Improving the Powerbook

[daveg5]

to each his own

im glad to see i am not the only one who wants more than a one button pad.
however, i probably am the only one who wants a well implemented apple designed scroll wheel/strip and i am not lazy i just like the convienence and it does not have to take away from the tibooks design but rather enhance it.
the leds will let me now the status of my powerbook from across the room as i control it closed with a remote in my lazy chair for dvd or mp3 or whatever. they would be small unobtrusive and defeatable and match the OSX stop caution go window design.
i guess i am also the only one that wants to see a small sony-like lense hidden in the screen frame, be great for ichat, conferencing etc. like in the intel commercial with the two college students chatting for a movie, except they could also see each other wirelessly of course.
being a musician i am hoping for 24bit in the pro line with at least dolby digital out this may fit on back but i thought small right side door may look better and its about time for 24bit and dvd-audio playback heck with the superdrive and logic we could make our own 24bit 5.1 dvd audio disk self contained, I dont expect any non musicians to see that as a good idea 16 bit is good enough most will say.
I also think 24k gold plated (not shiny pimp fake gold ports) would look more professional and with slightly a larger keyboard for my big hands about 1/4" on left and right side not to the ends will help to distance the powerbook from the ibooks.
okay the media key was a stretch but i like them on my desktop.
every one agrees on the firewire port, better paint(make mine black), better speakers, better screen, and faster cpu and vid chips.
it looks good now, but there is always room for improvement

 

[daveg5]

nice to here from a ti owner

although i used a friends on many ocassion i wish i had one like shadow man which made some good points but we will all use it differently so its good to here others ideas even if i disagree.
The one important thing we missed was a much improved, cooler and quieter cooling system which will probably happen when the g4 hit .13 or the 970.
i hope they keep the pc card slot that way we can upgrade to usb2-3 or firewire 2-3 later
peace out

 

[iJon]

Re: to each his own

Originally posted by daveg5
im glad to see i am not the only one who wants more than a one button pad.
however, i probably am the only one who wants a well implemented apple designed scroll wheel/strip and i am not lazy i just like the convienence and it does not have to take away from the tibooks design but rather enhance it.
the leds will let me now the status of my powerbook from across the room as i control it closed with a remote in my lazy chair for dvd or mp3 or whatever. they would be small unobtrusive and defeatable and match the OSX stop caution go window design.
i guess i am also the only one that wants to see a small sony-like lense hidden in the screen frame, be great for ichat, conferencing etc. like in the intel commercial with the two college students chatting for a movie, except they could also see each other wirelessly of course.
being a musician i am hoping for 24bit in the pro line with at least dolby digital out this may fit on back but i thought small right side door may look better and its about time for 24bit and dvd-audio playback heck with the superdrive and logic we could make our own 24bit 5.1 dvd audio disk self contained, I dont expect any non musicians to see that as a good idea 16 bit is good enough most will say.
I also think 24k gold plated (not shiny pimp fake gold ports) would look more professional and with slightly a larger keyboard for my big hands about 1/4" on left and right side not to the ends will help to distance the powerbook from the ibooks.
okay the media key was a stretch but i like them on my desktop.
every one agrees on the firewire port, better paint(make mine black), better speakers, better screen, and faster cpu and vid chips.
it looks good now, but there is always room for improvement

i think so far your only good idea was the extra firewire port. the gold would look stupid and i would agree with everyone else, it would be cool if i was a pimp. personally i hate gold tipped imputs. i have 7 of them on my audigy platinum and i hate it becasue i get confused sometimes which audio cables go in which, personally if im gonna have that many audio inputs i like color coded.

iJon

 

[kenkooler]

also, now that osx has support for 24 bit 96Khz audio i see no reason for implementing it in the hardware

 

[shadowfax]

