm waiting for the G5 PB and hopefully they'll move the 12" or make a new 13" or thereabouts a widescreen and make it a lot lighter 😀

Koing
Click to expand...

That would be sweet if they can drop the weight anywhere between 0.5 and 1 lbs 😀 I don't care about the LCD size. I just want a G5 PB with lighter weight 😀
 
Originally posted by: HermDogg
The Mini's got a little bump in the SuperDrive department (quietly of course), and a bunch of price drops on made to order.
Click to expand...
And then they dropped the SuperDrive speed back down again today. 😕

Originally posted by: addragyn
I would take a dual core e600 PB over a G5 if I had the choice today. The advantages are numerous.
Click to expand...
I don't think the dual-core e600s are supposed to be even sampling until the second half of 2005.

BTW, some weird things to add to the G5 PowerBook rumours:

Go to the Apple PowerBook page and look at the source. It says:

<!--BEGIN AVENUE A-->
<img height="1" width="1" alt="" src="http:/ /switch.atdmt.com/action/apple_G5_powerbook">
<!--END AVENUE A-->

And the Inq has this to say:

But perhaps the most interesting confirmation is that Hypertransport has a design win for the Apple PowerBook. This would appear to be confirmation that a G5 PowerBook is definitely turning up and that despite thermal problems, it is at least in the works

Hmmm.... I'm still thinking it might just be G4 1.67 bump though (next Tuesday).
 
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