PowerMac and LCD Rumor WrapUp - Winners and Losers

[NicoMan]

Re: Still wondering on parity guesses

Originally posted by DharvaBinky
Sooo... does *anyone* have any idea when the 15" Powerbooks will be brought into feature parity with the 12" and 17" version? I really want to buy a 15" Pbook, but don't want to get stuck at the end of a product lifecycle. I realize that if apple puts out deep discounts on 15" models, we can expect a new one soon, but... <shrug> just wondering what the wait time will be... any guesses?

I would say something like 6-10 weeks. I feel that they won't update it before the 17" ships. Besides they need to keep a professional laptop able to boot in OS9 for another couple of months...


NicoMan

 

[macdiehard]

Re: Re: Re: any new apple-pc comparisons?

Originally posted by MacCoaster

Jesus Christ. Not another Photoshop bakeoff.

Exactly, now about some specs for real things the rest of us to like.

- launching my 400 meg outlook application
- launching word
- launching anything for that matter
- searches and look ups

 

[cubist]

Oh and I just remembered the other thing about widescreen - the human vision system is widescreen: we can see more to the sides than up and down. In portrait mode we would have to move our head.

Makes one wonder why paper documents are always in portrait mode, doesn't it... I think that was because the columns get too wide, causing unnecessary eye tracking and confusion.

Ah, but when a magazine or newspaper or book is opened up - aha! Widescreen!

 

[littlejim]

Originally posted by mac_audio_freq
I like this site a lot, but I find this gloating to be somewhat unprofessional.

I've been reading MacRumors almost every day for well over a year now. It's great fun, it can teach you a lot and .... if you use it correctly ... can save you a shed load of money.

From what I have seen - MacRumors' professionalism is right up there with the best of them - VersionTracker, MacMinute and the BBC pages.

I for one, love the 'post mortem' articles and long many they continue.

littlejim
--------------------------------
He's fallen in the water.

 

[NicoMan]

Originally posted by cubist
Oh and I just remembered the other thing about widescreen - the human vision system is widescreen: we can see more to the sides than up and down. In portrait mode we would have to move our head.

Makes one wonder why paper documents are always in portrait mode, doesn't it... I think that was because the columns get too wide, causing unnecessary eye tracking and confusion.

Ah, but when a magazine or newspaper or book is opened up - aha! Widescreen!

I couldn't have said it better.
I also want to add that the widescreen format in those screens doesn't come to the detriment of the height: they keep the same height but add space on the sides. So you can still browse the same way. Now you are gonna tell me that you would rather have that extra space vertically, and I sort of agree, but it is only good for typing or reading long document, i.e. by putting your screen vertically you would make your Mac a typing machine... Not only is the horizontal layout much more efficient for the eyes, but I do believe that vertical layout would take you away from the digital lifestyle/entertainment center idea that 'everyone' is looking for.

Now if they made those screens pivot (under OSX) so that everyone would be happy... But I am almost sure that 80% of the people wouldn't even use it.

NicoMan

 

[RogueLdr]

Originally posted by Bregalad
By moving to an all widescreen lineup Apple would be telling the world that the only customers they value are those who spend their days in Final Cut Pro. Widescreen displays raise a large middle finger to anyone who authors websites, writes technical manuals, or basically creates any of the world's written content.

I don't really see a widescreen as giving the finger to web or print houses at all. The widesreen format, on a large enough screen to have a little height to it, allows a 4:3 window to be displayed all the way from top to bottom of the screen with plenty of real estate on either side for all the palettes of the application.

This is a better alternative than having to have your palettes hidden, or worse, your palettes covering your work space. The widescreen is handy for anyone creating anything, film or not. And this is Apple's primary audience for their PowerMac line.

RL

 

[MacKid]

Re: Re: Re: Re: any new apple-pc comparisons?

Originally posted by macdiehard


Exactly, now about some specs for real things the rest of us to like.

