I use Xcode on a daily basis. For non-GUI apps, it's a very nice IDE, I enjoy using it. I use C and C++ without any problems.
Designing GUI apps with Xcode is another story. While it's easier than writing oldschool classic mac gui apps, Apple's Cocoa (NeXT) API isn't much fun to work with. As you pointed out, it's certainly no Qt or GTK. I would put it on par with Microsoft garbage for fun/ease-of-use.
Historically speaking, the Cocoa API, Obj-C, and Xcode itself all come from NeXT. These were nice tools back in the NeXT days, but I honestly think Apple made a step backwards as they updated/enhanced them for Mac OS X. They're not _bad_, they're just not all that great.
Welcome to computing in 2004, everything's a tradeoff, moreso than ever before.
Of the professional Mac OS X converts I know, most are software engineers or computer science types. They like the fit and finish of PowerBooks and like the Unix/Unix-like/NeXT roots of Mac OS X.
Most of the electrical and civil engineers I know are sticking to Win NT/2000/XP as their tools (Cadence, Xilinx Foundation, AutoCAD, etc) are not available for Mac OS X. Also most of these type of enigneers were actually happy to leave the Unix world several years ago when they traded in their Sun SPARCstations for WinNT boxes. To them the Windows world is easier and cheaper to deal with.
But wait, this is offtopic, but I am pissed about that iTunes bug for Macs - the crashing, freezy thing? Damn that sucks! Apple's gotta fix that shit or what'll i do?!
What/which iTunes bug? I'm using iTunes 4.6 on my PowerBook G4 (OS X 10.3.5) without any problems. I have an older version on my PC, 4.5.1 I think, that seems to work OK.
Or are you talking about the iTunes UK overcharge? (Apparently Apple charges the German and French 0.99 Euro per song, and the British 79 pence [about 1.20 Euro] while Americans only pay 99 cents [0.80 Euro]).
An even bigger mess is the trouble the labels in Japan are giving Apple--they won't let Apple open an iTunes store in Japan unless they disable ALL ability to burn music to CD-R!!
My guess is they're not supporting it because the default install of Mac OS X 10.3 Panther doesn't yet include all of the goodies that developers want.
Here's what my buddies and coworkers complain about:
X11 is still not installed by default.
10.3 comes with an older version of Xcode (1.0 I think). The newest version (1.5 I think) has to be downloaded from Apple's website, requring a free-but-time-consuming Developer Online Membership.
Version number questions. Many OS X users are still hanging on to 10.2.x because it's almost as fast and almost as good looking as 10.3.x. Many are waiting for 10.4 Tiger, and some developers are already using developer seeds of 10.4.
To my understanding, OS X Server isn't even the same code-base as normal OS X. Supposedly it's more NeXTish.
OS X Server 1.0 came out over a year before the OS X Client. At the time of Server's original release it was basiclly a Mac-flavored version of NeXT OPENSTEP. Apple's client OS at the time was still classic Mac OS 9 (or was it 8.6?).
When Apple released Mac OS X 10.0, with the Aqua GUI and all of its refined NeXTisms, they replaced the original OS X Server with one based on 10.0. This trend has continued today with 10.3 and soon, 10.4.
The only differences between Server and Client today are the inclusion of more open source daemons and apps, optimized configurations, and some (really snazzy) closed source management tools. Remote admin can be done via a remote shell (BSD derrived), web interface, or from another Mac using the management apps. Server comes in two flavors: 10-client for $500 ($250.edu) and Unlimited-client for $1000 ($500.edu). Client restrictions only affect simulataneous Mac and Win file sharing, so many shops just use the 10-client version.
If you have an older Mac that doesn't support Mac OS X, or if you have an x86 PC (or if you have a semi-modern Mac but don't want to pay for an upgrade to 10.3 Client or Server), you can install Darwin, the open-source core of Mac OS X. It's basiclly Apple's NeXTish BSD distribution, but based on the Mach kernel and using NetInfo to manage configuration. You won't get the Aqua GUI (but you can use straight X11) nor the GUI admin tools, but everything else will be about the same.
Perhaps the coolest thing about Darwin is the fact it's opensource -- driver and utility coders love this, there aren't too many secrets when the core OS has open code.
At least Apple doesn't have quite as many layers of price confusion.
Another option is to build your own PC. If Dell can sell a bundle like that for $700 it's probably possible to go the cheap route on a few of the options and build a similar system for $600. (Or stay at the $700 price point, upgrading a few options or getting a cooler looking case).
