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PowerBook 15" Concerns

After reading this doc at apple support:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=30612

..I suppose I shall not worry about the heat.

I especially like this: "You should avoid prolonged physical contact with the bottom of the computer when it does get warm."
-- like someone could get burned with prolonged physical contact?!😀

Also the fan "comes on within a temperature range that is selected to ensure proper operation of the computer." whatever that may be... 😕


Nickfit, thanks for the link to the pics. However, could you tell from those where the fan is located?
 
Scorchin hot in more ways than one...

I just totally love this powerbook. I've carried it to school and gotten looks from people, its awesome. The 'book runs ultra cool.... except when I have it on the power adapter. Which doesn't surprise me. It gets especially hot over the left speaker grill, and above the Function keys. But other then that its super, battery life is excellent about 3 hours for me but I really haven't put it through its paces. Yeah, I will also remember the day that my powerbook got here...see I was born on Christmas day and well the Powerbook got here on 9/25 so I guess Xmas and my bday came early for me this year :-D !
 
Re: Scorchin hot in more ways than one...

Originally posted by Toeknee
I just totally love this powerbook. I've carried it to school and gotten looks from people, its awesome. The 'book runs ultra cool.... except when I have it on the power adapter. Which doesn't surprise me. It gets especially hot over the left speaker grill, and above the Function keys. But other then that its super, battery life is excellent about 3 hours for me but I really haven't put it through its paces. Yeah, I will also remember the day that my powerbook got here...see I was born on Christmas day and well the Powerbook got here on 9/25 so I guess Xmas and my bday came early for me this year :-D !
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Yeah, the only time I noticed it get kind of warm was when the battery was charging, but besides that, it is normally cool to the touch.
 
Originally posted by Counterfit
You guys get about 3 hours? Man, either I'm doing something wrong, or my estimator-thing is way off.
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I've only used the battery twice, but I've gotten 3 hours and 40 minutes the first time and just over 4 the second time. I am not doing anything major like video work or CD ripping, though. Just simple homework and web surfing.
 
my 1.25ghz seems to run fairly warm using simple everyday apps like mail and ichat. i've heard both fans in the computer turn on when i was compressing a 1 gig movie using quicktime. when both fans are on you can definitely hear the difference. once the compression finished both fans stopped. seems like the fans are only used during cpu intensive operation. this definitely runs a lot hotter than my previous 1ghz tibook, but is a lot quieter.
 
I don't understand folks saying these new PB's are running hot. I ditched my 667 DVI for the new 1ghz, and it's been like moving from the equator to the antarctic. I can't believe how cool the thing runs, whether it be ripping CDs, running from the adaptor or whatever. Battery life seems to be very similar, so I can't fault the unit there either.

I seriously suggest anyone worrying about the heat of the new pb's to go back and try out any of the Ti's on their knees. Heck, my 600mhz ibook was 10 X hotter than the new 15". There were no problems with the latch on mine either - overall it's a far more robust PB this time round, far nicer keyboard etc. The 1ghz runs cooler than any portable I've owned.
 
Originally posted by Ben Sheehan
I don't understand folks saying these new PB's are running hot. I ditched my 667 DVI for the new 1ghz, and it's been like moving from the equator to the antarctic. I can't believe how cool the thing runs, whether it be ripping CDs, running from the adaptor or whatever. Battery life seems to be very similar, so I can't fault the unit there either.

I seriously suggest anyone worrying about the heat of the new pb's to go back and try out any of the Ti's on their knees. Heck, my 600mhz ibook was 10 X hotter than the new 15". There were no problems with the latch on mine either - overall it's a far more robust PB this time round, far nicer keyboard etc. The 1ghz runs cooler than any portable I've owned.
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Yeah, my 1.25 GHz PowerBook is a lot cooler than my 400 MHz G3 was to the point of the case being literally cold to the touch about 80% of the time. As far as the quality, this thing is like going from a Saturn to a Mercedes. It's really wonderful.
 
Originally posted by Powerbook G5
I've only used the battery twice, but I've gotten 3 hours and 40 minutes the first time and just over 4 the second time. I am not doing anything major like video work or CD ripping, though. Just simple homework and web surfing.
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iTunes?
 
Originally posted by Counterfit
iTunes?
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I used iTunes once but found that I couldn't get the music store to work, so that has been the end of that. I am wondering if the school somehow blocked that like they blocked all the P2P networks, too.
 
Originally posted by yujini
I think battery life and heat depends on what you do on your laptop. You two are probably doing different stuff.

When just doing normal stuff like word processing, email checking,
web surfing, I think the new powerbook 15inch doesnt emit that much heat or suck up the battery power.

Probably some heavy stuff like gaming, unzipping (like a bigass file), compiling (a longgggggg code), etc will make the processor run hot.
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Yep definently. I have the new 1.25G 15", and when I've been ripping CD's for a while or playing a 3D game that's when it really gets cooking hot underneath - not so bad on the top. I don't use it much on my lap so it's not much of a problem for me
 
Originally posted by Counterfit
You guys get about 3 hours? Man, either I'm doing something wrong, or my estimator-thing is way off.
Click to expand...

Did you optimize the battery? You HAVE to do that. Read about it in your owner's manual, but the basic gist is you have to let the battry run all the way down in the first week you own it without shutting it off, and as soon as it goes to sleep to conserve power, you charge it all the way up to 100%.

If you dont do this, your battery may only last half as long as it could.
 
I did, about a week after I bought it, but it didn't seem to change anything. Well, I'm gonna watch a movie so I'll see how long it really lasts.
 
Originally posted by agreenster
Did you optimize the battery? You HAVE to do that. Read about it in your owner's manual, but the basic gist is you have to let the battry run all the way down in the first week you own it without shutting it off, and as soon as it goes to sleep to conserve power, you charge it all the way up to 100%.

