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yoyoman · Jun 29, 2003, 06:28 PM

a 1.3GHz Centrino laptop (12" screen) vs the 17 inch. It ran CineBench 2003 100% faster than the PowerBoo G4/1GHz (17" screen). It ran Photoshop 20% faster. It ran quake3 103% faster in 640x480 "Fastest" mode. The 17" PowerBook did, owever, run Quake3 84% faster in 024x768 "Max" mode. Probably has more video emory. Now why can't we have a 12" powerBook that runs as fast as a Centrino? Hummm?

The Placid Casual · Jun 29, 2003, 06:43 PM

Oh man, do we have to go over this again? It seems like there have been loads of threads on this recently... Do we really need another?

There is one big difference that really says it all for me.... the Centrino doesn't run OS X.

Peace,

Marc

yoyoman · Jun 29, 2003, 06:49 PM

Originally posted by The Placid Casual:
Oh man, do we have to go over this again? It seems like there have been loads of threads on this recently... Do we really need another?

There is one big difference that really says it all for me.... the Centrino doesn't run OS X.

Peace,

Marc

Still even if it doesn't run osx speed wise it is still faster. Even if osx is nicer than xp u can always run linux or something.

todrain · Jun 29, 2003, 06:58 PM

Now why can't we have a 12" powerBook that runs as fast as a Centrino? Hummm? [/B]

Ummm... are you new here????

If Apple could make a faster PowerBook, of course they would. Right now, we're stuck with the G4s until IBM can make a low-powered and cooler-running G5.

The Placid Casual · Jun 29, 2003, 07:04 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Even if osx is nicer than xp u can always run linux or something.

Why would I want to do that? This is a Mac board after all...

Peace,

Marc

slow moe · Jun 29, 2003, 07:22 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Still even if it doesn't run osx speed wise it is still faster. Even if osx is nicer than xp u can always run linux or something.

Yeah, woohoo! Just what I want to do, go back to using linux with some cheezy KDE Aqua rip-off theme.

Alpha-sphere · Jun 29, 2003, 08:11 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
a 1.3GHz Centrino laptop (12" screen) vs the 17 inch. It ran CineBench 2003 100% faster than the PowerBoo G4/1GHz (17" screen). It ran Photoshop 20% faster. It ran quake3 103% faster in 640x480 "Fastest" mode. The 17" PowerBook did, owever, run Quake3 84% faster in 024x768 "Max" mode. Probably has more video emory. Now why can't we have a 12" powerBook that runs as fast as a Centrino? Hummm?

As long as i can do my things in a almost carefree environment (wich is also very slick) i would be happy to give in some performance.

Not that i can't fix stuff but in this way i can enjoy using a computer instead of getting irritated by it. That's why i'm going for a powerbook over a centrino wich is also very capable of doing the stuff that i do.

RooneyX · Jun 29, 2003, 10:53 PM

But it doesn't run OSX!

Sean Li · Jun 30, 2003, 03:20 AM

Benchmarks are only one indicator of performance, IMO. Performance in real-world tasks, such as putting together a report in Word, editing an image in Photoshop, etc... aren't always accurately reflected.

Remember as well when PC users were always referring to their clock speeds, until Intel comes out with the Centrino which, at a lower clock speed, outperforms some of their desktop equivalents. I'm sure their marketing department is still wondering how to put the right spin on that.

Having said that, it's true that an average Centrino notebook will do very well against a PowerBook when it comes to gaming. But we didn't get PowerBooks to play games, did we?

Anyway, it seems that Apple is finally putting some serious thought in closing the benchmarked performance gap, as evidenced by the G5. It's only a matter of time before this momentum is directed at the Apple portable world.

Michel_80 · Jun 30, 2003, 07:13 AM

Pentium M is by far the best technology currently in any laptop. Thinkpad R40 gets 8 hours battery (standard) and gives amazing performance.

Lets just hope that G5 for PB is not far away.

TAZ · Jun 30, 2003, 10:11 AM

While I agree that the Cnetrino is faster than the Powerbook, he question for me has come down to this: Which one will work for me EVERY time? Every Apple has run like a Swiss watch for me. I have owner the VERY forst powerbook they produced, a Performa and now a Gen 1 TiBk. In over 15 years of owning Mac, the number of crashes I have had I can count on one hand. These were mostly from the original Powerbook once it reached 8 yrs old. Since then I had one self induced crash on the TiBk, but it cost me no data, and it has been on since I brought it home. I went the winbloz route for a few years and I wish I could say the same for its history. So, yes, the Centrino is faster and I wish Apple could match it for speed, but I do not want that to happen at the sake of stability and productivity. Until Winbloz machines can match Macs in stability and productivity I really dont care much about how fast they are.

