Confused consumer... Buying a laptop... possibly ibook • Non-Gaming • Apple, Mac, and iPod • Eurogamer.net

nomess 23 Apr 2005 02:46:36 71 posts
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Hi,

I'm in the market for a secondary computer, more notably a sub Ł1000 laptop, which will be mainly used when I'm not in uni i.e. travelling/holidays. Anyway I've never had a laptop before and I've never had a mac, so I figured I would hit to birds with 1 stone, by considering the ibook 12" or 14" range or 12" powerbook.

I know.. I know if I get an iBook I should up the ram, but are there any other recommendations (i.e. models + linkage)? Should I even be getting a mac laptop (note mac gurus is g5 on the horizon or not?!?) or should I be considering pc laptops?

Cheers,
nomess

PS I'm a 2nd year comp sci student going onto 3rd, so apart from that I will be using my laptop mostly for watching, using productivity software (i.e. photoshop etc).

Oh yeah final point, I have a maxtor onetouchII external hdd which I use for storing mp3s + files. Will a mac recognize the stuff on it or will the drive have to be reformatted to mac standards?

TennesseeStiff 23 Apr 2005 11:01:14 372 posts
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The Maxtor drive will be fine. The one button backup business my not work; you'll have to check but it will work fine as an external disk drive without having to reformat (unless you have it formatted with some strange file format. Actually OSX supports quite a few strange file formats.

As for a Mac in the first place ...... you do need to be aware that as far as hardware is concerned, you tend to get better value for money on the PC side. However, in most cases, when you consider the combination of software and hardware across the two platforms, Macs win out.

For example, the iBook screen and keyboard are, how shall I put this, budget quality. However, for the same price, you will get PCs with much better screens and keyboards ....... and these days they will have DVD writers as standard. The PB have much better screens and keyboards by the way.

Gaming is a deal braker but then again, as far as I am concerned gaming and laptops don't go together on any platform.

As for software, there is just so MUCH! I am now starting to think that it's Windows that is lacking software not Mac. The amount and quality of software for this platform is amazing.

That's about it. At the risk of tormenting Otto further, the new operating system, Tiger is pretty amazing. I think Spotlight even gave me an erection when I first used it. I think the extra you pay is worth it. The Mac is, as whole a much better platform.

PS. If you can hold out for a month or so, it will be worth it. I think the iBooks are due for a refresh. They need to have new GPUs to fully support the stuff in Tiger and so I susoect they will be updated soon.

Edited by TennesseeStiff at 11:07:18 23-04-2005

mull 23 Apr 2005 11:04:51 463 posts
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The thing to point out is that the ibooks haven't been updated in 6 months, and are sue to be given better specs, allegedly with 512 RAM standard, very soon. I'd say buy straight after the upgrade.

TennesseeStiff 23 Apr 2005 11:08:30 372 posts
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^^^

LOL, great minds think alike.

bainbrge 23 Apr 2005 11:29:20 1,687 posts
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ibooks are lovely, my sister was bought one for Xmas. Lovely size, lovely software, very practical, and very easy to use. After years of struggling with PC's, within a few weeks she was faffing around with photos, using the calendaring system, using itunes, etc. etc.

nomess 23 Apr 2005 12:01:46 71 posts
Registered 19 years ago

Thanks for the info, i'll probably get one then, but will wait for it to be updated. So now how long will I have to wait for it to be updated... May or June, possibly when Tiger gets relased?
And what's wrong with the keyboard and screen?

PinkSpider 23 Apr 2005 12:40:00 3,349 posts
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I have a 17" Ibook, we got it on the cheap. Its pretty good, does most of the stuff I want on it, doesent do games but I have a PSTwo for that (wouldnt mind Counter Strike tho, sigh. Runs MSN Messenger (a barebones version). Video playback is good, occaisionly slow on my G4 if im multitasking (need more ram me thinks). Erm, emulation is okay for games (anything above 16 bit aint as good as pc). However applications software is excellent (would kill for paintshop pro instead of Photoshop though as im used to it, but everything is here.

The keyboard is okay, took abit to get used to buy its all good now. I did once get hair dye from my fingers to the keyboard which took weeks to get off, had a purple ibook almost :s).

If you can afford it wait for the update mind.

Yes.

TennesseeStiff 23 Apr 2005 13:39:43 372 posts
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I don't know what a 17" iBook is. There is a 12" and 14" iBook. PowerBooks are 12", 15" and 17".

