buying iBook now?

[sumomo]

hey everyone,

i'm thinking of buying a 12" iBook for school/university use. do you think the promotion of purchasing the iBook and iPod together, with $250 (CDN) rebate, a good deal now? or should I wait until they update the ibook, if they do in the future 3-6 months?

plz give me some advice
thanks in advance ~

 

[m1k]

I'd suggest a PowerBook, but if you're hooked on the iBook, very well...

The iBook is a pretty good deal now. The last time Apple updated the iBook line was at the beginning of the summer, so expect it updated again either sometime very near to Christmas, or probably in early 2005. The iPod was just updated a few months ago (I think one month, actually), so it's a very good deal.

Overall, it would be a good time to act on Apple's promotion. The iBook is quite fast, and the iPod is as good as ever. If you wait until the iBook gets updated, the iPod will probably be getting old, and then you'll have to wait until that gets updated, and then when that gets updated, the iBook won't be newly updated... etc, etc, etc.

It's a good idea to buy now, both the iBook and iPod are very solid Apple products.



PS: The PowerBook is much better than the iBook, if you can spare the $$$ GET IT over the iBook. My 12" PowerBook is about 2-3x more powerful than our 2GHz Pentium 4 main PC. GET THE POWERBOOK IF AT ALL POSSIBLE, EVEN IF YOU DON'T NEED THE EXTRA POWER IT'S MUCH BETTER THAN THE iBOOK!!!!

*hinthint*


However, if you're really stuck on the iBook, by all means act on the promo.

Good luck!

 

[sumomo]

firstly, thanks for replying. your advice is great help to me.

i've been looking into the powerbook specs after seeing your response.
with the powerbook, i really don't need to upgrade as much... maybe the RAM?
however i'm still a student, so $$$ is an issue. it comes down to a $100-$200 difference... i could still deal with that, if it's worth it

one of my concerns would be, which one, ibook or powerbook, is more "durable" physically? since i'll be carrying it everywhere... (and i'm also a very clumsy person )

p.s. i really like the white finish on the iBook. hehehe

 

[Clamshell62489]

i believe an ibook is good enough for you. the ibook is more durable and the ibook's 5-6 hour battery life totaly beats the powerbooks around 3 hour .

 

[cde_woods]

It really comes down to screen space. The iBook can get you a lot of screen real-estate (14") for a hundred dollars less than the smallest PowerBook (12"). Since your budget is tight, you've got to decide which one is more important:

Power, or screen size?

Depending on what you're studying, you may not need the extra power. For example, video manipulation and audio editing may require a powerful graphics card, while regular study cources like anatomy and physiology or russian culture would work a lot better with that extra 2" screen space. Consider it.

 

[m1k]

i've been looking into the powerbook specs after seeing your response.
with the powerbook, i really don't need to upgrade as much... maybe the RAM?
however i'm still a student, so $$$ is an issue. it comes down to a $100-$200 difference... i could still deal with that, if it's worth it

one of my concerns would be, which one, ibook or powerbook, is more "durable" physically? since i'll be carrying it everywhere... (and i'm also a very clumsy person )

p.s. i really like the white finish on the iBook. hehehe

Well, I'm still a student, but I wanted a laptop that would last me, so I got the PowerBook. It's a LOT more durable than the iBook. The iBook will be all scratched and shtuff in a few months if you use it daily, whereas the PowerBook's aluminum finish doesn't get scratched AT ALL. I've had my PowerBook for about 4-5 months, and it has one small scratch where I banged it badly on a sharp edge. But seriously, the iBook looks much more banged up than the PowerBook after using it for a few months.

The PowerBook also is much more durable in general. It doesn't have your typical 'laptop creak' when you move it or shut the screen. It just feels more solid. Plus, the aluminum keyboard is an absolute dream to type on. I prefer it over the iBook's keyboard

If at all possible, I'd go for the PowerBook. You do get a lot more bang for your buck, and you also get a machine that'll last you a lot longer than the iBook. iBooks are good little machines, I just prefer PowerBooks.

PS: The white finish on the iBook is nothing aesthetically compared to the aluminum finish of the PowerBook. Compare them in person and you'll see just what I mean . Also, the white finish is a lot harder to keep clean because it scratches and shtuff like that.

i believe an ibook is good enough for you. the ibook is more durable and the ibook's 5-6 hour battery life totaly beats the powerbooks around 3 hour .

