Getting a powerbook 12" 1.33

stevey500 · May 16, 2005

Well... Getting ready to ship off my Powermac G4 graphite to afford a new computer and decided to go portable. I have found a user in classifieds and made a deal with him. I am buying his powerbook at the specs of... Powerbook G4 12" 1.33Ghz, Combo Drive, 256Mb ram, 60gb hard drive, airport extreme, and bluetooth. I know what you are thinking, I need to upgrade my ram. What exactly type of ram to I need, I think ill just go ahead and pick a 256 module up on ebay. But I have a few questions.
Does the powerbook 1.33 have the sudden motion sensor for the hard drive safety feature? Does it possibly have the 2 - finger scrolling, if not can there be a software mod to allow this? ... The firewire port, does it supply power when running on battery power? This would be kind of nice to charge my ipod a little bit when on the road. I'm just getting into highshool and i'm thinking this powerbook will be great for me. Anyone know of any great (possibly freeware) apps for Geometry? Well, anyways... thanks for any comments, help, suggestions, or answers.
-Steve

Rod Rod · May 17, 2005

Fry's Electronics (and Outpost.com, I guess) is selling a 512MB PC2700 DDR SO-DIMM (which is exactly the type of RAM the PB G4 you're getting takes) for $50.

The FireWire port can charge an iPod while the PowerBook is running on battery.

There is no sudden motion sensor on the 1.33GHz model. That's a new feature in most recent (meaning current) models.

I remember taking geometry. I barely needed a calculator the whole time, so I doubt any software would help.

Two finger scrolling can be enabled using a program called Sidetrack. Look it up on versiontracker.com. http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/20854

Lacero · May 17, 2005

I use iScroll 2 on my 12" PB 1.33Ghz laptop. Works wonderfully well. Much more elegant than those areas to the right of the trackpad on PC laptops.

tekmoe · May 17, 2005

just out of curiosity...what are you paying for this laptop? people are buying these at microcenter for around $1000.

weg · May 17, 2005

Rod Rod said:
The FireWire port can charge an iPod while the PowerBook is running on battery.

Though I my guess is that the Pod will suck your battery empty within a few minutes

Btw: You can order RAM at Crucial, or you can at least use this webpage to check what kind of RAM you need (I bought the RAM for my PB 12" 1.33GHz at Crucial and had no problems with it).

Rod Rod · May 17, 2005

Crucial isn't plugged enough on these forums.

Anyhow, I use http://www.ramseeker.com to find the best deals and all the RAM I've ordered has been excellent.

Charging an iPod wouldn't drain a PB's battery within minutes. It might suck an hour or so from your PB's battery life though.

stevey500 · May 17, 2005

hey thanks, I am getting it for around $1150 US ... it's in great condition, has a nice laptop case built for the 12" powerbook
Well at least I know it will power the ipod, cause I might use it for external storage for DV storage. Would I get much performance out of it running Unreal 2003 or 2004? .. is there a chance it will run DOOM 3. Minimum specs were a 1.5ghz processor and nvidia 5200... I dont expect to get much out of it running Doom 3, but would it be good enough playable?
-steve

wheezy · May 17, 2005

Just getting INTO highschool? How can you afford all these toys...I live in Utah too and I don't see jr High-ites bein as cool as you.

Congrats on the PB...mine is a 12" and I LOVE it, love it love it. The screen is smaller, but, plugging into a bigger one is no hassle at all, currently a 19" LCD, which does great.

I'd shoot for a 1 gig stick myself though, I found one on newegg just a few weeks ago for $150....

stevey500 · May 17, 2005

hehe... well i got my g4 tower after selling about everything i have... then sold that and im putting the money together with the money i made all last summer to afford the powerbook. I just kinda need it cause I'm always doing audio, video, slideshows, imaging, tons of misc. stuff for school and got tired of having to do all of it in my room... i think im just sick of my room. So yeah, im thinking on getting the 1gb of ram, cause I am at a gig right now and i catch myself at least twice a week topping it out. I'm going into 10th grade cause.. well here in my part of utah, you go through 7th - 9th in jr. high. I'll use it with my 17 apple display that i got for christmas... or i think i might sell it for around $400 ish and get a dell 20" cause it works with DVI right away.

