James Philp said:
I have a slightly older mac, a slightly older mac than YOU!
The machine I'm using RIGHT NOW, is AT LEAST as old as both your machines, if not OLDER!
It is a PowerBook G3 Pismo, it had 2 Firewire 400 slots, a PCMCIA, Airport etc etc (Expandable to 1GB RAM 80GB HD and a G4 too if I want)
You get what you pay for mate. You bought an "i" model (I've an iMac G4 that i'm already begining to regret). The whole point was that "they're cheaper and not upgradeable" - THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT!
The point of the "i" line is to market to consumers, students, switchers, etc. Apple might employ a strategy of non-upgradability, but that's not the "point" of the "i" lines.
And if you read my post, you'd see that it wasn't the non-upgradability that was the problem, it was the combination of non-upgradability (lack of PCMCIA in iBook and no PCI in iMac), non-expandability (using USB 1.1 instead of 2.0), and lack of support for older computers (AirPort not sold, only AirPort Extreme). If any of these had been done differently, then I wouldn't be bitching. Hell, the one that pisses me off the most is that used AirPort cards on eBay sell for twice what a new AirPort Extreme card goes for.
James Philp said:
I CURRENTLY have an external optical drive that burn's a CD in 2 minutes or so, and my machine is OLDER than yours!
You get what you pay for, like I said before. This machine cost around £2000 when I bought it 4 years ago, but as you can see, the "Power" models really do last (hardware wise), and pay you back.
When I switched, and got my iMac, I knew nothing of this. Then I learned, and when my girlfriend got a Mac, I got a PowerMac, which can presumably take PCI cards. In fact I've upgraded the internal optical drive in it already. So, I've learned that lesson, the hard way.
James Philp said:
Find me one PC laptop that has wifi built in that is 4 years old, or has 2 Firewire ports!
The equivalent PC laptop in terms of price and age to your iBook would probably not have firewire even!
OMG - I just re-read summit you said - "Apple did mot make it FORWARD compatible"!!!!!! - Hahaahaha - how do you do that?;
By forward compatible, I meant that if Apple had used a standard connector, like PCMCIA, then I could easily put in either an original 802.11b card, or upgrade to a new 802.11g card. The machine would be forward compatible.
All notebooks, including your PowerBook use PCMCIA, and the iBook has something like that, so I think it's reasonable to be annoyed that they didn't just stick with the standard.
James Philp said:
Right, in 3 years we might be using a faster connection, so for now I'll leave a big hole in the computer with a separate bus with infinitley variable speed and protocol variation, that has 300 I/O lines, and can access the CPU directly, good - the machine now has the potential of forward compatibility... Oh hang it, I'll just wait and see what comes out and make my computer then! (But of course you never would!)
Or just stick with a standard PCMCIA slot, and use USB 2.0 when it was originally available, instead of intentionally crippling the hardware...
James Philp said:
I use 802.11b and I find the speed of that more than adeqate for all but duplicating drives!
I agree. If only I could easily and affordably get an 802.11b adapter...
James Philp said:
Why dont you just trasfer your files from iMac-iBook (or network via ethernet) and burn everything from the iBook? you could get a MUCH faster drive that way?
I bought the burner when I only had the iMac, before I got the iBook. I've been looking at getting an internal burner and putting it into an external firewire enclosure, but I have no idea if that would actually work on a Mac.