- launching my 400 meg outlook application
- launching word
- launching anything for that matter
- searches and look ups

That's the only thing I had (and anything to sell one more PowerMac to a switcher )

 

[Dave Marsh]

Radius Pivot Display

Way back in the early Mac desktop publishing days (in the '80's?), Radius addressed this need with a product they called the Radius Pivot. You can still check it out by searching Google. You simply rotated the screen from portrait to landscape mode, depending on what you were doing, waited a couple of seconds while the screen blacked out and then redrew for the new layout. Its resolution was 640x864 in vertical (portrait) mode. Monitors started getting larger and the need waned, so the product died. I find it amusing that the Windows world now finds this so novel. I saw one of these new generaton Windows pivoting monitors recently and tried rotating it to see if it would automatically redraw the way the old Radius Pivot did, but it didn't. So, I don't know if I was supposed to reboot Windows, or run some utility to force a redraw to the new orientation.

 

[centauratlas]

iLife shipped today, fyi

Just FYI, Apple is shipping iLife as of Jan 29...

 

[JGowan]

LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Ok... lemme get this straight. Apple takes a monitor that, until just a couple of days ago, would bring them $3499... and then drops the price by $1500! No, no no! There is something to this.

Here's my take...

There will be TWO TIERS of monitors. There will be the 17", 20" and the 23" panels for the moderate buyers and then (soon, hopefully), Apple will offer a second tier of Monster panels... perhaps 26" HD ($2,499); 29" HD ($2,999) and 32" HD ($3,499).

This is just me speculating (especially the prices [God only knows what these sizes would/will cost]), but it seems odd to quit making $3,500 with nothing in the works to replace it.

The whole BIG LCD panel started out with the 22" which sold for $4,000! And they sold a lot of them. And every time they dropped the price, the sold even more. Now, obviously the 23" HD will now sale quite briskly, but Apple KNOWS that there are the Rich people out there that WANT to spend $3500 on a monitor. And they're going to cater to them.

 

[dongmin]

Re: LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Originally posted by JGowan
There will be TWO TIERS of monitors. There will be the 17", 20" and the 23" panels for the moderate buyers and then (soon, hopefully), Apple will offer a second tier of Monster panels... perhaps 26" HD ($2,499); 29" HD ($2,999) and 32" HD ($3,499).

A 32" screen sitting on my desk--now THAT would be something. Your neck would get a major workout...

 

[MacKid]

Re: Re: LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Originally posted by dongmin


A 32" screen sitting on my desk--now THAT would be something. Your neck would get a major workout...

Unfortunately, some people in the PC world might comment that Apple was taking a cue or trying to follow after Gateway, because I think I read that they make some huge 42" LCD's.

 

[PretendPCuser]

Pivot Display (OFf-Topic)

Bregalad,

I see your point if you design or view mostly corporate websites. Have you ever seen a side scrolling website on a widescreen? It looks nice. Try it, you might like it. Pivots are cool, i believe that they did make those for Apple once upon a time.

Now, the real deal is having a CRT and LCD side by side so you can have the best of both worlds. (and be really anal about web site consistency).

Sorry Arn, for being off topic, i do enjoy the rumor wrapups. They're Not offending me!

By the by, who else besides me was totally bowled over by the new announcement? I hadn't been following rumors for awhile and one day opened up explorer and BAM!! New macs! Life is good.

Peace love and unity!

 

[jettredmont]

Re: Re: Re: LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Originally posted by MacKid


Unfortunately, some people in the PC world might comment that Apple was taking a cue or trying to follow after Gateway, because I think I read that they make some huge 42" LCD's.

They make 42" Plasma HDTV displays ... just the latest in their "Monitor/TV" Destination series.

Which would be nice if we had the pixel density of Apple's 23" in a 42" model ... couple thousand pixels across ... But Gateway's units have mega-size pixels like all other big-screen TVs and are not suitable for up-close usage ...

 

[Nermal]

Re: Radius Pivot Display

Originally posted by Dave Marsh
Way back in the early Mac desktop publishing days (in the '80's?), Radius addressed this need with a product they called the Radius Pivot.

I've still got one of those!

 

[MacKid]

Re: Re: Re: Re: LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Originally posted by jettredmont


They make 42" Plasma HDTV displays ... just the latest in their "Monitor/TV" Destination series.

Which would be nice if we had the pixel density of Apple's 23" in a 42" model ... couple thousand pixels across ... But Gateway's units have mega-size pixels like all other big-screen TVs and are not suitable for up-close usage ...

