WWDCHappy Or Not?

i know WWDC made me happy
i am totally stocked about the dual 2 ghz g5
im gonna go out and buy one ASAP
and i think ichat av is a nice feature
i will prolly never use it but isight seems like an interesting peice of equipment

so yeah overall im bery happy at what came out!

 

Overall, I was happy with the keynote. I was disappointed that there isn't going to be a cheap headless box, and I think that Apple will need such a product if it is ever to make any serious gains in market share.

G5: I'm thrilled, but not ecstatic. I do think it is just what Apple needs, and I expect a huge boom in Power Mac sales when you combine the G5 and Quark for OSX. I'll probably care more when I'm in the market for a new computer in two years.

iSight: It's not bad. It's good for people who seriously want to use video chat but don't have the money for a FW camcorder or digital camera. Read on, though...

iChat AV: I don't give a damn about the video stuff. I don't see any point to it. Audio chat is pretty cool, but only when it allows you to skip an expensive long-distance phone call. Frankly, I have never understood why videoconferencing or video telephones are even necessary.

Safari update: It's more or less the same as Public Beta 2, except it has more bugs ironed out. I'll DL it for the bug patches, but Public Beta 2 was practically a final version anyway.

Panther: Now THIS is what I'm most excited about. I hope it runs on my iBook 700 because I want to install that sucker yesterday. If 10.0 was alpha, 10.1 was a beta, 10.2 was a developer pre-release and 10.3, I think, is finally OS X ready for prime time. It seems as if all of the UI kinks that drove me mad are finally worked out. Faster Mail and Preview are BIG. I think that Panther will represent a speed improvement over Jaguar, just as Jaguar did over 10.1.

All in all, a fine keynote.

 

I am happy with everything but the new powermac case design <yuck> and the fact that prices were not lowered on other apple items like iBooks and iMacs.

 

so where is the damn qt video they promised?

It's still not available.

 

ichat/video = cool
isight = cool
Panther = very cool
......PowerMac G5 = eh...not bad...I guess. Speed is nice, but casing isn't to great. It will probably grow on me though.

I've got a question for all of you though. Is a single 1.6 G5 that much faster than a dual 1.25 with the RAM being the same? I'm thinking about selling my 17" PB for a single 1.6 or 1.8 G5 and that super sexy 23"HD monitor. Let me know what you think!

 

I couldn't care less about ichat AV, or the isight. Safari... well, I'm glad it's not beta anymore, but the real improvement was getting tabs and autofill. Panther... cool, but that's all. Just cool. Not amazing, revolutionary, or mind blowing. And certainly not $130 worth of mind blowing.

But the G5. Well. Frankly, the rest of that stuff means about zilch to me compared to the G5. Now that Powermacs have the G5, soon we will see them in powerbooks, then imacs. ibooks will get the Gobi processor with altivec. The whole apple line is going to be a whole lot faster, starting today. And for that, I'm very very excited. All Steve Jobs had to do was come out and demo the G5 and I would have been happy.

 

according to what Jobs said today, and according to the specs on apple's website, the 1.6 Ghz G5 will SMOKE the dual 1.25, and the dual 1.42 on most tasks as well. I think I'd just be happy with that amazing 17" powerbook if I were you, but if you do sell it, *don't* get the G4. The G5 is the future; the G4 is (finally) dead.

 

Amazing.

I was truly not expecting these kinds of specs. Rumors are usually in fantasyland, and the reality is nearly always a letdown. But not this time!

Holy smoke. Everything we heard, all those dream specs, are REAL!! I'm still waiting to wake up. The only thing that would make this dream complete would be to have the money to afford one of these.

I think I answered that, although unlike tazo, I think the design of the new G5 Macs is outstanding and looooooong overdue. That sleak, ultra-modern look is to kill for.

Looks like a nice new toy to make Macking even more fun. But we'll hafta see reviews first.

I just hope that it makes importing all my Chimera and IE bookmarks easy.


Wondering what updates will exist in the laptops when they come out.

 

Here's what I think:
Power Mac G5: AWESOME specs! A dual 2.0 GHz is great with 8 GB RAM! I'm disappointed at only 3 PCI/PCI-X slots, only one optical drive bay, and only two internal hard drives. I also think the case is kind of ugly. But I'm still pleased with it over all.

iSight: It's nice Apple introduced another hardware product. I like how it carries video, audio, and power in one FireWire cable.

iChat: Audio and video chat can be neat. Apple is the first to make this so easy to do.

Safari: It's nice Safari is now a full, non-beta version. I'm also VERY happy it runs on Jaguar.