I think I'll keep my desktop PC and my PowerBook G4.
What they've basiclly done is make a cluster-in-a-box; each board contains 12 self-contained single CPU circuits and a gigabit ethernet switch circuit (with 10GigE uplink). Multiple boards are connected together via their 10GigE uplinks.
If there were aiming high with 96 CPUs in one box, why didn't they really try to impress potential users by making each board a *single* PC?! That is, rather than 12 individual PC nodes on each board (each running its own copy of the OS), why not make each board a single 12-CPU PC? That way you'd still have 96 CPUs, but with much greater thruput and much faster shared memory between every 12 CPUs. You'd still have 8 total PC nodes in the box, so reliaiblity would still be reasonable.
When I think "multiple CPU workstation" I tend to think that at least SOME of the CPUs will be directly connected in an SMP manner for faster shared memory, much easier process migration, and the need for only one copy of the OS to reside in memory. Gigabit ethernet is a nice technology, but a CPU interconnect it is not.
I have some side questions: How upgradable is this monster? With 96 individual nodes, I would assume it will have at least 96 SO-DIMM slots. 192 slots would be nice as it would allow me to upgrade the RAM without throwing away the original sticks. How does this thing bootstrap? Am I correct in assuming that at least one node has a hard drive from which it boots, then serves itself up as a netboot server to the other (diskless) nodes? This brings me back to one of my earlier points: with 96 nodes you have 96 copies of the OS to load up. That may be cool in a geeky way, but I would really much rather just deal with 8 nodes, each a 12-CPU SMP PC. Heck, you could even afford to have one real hard drive for each of those 8 nodes.
VNC feels about the same regardless if you're using 100BaseT, GigE, or 10GigE. You still have the overhead and latency of ethernet, TCP/IP, and VNC itself. Upgrading from 100BaseT to 10GigE will greatly increase the amount of thruput possible, but it will do very little to reduce the total lag.
This isn't really a show stopper, unless your GUI applications are tied directly to the 96 CPUs. In that case, they really outta add at least one x16 PCI-E slot to that beast for graphics.
Otherwise, just use a $250 PC as your main desktop GUI box and make use of Linux's wonderful networking abilities to tap into the power of that 96 CPU beast sitting beside it (and hopefully connected via a sweet GigE or 10GigE crossover cable).
I know people that still use an SGI Indy as their desktop workstation, but almost every one of their CPU hungry apps runs on a server in some other room. With X forwarding and NFS mounts it all blends together.
Also note that pretty much all unix vendors have some sort of remote functionality as well. Sun has their LightsOutManagement, SGI has their L1/L2/L3 remote control systems, and even Apple has an oldschool console serial port on the back of the Xserve for remote mangement.
I wonder if anyone is planning to make a Windows2003 server box with some sort of serial-based mangement system. With web interfaces and microsoft's slightly enhanced command prompt, a person really shouldn't have to resort to using a full keyboard/mouse/video setup just to administer a Win2K3 server.
I think Dell gets their KVM-over-IP equipment from Avocent, though there are other providers, such as Raritan. The best setups allow for a hybrid combination of traditional rackmount matrix KVM and more modern KVM-over-IP.
Also note that not all Cat5/RJ45 KVM units support KVM-over-IP. Many units simply use Cat5 cable to cut down on cost. (Cat5 plus an adapter on either end is cheaper than long runs of coax for video plus USB or PS/2 cables and repeaters.
Does anyone have one to crack open? I'm interested in what chipset it uses for divx/xvid decoding and to drive the LCD. It has to be some sort of existing dedicated chipset, or at least a somewhat affordable programmable setup. I don't think they could have designed their own custom chipset, included a color LCD, used a 1.8" hard drive, and still keep the price this low. I doubt they sell enough units to get the same volume discount Apple gets when ordering parts to build its iPods.
If you really want KVM-over-IP, you'll want a hardware solution. A software-only setup won't help you with BIOS or networking problems. With a hardware-based KVM-over-IP you can have multiple network (and non-networked) paths back to the KVM itself.
If you haven't worked with high-end KVMs before, don't be alarmed by the RJ-45 ports on the Raritan models. High end KVMs use Cat5 cable and adapters, it's quite handy and cheaper than buying thick bundles of coax for RGBHV.
