Slashdot Mirror
Apple Gives Laptops Speed Bumps
sockit2me9000 writes "Apple released their new PowerBook today. They include faster processors across the board (up to 1GHz), Radeon 9000 GPUs, and the top-of-the-line model will include a slot-loading SuperDrive. Price points remain about the same. New iBook was released as well."
Honestly, no PC-based laptop can compete. Size, battery life, specs other than CPU speed....style
Now, if they'd put a serial port on the back, it comes with a UNIX-based doesn't it?!
Maybe a USB-serial converter would work. Can you say console access?
I have to say something that I never though I'd say: "These new Macs look great! They are relatively cheap, run *nix and have al the hardware you could wish for!"
My sincere congratulations to Apple for having swung around from being a stubborn, expensive brand to become a computer supplier that I like. I will concider an Apple next time I buy a computer!
Indeed, but for us Europeans, they have not realized that now $1 is very close to 1. I expected Apple to put roughly the same pre-tax cost on both sides of the pond. No way, it's about 10% more. To the point that it may be worth a trip to NYC to buy a fully loaded PowerBook.
"or 8 AMD 2400XP's combined together"
Are you fucking nuts? That's the single dumbest comment I've ever read at
They are still missing USB 2.0 support. They are missing from most of the current PC laptops as well but I don't know why Apple didn't include one if they were coming out with *new* ibooks and powerbooks. Also, one another complaint I have on most laptops including a Dell I recently purchased is that even though I have essentially a portable DVD player which can hook up to a TV/Projecter, etc via S-Video, it doesn't contain a digital out and I'm stuck with stereo out. You would think multimedia conscious(whatever that means) Apple would think of these things...
I guess nothing is perfect.
A somewhat nicer model with the 800mhz G3, a DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive and the same 640mb of RAM lists for $1489. That gets you a very potent UN*X box with a lot of wonderful features, a lovely OS, and a massively high portability level.
All this, and an amazing attention to detail as well. Really, switching to Apple is like moving from Chevy to BMW. Sure it may not stack up on paper (horsepower per dollar, etc) but you can end up with an incredibly friendly machine that's a pure pleasure to use! Do yourself a favor and go check 'em out if you've been on the fence.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
If you're in hock up to your loogies, why are you buying a new computer?
Mod point free since 2001
Why doesn't Apple start putting USB 2.0 in its machines? I doubt that it's much more expensive than USB 1.1 or whatever they're using. Is it sour grapes from Intel muscling in on Firewire (USB 2.0 has been adopted very quickly by PC motherboard manufacturers). Firewire isn't going anywhere (DV is the killer app that will keep it alive). But it would sure be nice to have access to USB 2.0 stuff like high-end scanners. And I'm sure peripheral manufacturers don't like having to choose between a firewire and USB 2.0 interface for everything.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Actually, for what it is targeted for, the G3 in the iBook is a decent chip. There is good performance, fantastic battery life and low heat production. I've been running an iBook for a while now and am quite impressed with the size, packaging and performance. Granted it is not a replacement for my Dual G4 with 2GB of RAM, scads of hard drive space and 22in Cinema Display, but when I am on the road, getting my email, writing papers and giving presentations, it is all perfectly suited to the iBook.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
The proliferation of categories is pretty silly, ...
but
this is a unix-focused site to some extent. And
Apple ships more unix than any other manufacturer.
So it stands to reason that we'd talk about them
here.
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
The majority of the processing needed in modern pcs is in fact for all the graphics. So it makes perfect sense to have a faster GPU than CPU - that's where the horsepower is needed. Even if you're doing relatively computationally intense work (I run statistical analyses daily) the requirement still don't add up to the level required to run Aqua or WinXPs graphics.
Remember the Amigas? Positively legendary machines, and for good reason, they were designed this way. The CPU wasn't much at all by modern standards, but it was enough to do what it needed to do just fine (and, in all honesty, enough to handle the non-graphical computations done on most pcs to this day.) The Video Toaster was capable of working pretty much independant of the CPU, and it had a lot more horsepower... the end result was a machine that surpassed PCs made many years later in real functional power.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
Excuse me, the reason I can afford a Mac is that I work therefore that makes me in the "working class". What you are talking about is that "Slashdot Class" -- a group of people that think its a sin to pay for anything. Which makes the best notebook for you the one found in the dumpster behind a fortune 500 company. Instead of using the Windows 2000 Pro install already on it, you fdisk the harddrive and install Gentoo Linux so you can show it off at your next meeting of the 2600 club complete with Anarchy and Calvin peeing on the Windows logo stickers.