Panther: I think Expose is really neat. It's something you have to see in action to appreciate how useful it can be. All the other features sound great, too! I'm still a little disappointed about the $129 price tag. I think it should be about $89 or $99, but it's still not too bad, especially when compared to Windows!

 

Re: Amazing.

I couldn't agree more. Weren't we initially expecting 1.4, 1.6, and 1.8 GHz? Who could have guessed a dual 2.0 GHz G5?! The new low-end G5 will be quicker than the current high-end G4!!!

 

I like everything I've seen!

I see a lot of people already complaining (not in this thread but in others) about the price of the lowest model (1.6 GHz). These machines are designed for professionals, a 1.6 will give a 3.0 GHz P4 a run, and if you compare to the Dell XPS (which doesn't have a superdrive but does have a better videocard and more ram not to mention it's software sucks), the Dell is $600.00 more. Add a super drive and it's $800.00 more. The 1.6 GHz is very competetively priced in my opinion and a dual 2.0 GHz for under $3000.00 is a steal. Remember these are marketed towards power users not the average public.

 

I also think the price is resonable for the entry level model. The high end is very cheap. I'm amazed there is only a $1,000 difference between low-end and high-end. However, I do think Apple needs a cheaper tower for "prosumers." Maybe they will keep the 1.25 and dual 1.25 G4 towers for a while for this purpose.

 

I would be but...

Yeah, I would be but reality has set in and I don't use the portability. The problem will be scraping up the $$ while trying to pay bills. Thanks for your input!

 

I love the design of the G5, Apple's design is really progressing.
dunno about the iSight .. wouldn't have use for it.
iChat will be cool I guess .. I didn't read carefully though about any other changes, I hope video conferencing isn't the only change.
Panther looks really nice except the one window I saw with the listings in the left pane (iDisk, MacHD) then the contents on the right .. looked too much like XPs layout for my liking. But we'll see about speed.
No PB updates, wondering when that's coming...

 

Sorry to those of you who don't like the G5 case - I think it looks damn sexy. It's just got this cool new york loft feel to it. I'd be all over it if I had the money.

 

Re: WWDCHappy Or Not?

G5 is the greatest next thing to happen to the Mac platform. I am really excited about the performance and the room to grow. I just wish it would move to the rest of the machine ASAP!

Blah! Too expensive, if it was Apple or some other company that made something like this, it is not THAT revolutionary.

Coming from the Windows side, I found out YIM on the Mac didn't support AV, so I guess this is a good thing, but $30 for Jag users?!? WTF!

We are finally at 1.0, but I don't use Safari yet. I might get into it later, Netscape 7.0 is what I use now.

I think Panther looked great! I LOVE Exposé, and the other cool things are good. However, I HATE the metal look and I really really hope that I can change it. The metal look to me is a theme, might fit some personal tastes, but I'd rather the main theme be subdued. Oh yeah, and $129 is too much ... but then again I feel that way because I bought my first Mac end of May.

It was long, it had its moments. I don't like the design of the new PM case, I loved the hinge on the old one and I used to advocate the Mac to PC users by just showing them that cool design whenever I could, but of course functionality comes first.

The part that I am not happey with is the price of the new systems. Entry level PM for $1999?!?! WTF? I mean I was sooooooooo waiting for this update to get a PM, but this is ridiculous, it is WAAAAY too expensive! I was hoping to replace my PC desktop, but now I am going to wait until the price drops to something more reasonable. $1499 for the entry level with a combo drive is something I can live with, and that is $300 less that what the prices are now. And for God's sake, put friggin 512MB of RAM in there, you know we all need it.

And for those who will say "it is a pro machine, go for the cheaper iMac, eMac, etc". This is no longer an option, the performance gap between the pro machines and teh "consumer" machines is now HUGE. Either update those machines, or bring PM prices down. I will be happy with my iBook until next year, in the mean time I will invest in a full sized keyboard!

 

i have heard and read a lot of complaints about the lack of other hardware announcements, and I think everyone needs to remember that the WWDC is a developer's conference after all, its not MWSF part 2. The G5 was announced here for a reason - it is a developer's dream machine. The updated pbook will come in short order (no later than MWNY - or whatever its called now), updates and price drops to other hardware will happen too - in their proper forum.

As far as the G4 being "dead", don't count on it. Every machine that uses the G5 will need a brand new mobo and system design - that's gonna take time for the G5 to trickle down to the Pbook, iMac, eMac and whatever else...the G4 ain't goin anywhere for a while. Look for more speed bumps to those systems over the next 6-12 mos before you look for a G5.

the WWDC was a breath of fresh air and only a sign of things to come. I am quite pleased with what came out of it.