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Apple Releases PowerBooks and iBooks

*HELP* -- my BTO is delayed until MAY 3 --!!

I've been enviously following the various birth announcements on this thread ("my baby is here!" e.g.) and wondering why oh why *MY* 15" PB hasn't even -started- shipping yet. I ordered it about 9:30 AM on Monday 4/19 (1.5 GHz, 128 MB video memory, 5400 rpm 80 GB hard drive) and asked for it to be shipped to an address different than the billing address on my credit card. I knew this might raise eyebrows in Apple's charge-processing department, but my sales rep assured me it wouldn't be a problem. Luckily I just happened to be online the very moment that Apple sent me an e-mail requesting that I confirm my shipping address with my bank, which I was able to do pronto. So the order was fully confirmed as of Tuesday afternoon 4/20, with order status showing shipping "on or before 4/26/04." What with all the happy new parents I kept reading about on this thread, I started feeling more than just envy... 'cause I live in the SF Bay Area, and I saw some posts mentioning BTO deliveries out in the East Coast & Midwest already. So finally today (Sunday 4/25) I called up the Apple Store & got a guy who said that my P-book is now in the process of being built -- but is delayed because of a shortage of some part, most likely the 5400 rpm drive (he thinks). 😡 A I I Y Y Y Y!!!!*@!#

-- OK -- now that I feel a LITTLE better (or at least ventilated..) I just wanna know : what CAN be done?? Who do I need to talk to to get some action on this mess? Any ideas at all for me, y'all?

Thanks for helping (or even just sympathizing....... 🙁

Katydid
 
SlowX said:
btw, not sure what bag I'm going to go with, but I did start a thread looking for a bag of the funky/cool/hip/nifty/gnarly (etc.) variety:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/69086/
Click to expand...

I know what you mean... I had been looking around for a while as well. Eventually, I settled on the Mamba.XS bag from BOOQ (http://www.booqbags.com/Detail.bok?no=63). When I first saw it I wasn't sure, but I came back to the site a couple of days ago, and it hit me... That was the one I wanted. It's funky, yet, not over the top, and it seems very practical for what I need.

HTH.
 
I ordered my BTO 15" on 4/19 @ 5:46AM PST. I'm still showing "OPEN" status. It is rather interesting to see all these people with the same config, with standard shipping (I chose expedited...go figure) getting shipped out days ago, with their books showing up probably tomorrow morning. The last post isn't making me feel any better about seeing it this week. I guess I'll call apple tomorrow and see what they can do about "expediting" my order, I think we west coasters are seeming like the last priority for apple to ship out to.
 
~Shard~ said:
If you already have a DVD burner in your desktop, I would forego the superdrive in the PowerBook - unless you really see a pressing need to burn DVDs on the road. But if this isn't the case, I'm sure the combo drive will suit you just fine, and you can save $200 (or whatever it is) instead of getting the Superdrive. If you see a big need to burn DVDs on the road though, then by all means get the Superdrive....
Click to expand...

I second this motion

A superdrive will also increase resale value of the machine though... in 3 years when you are trying to sell this laptop Combo drives are going to seem excessively long in the tooth...
 
MikeyJ said:
I ordered my BTO 15" on 4/19 @ 5:46AM PST. I'm still showing "OPEN" status. It is rather interesting to see all these people with the same config, with standard shipping (I chose expedited...go figure) getting shipped out days ago, with their books showing up probably tomorrow morning. The last post isn't making me feel any better about seeing it this week. I guess I'll call apple tomorrow and see what they can do about "expediting" my order, I think we west coasters are seeming like the last priority for apple to ship out to.
Click to expand...

I made an order on Sat 4/17 for a 15" Superdrive, Apple upgraded it to the new PBs on the 19th, and I called again that evening to upgrade to 128mb, 5400rpm, 1 SODIMM 512MB instead of 2. My "on or before" ship date was 4/28. It shipped on the 23rd and has now just left "FedEx central" in Memphis. My final order wasn't made until Monday night then. I can sympathize with anyone still waiting for their order to ship. Hopefully Apple is able to finish building your laptops soon. I can't stop thinking about the moment I get to play with my new powerbook! 😀
 
here'sssssssssssssssss Johnny

😱 Dinner is in the Oven.............

