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What is the rarest PB?
- Thread starter catzilla
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Another vote on the DLHR. Anything late-05 is the rarest. Especially the iSight iMac G5. Sold for 3 months and 2 days.
Isn't it one of the very old ones? Like 165? Or PowerBook5,9 which was sold for like half a year.
The rarest Apple portable is the Macintosh Portable. Technically, its not a PowerBook however its basically a Mac SE in a portable case.
The rarest notebook under the "PowerBook" moniker is most likely the A1138, aka the Dual Layer, High Resolution PowerBook G4 15". Its 17" A1139 brother was actually sold 6 months where as the 15" was only sold for 4 months. By the time those machines came out, the Intel switch was already announced so sales of PowerPC machines were already slowing (unfortunately), plus the very short life span is bad for replacement parts.
The rarest notebook under the "PowerBook" moniker is most likely the A1138, aka the Dual Layer, High Resolution PowerBook G4 15". Its 17" A1139 brother was actually sold 6 months where as the 15" was only sold for 4 months. By the time those machines came out, the Intel switch was already announced so sales of PowerPC machines were already slowing (unfortunately), plus the very short life span is bad for replacement parts.
I see both the A1138 and the A1139 on eBay frequently and got my A1139 in a general second hand shop. A pristine boxed version with all the accoutrements might go part way to achieving rarity status. They might not have been on sale for long but seemed to have sold plenty.
Perhaps one of the really old PBs with SCSI drives. Can't be too many of those still running without burnt out screens or working batteries.
I'll have to pull out my PowerBook 165 someday and take some pictures. To my knowledge, its completely stock and it works wonderfully. The other thing that constantly breaks is the trackball assembly as they get worn out. Mine is also pristine in that aspect. Bought it from the original owner a few years back as a lot with a 5300c. She was an avid Mac user dating back to Mac Plus, a graphic designer and desktop publisher. Both her and her husband had Mac Pros (2006 and 2010 IIRC). Very nice people. They were supposed to call me to make an offer if they ever found their Mac Plus since it was just taking up space. Guess they never found it. Owell.
I had a college room mate who had the 15". Although I wasn't a "Mac person" at the time, I was pretty seriously into photography at the time and the Intel transition was big news within photography circles.
His Powerbook had been a Christmas Present in 2005, but he said that he specifically wanted a PowerPC rather than wait for the Intel processor equivalent because he felt(at the time) that PPC was better supported. And, of course, at the time(fall '06, spring '07) there were still a lot of PPC machines in circulation.
In any case, I always admired his laptop. I would have gladly traded him the Gateway that I was using at the time for it
I'll cast a vote for the Japanese 2400 which clocked in at 240MHz. Even the US models are tough to get, but not impossible. A buddy of mine got one a year or so ago. It's a cool little Mac.