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PowerBook to gain iSight, iBook to go widescreen in 2006
- Thread starter runninmac
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macrumors12345 said:
I think you are missing the poster's point. His point was such a resolution would be too small and uncomfortable (the better the rez, the smaller the text and graphics appear, even if they are sharper) to read on a 13". I have to agree. I find the native rez on the new PBs almost too much.
rye9 said:
They're only faster at integer maths. They're slower at floating point and vector maths.
For instance, my 1.8 Ghz G5 iMac rips music at between 11 and 16 times the normal speed whereas my 1.8 Ghz Pentium M laptop rips at a dissapointing 6x speed. Both from the hard disk.
However, that's made up for mostly in that you can get 2Ghz+ dual core Intel chips next year and the G4 is topping out at 1.67 so far with a single core and slower FSB.
But then if you've no native Intel software you're left with Rosetta which runs AltiVec code at about 10% the speed of a G4 currently. ie. slower than a 500Mhz iBook G3.
I'm still a windows user here, but I've been saving my money for what seems like forever now to buy myself a purrty powerbook. But now with these new rumors, I'm thinking maybe I should wait a few more months or longer.
I'm not a gamer, nor would I use any software for video editing or anything like that. Other than Photoshop, Dreamweaver, firefox, iTunes, msn messenger, and watching a movie I've downloaded or a DVD on occasion, I don't do much else really. So would I be ok with buying one of the newly updated G4 powerbooks or should I still wait?
I'm not a gamer, nor would I use any software for video editing or anything like that. Other than Photoshop, Dreamweaver, firefox, iTunes, msn messenger, and watching a movie I've downloaded or a DVD on occasion, I don't do much else really. So would I be ok with buying one of the newly updated G4 powerbooks or should I still wait?
7isles, for what you're planning on doing I dont see why a current ibook wouldnt hit the sweet spot- and save you some cash! Even when they release the new widescreen ibook, I'll still love this baby. What a deal!
dahacouk said:
That's only a minor problem.
The web is the major problem. Images usually are specified in pixels as are movies so will be much smaller than the text. If a site designer has specified any table widths or fonts in pixels then those will be very small too.
Images from your camera are fixed resolution.
If you're working in photoshop, a 72dpi image at 100% will be very small on a 133dpi screen (the current Powerbook's dpi). You'll have to blow it up 200% to work on it.
There's lots of problems moving away from dpis that we've presumed for years.
EricNau said:
Maybe they could span across multple flash drives, so it only looks like 1 drive to the end user.
AndrewMT said:
I bet ya 15 years ago, someone said the same thing about a laptop that is the current size of the pb
922 said:
The displays are quite thin, the graphics quality of the iSight is going to suffer. Much like mobile phones, you can increase the MP of the camera, but the pictures are still inferior because of the cheap optics and the short optics length.
TaKashMoney said:
The 1024x768 resolution on the iBooks is totally inadequate for running Dreamweaver or Photoshop IME. You can do it, but you'll feel very, very cramped. Those are applications where widescreen displays make a lot of difference as you can run a fairly normal 800x600 size area for viewing your web output with all the panels you want at the side.
The 15 or 17 Powerbook are better suited. An iMac is even better if you don't need the portability and the screen doesn't have such weeny fonts so it matches up with what most people actually have rather than the few people that have high resolution screens. Much nicer on the eyes.
pionata said:
I'm guessing you were comparing a 1.6 GHz Pentium 4 to your iBook. The processors in the powerbooks will NOT be Pentium 4's (obviously). They will be processors with much higher performance per clock. I'm betting a 1.6 GHz Pentium-M will outperform your lowly iBook by miles.
jeffcorbets said:
Ya, the camera in the laptop seems like an iBook thing to me anyways. If they are trying to sell PowerBooks to "pro" users and iBooks to "consumers" then I think it would make sense to put an iSight in the iBook. Did they put an iSight into the 23" and 30" ACD? No, they put it in the iMac, where you could argue, it belongs.
Anyways, I am still reading this thread, but wanted to chime in that I will be buying the Rev A Intel iBook, especially if it is a 13" widescreen, but not if they only have a single model with a 14" or larger LCD.
If they continue to not have DVI on the iBook I might change my plans as well, and if they severely cripple the GPU I may hold off. I'm hoping they put something DECENT (I would be more than happy with a card that can play this past summers games on a computer released next summer - so a GPU that can put out decent results in Doom 3, basically). Oh, and if they disable screen spanning for "no good reason" again I will probably hold off.
Either way, I hope they do make a 12 or 13" iBook, or worst case they keep the 12" PowerBook and make it a decent machine (not just an overpriced, over-styled iBook like it is now). I need something super small and light that I can take from home to work everyday. Screen size is only relevant for me as a portable DVD player, so 10"+ is fine there. At home and work I will use an external display anyways.