In my opinion the iBook screen is too low in resolution and has a slightly uneven backlighting for a machine of that price. Also the keyboard is simply not as good as many others in the same price range. Otherwise it is a great machine. Its graphics are also very good. Unlike a lot of sub Ł1000 PC laptops, it doesn't have shared memory graphics and has a GPU with its own VRAM.

Tiger has already been announced and will be out in retail on Friday. That means any computer you buy as of the announcement is eligible for an update at the cost of 14 quid (I think) post and packaging. Some time after the 29th (Friday) Apple will start shipping its computers with the Tiger DVD in the box. A little later Tiger will be pre-installed.

As for when the iBook update is coming, you have to realise that Apple is the most secretive PC manufacturer around. It's part show business, part business sense and part being behind in the hardware game so that unlike the PC side, it is actually worth buying the fastest Apple. People tend to buy on an upgrade and if you knew in advance exactly when an upgrade was coming, no one would buy one for two months before.

Predicting when a particular line is due for an upgrade is a black art ..... you have to be aware of how long the line has been going for, what the sales are like, what demand has been like and most importantly if IBM or Freescale (PAK Motorola) have managed to squeeze any kind of improvement from their processors so that there is actually something to upgrade to.

Anyway, in the case of iBooks, all the stars are aligned and the consensus of opinion is that we should see some kind of update soon.

Edited by TennesseeStiff at 13:42:29 23-04-2005

nomess 26 Apr 2005 20:10:55 71 posts
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How about the fact that tiger is coming out this friday and it's gui is going to be mostly gpu intensive. Surely the 32mb card of the ibook is just too little for it to cope with tiger and surely they will update it sometime this week... no?

nomess 26 Apr 2005 20:50:31 71 posts
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It's true that the macmini has only a 32mb card (actually the same card as the ibook - radeon 9200), but the 12" powerbook has been upped to 64mb gefore fx go.

Checking here:
http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/
It seems like the ibooks are updated every 6 months and the last update was october, so I'm just guessing I should wait a bit... maybe early may latest?

TennesseeStiff 26 Apr 2005 21:07:18 372 posts
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It is unlikely that the iBooks will get more than 32 MB for graphics .... but they will almost certainly get better GPUs. The fact that the GPU on iBooks, eMacs and Minis do not support Core Video and Core Graphics (and possibly Q2D Extreme) is not due to lack of memory; it's because the GPUs are old and don't have programable shaders.

Also, it is very likely that the iBooks will ship with 512 Meg ...... the PowerMac updates have already leaked out (Amazon had a slip) ... it looks like an iBook upgrade is eminent. I am also sure that the new Superdrives will support both +and - DVD RW versions (the currently only do -). These are all worth waiting for.

otto Moderator 28 May 2007 11:16:19 49,322 posts
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I honestly wouldn't worry too much about waiting for the update, it'll be incremental and not radical - no G5 iBook for at least a year, probably longer. The iBook's a very nice machine but as others have said the quality of the screen and keyboard feels a bit cheap when you've been using a powerbook. I recommend going into a local reseller and having a go. As Tennessee says you'll fall in love with the thing once you start using the software though. Unfortunately this NerdLan means that you can't get the wisdom of Shivoa and lost_soul on the issue, they're both l33t hardcore PC users who opted for an iBook as a second machine and they both love them.

otto Moderator 28 May 2007 11:16:19 49,322 posts
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It will cope fine with Tiger, it just won't display all the bells & whistles. I doubt the iBooks will be given more than a 32mb card as the smallest powerbook as well as the Mac Mini still have only 32mb gfx cards.

otto Moderator 28 May 2007 11:16:19 49,322 posts
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Ah, hadn't realised the 12" pb now had a 64mb card. Bollocks. Two macs, and only 64mb VRAM between 'em. >

I honestly wouldn't hold your breath for a bump to 64mb VRAM in the iBook range. I don't see why they would. They need to keep the range distinct from the powerbooks, and virtually the whole mac line-up bar the G5 towers aren't able to take full advantage of Tiger, so I don't think that's an issue.

otto Moderator 28 May 2007 11:16:19 49,322 posts
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Have to say I'm kind of pissed off that neither of my machines is going to be able to support Core Video. Gah! It'll be at least a couple of years before I can justify an upgrade. Just in time for 10.5 - codename Lion-o. RAWR.