Actually, the PowerBook is a lot more durable than the iBook by far. My PowerBook gets 4:45-5hours exactly, even with AirPort on, whereas my mom's iBook gets 4-4:30hours with AirPort on. So even though iBooks are supposed to have longer batteries, I've found that PowerBooks actually have the longer batteries. But it may just be that my PowerBook's battery really good and my mom's iBook battery is not that great.

Seriously though, there isn't that much difference in the battery life.

 

[Aptmunich]

"So even though iBooks are supposed to have longer batteries, I've found that PowerBooks actually have the longer batteries."

If that were true for everyone, you can bet that apple would be telling us about it...

Maybe your mum's battery is a bit older or she just isn't using it as efficiently.

Generally speaking though, the iBooks currently get around 1h more battery life.

 

[Clamshell62489]

the ibooks get light scratches on the plastic when the powerbooks get deep scratches into the aluminum. and hows ur lap? still burnt? lol, im just joking with you. but in his/her case i would go for the ibook

 

[sumomo]

"So even though iBooks are supposed to have longer batteries, I've found that PowerBooks actually have the longer batteries."

If that were true for everyone, you can bet that apple would be telling us about it...

Maybe your mum's battery is a bit older or she just isn't using it as efficiently.

Generally speaking though, the iBooks currently get around 1h more battery life.

...hey so i see you have a 12" ibook, the one that i'm considering to get...
so what do you think about it? any comments?

i need a something for daily web browsing, emails/msging, working on
assignments (i study comp sci & economics), listening to music, store pictures, occasionally video watching, and minimal gaming (since i'll play games on my pc). easy to carry though, weight is a factor.
i'm just someone who had enough of microsoft windows and wanted to switch.

does anyone know if they are likely to update the model before/after christmas?

 

[cde_woods]

I can tell you about gaming on the 14" iBook. Gaming on iBooks is hurt tremendously by the videocard. I got the 32 mb ATI Radeon, which was an upgrade from the default and cost extra money. It plays games like Unreal Tournament 2004 (with the settings all the way up if you're playing the deathmatch mode, but the vehicle levels will require you to tone it down), Command & Conquer Generals (no way around it, I play this game with settings as far down as I can take them), Max Payne (pump the settings all the way up on this one, plays fine). I also play a few smaller, open source games like Super Tux and Frozen Bubble. I got hooked on them in my Linux days, I can't let them go. Games like those will run fine regardless of the videocard you get, I'm sure.

The more video memory your card has the better the games it'll be able to play. I don't know of many games that require more than 1 ghz processing power, so that's not really the factor. It's all in the videocard.

The powerbooks and powermacs are nice, you can get them set up with a 128 mb or 256 mb video card and game with the graphics up all day. Needless to say, it's expensive as ****. I'm considering getting a higher-end machine from Apple for my next computer so I can game a little more, but it's not really that important to me, so I'm rather hesitant.

If you've already got a PC for gaming and can stand having low graphics settings when using your notebook on the go, i'd say go for it. Be aware that you'll have to buy new games for your Mac, the Windows CDs don't have mac installers on them.

 

[Aptmunich]

Well I'm very pleased with my little iBook.

I also just switched from the pc world, and haven't looked back since...

The size and weight of the iBook are ideal for lugging it around on campus and I rarely leave it home anymore as it's just so great to be able to access all my stuff wherever I am.

The battery life is also great, it seldom happens that I run the battery down and I generally get around 4-5 hours of battery life. (although I haven't really measured it carefully...)

For the needs you mentioned the iBook is definetly good enough, anything faster would be overkill IMO.

Get the 60GB harddrive though as you'll be amazed how quickly 40GB fill up!
Especially when you start managing ALL your data on your 'book. (i.e. movies, music and all your pics...)

I'd maybe wait until christmas if you don't need the notebook straight away as you'll then be able to get the latest and greatest release, which can't be far off.

check out the macrumours.com buyer's guide for more info on apple's product update cycles. They currently recommend 'don't buy - updates soon!' for the iBook...

 

[sumomo]

thanks~!
yah i think i'm going get it over x'mas... hopefully they will update the model by then!