If you dont do this, your battery may only last half as long as it could.
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I thought I did this, but I am only getting 2 hours. Any way that I can re-optimize my battery?
 
It really depends on how you want to use it. For school when im taking notes (yeah i know overkill) and such i turn Bluetooth, Airport, and the screen to the minimum. and it lasted me through the whole 1:15 min class, with plenty time to spare to go through another 1:15 class. One thing you gotta realize that the gauge on the menu bar isnt exact. If you notice when you charge the battery it tells you lets say 0:10 min... and it just stays there for like 2-3 min. So don't worry if the gauge says 2 hours... make it prove to you that its true.
 
I've noticed that my gauge is rather accurate. And that's not really a good thing, as it usually says less than 2 hours 🙁.
 
I'm having some heat issues with my new baby.

It does get hot on the bottom and stuff, and I'm just running iTunes, word-processing, and power point.

How do I know if my fans are kicking on? I can't hear them, or never heard them (I keep the music down low), or they're not kicking on.

How do I get them to kick on more often?
 
Apparently, ripping CDs into iTunes is an intensive task that causes the PB to run much warmer than usual. (That was my initial concern when I got the PB last weekend, but now am just getting used to it, since I'm not the only one experiencing this.)

I think the way I finally got to know when the fun turned on was: starting with a cold PB, begin to rip cds paying close attention to how the superdrive sounds. Then at some point, an additional whir kicks in (somewhere under the left palm rest) and figure that must be the internal fan! Of course it helped to not have any tunes playing that might drown out the generally quiet operation of the Powerbook 😉 .
 
optimization

does anybody know anything more about optimizing the battery? i'd love to read up on it, but apple screwed up and sent me a spanish manual, so im kinda screwed right now.

p.s. My new baby gets warm on the bottom, sometimes hot when I'm playing games, but its not too bad. Maybe a little discomfort when I actually have it on my lap. The last portable I owned was a Duo 280c which got so hot after a while you couldn't use it even on a desk because the palm rests got so hot. Never did any damage to it tho. Plus this thing cools down super quick - its like cold to the touch when I open it in the mornings. Must be the aluminum.
 
Open your HD and go to Documents, just about everything in the manuals is on the PDFs in that folder if you need to learn about using your new PowerBook, OS X, etc.
 
Here's my little quip about battery life as posted in a similar thread:

Ok guys, I have been totally unproductive this morning. I just sat around and waited for my battery to drain.

Screen brightness @ Half
Energy Saver @ Long Life
Using iTunes, Safari, iChat.. simple things in my opinion.
Airport Ex off
Bluetooth off

The tool bar said 2:15.. but what I actually got was 3:00 exactly.. and then plugged it in with 5% left.. so maybe could have squeezed 5-10 more minutes.

Overall, I am pretty happy with it
 
Then I must be working it too hard to get the full life. I usually let it run run down while watching a DVD with iTunes paused in the background. It almost made it through Supertroopers, and it probably would have if I didn't check some of the extra's out at the beginning. Same goes for Young Frankenstein last night.
 
Just read a review in the most important and serious german computer magazin. They tested a old and a new 17 pb and and an old 1000 ti book and a new 1000 alloy pb.

results are really disappointing. Batteries in the 15 alloy only last 2:15!!! due to smaller battery and 2:30 in the 17". This is really a bad joke. My old one lasts 4 hours.

benchmarks are bad as well. The only real advantage the new ones show in cinebench2003. all other benchmarks are close or equal especially for the 15 alloy!!! Game performance in quake was even better for the 1000 ti than for the alloy.

the lack of level 3 cache was somehave equaled by a bigger level2 cache so that didn't seam to be the problem.

I own a 15" 667 ti and ordered a 12" pb today. Hope I won't regret that decision.
 
Originally posted by brutus
Just read a review in the most important and serious german computer magazin. They tested a old and a new 17 pb and and an old 1000 ti book and a new 1000 alloy pb.

results are really disappointing. Batteries in the 15 alloy only last 2:15!!! due to smaller battery and 2:30 in the 17". This is really a bad joke. My old one lasts 4 hours.

benchmarks are bad as well. The only real advantage the new ones show in cinebench2003. all other benchmarks are close or equal especially for the 15 alloy!!! Game performance in quake was even better for the 1000 ti than for the alloy.

the lack of level 3 cache was somehave equaled by a bigger level2 cache so that didn't seam to be the problem.

I own a 15" 667 ti and ordered a 12" pb today. Hope I won't regret that decision.
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That's way off...I get a consistent 3 1/2-4 hours of battery and the performance is vastly better compared to the Ti models from looking at benchmarks. My CPU always cranks out at least 150 for CPU and in the 140-170s in graphics, which is a lot more than the xbench scores I've searched on the older Ti models. I dunno, it just seems a little odd that they found the new aluminum PowerBooks *that* slow...especially with an updated processor and a vastly faster graphics chip. As far a battery life, it is always dependent on what you do so that is up in the air.
 
Originally posted by Powerbook G5
That's way off...I get a consistent 3 1/2-4 hours of battery and the performance is vastly better compared to the Ti models from looking at benchmarks. My CPU always cranks out at least 150 for CPU and in the 140-170s in graphics, which is a lot more than the xbench scores I've searched on the older Ti models.
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Could you post your settings for brightness, processor (reduced/automatic/highest), sound, airport (on/off), bluetooth (on/off), and optimization for battery life/performance?

I've been planning to switch for about 8 months and will be buying a 15" PB soon. I'm debating whether the 1 GHz or the 1.25 GHz is better suited for me. Battery life is, in general, more important that performance for me.
 
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