Too raw right now, wait till July!
Written: Apr 16 '01
|
Product Rating:
|
|
| Ease of Use: |
 |
|
| Quality of Tech Support: |
 |
|
|
Pros: Speed, design, wow-factor
Cons: older architecture, small harddrive, defects
The Bottom Line: Highly recommend if you want to have a portable G4 and a subject of envy now.
|
|
|
| kostroma1's Full Review: Apple PowerBook G4 15.2 in. (M8362LL/A) Mac Notebo... |
There is so much hype about TiBook in Macintosh press and I thought I would share my experience with this Powerbook after a month of using it.
Well, first of all, nothing comes close to it in terms of design. It has sleek, metallic body (that is easily susceptible to scratches, though), it is thin (under one inch), light. The most noticeable part of it is a screen that allows to view two pages of text simultaneously. It is a great feature for those who do a lot of desktop publishing and word processing. The screen is a bit brighter than on a previous Pismo Powerbook.
As far as performance is concerned, my TiBook 400 is a zippy machine. I am running two systems at the same time (9.1 and X) on the same harddrive and there is a noticeable difference in OS X performance over Pismo Powerbooks. The Altivec processor really makes a difference when running the applications that are optimized for G4, i. e. Virtual PC 4.0 is much faster than on G3, some Photoshop effects are faster, not all of them. Overall, my G4 400 Mhz is comparable to Pismo G3 500 Mhz. The difference in speed is noticeable only when Altivec-enhanced applications are run.
The Powerbook has the same assortment of ports as Pismo: USB, Firewire (only one, unfortunately, to save the tiny size), PCMCIA, VGA, Airport (sold separately). One thing that is missing is a sound-in port, which is easily fixable by purchasing iMic for $35.00. The microphone is in a weird location behind the grill close to the PCMCIA slot. I have not used it yet, but I foresee some difficulties with using it since the sound is not directly accessing the mic. The DVD drive of my Powerbook did not have any troubles with ejecting the disks, as has been reported by other users.
Now about the things that are bothering me. First of all, the harddrive that comes standard (10 GB) is really puny for the machine that is advertised as the video-editing powerhouse. It needs to be at least 20 GB. So, if you are contemplating a purchase of the TiBook, do a custom order from the Applestore. You will save yourself money in the long run. Secondly, the sound in port would have been nice to have, although it is not a big problem. The performance of the G4 chip does not really improve compared to G3 except for Velocity engine enhanced applications which are very few right now. The DVD playback is still software based which means you WILL experience troubles viewing DVDs, as I have. But watching a DVD while seating on a plane with a Powerbook whose screen FITS without too much effort in a regular airplane seat is a great experience. The battery lasts for about 3 hours and it is rather average. The graphics card Rage 128 is rather old and needs to be accelerated. Overall, the TiBook is based on old Powerbook architecture with the only difference in a processor.
My overall experience with the TiPowerbook is excellent. It is fast for desktop publishing, graphic design, multimedia, etc. In July, the Powerbook will most certainly undergo a revision where my gripes would be resolved, I hope. It is a great product form a great company. In spite of all the gripes that I have, I really enjoy the Powerbook and highly recommend it.!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 2500.00
Operating System: Macintosh
Processor: PowerPC G4
Screen Size: 15
RAM: More than 256
Internal Storage: DVD
Hard Drive (GB): 13-20
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
kostroma1
|
|
Member: Vadim
Location: Ann Arbor, MI
Reviews written: 20
Trusted by: 5 members
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.