[moonmonkey]

They should do a super light weight PowerBook, like the new Sony.

Its stunning, but Apple could do a better job.

[yoyoman]

Hear is what I want from a g5 powerbook.
faster cpu duel core possibly.
better graphics card radion 9000 at 8x or pci express or what ever its called graphics
7k 80 gig drive or a 10k at 60 gigs serial ata if u can.
better ram
just as thin if not thinner and a way longer battery life like 6 hours to 8.
optical drive bluetooth
802.11n
gig ethernet
fw400 and 800 usb 2.0
no phoneline
optical out
dvi out
audio in better than waht we have now.
and a better screen.
tiger

[wunderkind]

Originally posted by moonmonkey:
They should do a super light weight PowerBook, like the new Sony.

Its stunning, but Apple could do a better job.

No optical drive, shared video RAM, 20GB HD, 2.5-4.0 hr battery life - and $3000.

And 10.4" LCDs are of little everyday use, except when using a projector for presentation.

[jonzilla]

Originally posted by wunderkind:
No optical drive, shared video RAM, 20GB HD, 2.5-4.0 hr battery life - and $3000.

And 10.4" LCDs are of little everyday use, except when using a projector for presentation.

I concur with wunderkind, I once had(company issued) a Fujitsu 10.4", while it is nice and small and expensive too (may I add), once you factor in all the optional assessories (say CD-RW, floppy (yes those days) it is a hassle to take it overseas and for everyday day to day use, having to plug in all these assessories is a wee pain. But then again, as wunderkind suggested, it is great for presentation and light too and great for travelling overseas but then again, I still prefer my PB


Jonzilla

[wilsonng]

I'm sure Apple's R&D team will come up with something that will blow us out of the waters. I'm pretty sure they have tons of mock-ups and demo units floating in their R&D labs that would've been drool-worthy...

I remembered the time I first saw the 867 Mhz 12" PB and I said "that's the one I'm gonna get..."

In any case, I was hoping to squeeze in something a little more than 1024 x 768 into a 12" screen. Maybe make it 12.5" to make it widescreen? Who knows? I was thinking of a little wider screen but then again, I ain't no inventor... I'll leave that to the folks that know what they're doing (and even then they stumble onto many inventions by mistake).

And if only they could pump up the speakers on the 12"..... Always gotta carry headphones for anything serious.

Originally posted by sniffer:
While I like the idea, I kind of find it difficult to imagine a smaller wrist area, unless a smaller screen or a wider PB is on your mind.

[Lancer409]

Originally posted by diehlr:
This guy's quick.

[Lancer409]

Originally posted by Luca Rescigno:
No, see, what you do is put the PowerBook INSIDE the stove. In the bottom. Then you set it to run SETI and just cook your brats or burgers or whatever using the heat from the PowerBook.

SEE? IT'S FUNNY!!!!

be sure to protect it from the juices from the brats/burgers ... then again .. it may evaporate before it hits the g5 book ..

[Lancer409]

Originally posted by laseca:
Screw the stove, THIS is what I call a G5 Powerbook!

more phonebook than notebook ...

[Lancer409]

Originally posted by TailsToo:
Are those Three SuperDrives at the bottom????? SWEET!!!!!

haha always the optimist

[Cadaver]

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Hear is what I want from a g5 powerbook.
faster cpu duel core possibly.
better graphics card radion 9000 at 8x or pci express or what ever its called graphics
7k 80 gig drive or a 10k at 60 gigs serial ata if u can.
better ram
just as thin if not thinner and a way longer battery life like 6 hours to 8.
optical drive bluetooth
802.11n
gig ethernet
fw400 and 800 usb 2.0
no phoneline
optical out
dvi out
audio in better than waht we have now.
and a better screen.
tiger

[tonywong]

Originally posted by gioele:
Strictly speaking G5 are not PowerPC but POWER4 chips.
Luckly POWER4 and POWER5 chips are compatible with PPC chips.

