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Will a powerbook last 3 years?
- Thread starter GULCkid
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newest revision of powerbook more sturdy than iBooks:
newest revision of powerbook more sturdy than iBooks:
From Apple's website:
Takes the Fall
Now every PowerBook G4 is equipped with Apple's Sudden Motion Sensor to help protect your most valuable asset: your data. The Sudden Motion Sensor senses change in axis position and accelerated movement. In the event of a drop or fall, the Sudden Motion Sensor instantly parks the hard drive heads so they wont scratch the disks on impact, lessening the risk of damage and improving your chances of retrieving valuable data. When the Sudden Motion Sensor senses your PowerBook is once again level, it unlocks the hard drive heads automatically.
iBooks do not have this technology yet...
newest revision of powerbook more sturdy than iBooks:
From Apple's website:
Takes the Fall
Now every PowerBook G4 is equipped with Apple's Sudden Motion Sensor to help protect your most valuable asset: your data. The Sudden Motion Sensor senses change in axis position and accelerated movement. In the event of a drop or fall, the Sudden Motion Sensor instantly parks the hard drive heads so they wont scratch the disks on impact, lessening the risk of damage and improving your chances of retrieving valuable data. When the Sudden Motion Sensor senses your PowerBook is once again level, it unlocks the hard drive heads automatically.
iBooks do not have this technology yet...
My 12"PB took a fall which dented a corner. No ill effects except for the dent. It is a little over a year old now.
As long as you take good care of it, it will definitely last you 3 years. My friend bought his PowerBook 4 years ago (500 MHz I believe) and besides a RAM upgrade to 256 MB, he has had no troubles with it and it still runs fine. He can run all of the latest apps on it and when he upgraded to Panther, it actually made his system faster (what a novel concept for an OS upgrade!)
Here are some tips for your University experience.
Get the powerbook, max out the ram, and get apple care. You might think about an external hardrive as a fail safe if your parranoid. I have one just to back up my documents, and photos. Never know, but I have been a mac user for about 7 years now, and have never had one crap out on me. I highly recommend them, and the cross platform thing is no issue with Microsofts Office 2004. Good luck, and don't work for corporate america work for the little guy. It's about time we had some good lawyers defending us, and not the man.
Get the powerbook, max out the ram, and get apple care. You might think about an external hardrive as a fail safe if your parranoid. I have one just to back up my documents, and photos. Never know, but I have been a mac user for about 7 years now, and have never had one crap out on me. I highly recommend them, and the cross platform thing is no issue with Microsofts Office 2004. Good luck, and don't work for corporate america work for the little guy. It's about time we had some good lawyers defending us, and not the man.
1. Get the Powerbook (your university even recommends it, right!?)
2. If you are not planning to have an extra screen, get the 15" since it will be easier on the eyes during long typing sessions.
3. Agrees totally with imac abuser:
4. Also: get an external harddrive for backup. You might even consider to format it in FAT32 (Windows) for extremely quick and easy access to your files in case anything bad happens (the biggest risk for data loss might be theft, not hardware failure). I myself would however format in HFS+ (Mac) since it is better for everyday use with your mac. Install MacDrive (search on www.versiontracker.com) on a pc to access your files there.
Your PB will last you for much longer than 3 years, no problem.
Edit: My PowerBook 190 of yesteryear (1996) still works fine even if it is now seldom used due to my new iBook 12". So, yes, Powerbooks just contimues to work year after year.
2. If you are not planning to have an extra screen, get the 15" since it will be easier on the eyes during long typing sessions.
3. Agrees totally with imac abuser:
imac abuser said:
4. Also: get an external harddrive for backup. You might even consider to format it in FAT32 (Windows) for extremely quick and easy access to your files in case anything bad happens (the biggest risk for data loss might be theft, not hardware failure). I myself would however format in HFS+ (Mac) since it is better for everyday use with your mac. Install MacDrive (search on www.versiontracker.com) on a pc to access your files there.
Your PB will last you for much longer than 3 years, no problem.
Edit: My PowerBook 190 of yesteryear (1996) still works fine even if it is now seldom used due to my new iBook 12". So, yes, Powerbooks just contimues to work year after year.
I also plan to get a powerbook for university, where i also plan to study law, and i hope to make it last 5 years at the least (it takes a long time to become a lawyer in Scotland) this is also why i chose the powerbook as i have learnt from experience that its always best to get the fastest computer afordable to you otherwise you just end up kicking yourself everytime something wont run on your system.
Also in this thread i have heard a lot of recommendation of applecare and wondered if it really was worth the price as i am allready pushing out the boat a little bit with the system i want.
My experience of macs has been that if you treat it well you will have no problems, bar any production mess ups of course. My performa from about 8 years ago can still boot up pefctly and function as it did the first time we switched it on and both my G3 and G4 iMac's have operated without any mechanical, and very few software, malfunctions. Although admitedly these are desktops and not laptops i hope the same level of suriveability is present in apple laptops.
As for cosmetic scratches i think that even if your powerbook ends up with a fugly scar across the lid it will still look 30 times better than anything the PC market has to offer.
Also in this thread i have heard a lot of recommendation of applecare and wondered if it really was worth the price as i am allready pushing out the boat a little bit with the system i want.
My experience of macs has been that if you treat it well you will have no problems, bar any production mess ups of course. My performa from about 8 years ago can still boot up pefctly and function as it did the first time we switched it on and both my G3 and G4 iMac's have operated without any mechanical, and very few software, malfunctions. Although admitedly these are desktops and not laptops i hope the same level of suriveability is present in apple laptops.
As for cosmetic scratches i think that even if your powerbook ends up with a fugly scar across the lid it will still look 30 times better than anything the PC market has to offer.
I've had a good experience with the PowerBooks that I've owned.GULCkid said:
PB170 still works (about 12 plus years now. Had to replace the track ball).
PB15 works great. Had it about 1.5 years.
Applecare is key in case you need it fixed fast. Be sure to back up your data daily, or at least weekly.
Sushi