My mistake , I was just checking out the competition, and took one look at Gateway.com and left.

 

[Rocketman]

Re: Why widescreen?

Originally posted by Bregalad


I really don't understand why everyone wants a widescreen display.

When I switched to a TiG4 with it's "wide screen" my usage habbits changed a bit from tileing windows vertically to tileing horizontally more often. I find it more intuitive. Not sure if that was the intended consequence, but it was the result. If you open 50 images in photoshop, it tiles horizontally as well.

Rocketman

 

[eric_n_dfw]

Re: Re: Re: Re: LCD Panels & the Rich people?

Originally posted by jettredmont


They make 42" Plasma HDTV displays ... just the latest in their "Monitor/TV" Destination series.

Which would be nice if we had the pixel density of Apple's 23" in a 42" model ... couple thousand pixels across ... But Gateway's units have mega-size pixels like all other big-screen TVs and are not suitable for up-close usage ...

FYI - the Gateway 42" Plasma monitor (which, I belive is a re-branded Samsung) is not a true "HDTV". It's actually what is commonly referred to as EDTV. It's digital, it supports HDTV signals, but it's spec's show a resolution of, "852 x 480 native pixel with progressive scan" To me, if you can't do 1080i, why bother?

That's why it's so cheap.

 

[macdiehard]

Wide screen viewing

Someone mentioned viewing a web site and having a word document open at the same time. I a lot of web site reviews - I get paid to tell people why they sites suck

Is 1280 by 1024 enough resolution to that? Thinking of getting a 19 inch at that resolution. Hopefull I can view a site and type confortably on a word doc next to it.


P.S. Did they use a PC or a Mac to save the world in Independance Day, a Mac right, enough said.

 

[FlamDrag]

Portrait displays

Anyone who hates scrolling - get a PowerMate, I just got one and they're awesome.

What's really funny to me is that most of the people I've seen who type long documents tend to scroll to the top 1/3 of the screen. This is even more true for reading in my experience.

If you had an 11x17 paper in front of you, full of text - would you hold the paper perfectly stationery while you moved your head from top to bottom? No, you'd move the paper up as you read. Screen - same thing.

However, I won't argue the usefulness of having that extra space for reference - especially when writing code and looking for functions etc on up the page.

I frequently span my monitors top/bottom (one closer to me, one farther away and elevated) on my Pismo and I always keep the menubar on the bottom one. This allows me to have the mouse anywhere on the screen and get quickly to the menu.

I can't imagine having the mouse at the bottom of the 17" portrait monitor and having to go ALL the way to the top to change the font.

The roundups are great!

 

[herocero]

http://a784.g.akamai.net/7/784/51/542bf2ee280d41/www.apple.com/powermac/pdf/PowerMac_TO_012003.pdf

answers such questions as "is airport extreme and bluetooth integrated on the mobo" and the like.


cdm

 

[JGowan]

Trading up... CompUSA style!

I just had to share!

I bought a 22" panel in mid FEB'02 (paying $1999 after receiving Apple's $500 rebate which came in about two weeks [I had bought a Dual 1GHz Tower at the same time]) ...

... in AUG'02, I went back to CompUSA and for $109, bought a two-year warranty that protects for damage or for Technology upgrades, locking in the price of $2,499 (which the 22" retailed for then) ...

I'm going back to CompUSA tonight and trading up for the 23" HD Display and they're going to issue me a gift certificate for the $500 difference!

I don't even have to pay tax because I am graphic designer and with a state form given to those who create multimedia projects to be sold, no tax is taken!

Of course, I plan on buying the $109 plan again tonight again. I'll give you an update on another trade-up in a year or so if all goes well!

This is so Friggin' BOSS!!!

 

[JGowan]

Got the 23" HD!

Well, all things went great last night... I traded up from my year-old 22" to the 23" HD -- only snag was that the associate that told me that I'd be able to get the $500 difference (from $2500 to $1999) on a gift card was mistaken and they would only do the swap on the monitors. I was still super-thrilled!

I am so jazzed as this thing is just utterly beautiful- so awesome.

Of course, I gladly gave them another $109 for a 2yr warranty on this new one (locking in the 2K it retails for now)...

Too sweet!