[gun_street_boy]

I'd like to preface this by saying that I am not a professional in the strictest sense of the word.(I don't really make any money at this is what I mean)I'm not working for a company, so time isn't money or anything. Most of my work involves blending different media (real paint, photos and scans with some computer stuff) and no video at all. I've been using a Celeron PC with windows ME and 512mb ram running photoshop 6 and a little bit of Illustrator 10. They've always run OK (not great, a little slow, occasional crashes and lost some work once, but mostly OK) but I'm in the market for a new computer now and I've been looking at the MACs. Here are the things I want to do with my computer:

Photoshop for some photo editing
Quite a bit of Corel Painter 8
Large files for output to a plotter
Some Illustrator
Word processing
A little bit of web page creation
Plus, I'm in school for environmental science and will probably eventually use it for GIS work (I know arcview hasn't been putting things out for mac lately, but maybe one day.)

NO video
No music editing
NO DVD creation
I don't really play computer games that much

So, I was looking at the PB12" and I LOVE the portability of it and it seems to be pretty good as far as ram and HD go. The problem is, there are no stores that sell apple around here, and I don't really know anyone with a mac. I DON'T KNOW CRAP ABOUT HARDWARE!

I figure if I go with the 12, it would be the full 1.XXX gigs of RAM and the 80gb hard drive.

I hear the screen for the PB12 isn't so hot, but I would be getting a bigger display for any of my art stuff so that doesn't concern me too much.

What about the graphics card? The 12"s Nvidia is half the power of the 15"'s ATI. Is this even important for the kind of stuff I want to do?

What about that Altivec stuff? Apparently the 12" doesn't have any. Can anyone help?

Is a 1ghz G4 12", 1.xxGB RAM 80gig HD strong with an external display strong enough for what I want to do? Or do I have to get the bigger 15?

Can I actually call apple and ask them about this kind of stuff or will they send a customer support person over here to punch me in the face for being such an idiot?

Any help would really be appreciated here. Thanks.

[art_director]

given what you described your needs as being the 12" powerbook will foot the bill. i guarantee it.

as for your pc software, well, you can get virtual pc and run any of that software on your mac.

good luck.

[bluedog]

For what you want, it should be good enough. VPC really blows on this hardware (perhaps with your upped memory it will do better).

The PowerBook has a G4, and DOES have altivec.

A collegue bought one and was used to a desktop machine. The limitation I see for these machines is the lack of L3 cache for the VPC which strongly recommends a machine with such for optimum performance.

For your GIS stuff, try looking at this software:
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/9341

and its updater:
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/16608


As for the video, the performance is actually quite good. The card warms up the case when the fan turns on (due to higher heat) an d is on the left side of the mousepad area. Otherwise it appears to fit the bill for my colleague and got me motivated to get one for myself (likely around the end of the year).

Good luck and enjoy the new machine! I've been eyeing the 12" Powerbook but may just get the ibook because it isn't intended to replace my main desktop machine which has the dvd burner and such. Just a warning on the VPC use with these laptops, in which case the RAM may help out some.

[buchrob]

At the risk of ticking off some people...

I have been a mac user for over 20 years and a Wintel conscript intermittently.

You already have the Wintel software for what you want to do. Your software upgrade cost will be ZERO if you stick to that platform.

Some of the stuff you want to do is NOT available on the mac at ay price. If you mention the words Corel and mac in the same sentence, you will send everyone at the service bureau screaming for the exits. Bye bye large format poster output from someone reliable.

Panther and Virtual PC 6 don't get along. Any version of Virtual PC that works (seems limited to G3 laptops currently) is ok for use several times a month to open and convert simple documents because no one want to look like a fool by not being able to open XPfiles, but precious little else requiring any horsepower.

IF you insist on keeping your current software suite on a laptop, buy a Centrino or Pentium IV machine (not the Celeron) with about 512 mb of RAM and you will be happy for a few years. The Acer 290 series is inexpensive, performs well and offers a DVD burner, 802.11b, Firewire & USB 2.0 at very low cost. Screen viewing from extreme angles is also very good, which is a very weak point on Apple's current crop of 12" Powerbooks.( I found the visuals to be better on the new 14" iBook).

At some point, when you want to take the professional or semi-pro plunge, then consider the mac and updated software, because your productivity will be much better.