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

thanks ALL,

I ordered my 17" loaded today and went to crucial.com and order a 512ram to make it a 1 gig dream machine, 80g/hd 5400, 128mb ati 9700, .mac bundle, apple extended warrenty, then I went to http://www.radtech.us/Products/BT500.aspx and ordered my screen cloth, display cushions and tool kit to include a new BT-500 Bluetooth Optical 3-Button Mouse. I figure If I went all the way, I better get a/c and power windows

I called Apple and they threw in a Epson c84 printer for $50.00 and 2day shipping for free.

I am so freakin excited

Thanks again
 
I think there's a $99 rebate if you purchase a mac and epson c84 printer. I'm not positive but I think i saw the rebate form somewhere in the apple store website.
 
Hey all,

I just want to ask a clarifying question...

My machine moved quickly from Shanghai to Memphis Thursday and Friday, but has been showing as "Held at Sort Facility" all weekend. I figured it was because they didn't do a whole lot on the weekend.

Have you guys been getting updates to your FedEx tracking over the weekend (Sat and Sun)?

Cheers,

James
 
the last update i got was on april 24th, and my book is in the city i live in. it showed that it left Columbus, Oh at 2:52 pm on the 24th (it's going to the fedex facility in West Columbus, OH, like 20 mins away), so i highly doubt the package has been in route since then... so i just the the status dosen't update.

the package will be in my mail room when i wake up tomorrow anyways, so the next time i check, it wont matter! i'm so pumped.
 
James L said:
Hey all,

I just want to ask a clarifying question...

My machine moved quickly from Shanghai to Memphis Thursday and Friday, but has been showing as "Held at Sort Facility" all weekend. I figured it was because they didn't do a whole lot on the weekend.

Have you guys been getting updates to your FedEx tracking over the weekend (Sat and Sun)?

Cheers,

James
Click to expand...

Mine has been in Memphis almost all weekend as well. It finally left at 5 pm Memphis time. FedEx does do moving on weekends, but you have to understand Memphis is like the headquarters of FedEx. So thousands of packages go through there daily, turnaround isn't quite as fast as at the smaller package centers.
 
12" powerbook screens

I have just ordered a 12" powerbook, my first mac.Can anyone who has received the new model 12" please give me feedback on the screen plus i'm interested to hear about the sound quality compared to the 15".
 
powerofthekiwi said:
I second this motion

A superdrive will also increase resale value of the machine though... in 3 years when you are trying to sell this laptop Combo drives are going to seem excessively long in the tooth...
Click to expand...

Thanks to both of you. Actually I don't have any kind of dvd burner now, but there was a possibility (more like dreaming) of getting the dual 3ghz powermac whenever that thing comes out and I didn't know if should pay for the same thing twice.

I'll probably only end up getting a portable, but I'm not sure how many dvd's I'll be burning. Not much I think, but I feel if I don't get it at some point I'll wish I had.

Someone discovered some sort of hack to get iDVD to burn to external drives. It was posted on xlr8yourmac.com in March and if you do a search of their forums you will find it.

So my next question is this:

iBook 12" CD-RW + external DVD-R of your choice with hack to use iDVD
or
Powerbook 15" 1.5GHz Superdrive 128MB VRAM, 5400rpm HD, 512MB Ram, etc.

I like the 12" iBook because it's small and cheap. But the powerbook has a bigger screen & HD, faster cpu, plus other things that make it a powerbook.

Which would you pick? Do the extras of the powerbook overcome the affordable price of the iBook and compact size? I would be willing to use an external DVD with the iBook this way I can use it with my PC too.

My main use for either will be programming graphics + regular user stuff like web/email/office & ocassionally try maya or the like.

P.S. I don't know why, but I just don't like the 12" PB!
 
psingh01 said:
So my next question is this:

iBook 12" CD-RW + external DVD-R of your choice with hack to use iDVD
or
Powerbook 15" 1.5GHz Superdrive 128MB VRAM, 5400rpm HD, 512MB Ram, etc.

I like the 12" iBook because it's small and cheap. But the powerbook has a bigger screen & HD, faster cpu, plus other things that make it a powerbook.

Which would you pick? Do the extras of the powerbook overcome the affordable price of the iBook and compact size? I would be willing to use an external DVD with the iBook this way I can use it with my PC too.

My main use for either will be programming graphics + regular user stuff like web/email/office & ocassionally try maya or the like.