I expect to get one, tho; with such a wide selection of CPUs from Intel Apple can use single core/dual corse, clock speed, front side bus, and more to separate the laptop lines and not rely on artificially hobbling the "low end" machines.
iSight??
Yeah, but the iMac is over an inch thick. The laptop screens are less than a centimeter. I don't see how they can fit an iSight in there without something sticking out, and Apple wouldn't like that.
runninmac said:
Yeah, but the iMac is over an inch thick. The laptop screens are less than a centimeter. I don't see how they can fit an iSight in there without something sticking out, and Apple wouldn't like that.
I think many of us (at least this guy) would have preferred that Apple would have stayed with PPC. That would be for reasons other than raw performance though. In any event it is obvious that Apple doesn't have a supplier for laptop chips that are competitive overall. It is nice to see develoment going on in the PPC arena but frankly that stuff is just to far out to be engineered into a coputer to be delivered in a couple of months.Hattig said:
So yeah the G4 is pathetic thus the interest in all the new PPC development. It is just unfortunate that it is to little to late.
Funny how you first state that the G4 isn't pathetic then go on to zero in on things that make it pathetic. So which is it? Is it a chip that has failed to evolve to effectively compete against stuff in x86 land - or is it a chip that can effectively make use of modern technology? The answer is clear the G5 is a pathetic chip for use in a modern laptop. No amount of weakly argued promotion is going to change that in my mind.
So agian what is it, is the G4 useles or not? The company has little to do with it, for the markets it intends to target it may very well be a usefull chip. For Apple though it is crap, there is really no other way to describe it.
Well that is one way to look at it. The other way is to realize that once Apple has a X86 code base to release then they have alternatives. An Opteron based Mac would have been very competitve and probably a bit easier on power. I'm almost certain that Apple had AMD in the back of its mind when making the change, if for nothing else to keep Intel honest.
The unfortunate thing with PPC is that even though there are several manufactures of PPC chips none of them have targetted the desktop markets instead have focused on the embedded market. These players in PPC land have done nothing to generate competition with respect to PPC hardware. It is a bit of a shame but that isn't where the profits are apparently.
Dave
While I applaud the idea of an even thinner PB I do wonder about its durability.... I'd love to have a tiny lightweight little PB to tote about, but undoubtedly there would be a price to pay in terms of functionality and features. Prior to going with my PB I had briefly considered the Toshiba R200, but soon ruled that laptop out because compared to a PB it just looks so....flimsy and fragile. The keyboard sinks in on one side, which is somewhat disconcerting when typing on it. Sure, the R200 is extremely thin and lightweight, but it also requires that the optical drive be an external add-on, which somewhat negates the value of its tiny size, since the user would then have to tote along the external drive if he/she needed to use it for anything while on the road. For the money, I quickly realized that the value just isn't there, especially when compared to any of the Apple laptops. (Not to mention, of course, that the R200 is afflicted with Windoze....LOL!)
I really hope that Apple DOES NOT put the iSight camera in the new PBs!! Save that for the iBooks and leave the PBs alone. As has already been noted, there are some corporations and government agencies which would not permit anyone with a camera-equipped laptop to enter the building, as there is potential security risk. Aside from that, in my opinion adding a camera to the sleek PB would spoil its looks and definitely detract from the overall elegance of the design. It also (again, my opinion for what that's worth) would not be as "professional" looking. The sleek, elegant PB looks very clean and professional, as though the user means business..... Maybe, as someone suggested, there will be options, and people will have the choice of buying a PB with or without the iSight. That would be just dandy in my book!
OTB
I really hope that Apple DOES NOT put the iSight camera in the new PBs!! Save that for the iBooks and leave the PBs alone. As has already been noted, there are some corporations and government agencies which would not permit anyone with a camera-equipped laptop to enter the building, as there is potential security risk. Aside from that, in my opinion adding a camera to the sleek PB would spoil its looks and definitely detract from the overall elegance of the design. It also (again, my opinion for what that's worth) would not be as "professional" looking. The sleek, elegant PB looks very clean and professional, as though the user means business..... Maybe, as someone suggested, there will be options, and people will have the choice of buying a PB with or without the iSight. That would be just dandy in my book!
OTB
Intel noooo
Soundz like I'm the only one who doesn't want apple to switch to intel. I'm in the process of buying an ibook. Do you think I should wait.
Soundz like I'm the only one who doesn't want apple to switch to intel. I'm in the process of buying an ibook. Do you think I should wait.
thoroughbred said:
no. dont wait. the current iBooks is a great value. additionally, there have been refurbished models of the current line available on the apple store in the past weeks. at $800 it's hard to beat if you can snag one.