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Over the Christmas holidays I have been ruminating over a possible system upgrade before the end of the year, in order to maintain dual-booting on a more up-to-date machine. I need to decide by December 31st for income tax reasons. My short list is down to a choice between the 700 MHz and 800 MHz 12.1-inch screen iBooks. I definitely want a laptop, and those are the only Mac laptops that my budget can currently accommodate. The bottom line difference in price in Canadian dollars, taxes and shipping included, comes to an even $575. The 800 MHz machine includes obviously the 14.3 percent faster processor, a 50 percent larger hard drive, a CD-RW combo drive instead of a plain vanilla CD-ROM, and 32 MB of video RAM instead of 16 MB. I think the value is there in the price difference, but my budget resists. I still have about 6 MB free on my present 20 GB HD, and I have a fast FireWire freestanding CD-burner and DVD support in my Pismo for the rare occasion that I need it. One of the big conundrums is whether OS X Jaguar Quartz Extreme is supported adequately by the lower priced machine's 16 megabytes of the VRAM. I have been unable to find a direct scientific comparison, but I'm inclined to think that for the 12.1-inch, 1024 x 768 resolution monitor in the iBook, the extra 16 MB of video RAM in the 800 MHz unit probably wouldn't make a whole lot of difference *for the sort of work that I do.* I averaged a battery of real world speed test results from MacSpeedZone for functions of the sort that I actually use, and the 32% more expensive 800 MHz iBook averaged only 7.8 percent faster then the 700 MHz model. Quartz Extreme is the hardware-accelerated graphics technology on supported graphics cards in OS 10.2 and later. The window compositor has been moved from the CPU to the graphics processing unit for improved system performance. Compositing of 2D, 3D, and QuickTime content is accelerated using OpenGL. 
As Apple explains: "Everything you see on screen is the result of millions upon millions of calculations by Quartz, the revolutionary composited windowing system in Mac OS X that uses the Portable Document Format (PDF) as the basis of its imaging model. Quartz delivers crisp graphics, anti-aliased fonts, and blends 2D, 3D and QuickTime content together with transparency and drop shadows. 
"Quartz [Extreme] uses the integrated OpenGL technology to convert each window into a texture, then sends it to the graphics card to render on screen. The graphics processor focuses on what it does best -- graphics -- freeing the Power PC chip to do more operations in the same amount of time. Everything is zippier"
In brief, Quartz Extreme:
The Mac OS X graphics system consists of Quartz 2D, which renders fonts as well as vector and bitmap graphics; OpenGL for generating 3D graphics; and QuickTime for producing dynamic media. These media types are blended together on the display by the window server, called the Quartz Compositor, the engine behind the unique effects in Aqua, such as transparency and drop shadows. In earlier versions of Mac OS X, the Quartz Compositor operated entirely in software and used the central processing unit (CPU) to position window content on individual layers. Quartz then composited the layers into a single frame and sent the frames to the graphics card. In this case, the graphics card simply acted as a conduit carrying frames to the display. Mac OS X v10.2 uses hardware to accelerate the Quartz Compositor. If a supported GPU is installed, Mac OS X v10.2 automatically enables Quartz Extreme which moves the Quartz Compositor from the CPU to the GPU. This allows the CPU(s) to focus on application-specific needs. As a result, the entire system will be faster and more responsive when Quartz Extreme is enabled, and CPU use drops dramatically. Applications draw windows into source buffers. The Quartz Compositor assigns each window to a separate layer, arranges then flattens (composites) the layers, and pushes each scene through the graphics card to the display. OS X can do more processing in the background while you work in the foreground. To gauge the performance improvement in compositing content with Quartz Extreme, Apple compared window compositing on Mac OS X v10.1 to window compositing on Mac OS X v10.2 with Quartz Extreme enabled on a supported graphics card. 
Window scrolling is now performed by the graphics card. In addition, the Quartz Compositor is completely vectorized to take advantage of the G4 Altivec Velocity Engine and receives an extra boost from symmetric multiprocessing (SMP). 
Every Mac with a G4 processor will benefit from these software improvements (but obviously, the iBook, with its G# processor, will not benefit nearly as much. Only Power Mac G4 and PowerBook G4 computers receive the benefit of the G4 Velocity Engine enhancement, and only dual processor Power Mac G4 computers benefit from symmetric multiprocessing enhancements in Quartz. Quartz Extreme requires an NVIDIA GeForce2 MX, GeForce3, GeForce4 Ti, GeForce4, or GeForce4 MX card or any ATI AGP Radeon card (the iBook has a Radeon 7500 card). A minimum of 16MB of video memory is required; 32MB is recommended for optimum performance -- which is the conundrum. Would I notice the difference? According to a posting to The Mac Observer Express Daily Newsletter by "A. Nonym,"
32 bit= 4 byte (/8). if you have an iBook with resolution at 1024 by 768 pixel, you need: 1024*768*4byte *2 = 2D-VRAM = 6 MByte.
