Talk me out of buying an Apple

[swanky]

Oh my . where should I start. I recently got my first proper job (yes - one with a monthly pay check!). So I can finally afford a laptop. I have an OK pc, but for the last 6 months I've almost exclusively been using my girfriends old Toshiba Satellite Pro. It's a good computer, but it hardly breaks any speed records these days (Celeron 550).

In any case - I'm on the market. I have this friend who owns a PowerBook (15") which he loves. He's a graphic designer, and seems to do OK with it. I feel drawn towards two Apple computers: the 12" iBook and the 12" PowerBook. They are both within my budget.

I want a 12" laptop, if they get any larger I know it'll stay on my desk, and that's no way to use a laptop is it?

What I'm looking for:

• 12" screen (1024x768)
  6 lbs MAX - would prefer 5 lbs
  good enough to use Dreamweaver and Photoshop without annoying the hell out of me (yes I know 12" is a bit small
  TV-out
  DVD/CD-burner combo
  Not more than $2000

That's all. And the Apple's are looking mighty tempting. What do you think? Does anyone here use a PowerBook/iBook? How is the performance? Will I be making a fool out of myself?

Thanks,

swanky

 

[SinfulWeeper]

May the lord have mercy on your soul.

 

[Bloodstein]

Buddy, I feel your pain.

But remember, if you go with apple, then you isolate urself from the rest of the world.
That would be the single argument against ur decision. ibook can kick butt in every category against a laptop but unless you're not planning on collaborating with the rest of the human race, it'll not be of much use.

 

[imgod2u]

There's no reason not to go with a Powerbook. The only consideration you have is, does all your software run on OSX. If not, I don't see why not. The 12" is what, $1300? That's probably on par with whatever notebooks you'll find out there in terms of value (assuming it has a 1 GHz G4 in it, I'm not sure).

Although, just to mention, you could probably get a Centrino notebook with a 14.1" screen (it's not that heavy, 3 pounds or so) for that much. Acer's TM800 is certainly very nice. A couple of others are:

The Jetbook series
Toshiba's R100 (this one's only 0.7" thick)
Sony's Z1
Fujitsu's Lifebook S6120
Asus's M2000-N and their S2000-N

And, if you can find it here in the US (good luck), Samsung's X10

Although the Samsung is difficult to find (if not impossible) here in the US, it most certainly is the best of the bunch IMO.

 

[privatebreyer]

Its an Apple.

Nuff said.

 

[zeroidea]

Photoshop on an eMac (~700mhz G4?) compares very unfavorably to Photoshop on a 1.2Ghz Duron/SDR - to the extent that I'm annoyed enough to not want to teach my eMac-owning friend how to use Photoshop on her own computer. And it's just blown away by the P4/DDR I built recently. But hey, lots of graphic designers are very happy with their macs.

I'd suggest, if at all possible, comparing actual system responsiveness (and photoshop performance) on your prospective mac and pc notebooks; from what I've read of them, a Centrino system sounds a lot more attractive.

There's also the matter of display adapters - Radeon 9000 integrated is only available on the 15" PowerBooks, you probably stand a better chance of finding it, or maybe one of it's successors (9200, 9600) on the PC side.

(yes, I'm comparing different processors and speeds, but Mac people will rant on about IPC and whatnot anyway, and if you consider equal pricing, you won't be considering equal megahertz, anyway - the 12" PB G4 tops out at 867Mhz )

 

[swanky]

Yep, all these are valid points. I've tried to ask around on the MacNN forum, but they just rave on about how good the PowerBooks are. And coming from the "PC world" I know for a fact that speed counts (up to a certain point).

And Centrino sounds like a good idea, but out of the current models only the Dell D-series seems to be up my alley. But here in Norway it's more expensive than the 12" Powerbook.

My desktop PC is a 1.3GHz T-bird with 256MB RAM, and as long as I get similar performance from a laptop I'm satisfied.

swanky

 

[andrey]

Get a Powerbook! You won't regret it, seriously!