Actually, the G5 (PowerPC 970/970fx) are PowerPC ISA (instruction set architecture) chips. The 970 family is derived from the POWER4, which are POWER ISA chips.

The main difference between PowerPC and POWER is that there are legacy instructions in POWER that PowerPC does not support, and a couple of instructions in PowerPC that POWER emulates non-natively. Additionally, PowerPC has 'Book E' expansions to the ISA, ie. Altivec (Velocity Engine), and code compression (PPC 4xx) that POWER does not support.

Frankly, anyone thinking that the G4 is as powerful a chip as the G5 isn't looking at the chips themselves. All this talk of benchmarks doesn't identify the bottlenecks in the benchmarks themselves.

Anyhow to get back on topic, most likely the G4 will get a speed bump and support for dual-dvi for 30" support on the 17" Powerbook, and that's it.

I don't think Motorola/Freescale can produce 1.8 GHz chips in a reasonable quantity/timeframe. In order for Apple to use such a fast clock on a laptop would almost ensure 90 nm design rules (for power draw considerations), which Motorola currently is not on in any significant volume.

This also means that the dual-core G4 that Freescale has been bandying about is most likely not going to ship any time soon as well. That's too bad because it would close the performance gap between the current G4 and IBM's 970 series.

The Freescale design may have been their last hope for Apple to pick up, as I don't think Apple will look back once their line-up has moved to IBM's 970's.

[MilkmanDan]

Wait, are we STILL on this subject? I write this from my oh so out of date and underperforming 1.33 ghz 12in Powerbook, and lord knows I had a horrible time playing the new Spider-man 2 game on it for several hours this afternoon. I mean, it was so horrible, I just had to keep playing.

[arekkusu]

Originally posted by tonywong:
most likely the G4 will get a speed bump and support for dual-dvi for 30" support on the 17" Powerbook, and that's it.

So, you see dual link DVI as being limited to the 17", then? I hope not, because I'd really enjoy having the 30" display. But there's no way I'd buy a 17" PowerBook-- it's too big for my lap! 15" is perfect size.

[Luca Rescigno]

Originally posted by MilkmanDan:
Wait, are we STILL on this subject? I write this from my oh so out of date and underperforming 1.33 ghz 12in Powerbook, and lord knows I had a horrible time playing the new Spider-man 2 game on it for several hours this afternoon. I mean, it was so horrible, I just had to keep playing.

It's not for gaming. I don't care about that anymore. Maybe two weeks ago I would have said that yes, the PowerBook 12" needs a better video card for gaming. Not anymore. Macs aren't made for games anyway. And if they do run "fine" (if by fine you mean 25 fps... whatever), then more power to you. I think the concern here is that the 12" PowerBook's graphics card will not be completely up to the task of fully accelerating all of Tiger's new graphical features. And if the PowerBook struggles at that, the iBook will struggle even more. And that would be bad... all of Apple's systems should at least do a good job on the current OS.

[Lancer409]

Originally posted by Luca Rescigno:


It's not for gaming. I don't care about that anymore. Maybe two weeks ago I would have said that yes, the PowerBook 12" needs a better video card for gaming. Not anymore. Macs aren't made for games anyway. And if they do run "fine" (if by fine you mean 25 fps... whatever), then more power to you. I think the concern here is that the 12" PowerBook's graphics card will not be completely up to the task of fully accelerating all of Tiger's new graphical features. And if the PowerBook struggles at that, the iBook will struggle even more. And that would be bad... all of Apple's systems should at least do a good job on the current OS.

i expect my rev c to handle all of the gui goodies tiger can throw at it. what do you guys mean about not handling the new graphical features in tiger. as in coreimage and corevideo and stuff? or just gui eye candy?

[tonywong]

Originally posted by arekkusu:
So, you see dual link DVI as being limited to the 17", then? I hope not, because I'd really enjoy having the 30" display. But there's no way I'd buy a 17" PowerBook-- it's too big for my lap! 15" is perfect size.