For those not in the know, the Mac Portable was Apple's first portable Mac. It had about 8 hours of battery life, a full size real keyboard, a full size trackball, a 3.5" hard drive with desktop performance, and a whole slew of I/O ports on the back--but it weighed almost 20 lbs!!!
I'm on a slow connection, so I'll give this beta a try sometime this weekend, but I have tried 5.2 current and had some problems trying to do a truly minimal install. (Note: I've been mostly a Debian user).
Are there any tricks to installing just the very basics? I have two needs for two seperate machines, actually. I would like one such install to have just enough to serve as my gateway, dns, and web server (but not mail). I would like another very simple install to run just X and Mozilla-Browser (the browser-only, GTK1 version).
Here's the problem: every time I try to do a custom minimal installation, I still end up with about 170+ MB installed. Yet when I google for suggestions, I keep reading stories about folks managing to get X, Mozilla, and maybe AbiWord all into their tight 100 MB install.
So, what's the trick?! I'm baffled and would like to learn!
You can get the player for free, but it's the "foot in the door". The more interesting things you can do only with the full version, like authoring and so forth, and movie previews at Apple have become the de facto way of viewing trailers online.
It's more than just Quicktime, it's the Quicktime-based pro apps (and G5 hardware) that Apple wants to promote.
Quicktime (which is an extensive media framework which happens to also include a [somewhat crappy] Quicktime media player) is free for users and developers alike. Apple also sells a "Quicktime Pro" package, which is little more than a beefed up Quicktime media player for converting, editing, and exporting several media types. Back in the Mac OS Classic days, there were many third party Quicktime movie players that provided many extra features, but still used Apple's Quicktime framework to do the heavy lifting. I don't know of any (good) players for Windows or Mac OS X, so it seems Apple has been stepping in with their "Quicktime Pro" player for $30.
Getting back to my initial point, Apple is promoting their name and their Quicktime framework to sell products like FinalCutPro, DVD Studio Pro, and Shake. They're also using it to help promote other similar tools, such as the iLife suite (iDVD, iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and Garage Band). But these apps are only available for Apple's hardware and OS, and iLife happens to be included free of charge on new Macs.
So, yes, Apple is hosting their mega awesome huge trailer site for a reason, and they are making some money off their deluxe "pro" Quicktime Player. But it's the big fish they're after, they want to promote their brand and technology to sell G5s and FinalCutPro/Shake/DVD Studio Pro class software.
Oh man does that bring back memories. We had a 44 MB Syquest (winchester) drive. It was slow and loud. Though it interfaced our Macs and PCs via 5 MB/sec SCSI-1, I think the true transfer rate was something like 600 KB/sec.
We used to lust over the Iomega Bernoulli drives, removable like the Syquests, but faster and larger capacity. They even had a 230 MB version back when 160 MB hard drives were the norm. Prices for those Bernoulli drives and cartridges were INSANE though.
Anyone remember the 22 MB Floptical drives? I've seen some Macs with external floptical drives and Silicon Graphics used to offer it as an option for their Indy workstations. Sure seemed like a huge step up from the previously "exotic" 2.88 MB 3.5" floppies that NeXT used in their cubes and slabs.
The (old) Apple eMate would be a good choice, as many others have pointed out. It's a durable laptop based on a hybrid of the Newton 130 and Newton 2000. It uses the software from the 2000, but the logicboard of the 130... still, it's more than fast enough for the bundled office suite and many other lightweight Newton apps.
Note that some CPU-intensive apps designed for the 2000 may not work well on the eMate, as the Newton 2000 has about 7x the CPU performance.
Bulletproof I was in a CompUSA store in early 1997 when an Apple rep was demoing the eMate to some CompUSA salespeople. Part of his demo was to fling the eMac down the aisle!! It cartwheeled, tumbled, and finally skidded to a stop about 50 feet away. He picked it up and went back to showing off the various preinstalled applications!
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.sgi.com/company_info/newsroom/press_rel eases/2004/june/fleet_numerical.html
I use Xcode on a daily basis. For non-GUI apps, it's a very nice IDE, I enjoy using it. I use C and C++ without any problems.
Designing GUI apps with Xcode is another story. While it's easier than writing oldschool classic mac gui apps, Apple's Cocoa (NeXT) API isn't much fun to work with. As you pointed out, it's certainly no Qt or GTK. I would put it on par with Microsoft garbage for fun/ease-of-use.
