I'm about to get a powerbook for school (college) and I just wanted to make sure i'm making the right choice. I'm stuck between the more expensive more stable 15" 1.67ghz powerbook (lots of ram) verses a cheaper, less stable dell (or somthing of the like). I will be using the laptop mostly for school (wordprocessing, powerpoint) and it will be replacing my desktop (which is staying home with my mom). I plan to use Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, Dreamweaver, some DVD authoring apps, surf the web, chat and check email. I just want to make sure this computer will be up to those tasks and will last a few years (I guess until the intel apples come out and are bugfree-ish). Oh and i'm tired of Windows.
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About to buy a Powerbook
- Thread starter dummptyhummpty
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Get the powerbook. I had the same decision to make at the beginning of the year. Bought the PB and its the best decision I have made. Hasn't crashed yet. If I bought a PC it would have crashed multiple times by now. I also have a desktop PC. I thought I would still use the PC but I don't. Its become completely redundant. When I do have to use it I cringe (my mum uses it so I often have to help her out on the PC). I hate using Windows after using OS X. Trust me, do ur self a favour and get the PB. I also have the 15" 1.67.
Considering that you are replacing your desktop system and want to use all those apps you can't beat the PB.
Let me know what you end up doing.
Considering that you are replacing your desktop system and want to use all those apps you can't beat the PB.
Let me know what you end up doing.
A couple of years ago I was trying to choose between an iBook and a Windows laptop. I ended up getting the iBook, and mum got a Dell. The iBook worked very well (although it got hit by the infamous logic board problem), and the Dell crashed 20 minutes out of the box 
(it somehow wiped its boot sector)
(it somehow wiped its boot sector)
The PowerBook 15" is a very stable Mac. It will do all the things that you mentioned very well. My wife has one and loves it. No worry about a virus. If you can afford additional memory, try boosting it to 1 GB, use Crucial link above. Also recommend AppleCare.
Saying that the Dell is less stable is a joke. If you say the Apple is more stable, I'll tell you I crashed my PowerBook within two hours of having it. Crashed it again earlier today. I've had it since Monday, not even a week. All the while my Windows machine is going on two weeks uptime, though it's not a Dell. I wasn't doing anything intensive either when the PowerBook crashed. Finder, iChat, Safari. I semi-run 6 Windows XP Pro machines on an Windows Server 2003 domain, all the machines have been running for weeks and in fact they are all Dells.
Anyways for what you say you will be doing the Powerbook would be a fine choice. Mine runs Photoshop CS, Studio MX 2004 all just fine while doing other things, then again I could say the same about my Windows machine at home or at work. The one thing I can't live without has been Expose, I can't get enough of it. If you are sick and tired of Windows and don't feel like dealing with Linux then I guess you choice would be to go to an Apple.
Anyways for what you say you will be doing the Powerbook would be a fine choice. Mine runs Photoshop CS, Studio MX 2004 all just fine while doing other things, then again I could say the same about my Windows machine at home or at work. The one thing I can't live without has been Expose, I can't get enough of it. If you are sick and tired of Windows and don't feel like dealing with Linux then I guess you choice would be to go to an Apple.
go with the pb - I'm a filmmaker and dvdsp and fcp are my life - I also run a website using dreamweaver - the 1.67 ghz g4 is VERY underrated in its performance - as a filmmaker, I am very pleased with its speed - its 'comparable' to my G5 - definitely get at least 1 gig of ram and try to get the 128 of vram - otherwise, you're gonna LOVE this machine