Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple Releases PowerBooks and iBooks

AKR said:
Also, an IBM style thumb mouse would be a nice addition.
Click to expand...
As someone who works for The Three Letter Computer Company by day, and then fights crime, rights wrongs and designs on a Mac by night, :D , I can tell you that a TrackPoint blows chunks when it comes to anything graphics related. And that represents too big of market for Apple to even consider adding that. For a corporate drone inserting text into Word, sure. But trying to select something in Photoshop with a TrackPoint is like doing needlework with oven mitts on.
 
Well, according to the Developer Notes none of the new PowerBooks are using the new 7447A chips. They use the same 1/2 clock speed reduction as the previous models. Instead they have higher capacity batteries to compensate. So apparently they are still using the 7447 chips.
 
TWinbrook46636 said:
The Developer Notes for the new iBooks and PowerBooks have been posted!

http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Hardware/AppleHardware-rev-date.html

They do not say what G4 processor is used so the 7447A mystery continues.

:confused:
Click to expand...

If you check the appendix and look for the G4 Processor section, it gives you this link:
http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC7447A&nodeId=018rH3bTdG8653

It is indeed the 7447A for *ALL* of the new portables.

Jeff
 
Soire said:
Here's a situation. I live in Washington DC. There are no Apple stores in the district, and we are treated as quite an obscure address for billing, etc.

So do I have to pay sales tax if my delivery address is DC, but the billing address is NJ? If anybody actually knows the answer please let me in on it.

ps- PowerMacs?... Rev. B?... Who said that?... :)
Click to expand...

I'm not positive. I got charged sales tax but I don't believe there's an apple store in Wisconsin. However I did go through the education store as well.
 
sales tax, BTO, etc

I think everyone understands that if the company you order from does not do business in your state, when they ship to you there is no local sales tax from your state on the bill. In theory, you are STILL supposed to report and pay the sales tax to your state. In practice, no one does. I mail order from MacConnection and MacWarehouse all the time and there is no sales tax in California. Other companies have sales tax in CA because the do business there, but no sales tax in some other states.

http://www.powerbookcentral.com/

Powerbook central has a pretty good tracker that lists where sales tax is collected from what companies. Apple collects sales tax in all 50 state (obviously that is zero if your state has no sales tax).

Regarding build to order or BTO options, I spoke with MacWarehouse today and THEY DO BTO ORDERS of Apple items. They take an additional 10 days for them to get the item. The thing is, as of this morning the new machines were not even in their system to order. I'm sure that will be resolved very soon if it already hasn't. Ceraintly in a week or two when these are flowing freely it will be very easy to BTO through a reseller like MacWarehouse. I'm sure there are many resellers who cannot do BTO, but according to the guy I spoke to today MacWarehouse does...

Good luck with all the new purchases!

d.
 
Yes, it appears that the 7447A is being used but it is not what we expected. It does not scale the processor speed down in 50 Mhz increments or anything like that but rather cuts it in half.

Taking the 1 Ghz iBook as an example:

Old (7447):

Processor speed cut down from 1 Ghz to 765 Mhz.
Processor and memory bus speed cut down from 133 Mhz to 102 Mhz.

New (7447A):

Processor speed cut down from 1 Ghz to 500 Mhz.
Processor and memory bus speeds are left alone.
 
please HELP, 15" or 17"

I am going to be a switcher and I need help in figuring out which is best all round. I want it loaded,
I like the 2 lasps on the 17" keeps the closed cover even vs the 15"

I don't plan to travel hardly, maybe 1 time a year if that.

I worry maybe the 17 screen can go bad faster the the 15" cause of size.

Help me please

I don't want to draw straws and I hope you MAC Pro's can help this Virgin Switcher.