Rod Rod · May 17, 2005

stevey500 said:
hey thanks, I am getting it for around $1150 US ... it's in great condition, has a nice laptop case built for the 12" powerbook
Well at least I know it will power the ipod, cause I might use it for external storage for DV storage. Would I get much performance out of it running Unreal 2003 or 2004? .. is there a chance it will run DOOM 3. Minimum specs were a 1.5ghz processor and nvidia 5200... I dont expect to get much out of it running Doom 3, but would it be good enough playable?
-steve

You're welcome.

I wouldn't recommend using an iPod for DV storage. That'll wear down the iPod way too much. It's much cheaper to get a dedicated external FireWire hard drive (unless of course you already own an iPod). If you're trying to justify the cost of an iPod by thinking of it as a DV storage solution, well that doesn't hold much water. Get a FW case with an Oxford 911 bridge chipset (they cost about $40 or so) and a 7200 rpm EIDE drive (around $110 for 250GB). If you must have an iPod but you don't have much cash left over, well at this point an iPod mini or shuffle starts looking really good.

I don't have any idea about how games perform. I haven't played anything beyond Chess on my 12" 1.33 GHz 1.25GB RAM combo drive PB.

crazydreaming · May 17, 2005

Rod Rod said:
The FireWire port can charge an iPod while the PowerBook is running on battery.

Would about the USB port charging a mini or a shuffle? Anyone know?

crazydreaming · May 17, 2005

tekmoe said:
just out of curiosity...what are you paying for this laptop? people are buying these at microcenter for around $1000.

Not at the moment! All sold out online...

Rod Rod · May 17, 2005

crazydreaming said:
Would about the USB port charging a mini or a shuffle? Anyone know?

Yes, the PB's USB ports charge iPods too.

stevey500 · May 17, 2005

I'm sure the powerbook has 5V Usb power so it will for sure charge a 4G iPod, iPod Shuffle, and iPod mini... or anything USB unless it goes beyond 500mah draw power. Yeah I was thinking it would be too much ware to my ipod, i guess with my left over if I have any I will invest in an external HD.. or enclosure because I had 2 drives in the powermac I just sold and I took out one and left a 60gb maxtor ( not a fan of maxtor ) and took my 80gb Wd drive. They have the external enclosures around $19 on ebay

My buddy aaron has a DV cam and we always make little video projects or do video for school... stuff like that.

TheMasin9 · May 17, 2005

i just got mine for 130

wheezy said:
Just getting INTO highschool? How can you afford all these toys...I live in Utah too and I don't see jr High-ites bein as cool as you.

Congrats on the PB...mine is a 12" and I LOVE it, love it love it. The screen is smaller, but, plugging into a bigger one is no hassle at all, currently a 19" LCD, which does great.

I'd shoot for a 1 gig stick myself though, I found one on newegg just a few weeks ago for $150....

Just got a 1 gig stick for 130 today, this makes me happy

govtcheez · May 18, 2005

Lacero said:
I use iScroll 2 on my 12" PB 1.33Ghz laptop. Works wonderfully well. Much more elegant than those areas to the right of the trackpad on PC laptops.

are you using it with Panther, or Tiger? He has a disclaimer on the site where it says:
"As of version 0.20, iScroll2 includes preliminary Tiger support. I can't test it on Tiger myself so far, but I have received various reports from people using iScroll2 successfully with 10.4.

There are still some pretty major issues, though. With version 0.24, the StartupItem sometimes runs too early on in the Startup process, causing a kernel panic. If you experience this, boot your computer in safe mode (hold the shift key while booting up) and remove iScroll2 using the uninstall feature.

For earlier versions, there is an issue with iScroll2Daemon and Tiger that makes iScroll2 forget its settings after each reboot.