Alpha-sphere · Jun 30, 2003, 11:06 AM

Originally posted by TAZ:
While I agree that the Cnetrino is faster than the Powerbook, he question for me has come down to this: Which one will work for me EVERY time? Every Apple has run like a Swiss watch for me. I have owner the VERY forst powerbook they produced, a Performa and now a Gen 1 TiBk. In over 15 years of owning Mac, the number of crashes I have had I can count on one hand. These were mostly from the original Powerbook once it reached 8 yrs old. Since then I had one self induced crash on the TiBk, but it cost me no data, and it has been on since I brought it home. I went the winbloz route for a few years and I wish I could say the same for its history. So, yes, the Centrino is faster and I wish Apple could match it for speed, but I do not want that to happen at the sake of stability and productivity. Until Winbloz machines can match Macs in stability and productivity I really dont care much about how fast they are.

Exactly! although WinXP is way more stable than Win98 it still isn't as stable as OSX. And i'll need like 1000 hands to count all the crashes i had. Mainly cause of Win98 and WinME. But WinXP is a OK OS

clf8 · Jun 30, 2003, 07:10 PM

Originally posted by slow moe:
Yeah, woohoo! Just what I want to do, go back to using linux with some cheezy KDE Aqua rip-off theme.

Come on now, KDE and Gnome aren't bad window environments. And let me tell you, they're a hell of a lot more configurable than Aqua is. That said, lord knows how long you could spend tweaking every little aspect to get it just right. For Aqua, well, we just trust Apple to tell us what's right.

Sure, I might throw Linux on my mac, my old iBook 466 that is. I might even get crazy and throw on vanilla Darwin and actually try and do something useful with it. In reality, it will play mp3's (oops, mp4's) through my stereo.

The Centrino is a decent chip. It's got great power consumption, and 802.11b. No 'g' yet, but that's really not a huge deal. For some reason they're adding 'a' support to it first, but that just shows their lack of vision. ;} Oh yeah, and it's pretty fast too, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna buy one.

The Placid Casual · Jun 30, 2003, 07:19 PM

Wow, I really can't believe that this is still being discussed!

slow moe · Jun 30, 2003, 09:13 PM

Originally posted by clf8:
Come on now, KDE and Gnome aren't bad window environments. And let me tell you, they're a hell of a lot more configurable than Aqua is. That said, lord knows how long you could spend tweaking every little aspect to get it just right. For Aqua, well, we just trust Apple to tell us what's right.

Never said they were bad, but c'mon, go to KDE-Look.org and see how many Aqua/OS X rip-off's there are. It's ridiculous, you must admit. Besides that issue, I still don't like KDE, it's to resource intensive, I prefer Red Hat's Bluecurve theme for Gnome, but that's a whole other topic.

DekuDekuplex · Jul 2, 2003, 02:35 PM

Originally posted by slow moe:
Never said they were bad, but c'mon, go to KDE-Look.org and see how many Aqua/OS X rip-off's there are. It's ridiculous, you must admit.
[stuff deleted]

I just checked that site, and discovered the following posting:

Originally posted by by gg3po on: 06/30/2003, 17:59:
Window Style

What Window Style are you using? I've been looking for one that looks aqua-ish like that for awhile, now.

DekuDekuplex

JVB_2112 · Jul 3, 2003, 10:30 PM

Originally posted by Michel_80:
Pentium M is by far the best technology currently in any laptop. Thinkpad R40 gets 8 hours battery (standard) and gives amazing performance.

Lets just hope that G5 for PB is not far away.

I would have to agree. The Pentium M and the rest of the hardware surrounding Centrino is pretty great stuff in my opinion, excellent performance and amazing battery life. I was recently given a new ThinkPad T40 1.5GHz with Centrino for a company provided notebook. I've had 3 company ThinkPads and the T40 with Centrino is by far the best. Do I like it better than my 12" Powerbook? Let's just say the Powerbook is great for personal use, but to get any real work done during office hours I need a PC. For that reason I really can't provide any real world comparisons between the Centrino and the Powerbook since I use them for two very different things. The Powerbook really acts as my "digital hub", a machine I enjoy using and have fun with while the ThinkPad helps earn the paycheck. But it is great to have the Pentium M powering my work machine.

JVB

Mac Zealot · Jul 3, 2003, 11:14 PM

Well you do have a point in that macs are useful as nothing more then toys that make quack sounds.

Actually the sad truth is in my house the macs are the work machines and the PCs are the toys since the only use I ever get out of them is games.. and seti crunching.