For the rest of us in the "working class", Apple has produced some awesome notebooks at a reasonable fee. Where is the PC Notebook that burns DVDs? What Linux distro supports that?
Don't fall into the Mhz myth, the clock speeds on these things are lower, but they get more work done in a clock cycle too.
That said, they're still a little slower in terms of work done per second than the fastest Intel has, just not nearly as much so as you may think looking at the clock speeds. But it doesn't really matter all that much. CPU speed is just one factor of overall performance, and with a good design it doesn't need to be nearly as fast as it would on a poorer design. The design on the Macs really is much better, the bottlenecks aren't as bad, and they have plenty of power where it counts. Think of it as finesse vs. brawn in comparison with your typical Intel/AMD system, where the surfeit of CPU speed is used to overcome a basically less efficient design. Consider that probably over 90% of the computation done on a pc these days is concentrated in the graphics rendering, and the look at how much more efficiently the mac handles that - all the way from a GPU which is faster than the CPU to the Altivec system in the CPU, which beats the hell out of MMX/SSE and all that.
I'm typing this on a TiBook now, a 666 Mhz G4, and believe me, when I put it up against a new Intel based notebook it won't take the speed crown, by any means, but it's close enough that I don't really care. It will outperform Intel notebooks with over twice the clockspeed quite handily on most tasks, and when you look at things like the screen and the cd-rw/dvd drive... Apple was overpriced once but it's changed. You'd be very hard pressed to find an intel notebook with the same features in the same weight-class much cheaper. And OS X beats WinXP in nearly every category for my money. Easier to use, prettier, AND more powerful under the good as well... tcsh or bash beats cmd.exe any day.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
Excluding my grandma who is sysadmin in a linux-only rendering farm (that's a joke), Apple is the only option consumers have to WinTel. Apple's tenacity, inventiveness, and rich *nixy-goodness is why Apple is the darling of the computing world these days, even at 6% market share.
I'm not trolling, but I'm guessing you've not yet used a recent (4 years) machine made by Apple. (My apologies if I've put my foot in my ignormaus. Apple is becoming a favorite among newly converted geeks because they produce good stuff and because they're finally starting to get it: *nix, Photoshop, Apache, SSH, MS Office. Apple's laptops have no WinTel equivalent. The interaction between the command line and Aqua is something at which to gawk.
On a less preach-to-the-choir note, is it so different than announcments for minor revisions of relatively arcane (if beloved) open source software? Not that I'm saying such posts are bad, but that it might be the nature of the Slashdot beast.
blog
Don't forget that (almost?) all European countries charge quite a bit of VAT (all that healthcare etc doesn't come for free!) In Belgium that's 20.5% on luxury items (which includes electronic products), I guess it's similar in other EU countries.
Donate free food here
No more complaining about the prices of Macintosh computers, please. Nice things come at a price.
Now if only they'd drop the price on the G4 towers and make them affordable.
I can get:
AMD Athlon 2000+
Soyo Dragon KT400 motherboard
512MB of DDR-333 ram
80GB WD hard drive
Asus GeForce 4 128MB AGP card
Superhawk Aluminum midtower case + 430watt power supply
and an 18" Sony TFT flat panel display for $1600. A dual 800Mhz G4 tower with 256 megs of ram and a geforce4 mx card is $1600 without a monitor. WTF? Why not take take the other processor out of it that I'm never going to use and offer it for $1000 and a 17" LCD flat panel for $500? Their LCD displays are over $900!!! WTF are they smoking?? I can get a 21" Sony Trinitron monitor for $475 now or the 18" TFT flat panel for $680. Sheesh. Fucking price gougers.
Think again.
Mega Hz myth is right. However it seems to me that many Apple users think that their very slow machine is much faster than top Wintel machines.
Well.. due to difference of CPU architecture, compare them with their Mhz only is totally wrong. Moreover, the PowerPC chip is efficient chip.
However, as you exaggerated, it is not as fast as
5 pentium 4's running at 2.3 Ghz a piece or 8 AMD 2400XP's combined together.
Probably the Mac system with 1Ghz processor will be comparable with Wintel systems with 1.3Ghz or 1.2Ghz.
With some tests, Mac will be faster, but with some other tests, Wintel will be faster.
Who said the PowerBook G4 or Mac G4 are super computers? No way! Is it as fast as the Cray?