P.S. I don't know why, but I just don't like the 12" PB!
Click to expand...


This is exactly the dilemma that i have been facing, and i'm a little bit offput by the lack of discussion relating to ibook's on this thread. Everyone seems to be ordering powerbooks!

I'm really attracted to the price of the ibook and i would get a bigger hd so they would be the same. The power book is just so damned cute..(so i dont have the problem of psingh01). It's hard to justify the extra $500aud just for the looks of the 12"pb (i would be buying an extra 512mb 3rd prty ram:

iBook 12" 1GHz
256MB DDR266 SDRAM built-in
60GB Ultra ATA drive
Combo drive (DVD/CD-R)
AirPort Extreme Card
Keyboard/Mac OS X
Unit Price:** $1,843.60

PowerBook G4 12"
256MB DDR333 SDRAM
60GB Ultra ATA drive @ 4200rpm
Combo Drive (DVD-ROM/CD-RW)
AirPort Extreme Card
Keyboard & Mac OS (default)
Unit price: $2338.60

Price difference = $495 AUD

.....i know the pb is sexy....but that sexy???
 
Inching closer 🙂

Mine BTO Powerbook 15 inch (the usual config -- 128VR, 5400RPM, 512 1-chip, SuperDrive) left on the Shanghai Express on the 23rd as well. It just hit the local Fedex facility. If all goes well, it'll be delivered this morning, but mine has the same mystical Wednesday by 10:30am target date on it, so who knows what our friends at Fedex will do.

Extra 1GB DIMM coming from Crucial to complete the config. I'm sure Fedex will make me sit around all day waiting for that instead of delivering both boxes this morning, so that will get installed when I get home from work.

The new Powerbook and this Wintel laptop will ride together in a Tumi Chambers Deluxe Computer Backpack I picked up over the weekend. This will be my first Mac in a long time (had a Mac classic years ago).

Hopefully my next post will be later today from that machine 🙂 Good luck everyone on getting your machines today!
 
patriotn11 said:
ordered my screen cloth, display cushions
Click to expand...

Does anyone know if the display cushions are still needed for the new models? I checked out the RadTech website, but I'm having a hard time understanding the benefit of using them. I can see that it ads a space between the screen and the base, but what is the benefit of that?

Also, does everyone recommend purchasing a screen cloth?


Thanks,
Frank
 
FrankieShakes said:
Does anyone know if the display cushions are still needed for the new models? I checked out the RadTech website, but I'm having a hard time understanding the benefit of using them. I can see that it ads a space between the screen and the base, but what is the benefit of that?

Also, does everyone recommend purchasing a screen cloth?


Thanks,
Frank
Click to expand...

I orderer the laptop screensavr from them today. It should stop any chance that my keyboard will ever mark my screen or allow acids from my fingers and palms to get stuck to the screen when its closed. And if I do get marks it should be excellent for quickly removing them. I went with the Black X 😎

http://www.radtech.us/Products/LaptopScreensavrz.aspx
 
fmcooper said:
Extra 1GB DIMM coming from Crucial to complete the config. I'm sure Fedex will make me sit around all day waiting for that instead of delivering both boxes this morning, so that will get installed when I get home from work.
Click to expand...

Does adding memory yourself void the warranty?
 
eazyc10 said:
I think there's a $99 rebate if you purchase a mac and epson c84 printer. I'm not positive but I think i saw the rebate form somewhere in the apple store website.
Click to expand...

I used this rebate, but it was for my HP printer. Anybody know if it works with Epson?

Kimo
 
I would think not

raiste said:
Does adding memory yourself void the warranty?
Click to expand...

I've never had an issue with adding memory to laptops before. Although, the first troubleshooting step a tech will probably have you do is remove all non-factory supplied peripherals, including 3rd party RAM. Crucial has an excellent memory finder that has the PB 15''' 1.5GHz listed, and Apple has posted the spec for the RAM (DDR PC2700), so I'm not all that worried about it. FYI, I ordered Crucial #CT368654.

I purposely bought the single chip 512MB DIMM configuration so I could add another chip on day 1. If all goes well, I'll probably put another 1GB DIMM in there and call it done 🙂

FYI -- Both my Powerbook and RAM now say "On truck for delivery", so apparently the 28th was a "worst case scenario" date.
 
|_wise_| said:
This is exactly the dilemma that i have been facing, and i'm a little bit offput by the lack of discussion relating to ibook's on this thread. Everyone seems to be ordering powerbooks!