Historically speaking, the Cocoa API, Obj-C, and Xcode itself all come from NeXT. These were nice tools back in the NeXT days, but I honestly think Apple made a step backwards as they updated/enhanced them for Mac OS X. They're not _bad_, they're just not all that great.
Welcome to computing in 2004, everything's a tradeoff, moreso than ever before.
Of the professional Mac OS X converts I know, most are software engineers or computer science types. They like the fit and finish of PowerBooks and like the Unix/Unix-like/NeXT roots of Mac OS X.
Most of the electrical and civil engineers I know are sticking to Win NT/2000/XP as their tools (Cadence, Xilinx Foundation, AutoCAD, etc) are not available for Mac OS X. Also most of these type of enigneers were actually happy to leave the Unix world several years ago when they traded in their Sun SPARCstations for WinNT boxes. To them the Windows world is easier and cheaper to deal with.
But wait, this is offtopic, but I am pissed about that iTunes bug for Macs - the crashing, freezy thing? Damn that sucks! Apple's gotta fix that shit or what'll i do?!
What/which iTunes bug? I'm using iTunes 4.6 on my PowerBook G4 (OS X 10.3.5) without any problems. I have an older version on my PC, 4.5.1 I think, that seems to work OK.
Or are you talking about the iTunes UK overcharge? (Apparently Apple charges the German and French 0.99 Euro per song, and the British 79 pence [about 1.20 Euro] while Americans only pay 99 cents [0.80 Euro]).
An even bigger mess is the trouble the labels in Japan are giving Apple--they won't let Apple open an iTunes store in Japan unless they disable ALL ability to burn music to CD-R!!
Here's what my buddies and coworkers complain about:
A Team Channel
I would love this! Especially now that TNN/Spike no longer shows A-Team reruns in the afternoons.
I hope they skip the last season--WTF was up with that? It wasn't even the same show anymore, the A-Team turned B-Squad!
To my understanding, OS X Server isn't even the same code-base as normal OS X. Supposedly it's more NeXTish.
.edu) and Unlimited-client for $1000 ($500 .edu). Client restrictions only affect simulataneous Mac and Win file sharing, so many shops just use the 10-client version.
OS X Server 1.0 came out over a year before the OS X Client. At the time of Server's original release it was basiclly a Mac-flavored version of NeXT OPENSTEP. Apple's client OS at the time was still classic Mac OS 9 (or was it 8.6?).
When Apple released Mac OS X 10.0, with the Aqua GUI and all of its refined NeXTisms, they replaced the original OS X Server with one based on 10.0. This trend has continued today with 10.3 and soon, 10.4.
The only differences between Server and Client today are the inclusion of more open source daemons and apps, optimized configurations, and some (really snazzy) closed source management tools. Remote admin can be done via a remote shell (BSD derrived), web interface, or from another Mac using the management apps. Server comes in two flavors: 10-client for $500 ($250
http://www.apple.com/server/macosx/
If you have an older Mac that doesn't support Mac OS X, or if you have an x86 PC (or if you have a semi-modern Mac but don't want to pay for an upgrade to 10.3 Client or Server), you can install Darwin, the open-source core of Mac OS X. It's basiclly Apple's NeXTish BSD distribution, but based on the Mach kernel and using NetInfo to manage configuration. You won't get the Aqua GUI (but you can use straight X11) nor the GUI admin tools, but everything else will be about the same.
Perhaps the coolest thing about Darwin is the fact it's opensource -- driver and utility coders love this, there aren't too many secrets when the core OS has open code.
You just do not know how to shop at Dell
At least Apple doesn't have quite as many layers of price confusion.
Another option is to build your own PC. If Dell can sell a bundle like that for $700 it's probably possible to go the cheap route on a few of the options and build a similar system for $600. (Or stay at the $700 price point, upgrading a few options or getting a cooler looking case).
I think I'll keep my desktop PC and my PowerBook G4.
Here's what really perplexes me:
What they've basiclly done is make a cluster-in-a-box; each board contains 12 self-contained single CPU circuits and a gigabit ethernet switch circuit (with 10GigE uplink). Multiple boards are connected together via their 10GigE uplinks.
If there were aiming high with 96 CPUs in one box, why didn't they really try to impress potential users by making each board a *single* PC?! That is, rather than 12 individual PC nodes on each board (each running its own copy of the OS), why not make each board a single 12-CPU PC? That way you'd still have 96 CPUs, but with much greater thruput and much faster shared memory between every 12 CPUs. You'd still have 8 total PC nodes in the box, so reliaiblity would still be reasonable.