I want to write books for kids and web browse, DVD watch and burn, and games. Hopefully 1942 Battle Field will come to Mac

these are my choicesPowerBook 1.5GHz (15.2" TFT) 3-5 bus.days Remove $2,479.00
1.5GHz PowerPC G4 with 128MB Graphics Memory
80GB Ultra ATA drive @ 5400 rpm
SuperDrive (DVD-R/CD-RW)
Backlit Keyboard/Mac OS - U.S. English
512MB DDR333 SDRAM - 1 SO-DIMM
airPort Extreme Card 065-4820
APP for PowerBook (w/ or w/o display) - Enrollment Kit bus.days Remove $239.00
.Mac Promotional Bundle $69.95

or

PowerBook 1.5GHz (17" TFT) 3-5 bus.days $2,589.00
1.5GHz PowerPC G4 with 128MB Graphics Memory
80GB Ultra ATA drive @ 5400rpm 065-4965
SuperDrive (DVD-R/CD-RW) 065-4966
AirPort Extreme Card 065-4974
512MB DDR333 SDRAM - 1 SO-DIMM 065-5071
Backlit Keyboard/Mac OS - U.S. English 065-4963
.Mac Promotional Bundle $69.95

THANK YOU FOR YOU PRO HELP

Switcher and can't wait :D
 
Riveting!!

Getting close to 600 posts! I've been reading this thread all day and I must say it's been most interesting (.....didn't get much work done!) I hope there will be some other more specific threads started relating to issues raised today. I'll take a 1.5 PB please.... Thanks everyone!!

BTW I visited Apple Soho at 10.00 this morning, they were selling the iBooks, PBs soon and nothing on display yet (for a week they said)
 
This is getting interesting~

ok now if the new PB's have the 7447a then according to specs
it uses 20w @1.42, the previous PB chip 7447 was
21.3 @ at 1.33

The top PB is a 1.5 chip
so the question is, what is the watts output for the 7447a at 1.5
and is it going to be HOT.

But if speed step or whatever its called, will cause the CPU to run as a
700, then what is the wattage then>

Am I making sense here?

Patriotn~ get the 15" , thats the truth, enough said!
 
patriotn11 said:
ANY, IF NOT TO MUCH TROUBLE

PLEASE REPLY TO MY ABOVE POST

15 OR 17"
Click to expand...

I'd go for the 15" cause it has applecare, since you are worried about it. If you arent travelling much, you could always get an external monitor, too, if you decided you wanted bigger than 15". I think the 17" is just akwardly large and it is very expensive.
 
thanks 15 or 17" apple care

I would get apple care 15 or 17"

thanks for reply :D

no more talk, thanks for your advice all :eek:

I can't wait :eek:

sorry for buggin you all, I just wanna get it right

Thanks from San Antonio

GO SPURS GO........................ :D
 
A few lessons

pigwin32 said:
Commiserations, guess some people are just born unlucky.

It would burn me too if I had ordered a new PB only for a refresh to occur prior to even receiving the one I ordered. Good luck on getting some kind of resolution. Of course the Buyer's Guide has been suggesting the PB was reaching the end of a cycle. So either you really needed the PB you ordered, in which case you commited to spending the money to fulfill a need, or your desire outweighed your common sense. If the first is true, despite feeling hard done by you aren't really any worse off, if the second is true I won't preach, I've been in similar situations.
Click to expand...

No it was the first. When I placed the order I believed PBs were coming sometime this quarter. I had seen the many references to the 10-day rule here and felt that a 2-week replacement window was enough to not feel bad about. That is, there's always new machines coming, the rumors here were NOT accurate enough and if you followed them blindly you'd never buy anything, and I needed the machine.

What happened as you say was bad luck in terms of timing for me. If the new PB was the same price as the old, I'd have been able to live with it. But when the price also fell so dramatically and I didn't even have the machine yet, that was annoying. What tipped me over the edge was the tone and attitude of the store manager.

What I learned out of this is that the 10-day policy isn't a blanket policy as references to it here suggest. Not all sellers offer it. And others in this thread have stated there are interpretations on when the 10-day timer starts.

Ok, so mea culpa there. I could have researched that much more carefully than I did.

But frankly, the sanctimonious attitude of some respondents here who wanted to reply with "if you read this site you would have known" completely misssed the point and are deluding themselves as to the usefulness of this site for a +3 week prediction. So many rumours are stated here so often that of course they're always right after the fact.

