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Is now the time to buy a 17" powerbook?

J

johnnowak

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jul 24, 2003
498
2
New York, New York
There's no chance of G5 PBs at MWSF, right? And its not like there can be a massive G4 speed bump. Seems like a good time to buy, yes? What do you all think.. should I go for it?

Also, what's a good, stylish laptop bag? Something hip and colorful. I need to be able to hold a 17" powerbook, some large AKG headphones, and a couple textbook sized books. However, I don't want something huge... the smallest thing I can hold all that stuff with would be best. Again, something sporty would be nice. No all black leather stuff ideally. I don't wanna spend more than 100 ideally, although I can go a bit over if need be.

Thanks for the help.
 
all personal opinions:

i don't think there will be a G5 PB at MWSF. there may be a speed bump, spec improvement and/or price drop. that said, those new machines may take a while to ship.

when do you want your PB? now? then buy it now. can afford to be patient? wait until the second week of Jan...
 
Well I want it for college which starts Jan 20th (I'm starting in spring). So yes, I know I should wait, but I'm impatient...

Also, there's no way around it, I will -need- a laptop by January 20th. I can't haul this 21" CRT with me, so I'd have to buy a flat-screen monitor, which I don't wanna do, since I want a laptop.

I'm also back and forth between homes a lot now. I could use one now. If there's only a small chance of something PB related happening at MWSF, I'll get it now.

Any other opinions?
 
get a smaller laptop, like 12" and a lcd monitor for the dorm room? (or wherever your "home" will be in college)

you might save some money... if you are going to do this, you will need to get a powerbook because iBook can only mirror without hacks.

i'm sure you've considered this...

but if you need a computer by Jan. 20th, you probably should order now and not wait. you are cutting it pretty close, between MWSF and jan. 20th, you are looking at around 10 business days. even if a newer machine is announced, you may not get it in time.

what i would do is this: wait until a week or so before MWSF and order your machine directly from apple. (btw, do you get educational discount?) that way, if something new is announced at MWSF, you may be able to either get the new one or get some sort of refund, esp. if there's a price drop. if nothing happens, you will be giving yourself extra week for that PB to get to you before the school starts...
 
I say go with the 15" as jobs says "its the perfect balance between power and portability".

its screen is 3" bigger than the 12 and only 2 smaller than the 17". plus with the money you save you could max the ram and maybe get a digi cam or printer or something.

something to think about..
 
I would also suggest the 15" PB now. I think G5 PB's are at least 6 months away and you need the laptop now. Anyway, G5 PB's will probably be bigger and have worse battery life.

I recommend the 15" as I bought the 17" 1GHz and, whilst I do love it, it really is not that portable. I have just bought a 12" PB as my main laptop, and us the 17" mainly as a desktop/server.

Just my opinion.
 
Thanks for the help guys. I plan on taking the laptop out of my dorm a lot and I'll be using it mainly for programming and doing music and DSP work. For that reason, I kinda thought a larger screen would be better, because when working with DSP prototyping environments like Max/MSP, screen real estate is key.

I did think of getting a 12" PB and then an LCD display, but the 12" PB doesn't hold enough RAM. I need at least a GB. Also I currently use a 21" monitor and have for four years, so going to 15" I think might bother me quite a bit. My sister has a 15" iMac, and the screen is too small for comfort. The resolution on the 15" PB is higher though than the iMac, so it might be alright. I saw the 17" at an apple store, and I felt it would be okay to carry around. I'm fairly tall, so it would look fine next to me, haha.

Jxyama: You say if a new PB comes out within 10 days of me getting one, I can get a refund or something. How do you know this? Is it an official policy?
 
i've seen posts here on that 10-day thing... i am not sure if it's official, but the indication is that if you order and an update comes out in whatever the form within that timeframe, you can expect some sort of compensations...

look around the buying tips forum. you may be able to find better answers.
 
Originally posted by johnnowak
I did think of getting a 12" PB and then an LCD display, but the 12" PB doesn't hold enough RAM. I need at least a GB.
Click to expand...

The Revision B 12" PowerBook officially supports 1.25GB of RAM. It was only the Rev A 12" that was limited to 640MB. Is 1.25GB going to be enough?
 
Ooo really? Hm... its only 1ghz though. My current dual 867 is barely fast enough for audio work... I'm afraid 1ghz would be too slow. The 1.33 would probably be alright... I think I'll go with that I guess. Thanks everyone.
 
i don't want burst your decided mindset, but if 867 is not fast enough for whatever the audio application you use, it's possible that it's not the CPU that's lacking power. bus speed comes to mind... and i'm not so sure if G4, even at 1.3+ GHz, will make *that* much of a difference...

i'd investigate a bit further as to why your current app is not running that fast before spending nearly $3k on a computer. 17" is a great machine, no doubt, but i would not bet on 60% increase in CPU speed resulting in your apps running 60% faster...
 
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