[K-Bat]

I really love my Ti 1Ghz (1G memory), but I've been debating last couple of days whether the new Al 15" 1.5Ghz would make me significantly happier. I use my powerbook for many things (usual stuff plus SPSS and ArcView within Virtual PC), but I use it quite extensively for digital photo editing.

A medium format film scan yields a file as big as 600mb. Opening and editing in Photoshop such a file is really taxing to the powerbook. I should probably use a G5 Powermac, but my work and budget force me into PB. Do you think the new 1.5Ghz model will give me a lot of juice in handling big scanned files? I love the form factor of Ti. I really do. I'd replace it without hesitation if 50% increase in CPU power is gonna be really significant for this type of use. I wouldn't if the change will be rather minor.

Any input is welcome. Thanks.

[rag on a muffin]

im not sure how much better it is. you can check the differences here though.

http://www.barefeats.com/

[K-Bat]

Thanks for the link. I haven't been to that site for a while. It's kind of discouraging to be visually presented the stark speed difference between PBs and Powermacs. It was a good headsup, allowed me to put things in perspective.

[jewing80]

Over the weekend I started having second thoughts... do I really need to upgrade? Right now I have a 1 GHz Ti that I purchased in March of last year. I passed on the original 1.25 Al 15" in September. I actually had a refurbished unit for a couple days in March of this year. Due to the case coming apart I ended up sending it back.

I definitely have a love/hate relationship with the Al design. I really like the solid feel; even my "defective" case felt much more sturdy than my Ti. I also really liked the fact that I didn't need a keyboard cover to prevent the keys from marking the screen. The two downsides in my opinion were port location, and overall appearance of the enclosure. The performance difference between the two was measurable (115 in Xbench as opposed to 100.2 with my Ti) but not largely noticeable in normal Safari/iTunes/iPhoto/Mail. I did like the addition of the second firewire port, it makes using an external HD and an iSight at the same time a lot more easier than using a hub. Gaming performance while playing Spearhead was noticeable, but not night and day.

My decision to upgrade to the 1.5 was largely based on future resale. I know that I will be purchasing a revision B G5 PB whenever it is released. My assumption is we are at least a year off. Right now the cost of upgrading once I've sold my Ti will be roughly $600-$700, and that is worst case. From a financial standpoint the upgrade is justifiable, but the question still remains is the difference in performance going to be worth it?

Since my 1.5 is a BTO (1.5 512 single 5400 rpm 80 gig and 128 VRAM) the option to send it back is out. I can probably get close to what I paid for it on e-bay... the prices people pay for Apple stuff is insane! Ah decisions, decisions... sucks to be impulsive, indecisive and frugal... oh how I long for the old college days when I was dirt poor and decisions like these were so much easier!... no money = no new toys!

[todrain]

I was thinking of upgrading, but decided to wait.

My usual rule of thumb is that the new machine has to be close to twice as fast as the old - ibook 300mhz to ibook 500mhz to Powerbook 1ghz. (I guess I just like the simple math)

The 1.5ghz would be faster, but probably not that much faster with normal use. Built-in bluetooth would be nice, but I have an adaptor for my TI. USB2.0 is good too, but I have mostly firewire devices. i don't really have any games for the Mac, so the 9700 card wouldn't really make a difference.

I figure that the next revision will either see someting like a g4 1.75 or a G5. If a Rev A was to be avoided, I could always get the older G4 at a discount, and probably not lose much on the resale value of my TI.

[MoKoNa^]

oh how I long for the old college days when I was dirt poor and decisions like these were so much easier!... no money = no new toys!

I wish I had that problem... It's no picnic being in your college days and being dirt poor... Drooling over the new 15" myself... bah. Ah well, another year in school, then...

To quote Dr. Zoidberg, "Ha, big city! Who's intimidating who now?!"

Never mind my ramblings... Just jealous.

[anaphora68]

I would wait. You won't see that significant a speed increase. The biggest bottleneck when dealing with photoshop is RAM, not necessarily processor speed.

Wait a couple of months.

[K-Bat]

Thanks people for your opinions. I'm still torn.

The 2gb RAM possibility in Al is really attractive. (Not that I'm ready to spend extra $$$ for this.) But the placement of ports in Al is a thumb down. With all the cables hanging from the sides, Al may look like a crab. Of course the look doesn't have anything to do with the efficiency of work, but we all use Mac at least partly because of the form factor. The other thing is the horror stories I saw in the forum about the white spots and uneven illumination on the screen.

But my Ti is beginning to show signs of use. Keys and some parts of the trackpad became shiny from wear. I'm seeing a few deadpixes which I didn't see when I got this powerbook 17 months ago. The fan is as loud as before. But I can sell my Ti at a good price *if I sell it now*, allowing me to buy the 1.5ghz Al without making huge investment.

I guess I'll go down to a local shop this evening to see if I like the overall feel of the Al. But I doubt they have the 1.5ghz models on display already.