I would say it's a 50/50 shot that the dual-dvi makes it into the 15". I don't think it'll hit the 12" model though.

[mytdave]

Would love to see new PowerBooks, but without new CPUs and GPUs, there's nothing to do. The PowerBooks are about spec'd out as it is. The upper models are already at Radeon 9700. The only place to go is to a Radeon 9800. There aren't any faster G4s (yet). 80GB laptop drives are about it. 100GB drives are starting to show up, but you try and find one... The most I think we can expect is one last speed bump sometime early next year - truly maxing out the available technology.

I hope to see 15 & 17" PBs w/ 1.8GHz G4, Radeon 9800 128MB, 100GB 5400rpm HD, faster DVD, and a bigger battery. I think that's about the best we can hope for currently.

G4 vs G5:

The G5 is SIGNIFICANTLY different than the G4, and seriously kicks it's butt at any clock speed.

1. The G5 is a 64bit chip, the G4 is 32 bit.
2. The G5 utilizes massive parallelism. It can execute 8 instructions per clock, vs 4 for the G4.
3. It has bigger/faster memory addressing (double the G4).
4. It has a FSB of up to 1.25GHz vs <200MHz for the G4.

There are many other architectual differences between the two that make a huge difference. The G5 is at least 2-4 times faster than the G4 in any system.

Now, having said that, you may never notice when surfing the web, or running a word processor, simply because those tasks barely even tax a G4 chip. But if you start running several apps simultaneously, or some very demanding high-bandwidth apps, you will find a night-and-day difference between G4 and G5 systems.

D

[nooon]

They just started the cram & jam offer here in Norway, and it doesn't expire until the 2nd November. I seriously doubt that Apple will release an updated PB in this period..

So I'm not sure what to do.. I WANT to buy today, but I don't want to miss out on a new Rev either..

[ggirton]

Originally posted by nooon:
....
So I'm not sure what to do.. I WANT to buy today, but I don't want to miss out on a new Rev either..

This is an excellent chance to become trailing edge!

The difference between a powerbook purchased today and one tomorrow? Miniscule compared to the powerbook of 2 or 3 years from now.

In your case, I would definitely go for cram and jam. an ipod and a powerbook in the Norwegian Winter (did I capitalize that right?) What's not right? It sounds perfect to me.

My only rule: buy a new computer when the next one is 3 times as fast as the current one. By tihs logic, if you act immediately, you can hasten the purchase of your faster G5 laptop 2.75 years down the line.

(at that point, The iPod will still be spinnin' tunes.)

cheers!

[opsotta]

What I'd really like to see is a PowerBook with LED-Backlight!
Right now most of the LCDs use a fluorescent bulb. That thing
quickly gets darker during its life span. Plus it has a bad light
quality (colour). And last but not least it needs a bit more power.
The biggest advantage of a LED powered LCD though would be
the extreme brilliance of the displayed colours compared to a
conventional one.
SONY already has the first LCD TV sets with this technology.

[Simon]

Now that Freescale/Moto officially announced the 7448 can we guess when we'll see it in the PowerBook?

[iPoder]

Originally posted by mytdave:
Would love to see new PowerBooks, but without new CPUs and GPUs, there's nothing to do. The PowerBooks are about spec'd out as it is. The upper models are already at Radeon 9700. The only place to go is to a Radeon 9800. There aren't any faster G4s (yet). 80GB laptop drives are about it. 100GB drives are starting to show up, but you try and find one... The most I think we can expect is one last speed bump sometime early next year - truly maxing out the available technology.

I concur. Current PowerBook offerings can hold its own ground for a few more months before Apple figures out how to jam G5 chip into a thin 1" frame.

The only thing I see is that Apple decides to put Freescale's new Dual core chip into the 17 incher.

So dilemma is whether I like to see Dual Core G4 chip or G5 chip in PB? With all the benchmarks comparing single G5 chip with dual G4 chips out there, I am leaning toward to freescale chip.