I'm really attracted to the price of the ibook and i would get a bigger hd so they would be the same. The power book is just so damned cute..(so i dont have the problem of psingh01). It's hard to justify the extra $500aud just for the looks of the 12"pb (i would be buying an extra 512mb 3rd prty ram:

iBook 12" 1GHz
256MB DDR266 SDRAM built-in
60GB Ultra ATA drive
Combo drive (DVD/CD-R)
AirPort Extreme Card
Keyboard/Mac OS X
Unit Price:** $1,843.60

PowerBook G4 12"
256MB DDR333 SDRAM
60GB Ultra ATA drive @ 4200rpm
Combo Drive (DVD-ROM/CD-RW)
AirPort Extreme Card
Keyboard & Mac OS (default)
Unit price: $2338.60

Price difference = $495 AUD

.....i know the pb is sexy....but that sexy???
Click to expand...


Here is said and done, When you are looking between the Powerbook 12" and the ibook 12" there are several things you need to ask yourself. 1) Do you need that extra 330 mhz and built in bt and airport. Do you need a superdrive, do you need a strong case that is lighter than the ibook. 2) You need to ask yourself about which is more powerful and which one works better, Apple has a history of making its high end products(powerbooks, powermacs) work well and shortchanging their lower end products(ibook, emac, imac) this also applies to lower end powermacs like the 1.6. In these instances it has been proven that Apple will hinder the motherboard interface, cheaper memory(same speed maybe, but from a cheaper manufacturer, like Jt technologies instead of Samsung or Crucial. That is one reason the extra price is worth it, you also need to know that while the price difference is great, it is what you make of it that counts, if you are going to pay the extra money for the 12 inch powerbook, why not spend a little more and get a Superdrive(it does increase resell value)

To others who are asking why people are focused on buying Powerbooks instead of ibooks, it is because the people who use these forums are not everyday consumers, but dedicated or interested mac aficionados who know what they want, are happy to talk about what they are getting and desire the power that a laptop such as a powerbook brings. I am not saying that ibooks are bad or not hip, but they are not as powerful and are a more consumer level notebook and not a pro level, they however are a nice machine and i know many of my friends who love their ibook.

As for me, i have owned imacs, an ibook(for a few days) and have a Powermac g5 DP 2.0ghz. I went out on friday last week and chose a Powerbook 15" because i knew that it was the nicest laptop in the apple lineup with a nice combo of speed and size, the 17 inch screen is beautiful, but not portable. the 12" is portable, but not as powerful and since i intend to use SPSS, Final Cut and DVD Studio on my laptop as well as my desktop, the power of a powerbook was required, there is not that big of a difference between the 12 inch ibook and 12 powerbook except for power and superdrive, my recommendation to every one that is thinking between an ibook and a powerbook is to take power and money and think of what you can get and how long you will honestly keep this machine. If you are an infrequent computer buyer, only get the ibook, but if you want some power get the powerbook 12", now if you power, style and a nice screen and a machine that has good resell value, fork over the extra bucks and swallow your thoughts and buy a 15" powerbook because there is a major difference between a fifteen and a 14 ibook.
Good Luck
 
In my hands!!!

First post and first PB!!

Ordered my PB monday at 1pm EST.
Arrived at 9:45 a.m. East coast. just under a week!!!

15 inch 1.5 GHz
512 MB DDR333 SDRAM 1 SO-DIMM
80GB 5400rpm
Superdrive
Airport extreme

Crucial 1 gig ram arrived same time!

Looks great, fired right up. Let the fun begin!!!
 
Thats it, that is all you give us 🙁 You are not allowed to play with your PB until you give us a very detailed report. I am very interested in the heat it produces. Come on FedEx, get here all ready.

Kimo

J.T. said:
First post and first PB!!

Ordered my PB monday at 1pm EST.
Arrived at 9:45 a.m. East coast. just under a week!!!

15 inch 1.5 GHz
512 MB DDR333 SDRAM 1 SO-DIMM
80GB 5400rpm
Superdrive
Airport extreme

Crucial 1 gig ram arrived same time!

Looks great, fired right up. Let the fun begin!!!
Click to expand...
 
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