THE ultimate laptop, bar none - seriously.
Written: Dec 05 '02 (Updated Jan 04 '03)
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Pros: -OS X (unix)
-Beautiful design
-Amazing screen
-Super Drive
Cons: -Price $3000
-The envious looks people give you when you whip one out
The Bottom Line: If you have the money to spend(and God knows this economy needs it), its about twice as expensive as most laptops, but this is THE ULTIMATE LAPTOP.
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| ssamaha's Full Review: Apple PowerBook G4 15.2 in. (M8859LL/A) Mac Notebo... |
First some background on me. But first, I will not go into a long winded emotional explanation as to why I love this machine as much of that is subjective, I will give my reasons for why this machine better than other high end laptops in the $2000 price segment.
I started with Apple back in '78 and owned the II, and IIe, but then switched to PC with the advent of the IBM PC, I remained "wintel" until the intro of the PIII and G4. At that point, I had reached my fill with windows crashes, conflicts, and registry problems with every software and hardware install. I had heard that the new MAC OS was going to be UNIX based and that was it, I knew that I was gonna switch. Plus, at that time the G4 was clearly superior to the PIII. So I got my Duel Processor 500mhz PowerMac and have been loyal to Mac ever since.... Now on to the Powerbook.
The time came to go mobile with my fun and work (Mostly digital editing that requires significant floating point hp), so I went and got Ti800 mhz that I loved. 2 months later, I got word that Apple was going to shortly upgrade this machine and so I sold it on ebay (for close to what I paid) and waited for the 1.0Ghz SuperDrive PB!
I'll never for get the morning when I got up and went to check email on my PowerMac and found several MacNN message notifications for a thread about the rumor that a new PB was around the corner. It was Nov 15th and Apple announce the latest line of PB G4, the 867, and 1000mhz models.
I went for the 1.0GHz w/ SuperDrive (A DVD-R/CD-RW) combo drive that is only available with this laptop and a couple of other $2500 PC laptops from Sony and Toshiba. Another reason I got the 1.0GHz model is the ATI Radeon 9000 Pro with 64Meg DDR with a high bandwidth bus. This is desktop workstation power in a laptop (mind you the Radeon 9700 is top dog, but only available in desktop). I use some OpenGL 3D rendering software that can really use the extra video RAM and features of the 9000 GPU. The 1.0GHz also comes with a 60GB Harddrive with high thru-put, and 512Meg RAM, which I upgraded to 1.0GB for a meager $200.
First off, Man! This thing is good looking. They couldn't have done anything better. It is a 11 out of 10 in aesthetics. That said, it is also very functional. Using a Gateway or Dell laptop, then using this reminds me of driving a Chevy then going into a BMW.... they are just night and day.
The screen on this machine is also amazing. The aspect ratio and 15.2" size give an incredible workspace that is second to none(well, all but). The quality of this screen is easily seen in the use of photo editing software, which you can do for your self at any Apple store where they have PhotoShop 7 installed on all PBs. The screen also has quick access keys (F keys) that adjust the brightness and also displays the level right on the screen via an OS X feature. The color correction software built into OS X is great and you can get great CYMK and RGB profiles from the internet, or calibrate your own. The graphics card(GPU) in this unit is also the most powerful available in a laptop (and more powerful than most desktops)... the ATI Radeon 9000 Pro with 64MB DDR... The DDR IS connected via a 128bit data bus that runs at 1/2 speed which gives huge Video memory bandwidth. I play 3D games on this and never experience framerates that are choppy. This is a true powerhouse for graphics.
This computer also excels in the fact that it's about 33% lighter and thinner than comparable PC laptops. While it has a wide foot print, due to the 15.2" screen, it is hardly 1" thick and weighs 5.4lbs.... nothing for a machine of this power. It is cooled by two fans that come on by computer control depending on what you are doing. If you are using the CPU and GPU a lot, you will get both the stage 1 and 2 fans, which can get a bit loud for a small machine, but nevertheless quiet enough for me to be typing this in bed next to my wife and rendering a 3D model in a separate app all at once. Both fans are cycling on and off as the GPU heats up. Also when you burn a DVD-R, which can take upwards of two hours, you can expect fans on most of the time. And guys, fans are a fact of life when you cram this much tech into a space this small. I am frankly amazed at that there isn't a full time fan for this machine.
At this point, it is also worth noting that this powerhouse, can run anywhere from 2.5 to 5 hours on a full charge. The 2.5 hours would be with continuous use of DVD and HD as well. The 5 is very probable while surfing the net via ethernet (As airport, 802.11B, would consume power for the antenna). I got a spare battery ($129) which is pretty inexpensive compared to many other laptops and with the two, I can do a coast to coast and watch DVDs the whole time with no problems.
Now something about OS X. OS X is the Ultimate OS in my opinion. It has the stability of Solaris, the beauty of XP (and more than XP) and the ease of use of Mac OS 7-9.2..... Unix is universally used to power the largest computer networks and for a good reason. It is very stable and versatile. The Core of this Unix is the Darwin/Mach kernel, this is a tweaked BSD 4.4 Unix that is custom tailored for Mac hardware/software. In two years of Running OS X.0, X.1 and now X.2.2, I have NEVER, repeat, NEVER had to reboot the OS due to a system crash. If an application fails, the protected memory feature of OS X insulates the OS from the corruption. As a bonus, OS X, being a Unix OS, has multiprocessor awareness. This is of no use on the PB, but really shines on Duel Processor PowerMacs. The only drawback is you need lots of RAM.. I got a Gigabyte, but 256MB is really minimum, but not to worry, Apple ships it with 512 anyway.
Update for Jan 4, 2003...
I have been running Final Cut Pro 3.0.4 on this thing for about a week now, using a LaCie 120 Gig firewire drive for media.... this thig has smoked! I am doing many RT effects better than on my Duel 500 PowerMac. The stability of the program on this platform also has been incredible. This is a very resource intensive app and if a unit can run it effectively and without undue slowdown, it has proven it's self to me.
I ordered this machine with the extra RAM (for a total of 1.0GB), a Apple Pro mouse, and an extra battery & Charger.... I got the 3 year extended warrantee and paid just over $4000 with tax. This is a lot of $, but then I got a lot of computer!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 3200
Operating System: Unix
Processor: PowerPC G4
Processor speed: over 1000
Screen Size: Greater than 15 inches
RAM: More than 256
Internal Storage: CD-RW and DVD
Hard Drive (GB): Over 50
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Epinions.com ID:
ssamaha
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Location: Scottsdale,AZ
Reviews written: 15
Trusted by: 0 members
About Me:
Pilot, BS Finance, Computer Geek
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