If neither one is happening in the next few months, we are likely to see a price cut with current models only.

[shabbasuraj]

Screw Moto...

I want IBM G5 in PBs...

Yes LED tech would be great for LCDs...

However, I would rather have Lumileds Luxeon 5 watt emitter in an LCD... (imagine the contrast?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

[Simon]

Originally posted by shabbasuraj:
Screw Moto...

I want IBM G5 in PBs...

I tend to agree with you.

However, IBM is nowhere near to having a 970fx successor hat consumes only 10W at 1.4GHz.

[vinster]

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Hear is what I want from a g5 powerbook.
<snip>
no phoneline
<snip>

I disagree. I've used the modem to fax in a situation where I needed to do so urgently and for Internet access while waiting for broadband to be installed after I moved.

[shabbasuraj]

Agreed...in some places on this planet dial-up is the only option.

[meatyocre]

Regardless of what happens, there is a change nearing the PowerBook line. There are many people holding off a PB purchase until either: a slight speed bump, a Freescale chip, or price slash finally materialize. Taking Apple's business history into account, it is right around the corner. Personally & realistically I am hoping for a Freescale model with: faster processor & bus, GPU bump, faster HD (5400rpm), improved screens, better power consumption/ improved battery... Before December would be ideal, still waiting�

[hldan]

Originally posted by moonmonkey:
They should do a super light weight PowerBook, like the new Sony.

Its stunning, but Apple could do a better job.

I'm sorry Sony, but there's no way in hell that this machine is worth a friggin $3000.00. No features and it can only hold 512MB ram. For the buyer of this machine the bragging rights will only last a short time because this machine doesn't even look high tech, it just looks like a plain small notebook. I have seen it in person and it doesn't look like much. Someone will gawk at it asking you what does it do? And the response is, "well it surfs the web".

Sony is actually betting against themselves trying to pawn off this machine for $3000.00 when they sell the PCG-TR3AP3 that has 10.6" screen 1GB Ram and DVD-R optical drive built in and it's small enough for any traveler.

Sony is a big time extortionist company trying to sell anything at any price just because of their name.
Funny how some people here feel that Apple cuts corners and tries to sell at a premium price.

[nooon]

Originally posted by meatyocre:
Personally & realistically I am hoping for a Freescale model with: faster processor & bus, GPU bump, faster HD (5400rpm), improved screens, better power consumption/ improved battery... Before December would be ideal, still waiting�

Well don't hold your breath.

Quote The Register:

"Indeed, the 7448 is likely to provide Apple with its next notebook speed bump, as the company struggles to fit the hot-running PowerPC 970FX - aka the G5 - into a laptop.

However, it will have to wait: the 7448 is not expected to sample until H1 2005, Freescale said."

[SierraDragon]

Sold my TiBook, stuck on the desktop box at work (dual 1GB G4) waiting for the next PB rev. No matter what I buy this Fall, I expect to replace it with a G5 PB when they are available because G5s are far superior for heavy Photoshop use. I run lots of apps, but PS defines my power needs.

My expectation is that the graphics overhead from Tiger is very substantial, and that graphics processing and RAM architectural improvements will be what the upper end of this next PB speed bump will mostly be about. Also faster hard drives, which matters a lot to overall Photoshop performance. Dual hard drives in the 17 inch would be way cool: using a second physical drive for the scratch disk usually improves throughput a lot on apps like Photoshop that use a scratch disk.

[Edit: Yes, I know a second drive would suck the battery but that is no issue when plugged in, and could selectively be energy managed to access only one drive when on battery power.]

[Fiete5401]

Originally posted by nooon:
They just started the cram & jam offer here in Norway, and it doesn't expire until the 2nd November. I seriously doubt that Apple will release an updated PB in this period..

So I'm not sure what to do.. I WANT to buy today, but I don't want to miss out on a new Rev either..