The general definition of the super computer is
the fastest class computer "now".
if Mac G4 is a super computer, then current Wintel computers are also super computers.
From probable iBook buyer.
( Well.. the features of iBook is great.
No other PC makers give such features with such
price tag. And it has a robust and manageable Unix on it. However...... The processor speed is
too slow for the price tag. You can buy Toshiba AMD notebooks with Athlon +1500 processor with $1099 or something. And.. they also have good features.. )
This is proof that Apple still has a ways to go. If their changes were that radical, nobody would wait for "...next time I buy a computer.." and would actually do it NOW.
Radical or not, I, like most people, have to wait until I have the money to actually buy it in order to, well, buy it. I'm going to shoot for the entry iBook the next time I buy a computer because that's when I'll have the money to do it.
Besides, what moron goes out and gets a new computer when their current one works just fine? I have a PowerMac G4/450 that's over three years old and it runs 10.2 at a more than acceptable speed ("damn fast") and is no where near needing an upgrade. I'm only getting the iBook because I need an iBook. There are those people that buy things for the sake of having them and then there are those that buy when there is a need. Obviously the previous poster does not need a new computer now. The fact that he is waiting is not a statement on Apple's ability to market or make a product but a statement on the efficiency of the poster with regard to his possessions and money.
Hmm, a mature attitude towards something on Slashdot. Anyone else feel that cold draft come out of the cracks of Hell?
It's been my experience that the hard-numbers I've found, when taken alone, still don't seem to answer the question. Even the most seemingly objective benchmarks can be argued either way - there's just too much religion on the subject.
Bottom line, you have to decide for yourself. If you know someone with a Mac, ask 'em if you can play around for an hour, or go hang out at CompUSA or an Apple store and bug the folks there for an hour.
I'm biased, I converted from PC after years of using Windows and a brief and generally positive flirtation with Linux (Rehat's 6.2 thru 7-ish). I have a dual-gig G4 tower and I NEVER notice a speed problem, my daughter has a 600Mhz G3 iMac and it's slowish - BUT, what are you going to use it for?
I know a developer here where I work who works all day on an older G4 Powerbook laptop - he loves it. I myself use my Mac for coding in Java and it's awsome, I love the fact that I can run just about any Java-related open source project I want. That being said, I'm sure there are uses where the Mac won't be the best choice, and there is the issue of making sure all your favorite software has a Mac version, and re-buying if you use commercial apps.
If I had the spare cash, I'd be buying that new 1Ghz Poerbook right now!
"That naive cube! How long must I suffer this!" --Sheldon J. Plankton
I can't agree with you there. My current computer is an 900 Mhz Athlon, although I feel pretty sure my next system will be a G4 (or G5, depending on when I buy it). At the moment, my financial situation doesn't allow for me to invest in new computer hardware, particulary a £3000 Apple Mac. I'm sure many other people will be in this same position.
My point is, although some people say a Mac will be their next computer, given the chance - and resources - we would actually buy it right away.
Tim
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
What is "proprietary" about Apple's hardware, and how is it different from the "proprietary" hardware that Dell, Sony, and Gateway sell?
Oh, I see you're an ignorant troll. Nevermind.NetInfo connection failed for server 127.0.0.1/local
I have a feeling it's more along the lines of "Mommy and Daddy buy me whatever I want, whenever I want." These people really don't understand that money is hard to come by and does not grow on trees. Being 21 and living on my own is hard, some of my friends are living at home or are very supported by their parents. They won't ever truly grasp saving money and waiting till you need something to buy it until they are on their own.
Understanding is a three-edged sword. -- Kosh Naranek
Standard Anti-Apple Rant #14. I won't even bother (I don't think $999 is expensive).
The Unix-side of OSX was updated to 4.4 with Jaguar.
First, what is "non-native" hardware? Secondly, what's so proprietary about IDE drives, SDRAM, Firewire, OpenFirmware (OK - that's not hardware per se) or PPC?
You know, not everybody on Slashdot is a stark raving mad zealot misspelling "Microsoft" intentionally.
-- The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'.
Next time you should listen to the people talking about the releases or pay attention to Apple's release schedual. The laptop line has been in need of a revanmp for a while now, and I've been saying it for a while. I actualy expected them in september, but hey, even November is within their average time frame.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I'll make you a deal. You can have our Apple Macintosh Laptops at our price, if we can have prescription drugs at your price. Deal?