Re: nice to here from a ti owner

Originally posted by daveg5
although i used a friends on many ocassion i wish i had one like shadow man which made some good points but we will all use it differently so its good to here others ideas even if i disagree.
The one important thing we missed was a much improved, cooler and quieter cooling system which will probably happen when the g4 hit .13 or the 970.
i hope they keep the pc card slot that way we can upgrade to usb2-3 or firewire 2-3 later
peace out

the cooling is probably hands down the best point you or anyone has mad so far. if they could make it silent all the time (minus hard drive noise, that's quiet and rare enough for me), that would be revolutionary and very very cool.

about the gold plating, i wasn't saying fake gold, i was making the allusion to the pimp because, if you look at the tibook as a work of art with color continuity and all that good stuff, you see that gold would be out of place, at least aesthetically. i'm not saying it wouldn't be moreprofessional, but it wouldn't fit right. now, if they put the audio port behind the back cover, or didn't gold plate the actual visible rim, that would be fine, great, good idea.

 

[shadowfax]

Re: Re: to each his own

Originally posted by iJon

i think so far your only good idea was the extra firewire port. the gold would look stupid and i would agree with everyone else, it would be cool if i was a pimp. personally i hate gold tipped imputs. i have 7 of them on my audigy platinum and i hate it becasue i get confused sometimes which audio cables go in which, personally if im gonna have that many audio inputs i like color coded.

iJon

the reason he wants gold plate ports is because when electricity passes thrrough steel, or whatever metal they use on input/output connections, contacts it slowly leaves carbon there, and this carbon gradually deteriorates and then altogether disconnects the signal passing through. if, however, the contacts are gold plated with 24kt gold, this carbonizing doesn't occur, so the connector lasts a great deal longer.

on your audigy, there should be color-coded labels on each of the ports. green is the speaker/headphones port, red is the mic port, and so on. if they aren't color coded, then i guess SB is getting cheap, and i'm sorry you paid so much for your audio card.

 

[shadowfax]

Originally posted by kenkooler
also, now that osx has support for 24 bit 96Khz audio i see no reason for implementing it in the hardware

what? that's actually a reason for implementing it into the hardware, isn't it? i mean, you can't produce 24 bit audio on a 16bit audio board, can you? that's counterintuitive, just like you can't do real 64 bit computing on a 32 bit processor or see 32 bit color on a 16 bit display, no matter how many colors there are on the picture you are looking at.

so why would we not want 24 bit audio, now that OS X supports it?

 

[daveg5]

gold and black

Well remember the powerbook i want would be black, therefore the color continuing scheme would work out and not the whole back plate just the ports, heck they are on my stereo system and my yamaha dsp factory, and emagic audiowerk2 card so i am used to it and with black i think it looks better then the dry tin gray. with the current titanium color gray would probably look better, agreed.
on the pro line I want 24bit at the hardware level, nothing less will do, i should not have to buy a usb or firewire or pc card on a pro machine to get pro sound. and with dvd audio maturing and 5.1 it is a must. for me anyway. even in silver.
but thanks shawdow for explaining the pros of gold over steel or color coded.
i think the camera hidden near the latch would be cool, you could keep in eye on your room or baby from a remote computer, take movies on the road, record who using your cpu and who with a lap top wants to hook up a large un weilding camera thru usb or firewire just for ichating, the cables and mess would not be worth it. my take anyway.
My top 5 powerbook improvement/added features not including cpu and video, hard drive speed and battery life are:
1. 24 bit in and out 5.1 surround digital (preferably gold on a black powerbook)
2. cooler running and quieter
3. small hiden camera
4. extra fire wire port
5. extra button and scroll wheel/strip
not necessarily in that order:
status leds and remote would just be icing not needed but fun(maybe a slightly larger or better keyboard not needed but cool for my big hands).
What are your top five request other then cpu, vid, hard drive speed and battery life.