So, in summary, I knew new PBs were coming sometime soonish. I thought I had a 10 day replacement window and given my need for a machine I decided I could live with a machine that was obsoleted 3 weeks after I got it (worst case - so I thought).

The 10 day window appears to have been a false assumption.

But, I will talk to them today now that the announcements have happened and see what happens. It really seems like it is Apple Australias call on what happens. David Jones made it clear yesterday what their position is.
 
Just bought a new powerbook 12" last week

Help!!
I bought a powerbook 12" las week. It is the 1GHz version. What the hell should I do. It was BTO, so I doubt apple will do anything about it. Is there anything I can do to get rid of this one and roll into a rev C powerbook. Thanks for your help. :mad:
 
patriotn11 said:
ANY, IF NOT TO MUCH TROUBLE

PLEASE REPLY TO MY ABOVE POST

15 OR 17"
Click to expand...
I'd say 15 inch cause that's what i'm going to get when i have the money. i'm not sure if this is true but i believe (don't trust me on this) i think the 17 inch might have a shorter life due to the large screen also the 17 inch screen doesn't open all the way in airplane seats at least that's what i've heard.
 
Mistake on Apple site screwing up my order

Go here:

http://store.apple.com/AppleStore/WebObjects/EducationIndividualCanadaCustom?qprm=117736

It is the Canada developer site. Select the 15" Superdrive, or the 17". The first BTO option is the extra vram (up to 128). It costs $70 Canadian, if your read the price in the drop down menu.

Now, update the price in the summary to the right. Check out the price now! it isn't adding $70, it is adding over $700 to the price for the extra vram!

WTF!?!?!?!

This seems to be the only site that this mistake is made on. Does anyone know how I go about ordering a developer machine over the phone so I know I got the price right?

Thanks in advance,

James
 
gensor said:
http://www.macminute.com/2004/04/19/powerbookg5
Click to expand...
I read the article(s) and they contain exactly zero information about the release date of the G5 PB. If you were the VP of hardware product marketing for Apple would you confess that the new G5 PB is just around the corner on the day the existing G4 line is refreshed? His comment "it will be some time before that processor will be in a notebook" provides no information. And certainly his comment about the G4 taking 2 years to make it into a laptop is pure obfuscation.

If the G5 isn't released until January next year the whole PB line will be looking very tired. There will not be another G4 speed bump, there is no further development being done on the G4 PB's. This refresh was solely as a result of pin-compatible chip replacement. The graphics card has been updated but not the screen. And the airport extreme card in each box plus the price reductions are purely sweeteners to assist sales and maintain momentum. The big picture is that this refresh was based on the replacement of some existing components with near-zero engineering required.

Apple will in any case be reluctant to increase G4 speed again because it would force them to debut the G5 PB at a higher clock speed, removing some of the heat advantages of lower speed G5's.

In any case, these are worthy machines and if the screen resolution had been improved I would possibly have invested. But it just doesn't seem right that my TiBook 667 wears the same screen as the latest AlBook.
 
Joswiak said that it took two years for the G4 to make it into the PowerBooks - not that the G5 is two years away in the PBs.

And that's not a correct statement. The PowerMac G4 was introduced in September of 1999. The PowerBook G4 was introduced in January 2001. That is a difference of 15 months. 15 months from the G5 would fall into the range of September/October/November of 2004 range.

At that time there should be Power5 derivatives beginning to filter in to the desktops - with them possibly being better suited for notebooks. I fully expect Apple to have a G5 notebook by the end of the year. Also, Motorola should be at 90nm by then, so the G4 should be faster - giving the iBook more options.
 
devman said:
But, I will talk to them today now that the announcements have happened and see what happens. It really seems like it is Apple Australias call on what happens. David Jones made it clear yesterday what their position is.
Click to expand...
As you say, if it hadn't been for the large price drop it wouldn't have been an issue. I hope Apple comes to the party for you. Of course obsolescence occurs pretty much the moment you buy any new machine, it's just a fact of life.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back