I'm in the same situation.
What will you do?
I'll wait until Nov. 1 and see if there are new PBs or not. If not I'll throw a coin to decide what to do.
JESUS! Erhm... STEVE! Give us new PBs NOW and we can get a new PowerBook AND an iPod!

BTW I would buy a 15"-PB.

[shabbasuraj]

Next G4 PB revision (I am still somewhat doubtful there will be one) will introduce the illuminated keyboard across the entire line.

I have a bad/good feeling that the current PB's will be around for a long time.

Perhaps not...

[David Hagan]

November 2nd is a Tuesday

[theolein]

I read this thread and I have to shake my head. I'd been using a Ti667MHz with 1GB RAM for over a year until last wednesday. I didn't really have the cash for anything else before that and had been using my old Lombard G3 333MHz from 2000 to 2002. Even then the TiPB was a used machine that I got on the cheap. It was kind of slow but it worked reliably and did every task I needed it to until I recently had the oportunity to trade it in and get a new 1.3GHz 15"AlBook. This new machine is wonderful to me. I've never used a G5 and will probably be using this machine for at least a year before trading it in again.

To me the machine must simply be reliable and be able to do the work I need to do. The fact that Macs tend to be very reliable and the fact that OSX is a dream of an OS is the reason I use macs.

I owned a Dell 8200 Inspiron 1.8GHz P4 until June of last year and it was lightning fast. But, being a Dell meant that the quality was truly abominable since the cheap plastic casing parts didn't even line up seamlessly and the keyboard felt like it was permanently about to break. It certainly had good specs for the day, as it had a 64MB GeForce 440Go, which was about top of the line at the time (mid 2002). This is one area where Dell shines. They are usually the one PC company that makes laptops that are both cheap and have the very best in terms of GPUs. Almost all other brand PC laptops offer fairly useless GPUs or plain shared memory Intel graphics. But the problem of quality, due mainly to the hefty price war in PCs remains. About the only brand name PC maker that is equal to or better than Apple in terms of quality is IBM with their Thinkpads, which are built like rocks. But IBM's Thinkpads are no way cheaper than PowerBooks.

Sony's ultra thin Vaio is a business executive laptop. It's meant for people who have enough cash to pay for special edition stuff like that and who basically only need to browse, mail, message, type documents and view a spreadsheet or two.

And then, after all that, you have to contend with WinXP and Microsoft's trickery and abuse. WinXP is generally ok, but it's really nowhere near OSX in terms of security and above all, simplicity.

I'll stick to OSX and these wonderful Powerbooks with their long lifetimes and excellent mix of features.

The only thing I would really dearly love to see from Apple would be a tablet. I know that Apple is not really going to want to compete with Microsoft and their moronic TabletPCs, but the device I would like to see, let's call it iSlate, would be extremely simple, light, and generally behave like an electronic version of a piece of slate. Simply a lightweight piece of white plastic a la iPod and iBook with a small LCD, say around 8" or 10", just one or two buttons with Apple's usual simple easy operation, a stylus, and a special stripped down version of OSX that plainly and simply allows one to draw, take notes and easily and with one click transfer all that over wireless or firewire to a Mac. Artists would love a device like that.

[nooon]

Originally posted by Fiete5401:
I'm in the same situation.
What will you do?
I'll wait until Nov. 1 and see if there are new PBs or not. If not I'll throw a coin to decide what to do.
JESUS! Erhm... STEVE! Give us new PBs NOW and we can get a new PowerBook AND an iPod!

BTW I would buy a 15"-PB.

I just went ahead and ordered one. I need a laptop for my masters-assignment NOW, and can't wait until Nov 2.

I'm sure I won't be disapointed by it. (15" 1,5Ghz 1GB)

[Fiete5401]

Originally posted by nooon:
I just went ahead and ordered one. I need a laptop for my masters-assignment NOW, and can't wait until Nov 2.

I'm sure I won't be disapointed by it. (15" 1,5Ghz 1GB)

Yepp, great machine. I decided to shoot the iPod in the wind and to get one of the new ones.