 

[kenkooler]

Originally posted by Shadowfax


what? that's actually a reason for implementing it into the hardware, isn't it? i mean, you can't produce 24 bit audio on a 16bit audio board, can you? that's counterintuitive, just like you can't do real 64 bit computing on a 32 bit processor or see 32 bit color on a 16 bit display, no matter how many colors there are on the picture you are looking at.

so why would we not want 24 bit audio, now that OS X supports it?

sorry, i meant to say exactly the opposite, i guess i was too sleepy when i posted that

 

[iJon]

Re: Re: Re: to each his own

Originally posted by Shadowfax


the reason he wants gold plate ports is because when electricity passes thrrough steel, or whatever metal they use on input/output connections, contacts it slowly leaves carbon there, and this carbon gradually deteriorates and then altogether disconnects the signal passing through. if, however, the contacts are gold plated with 24kt gold, this carbonizing doesn't occur, so the connector lasts a great deal longer.

on your audigy, there should be color-coded labels on each of the ports. green is the speaker/headphones port, red is the mic port, and so on. if they aren't color coded, then i guess SB is getting cheap, and i'm sorry you paid so much for your audio card.

nope, creative does gold ports now on their audigys. they may do it on other cards. i have learned where the ports are, it was just confusing at first because because there was no color coding. plus i didnt pay a lot. i got my audigy platinum dirt cheap through our store.

iJon

 

[shadowfax]

Re: Re: Re: Re: to each his own

Originally posted by iJon

nope, creative does gold ports now on their audigys. they may do it on other cards. i have learned where the ports are, it was just confusing at first because because there was no color coding. plus i didnt pay a lot. i got my audigy platinum dirt cheap through our store.

iJon

well, they have always done gold plating on good cards. i have an SB Live! 5.1 that has the gold plate jacks, but then there is a color coding around that, and it surprises me that they don't still do that. oh well. not like you use the back a lot anyways, or if you do, you know it darn well.

 

[shadowfax]

Re: gold and black

Originally posted by daveg5
Well remember the powerbook i want would be black, therefore the color continuing scheme would work out and not the whole back plate just the ports, heck they are on my stereo system and my yamaha dsp factory, and emagic audiowerk2 card so i am used to it and with black i think it looks better then the dry tin gray. with the current titanium color gray would probably look better, agreed.
on the pro line I want 24bit at the hardware level, nothing less will do, i should not have to buy a usb or firewire or pc card on a pro machine to get pro sound. and with dvd audio maturing and 5.1 it is a must. for me anyway. even in silver.
but thanks shawdow for explaining the pros of gold over steel or color coded.
i think the camera hidden near the latch would be cool, you could keep in eye on your room or baby from a remote computer, take movies on the road, record who using your cpu and who with a lap top wants to hook up a large un weilding camera thru usb or firewire just for ichating, the cables and mess would not be worth it. my take anyway.
My top 5 powerbook improvement/added features not including cpu and video, hard drive speed and battery life are:
1. 24 bit in and out 5.1 surround digital (preferably gold on a black powerbook)
2. cooler running and quieter
3. small hiden camera
4. extra fire wire port
5. extra button and scroll wheel/strip
not necessarily in that order:
status leds and remote would just be icing not needed but fun(maybe a slightly larger or better keyboard not needed but cool for my big hands).
What are your top five request other then cpu, vid, hard drive speed and battery life.

OK, that makes sense, i suppose. i just like the gray color aplenty, and would prefer it over black. black would still be better than every other laptop i've ever seen, don't get me wrong, but i just don't like it. so now i guess we can say that most if not all of our disagreements are over taste/aesthetics, and you can't really argue that; at least, not productively.

"she's hot!"
"no, she isn't, you dolt."
"she's not? why?"
"i just don't think she is. her neck is too long, her arms seem kind of skinny, and i don't like the shape of her eyes."
"i like her eyes just fine, and her neck is gorgeous."
"no, it's not."

top 5:

1. quieter/silent cooling system
2. better, scratch resistant paint
3. extra firewire port
4. slightly higher resolution screen, say, about what the iMac has, but not the 1600 x 1024, that's outrageously high IMO.
5. i'd like to get 4-5 hours out of my battery in OS X while actually doing something, you know? i can't top 3 hours ever in OS X, and i hate OS 9.

