wilshakes1's Full Review: Apple PowerBook G4 12.1 in. (M9007LL/A) Mac Notebo...
A couple of years ago my family bought its first iBook, to replace an aging G3 tower. We liked it so well we decided to buy an AirPort router and 3 more notebooks, so each family member could have his/her own machine. This may sound extravagant, but with a high schooler, a college freshman, and a grad student in the family, it was worth it--No contention for computing facilities, greater efficiency, etc.
Because my wife and I both use motion media in our work, we needed to have at least one machine with a DVD burner, and I also wanted an audio-in port. So we ended up getting 2 G4 iBooks and this PowerBook.
To be honest, as nice as this machine is if didn't need to burn DVDs I'd have saved the money and gone with the iBook. They're just as powerful, properly configured, and even have some slight advantages, which I'll get to in a moment.
We ordered our PowerBook with extra RAM, which is something I'd recommend generally--you can never have too much RAM, and the one big quarrel I have with Apple is that they tend to low-ball the RAM on their base specs--to lower the price point, I suppose. The base 256 MB is fine if you're only going to do PC-type stuff--word processing, spreadsheets, downloading MP3s--but I run monsters like Adobe Creative Suite, Final Cut Pro and DVD Studio Pro, and at 256 MB, performance would suffer. With 512 MB, all the above run adequately, but I'd want more RAM still if I were using it as a primary video capture-and-editing machine. (My G5 tower at work sports 2GB). In any case, the 12 inch screen is going to be cramped for such applications. A small laptop's chief virtue is always going to be its portability. I've used this one for presentations, and for the authoring of 11th-hour, client-needs-it-yesterday DVDs, and it's performed admirably. I've also used it to record sound and digitize analog sound recordings.
Durability seems pretty good. This unit has been dropped twice, hard enough to bend the aluminum case, with no internal damage. One fall jarred the AirPort card loose, but it was easily popped back in. No malfunctions of any note in a year and a half of service.
The built-in software varies in quality. OSX, the operating system, is superb, of course. As for the iLife suite: iPhoto, iDVD, and iMovie are just not professional-grade tools, and I avoid them. But I use iTunes a LOT, and like it. The DVD player gets a fair amount of use as well. Headphones or external speakers are a must for these apps, as the PowerBook's built-in speakers are anemic.
One advantage of the iBook over comparable PowerBooks is that they're often bundled with a larger array of software, including AppleWorks. They also run cooler. I noticed after upgrading to the PowerBook from our older G3 iBook that the case got hotter and the cooling fan seemed to run a lot, even when I wasn't taxing the processor especially hard. I asked my son whether the fan in his new iBook G4 (same 1GHz processor) came on often, and he gave me a blank look. "It has a fan?" he asked.
The fan may be one reason this PowerBook doesn't go as long on a battery charge as an iBook will. It's never gotten the advertised four hours; now that it's got some age on it, I'm lucky to get two.
I use the audio-in port, but after buying this unit I discovered that Griffin makes an inexpensive adapter that allows you to input audio through a USB port. My son, a musician, uses this adapter (the iMic) to record his own work with GarageBand, plugging his guitar and keyboard directly into his iBook.
So now that iBooks can be had with SuperDrives, I see no reason not to go that way next time. Of course, now that they're putting Intel chips in these babies I guess all bets are off...
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1600 Operating System: Macintosh Processor: PowerPC G4 Processor speed: over 1000 Screen Size: 12 inches RAM: More than 256 Internal Storage: SuperDisk Hard Drive (GB): Over 50
The new PowerBook family gives you power in a choice of three ultrafast portables. Whether you prefer the ultra-compact 12-inch model, the coveted 15-...More at eBay
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