When I think "multiple CPU workstation" I tend to think that at least SOME of the CPUs will be directly connected in an SMP manner for faster shared memory, much easier process migration, and the need for only one copy of the OS to reside in memory. Gigabit ethernet is a nice technology, but a CPU interconnect it is not.
I have some side questions:
How upgradable is this monster? With 96 individual nodes, I would assume it will have at least 96 SO-DIMM slots. 192 slots would be nice as it would allow me to upgrade the RAM without throwing away the original sticks.
How does this thing bootstrap? Am I correct in assuming that at least one node has a hard drive from which it boots, then serves itself up as a netboot server to the other (diskless) nodes?
This brings me back to one of my earlier points: with 96 nodes you have 96 copies of the OS to load up. That may be cool in a geeky way, but I would really much rather just deal with 8 nodes, each a 12-CPU SMP PC. Heck, you could even afford to have one real hard drive for each of those 8 nodes.
Maybe I just don't "get it".
VNC feels about the same regardless if you're using 100BaseT, GigE, or 10GigE. You still have the overhead and latency of ethernet, TCP/IP, and VNC itself. Upgrading from 100BaseT to 10GigE will greatly increase the amount of thruput possible, but it will do very little to reduce the total lag.
This isn't really a show stopper, unless your GUI applications are tied directly to the 96 CPUs. In that case, they really outta add at least one x16 PCI-E slot to that beast for graphics.
Otherwise, just use a $250 PC as your main desktop GUI box and make use of Linux's wonderful networking abilities to tap into the power of that 96 CPU beast sitting beside it (and hopefully connected via a sweet GigE or 10GigE crossover cable).
I know people that still use an SGI Indy as their desktop workstation, but almost every one of their CPU hungry apps runs on a server in some other room. With X forwarding and NFS mounts it all blends together.
Also note that pretty much all unix vendors have some sort of remote functionality as well. Sun has their LightsOutManagement, SGI has their L1/L2/L3 remote control systems, and even Apple has an oldschool console serial port on the back of the Xserve for remote mangement.
I wonder if anyone is planning to make a Windows2003 server box with some sort of serial-based mangement system. With web interfaces and microsoft's slightly enhanced command prompt, a person really shouldn't have to resort to using a full keyboard/mouse/video setup just to administer a Win2K3 server.
I think Dell gets their KVM-over-IP equipment from Avocent, though there are other providers, such as Raritan. The best setups allow for a hybrid combination of traditional rackmount matrix KVM and more modern KVM-over-IP.
Also note that not all Cat5/RJ45 KVM units support KVM-over-IP. Many units simply use Cat5 cable to cut down on cost. (Cat5 plus an adapter on either end is cheaper than long runs of coax for video plus USB or PS/2 cables and repeaters.
My brother is a DJ and I'm a VJ
I know what a Disc Jockey is, but what's a VJ?
Does anyone have one to crack open? I'm interested in what chipset it uses for divx/xvid decoding and to drive the LCD. It has to be some sort of existing dedicated chipset, or at least a somewhat affordable programmable setup. I don't think they could have designed their own custom chipset, included a color LCD, used a 1.8" hard drive, and still keep the price this low. I doubt they sell enough units to get the same volume discount Apple gets when ordering parts to build its iPods.
If you look at the specs, it has composite video out.
I personally would have liked to have seen SVideo or DVI (or Mini-DVI, or what ever that funky new HDTV connector is called).
If you really want KVM-over-IP, you'll want a hardware solution. A software-only setup won't help you with BIOS or networking problems. With a hardware-based KVM-over-IP you can have multiple network (and non-networked) paths back to the KVM itself.
n ion_kx/prd_line.aspx
I love the Raritan Dominion KX series, it's both a classic KVM and a IP-enabled KVM:
http://www.raritan.com/products/kvm_switches/domi
If you haven't worked with high-end KVMs before, don't be alarmed by the RJ-45 ports on the Raritan models. High end KVMs use Cat5 cable and adapters, it's quite handy and cheaper than buying thick bundles of coax for RGBHV.
Mac Portable
For those not in the know, the Mac Portable was Apple's first portable Mac. It had about 8 hours of battery life, a full size real keyboard, a full size trackball, a 3.5" hard drive with desktop performance, and a whole slew of I/O ports on the back--but it weighed almost 20 lbs!!!
http://lowendmac.com/pb/portable.shtml
(This was a few years before the Sony-designed/built Apple PowerBook 100 and Apple-designed/built PowerBooks 140 and 170)
I'm on a slow connection, so I'll give this beta a try sometime this weekend, but I have tried 5.2 current and had some problems trying to do a truly minimal install. (Note: I've been mostly a Debian user).