 

[Bear]

Second Firewire Port

This would be useful for having an iPod plugged in and using a second firewire device without having to carry around a firewire hub.

In my case, the second device would be a CompactFlash reader. It is noticably faster than the PC-Card(PCMCIA) reader I carry.

(And yes, the PC-Card reader is faster than a USB one.)

 

[daveg5]

Re: Re: gold and black

Originally posted by Shadowfax


OK, that makes sense, i suppose. i just like the gray color aplenty, and would prefer it over black. black would still be better than every other laptop i've ever seen, don't get me wrong, but i just don't like it. so now i guess we can say that most if not all of our disagreements are over taste/aesthetics, and you can't really argue that; at least, not productively.

"she's hot!"
"no, she isn't, you dolt."
"she's not? why?"
"i just don't think she is. her neck is too long, her arms seem kind of skinny, and i don't like the shape of her eyes."
"i like her eyes just fine, and her neck is gorgeous."
"no, it's not."

top 5:

1. quieter/silent cooling system
i can see the benefit of more screen resoltion i dont know if 1400*900 will look good on a 15. i saw a pc 1600*1200 i believe on 15" very crisp but way to small. I dont think they need to increase the screen size though 15 is cool . you have 1 more idea cause battery life is a no brianer and i doubt if multi tasking osx will ever be as effeciant with batteries as the single tasking os9, but hey you never know.
2. better, scratch resistant paint
3. extra firewire port
4. slightly higher resolution screen, say, about what the iMac has, but not the 1600 x 1024, that's outrageously high IMO.
5. i'd like to get 4-5 hours out of my battery in OS X while actually doing something, you know? i can't top 3 hours ever in OS X, and i hate OS 9.

 

[rmac]

Color Proofing

Anyone know how good Powerbook screens are for proofing images before printing them? In the college photo lab I work in we use all CRT monitors calibrated with a USB sensor. I understand that there are sensors that now can be used on LCDs too.

So is the LCD monitor and profile good out of the box (comparable to CRT)... or is a sensor needed for accurate color....or are CRTs still much better even with LCD sensors?

Having to print lots of proofs to get the right color is a pain...having calibrated monitors has helped immensely. Powerbooks seem perfect for photographers....even first generation G4 Powermacs handle 200-300 MB image files fine in Photoshop, so I imagine the Powerbooks now would be awesome (except for slower harddrives for scratch disk). But the monitor is a potential problem, though I guess a CRT could always be hooked up to it for last minute color tweaking. Downloading images in the field and editing them soon after is very attractive (and indeed Apple has been writing about many photographers doing this on their "hot news" page).

 

[daveg5]

check out formac

http://www.formac.com claims thier lcd are the best for graphics with an available calibrator and many have used the cinema displays succefully. I doubt if the powerbook is in that same league.
Crt,s have matured much more and if you have to change from the "native" resolution all of your settings become slightly fuzzier not to mention bad pixels and frailty ever put a pen on a lcd screen and ease of theft, who wants to logg away a 22" sony flat screen which I am using now.
Lcds will probably catch up in a few years and are now being used with much success, lighter, quieter, and much easier on the eyes and my next monitor purchase will be one.
Anyway i am not sure how accurate they are as opposed to crt's and would like to now also.