[K-Bat]

Against the recommendation some of you have given me, I went ahead and ordered online a 15" 1.5ghz BTO (Combo drive, 128 Video Memory, 80GM 5400rpm HD, 512mb RAM). I also ordered a 1gb memory unit from a separate place. Four things convinced me:

1. Solid build quality of the AlBook (I finally got to handle the AlBook at a local shop)
2. 100% increase in RAM from the 1gm I have in my Ti (if I decide to add another 1gb unit later)
3. 50% increase in chip speed from my Ti's 1ghz
4. 22% speed increase in HD from the 4200rpm HD in my Ti.

I'm expecting the combined effect of these improvements will be significant when working with huge image files. (If not, I would sell it right away, to prolong my love affair with my Ti ) I doubt the 128VRAM will make any difference, but what the heck, it only costs $45 to doble the vram. I'm just hoping that Apple took care of the infamous white spots and uneven monitor illumination issues for the new Al.

K-Bat

[siflippant]

Originally posted by K-Bat:
Against the recommendation some of you have given me, I went ahead and ordered online a 15" 1.5ghz BTO (Combo drive, 128 Video Memory, 80GM 5400rpm HD, 512mb RAM). I also ordered a 1gb memory unit from a separate place. Four things convinced me:

1. Solid build quality of the AlBook (I finally got to handle the AlBook at a local shop)
2. 100% increase in RAM from the 1gm I have in my Ti (if I decide to add another 1gb unit later)
3. 50% increase in chip speed from my Ti's 1ghz
4. 22% speed increase in HD from the 4200rpm HD in my Ti.

I'm expecting the combined effect of these improvements will be significant when working with huge image files. (If not, I would sell it right away, to prolong my love affair with my Ti ) I doubt the 128VRAM will make any difference, but what the heck, it only costs $45 to doble the vram. I'm just hoping that Apple took care of the infamous white spots and uneven monitor illumination issues for the new Al.

K-Bat

Are you trying to convince us, or convince yourself? Whether your decision is based on techno-lust or just productivity, you will have a good machine that will last you until the rev. b g5 comes out... just enjoy your PB...

easy really...

[Link]

There are all sorts of things to take into consideration. Ironically, from what I've heard the speed improvements are actually trivial.

Then again you're asking for things you really would want in a laptop (sturdiness for example), and the albook might very well take wear and tear better.

[Blizzake]

why not get a cheap hard drive from apple and swap in a 7200 rpm drive from a 3rd party?

[K-Bat]

Are you trying to convince us, or convince yourself? Whether your decision is based on techno-lust or just productivity, you will have a good machine that will last you until the rev. b g5 comes out... just enjoy your PB...

Of course I'm trying to convince myself. It's an expensive purchase, and I also felt that it's too soon to upgrade (I've used my Ti only for 17 months). The TiPB doesn't look obsolete by any means...it still gets the "wow" reactions from people occasionally.

why not get a cheap hard drive from apple and swap in a 7200 rpm drive from a 3rd party?

From what I've heard and read, opening the AlBook's case isn't as straightforward as the Ti. I don't have any Apple Store within driving distance, so I can't ask them to install it for me... Can I ask the tech people at local Apple resellers (e.g., Compusa) to do it for me without voiding the warranty?

[jewing80]

I was looking for the same type of improvements… although clock speed increase and real world performance are not linear I fully expected a noticeable speed boost going from a “stock” 1 GHz Ti to a “loaded” 1.5 Al. The combination of a 50% faster CPU, the faster DDR memory, a hard drive with 4 times the buffer and a 28% gain in rotational speed and of course one of the best mobile graphics processor available should have resulted in definite and obvious increase in system performance. Unfortunately I found the improvements did not match my expectations. Specifically I was most disappointed in GPU performance. On paper the Radeon 9700 128 should be leaps and bounds better than my Radeon 9000 64. Unfortunately neither benchmarks nor actual gaming have yielded dramatic improvements.

In my case purchasing the Al was a compromise between design and performance. I much prefer the look, style and port location of the Ti. After testing I found the performance increase to be academic… thus I will keep my Ti and sell the Al. If I had an older G3 Powerbook or a dual USB iBook I think the upgrade would be substantial and warranted. At least for the time being, my Ti will do just fine.

Obviously these are my personal opinions; hopefully those who plan on upgrading or already have will find joy in their new purchase. My decision to keep my Ti is a testament to the longevity and quality of the Powerbook line… I’m still considering a “companion” to my Ti, I love everything about the 12” except for the screen… oh well, maybe the next round of revisions will change that…

One final note: The Ti still has a definite wow factor. I was at a LAN a couple weeks ago and although I could not participate… bastards were playing CS, my Ti was still the most popular machine there. Initially everyone scoffed at the idea of bringing a Powerbook to game. Everyone stopped laughing when without any configuration I plugged into the 25 port Cisco switch we were using… (yeah, I know 25 port switch for 7 computers is a bit of an overkill) and was instantly on the network browsing though everyone else’s systems. In a bit of irony the network engineer who brought the switch had the most difficulty getting on the network… eventually he gave up and used one of the other computers…