That's it. My g4 does serving, routing, firewalling, media production, image editing, chatting, modern games, web browsing, mp3 and m4 playing, dvd playing, you name it.. all nice and fast.

Give me a PC OS that can do all of that as quickly, efficiently, and elegantly, and I'll listen. Unfortunately right now *n?X on x86 is great in one respect, but most major games don't exist.

Not to mention it's nowhere near as elegant. When I run freebsd I find the need to have a terminal window open at all times whereas in OS X it's all in the background unless I *REALLY* need it.

Webserving is automatic and in background, can windows do this? Yes with a lot of work, OS X does it in two clicks, I can install php, mysql, and practically everything else I want and use a config board through a web browser if I wish to make them totally custom..

:shrug: What more can I say. The PC might be faster but in my case it would just be another toy, I could buy a PC laptop and bust out my fav games any time or buy a mac laptop and do the same, but then turn around and crank out work too.

I'm not saying you can't be productive on a PC, I did it for 5 years, but I find that this works best

Karim · Jul 3, 2003, 11:38 PM

You made your case just about as good as anyone ever could. And I agree 100% with your sentiments.

dampeoples · Jul 3, 2003, 11:44 PM

The last page of the Macworld I just got has a nice little article thingy about speed/power. decent read.

DekuDekuplex · Jul 4, 2003, 01:43 AM

Originally posted by Mac Zealot:
[stuff deleted]

Actually the sad truth is in my house the macs are the work machines and the PCs are the toys since the only use I ever get out of them is games.. and seti crunching.

[stuff deleted]

:shrug: What more can I say. The PC might be faster but in my case it would just be another toy, I could buy a PC laptop and bust out my fav games any time or buy a mac laptop and do the same, but then turn around and crank out work too.

I'm not saying you can't be productive on a PC, I did it for 5 years, but I find that this works best

Agreed. I have both an old PC and a new PowerBook at home, and now use the PC almost exclusively for console game backups. For almost everything else, I am switching to my Mac.

For example, I am currently preparing for the second Oracle 9i OCP DBA exam. This preparation can be done on my PowerBook better than on a PC, since this RDBMS is available for download from the Oracle Web site, and Oracle on UNIX is known to be more stable than Oracle on Windows.

However, when I feel like playing a good Japanese import RPG (I play only Japanese imports because I am fluent in Japanese and prefer to play such games in the original language whenever possible), such as, say, "Final Fantasy IX" on the Japanese import PS or "Final Fantasy X" on the Japanese import PS2 (although, personally speaking, "Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time" on the Japanese import Nintendo 64 is my personal favorite), I just play it on my Japanese import PS or PS2, and then backup the data from the memory card using a PC game file backup tool (unfortunately, Mac versions don't exist in most cases), such as InterAct DexDrive (for the PS), or EMS PS2 Memory Adapter (for the PS2).

But I really have little need to play games on my Mac. My Mac is used primarily for study.

DekuDekuplex

Mac Zealot · Jul 4, 2003, 02:26 AM

There you go. I wonder if the english SC2 will have the japanese-esque link lol

spotze23 · Jul 4, 2003, 06:32 AM

one reason why we have to discuss this is that many of us are waiting von a 15" powerbook with uptodate hardware since january.

i thought several times of buying a pc-notebook instead. they are not cheaper. but they have ddr-ram, new fast gpus, etc. the titatium doesnt...

the fujitsu-siemens helium outperforms all powerbooks with its nViadia quadro. its design is ok (for an pc).

the only reason why i dont SWITCH is that photoshop and director do not run very well with wine and crossoverOffice under linux!

JVB_2112 · Jul 4, 2003, 06:33 AM

Originally posted by Mac Zealot:
Well you do have a point in that macs are useful as nothing more then toys that make quack sounds.

That wasn't what I meant

. However I can't use my Powerbook to run applications like Visual Studio .Net, Crystal Reports 9, IBM's Client Access for iSeries etc. All of which I need to use on a daily basis at work.

JVB

GENERAL_SMILEY · Jul 4, 2003, 06:49 AM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
a 1.3GHz Centrino laptop (12" screen) vs the 17 inch. It ran CineBench 2003 100% faster than the PowerBoo G4/1GHz (17" screen). It ran Photoshop 20% faster. It ran quake3 103% faster in 640x480 "Fastest" mode. The 17" PowerBook did, owever, run Quake3 84% faster in 024x768 "Max" mode. Probably has more video emory. Now why can't we have a 12" powerBook that runs as fast as a Centrino? Hummm?

Thats amazing, please do keep us informed about all upcoming benchmarks, I think it is absolutely fascinating, really, no honestly I really do care.