 

[Roger1]

I only have a few things I would like to see different on the Powerbook

1. a recessed trackpad, like the old G3 powerbook. It annoys me to no end when my mouse goes skittering all over the screen from my thumb bumping it.
2. a 2 button track pad

3. How about a midnight blue case? Maybe iridescent?

 

[daveg5]

my second choice would be blue

Originally posted by Roger1
I only have a few things I would like to see different on the Powerbook

1. a recessed trackpad, like the old G3 powerbook. It annoys me to no end when my mouse goes skittering all over the screen from my thumb bumping it.
2. a 2 button track pad

3. How about a midnight blue case? Maybe iridescent?

i think apple is working on technology to mac computers look to be different colors depending on light and angle, sort of like what duponts candy paint for cars does I would like a pealized blue that looks darker in light and ligher and dark (not glow in the Dark) if black is unavailable.
i agree on the two button pad, recessed hmmm interesting
maybe they will bring back the trackball optical of course

 

[shadowfax]

Originally posted by Roger1

It annoys me to no end when my mouse goes skittering all over the screen from my thumb bumping it.

if you go into the system preferences, you'll notice an option to ignore the trackpad when typing. it was annoying me too when i first got my tibook. i don't see what recessing the thing will do, the dells at school are like that only they don't let you turn off the trackpad while typing (at least, not with the protection software at school), and i still hit the trackpad inadvertently. the worst is that the tapping does a click, which often moves the cursor to a different place in the document i am typing on, and i don't notice.

 

[GeneR]

Re: Improving the Powerbook

Originally posted by will
The powerbook is already a very nice laptop, but there's always room for improvement. In this post I look at how Apple might change the powerbook in its next update.

Hard Drive
Bigger is obviously better, but faster is important too. from the evidence I've seen it was a mistake for Apple to drop the faster RPM drives from the new models. To conserve battery life couldn't they have a drive the spins at a lower speed when on battery, reverting to full speed when on the mains?

Price
It's no good having a fantastic laptop if no one can afford it. Apple have moved in the right direction recently, but I'd like to see the low end model come down below $2000/£1400.

I almost jumped up in my chair with joy about the announcement of the new powerbook 17" version, but then the 60GB size hard drive made me slump back down into my seat.

How about 120+GB - 200GB HD so we can REALLY think of the Powerbook as the alternative to the desktop? I'd love to be able to capture DV footage into the powerbook, edit several hours worth of material and then burn a DVD out of the finished results. And since it's so big, why not give us extra juice in the way of a bigger battery life?

In the meantime, (and until the processor speed goes up with the HD size) how about a nice robotic arm built into the Powerbook. And a nice levitating disco ball that would match the Powerbook's reflective nature? Hmmm.

I think it's "iDumb" not to give us bigger hard drives or at least the option to bump it up and tell us it is an alternative to the desktop. I really want this alternative to happen. But it just hasn't sold me yet.

 

[jefhatfield]

i have been sold on apple's high end laptops since the bronze keyboard g3 powerbook

and when the first revision tibook came out, i was forever stoked

the 17 inch powerbook is amazing, but for my purposes, the 12 inch powerbook is the best deal apple has going for a portable

apple could not bring the g4 to ibook this time, so apple brought the ibook 12 inch size to the powerbook...ultra cool and ibook priced at 1799

 

[shadowfax]

-

 

[vniow]

Originally posted by Shadowfax


17 inch powerbooK?
is? they have one? don't you mean "would be," in which case i strongly disagree.

http://www.apple.com

 

[JSRockit]

Originally posted by jefhatfield
i have been sold on apple's high end laptops since the bronze keyboard g3 powerbook

and when the first revision tibook came out, i was forever stoked

the 17 inch powerbook is amazing, but for my purposes, the 12 inch powerbook is the best deal apple has going for a portable

apple could not bring the g4 to ibook this time, so apple brought the ibook 12 inch size to the powerbook...ultra cool and ibook priced at 1799

I agree...I love the 12" model...I'm getting one as soon as possible...and have been waiting for a smaller TiBook.

 

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by JSRockit


I agree...I love the 12" model...I'm getting one as soon as possible...and have been waiting for a smaller TiBook.

and for two hundred more, a superdrive...and the whole thing is nearly a third of a pound lighter than the 12 inch ibook

for the portable side, i think apple has finally listened to what the market wants and gone under a grand for ibook, under two grand for the pro stuff, and now offers every size...and in the process, we may end up with more macheads who switch from the pc world