I'm currently working on these issues, but due to time constraints, it might be a while before I can offer fixes."

Rod Rod · May 18, 2005

stevey500 said:
They have the external enclosures around $19 on ebay

Just make sure they're FireWire and their bridge chipsets are Oxford 911. All the $19 enclosures I've seen on eBay have been USB 2.0. I wouldn't mind getting a $19 FW enclosure though. You can never have enough hard drive space.

TDM21 · May 18, 2005

govtcheez said:
are you using it with Panther, or Tiger? He has a disclaimer on the site where it says:
"As of version 0.20, iScroll2 includes preliminary Tiger support. I can't test it on Tiger myself so far, but I have received various reports from people using iScroll2 successfully with 10.4.

There are still some pretty major issues, though. With version 0.24, the StartupItem sometimes runs too early on in the Startup process, causing a kernel panic. If you experience this, boot your computer in safe mode (hold the shift key while booting up) and remove iScroll2 using the uninstall feature.

For earlier versions, there is an issue with iScroll2Daemon and Tiger that makes iScroll2 forget its settings after each reboot.

I'm currently working on these issues, but due to time constraints, it might be a while before I can offer fixes."

I'm running iScroll2 v 0.22 on my Rev. C 12" PowerBook with Tiger. So far things have been pretty good. The problem with it not remembering the settings after restart still exist for me, but I hardly ever restart my PB; I usually just put it to sleep. I haven't tried the later versions.

Mord · May 18, 2005

the usb and firewire ports power devices just as well as there desktop counterparts, infact better, you can chare your ipod while your powerbook is sleeping.

govtcheez · May 18, 2005

TDM21 said:
I'm running iScroll2 v 0.22 on my Rev. C 12" PowerBook with Tiger. So far things have been pretty good. The problem with it not remembering the settings after restart still exist for me, but I hardly ever restart my PB; I usually just put it to sleep. I haven't tried the later versions.

I have the same powerbook with 1.25gb of ram. Anyway you can try out the new (0.24) iscroll and see if it has the same bugs? I really want this feature, but I don't want to install it if it doesn't work well.

Thanks in advance.

_pb_boi · May 18, 2005

Doom 3 is a no-go

Those are the absolute minimum specs, and even they've been widely ridiculed as completely unworkable. Sorry mate; you're really looking at a G5 before it starts to get playable. I doubt anyone here will disagree.

"Unfortunately, PowerBooks and other G4-absed Macs need not apply..." [MacFormatUK]

However, the 12in 1.33 is a stunning machine - enjoy it

I'd also recommend the route of a FireWire drive. I have a LaCie D2 and love it, 160gig.

andy.

sw1tcher · May 19, 2005

crazydreaming said:
Not at the moment! All sold out online...

Try calliing around the stores near you if there are any. If I remember correctly, sammyman got one by calling around. Micro Center aren't listing them on their site anymore.

govtcheez · May 19, 2005

sw1tcher said:
Try calliing around the stores near you if there are any. If I remember correctly, sammyman got one by calling around. Micro Center aren't listing them on their site anymore.

I got mine last week at microcenter in fairfax, VA. They had 7 left. I'm guessing they still have a couple. I just sent in my $100 rebate today.

Pretty much the best deal for under $1000 before taxes.

wnameth · May 19, 2005

congrats on the purchase, i am dreaming of that lappy, i am saving up for a ibook. Let us know when u receive it, maybe give us your own persona; review.

stevey500 · May 19, 2005

Hey thanks a lot guys! I cant wait for it to arrive, Im really excited to break free from my desk..!!.. I will try the scrolling programs some of you recommended... I'm very sure this machine will satisfy me

Will I be able to play 720 HD H.264 videos very well?, because on my powermac 800mhz... it will not, maybe a new frame per 1.5 seconds, yeah its that bad. Does it make much noise to where if I pull it out of my backpack during a class and everybody is reading or doing something to where the classroom is silent, will the powerbook make much noise to bother others, is the hard drive very audible?

Getting a powerbook 12" 1.33

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