 

[Bloodstein]

Originally posted by: swanky
Yep, all these are valid points. I've tried to ask around on the MacNN forum, but they just rave on about how good the PowerBooks are. And coming from the "PC world" I know for a fact that speed counts (up to a certain point).

And Centrino sounds like a good idea, but out of the current models only the Dell D-series seems to be up my alley. But here in Norway it's more expensive than the 12" Powerbook.

My desktop PC is a 1.3GHz T-bird with 256MB RAM, and as long as I get similar performance from a laptop I'm satisfied.

swanky

Ahh...that's the prob....I'm in New Zealand and we don't get the deals that these guys at US get....We dun even have the 600m here....*grr*

 

[sk560]

i've been using my 1st ibook for 5 months.... still having fun w/ it.... OS X rocks !!

i've also played w/ an 12" PowerBook in Siba (similar to CompUSA in the states).... it's very similar to ibook.... w/ more features... G4, bluetooth etc... but i won't be trading in my ibook for it... since i don't need those features. one thing i like about the Pb is the keyboard.... more solid feel.

as for sw... check out fink and versiontracker.

 

[w0rmh0l3]

I'll agree with one of the already mentioned points: if your software doesn't run on OSX, are you willing to shell out the money to buy it all over again? Is it even available on the OSX platform in the first place? Personally, I consider that to be quite a waste.

Second: the newer 12" powerbooks seem to have their own spread of issues. There were two good reviews floating around on OSnews.com that talked about the thing getting rather hot in the lower left corner, amongst other problems such as a poor LCD (in terms of quality) and some air pressure/altitude related problem.

Ultimately, I'd recommend against purchasing a powerbook unless you have a massive student discount of some sort. The newer Centrino laptops now really put Apple in the hotseat when it comes to competing with a mobile solution that has incredible battery life and performance at the same time.

 

[Siddhartha]

Can he get the Powerbook to talk to his PC?

 

[swanky]

I get new licences at work if I switch to Mac, so that's no problem.

And I've heard it shouldn't be a problem sharing files between a "PC"-PC and a Mac.

But I would love some low price alternatives from the PC world, but they seem to busy making those 15" laptops...

Thank you all for your replies. Looks like I either have to wait for some small Centrino based laptop, or just get a PowerBook.

swanky

 

[MacNStein]

I have one of the new PB 12"ers (I'm typing on it right now), and it truly is a sweet piece of hardware... but it does have some cons. <gasp!> A Mac user critisizing his Mac?!?!

1.) It gets a little warm, not HOT, just fairly warm. Apple says it's not a big deal, and it only happens when I'm using it while the battery is charging. Once it's charged it cools back down.

2.) No PCMCIA slots. But since it has so many ports already, that's not a big deal to me.

3.) It can only be expanded to 640MB of RAM. This is the part that bothered me the most, but recently I've heard that Micron will be making higher density DDR SODIMMs of the 1GB variety that will work on the PB 12. Apple has said they will post a firmware patch to allow for the system BIOS to recognize the higher amount... so I suppose it's not really a big deal after all.

All in all though, it is the best 12" notebook in the world, IMO (plus you get a really neat Unix OS to play with that's alot more stable than XP ).

And DAMN it looks smooth.

 

[starwarsdad]

Get what you like and will use. The only thing I would try to talk you out of is the 12" screen, especially for Photoshop work. I have an old A20 with a 12" screen and it sucks for coding or working in Photoshop, Illustrator, etc.

Good luck whatever you decide

 

[w0rmh0l3]

Yea, a 12" screen is just way too small to get any real work done. The new inspiron 600m (centrino) has a 14.1" screen, and that's just about perfect if you ask me.

 

[JMaster]

The 12 inch screen IS way too small... But the powerbook is overall a great laptop. It's pretty darn fast, but a little pricey. Remember, you can always get the windows emulator if you have any windows apps not available for macs.