Are there any tricks to installing just the very basics? I have two needs for two seperate machines, actually. I would like one such install to have just enough to serve as my gateway, dns, and web server (but not mail). I would like another very simple install to run just X and Mozilla-Browser (the browser-only, GTK1 version).
Here's the problem: every time I try to do a custom minimal installation, I still end up with about 170+ MB installed. Yet when I google for suggestions, I keep reading stories about folks managing to get X, Mozilla, and maybe AbiWord all into their tight 100 MB install.
So, what's the trick?! I'm baffled and would like to learn!
You can get the player for free, but it's the "foot in the door". The more interesting things you can do only with the full version, like authoring and so forth, and movie previews at Apple have become the de facto way of viewing trailers online.
It's more than just Quicktime, it's the Quicktime-based pro apps (and G5 hardware) that Apple wants to promote.
Quicktime (which is an extensive media framework which happens to also include a [somewhat crappy] Quicktime media player) is free for users and developers alike. Apple also sells a "Quicktime Pro" package, which is little more than a beefed up Quicktime media player for converting, editing, and exporting several media types. Back in the Mac OS Classic days, there were many third party Quicktime movie players that provided many extra features, but still used Apple's Quicktime framework to do the heavy lifting. I don't know of any (good) players for Windows or Mac OS X, so it seems Apple has been stepping in with their "Quicktime Pro" player for $30.
Getting back to my initial point, Apple is promoting their name and their Quicktime framework to sell products like FinalCutPro, DVD Studio Pro, and Shake. They're also using it to help promote other similar tools, such as the iLife suite (iDVD, iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and Garage Band). But these apps are only available for Apple's hardware and OS, and iLife happens to be included free of charge on new Macs.
So, yes, Apple is hosting their mega awesome huge trailer site for a reason, and they are making some money off their deluxe "pro" Quicktime Player. But it's the big fish they're after, they want to promote their brand and technology to sell G5s and FinalCutPro/Shake/DVD Studio Pro class software.
Oh man does that bring back memories. We had a 44 MB Syquest (winchester) drive. It was slow and loud. Though it interfaced our Macs and PCs via 5 MB/sec SCSI-1, I think the true transfer rate was something like 600 KB/sec.
We used to lust over the Iomega Bernoulli drives, removable like the Syquests, but faster and larger capacity. They even had a 230 MB version back when 160 MB hard drives were the norm. Prices for those Bernoulli drives and cartridges were INSANE though.
Anyone remember the 22 MB Floptical drives? I've seen some Macs with external floptical drives and Silicon Graphics used to offer it as an option for their Indy workstations. Sure seemed like a huge step up from the previously "exotic" 2.88 MB 3.5" floppies that NeXT used in their cubes and slabs.
They used to have pics of their prototype spread out over the bench, with all the chips in view and the keys on the keyboard all hand-labelled.
Are these the photos you were talking about?
http://www.hpcalc.org/qonos.php
Microsoft isn't going to drop out of the VFX world without a fight. They had a huge booth at SIGGRAPH this year, lots of vapor and FUD.0 4/08-09SIGGRAPH2004PR.asp
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2004/aug
They even hired SGI founder and uber hardware/software enigneer Kurt Akeley!
Sorry but "London Bridge" has been moved to the suburbs of Phoenix Arizona.
Mostly true, except that Lake Havasu City is about a half day drive from Phoenix.
http://www.havasuchamber.com/lbridge.htm
The (old) Apple eMate would be a good choice, as many others have pointed out. It's a durable laptop based on a hybrid of the Newton 130 and Newton 2000. It uses the software from the 2000, but the logicboard of the 130... still, it's more than fast enough for the bundled office suite and many other lightweight Newton apps.
Note that some CPU-intensive apps designed for the 2000 may not work well on the eMate, as the Newton 2000 has about 7x the CPU performance.
Bulletproof
I was in a CompUSA store in early 1997 when an Apple rep was demoing the eMate to some CompUSA salespeople. Part of his demo was to fling the eMac down the aisle!! It cartwheeled, tumbled, and finally skidded to a stop about 50 feet away. He picked it up and went back to showing off the various preinstalled applications!