Women in Technology

Article:		A Developer's Perspective on Apple's 12-inch PowerBook
Subject:		If I had it to do over...
Date:		2003-03-29 13:01:47
From:		anonymous2
If I had it to do over, I'd definitely buy the 15", 1GHZ. I've been using mine heavily for three weeks straight, and the performance leaves much to be desired. I maxed it out to the 640MB and am relieved to hear there's a chance it can support more. Hearing all of the things it's missing makes me want a 15 even more. To the person running Visual C++ in a Virtual PC, I can barely stand running a web browser. I'm pretty demanding when it comes to performance. At one point, I was running BEA WebLogic, Oracle, and a Virtual PC. And, I was building an app. Luckily, I code in vim. On the bright side, It is cooler looking than the 15. It goes to sleep and wakes up in no time at all. It can sleep for a damned long time (easily overnight). The airport extreme and built-in bluetooth are damned cool. It doesn't wear on my shouler after standing in the airport for 4 hours like my old hunk of plastic used to. I can't emphasize how much I love that about it. I plug it up to a 19" display and keyboard and mouse at work every day. I run it with the lid closed--haven't had great experiences with running the side by side displays. I guess I should play with it more. I need to figure out how to make the monitor the primary display. I just put it to sleep, plug everything up, hit a key, and it comes up after a few seconds. -Bob

Showing messages 1 through 2 of 2.

• If I had it to do over...
  2003-03-31 11:08:06  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  I just thought I'd post t reply to Bob's note;" If I had to do it Over".
  I had plans to purchase a 800mhz i-book. I was at a local Compusa store and spent 2 hours comparing the i-books againt the 12" powerbook. When I found out they still had the 1ghz Titanuim 15" model avail at 2700, I opted for this for the following reasons.
  I could not see myself with a 12" for internet use, this would force me into the extensive use of scroll bars. The 15" had had much better responsiveness with the level-3 cache and 1ghz processor. I also thought about Airport Extreme and Firewire 800 not on the Titanium. To me, this is a non-issue since I wouldn't notice the diference in speed using the Titanuim wireless in my home fpr internet use. The only time I would see the benefits would be file transfers between my desktop G4 and Laptop. I'm sure in the near future, Orange Micro or other vendors will offer a USB 2.0/Firewire 800 combo pcmcia card which will fulfill me needs if I should decide this is an option I could not live without.
  My last consideration was waiting for the 17" PB which I consider a direct desktop replacement. As for my own needs, the 15" is the perfect portable screen size for portability. I am happy, I purchased the Titanium over the 17" for this reason alone. The 2x superdrive I could live without since most of the time spent between I movie to I-dvd is CPU intensive, with a burn time of 20 mins for a full 90 min DVD. The extra 10 mins saved with 1x v.s 2.x i could live with.
  I've got to admit, I did love the keyboard on the 12" powerbook. My only wish is that Apple would build a 15" Titanium with the new 12" type of keyboard, USB 2.0, Firewire 800, 2x superdrive, and a dual processor PB would be awesome.
  Ed
• If I had it to do over...
  2003-03-31 15:09:11  anonymous2 [View]
  
  
  Agreed. I think in a few months I'll buy a 15 or 17 and give this one to my mom. The lack of responsiveness is *really* driving me nuts.
  
  I'd try and take it back and exchange for a 15 now, but I'm sure there's a 30 day exchange policy (if that long). My 30 days will be up in a week and I'm stuck in Chicago for two weeks (my box and stuff is at home). Oh well. :(
  
  I'd ship it to a family member, but then I'd be without a computer. I don't think my client would appreciate that. ;)
  
  -Bob