[With a 16 MB VRAM iBook] You have a minimum of 10 MByte VRAM empty for 3D-Rendering --> for QE!! --> this should be more than enough for the Radeon to render its 3 textures-layer! If that's correct, I will probably be fine with the 700 MHz iBook for my purposes, or at least as fine as is possible with a G3. Here's hoping! Incidentally, there is a small Cocoa app called Quartz Extreme Check 1.1 that checks if the machine is using Quartz Extreme in Mac OS X 10.2.
You can check it out at:
Working to like an operating system? OS X Assimilation From Peter Blier Hi Charles-- I do love reading your odyssey with Mac OS X. I understand your ambivalence and am experiencing it myself as we just begin our own exploration of Apple's future on our brand new (well, refurbished) 15" G4 iMac. LCD screens are wonderful. Anyway, I wanted to find some old articles from the Odyssey through the archives, but at the bottom the site lists links for Page 1 through Page 5, which only takes me back a little way in the 200's. There seems no way to get to Pages 10, 20 (or higher?) to see articles from much earlier on. What am I missing? Sorry if it's something easy, but as much as I love Applelinks, I must admit to having a very difficult time navigating it. Thanks for your continuing good work! --Peter Blier
Hi Peter;
I just checked, and you're right. The links are not working correctly. Not my department, but I will refer it to the appropriate person. In the meantime, you can click the "Search Applelinks" link in the left column on the homepage, then type, say "Odyssey 90" ( or whatever) into the Search Applelinks News field, and that should bring up the articles individually.
Thanks for reading.
Charles Working to like an operating system? From Jon R. Smith Charles, You certainly stirred some opinions with the question of having to work at liking an operating system. I thought I would chime in. For me, one of the great things about the "Classic" Mac operating system, was getting into how things worked. I was taking radios apart at the age of two. I have OS 6.x-9.2 pretty much figured out. I like you prefered some versions better than others. This depended on the particular Mac you were using. I came to computers late in life at the age of 38 just about 10 years ago. My first Mac was a 128. I moved through about 80% of the Macintoshes Apple produced. It was great to have a university surplus within 2 miles from home. Anyway... figuring out the ins and outs of the hardware and software was much of the allure to me. Just to be straight, I hate doing the same with a Windows machine! I purchased my current Mac, G4500DP with the Apple Studio Monitor, 17" clear Acrylic model new from Apple with OSX in mind. I started with the beta version and have used all versions since and am now at 10.2.3. From the start I have slowly updated my programs to X. It spread the cost out over time. I am now anticipating QuickBookPro. Version 4 works great in classic! Now to my point. In reading your column and reader response, I see two common themes, comfort and familiarity. When we are comfortable with something as humans we hate to change. This requires action on our part. I was comfortable with all the Mac systems I used previous to OSX. I was also excited to use X. At first I was furious with it. It seemed so foreign to me. Where were all the things I had grown comfortable with? OSX is now my main axe. I never boot into 9 anymore. I still love the mature system that OS 5.x-9.2 became after years of developement. Imagine X after that long. Anyway, learning the ins and outs of X has been an ongoing process for all of us. It will continue until the next great thing comes around, what ever that may be. There will also always be someone who will not like one part or another of the system, 9.x or X. Charles, thanks for your great reads and sharing your experiences with OSX. I have found it informative and wonderfully entertaining. Keep up the great work! I hope your family had a great Christmas and best wishes to you this holiday season! Jon R. Smith
Hi Jon;
We had a very nice Christmas, thanks. Glad you enjoy the Odyssey.
I'm actually quite comfortable in OS X, other than the slowness. None of my annoyances with the way certain aspects of the interface function would be a showstopper in and of themselves.
Charles From Fenton Jones Hello Charles. It's been quite a while (years) since I wrote last. I recently switched to OSX. However, I did so by buying an eMac 700. There was no way I was trying it on my iMac 350. It has taken me over a week of downloads and configurations, to get back to near the productivity level of OS 9.
Here's an app for you to try:
Ittec, about $15. It's an attempt at replacing FinderPop (which I considered one of the greatest tools ever), the ability to drill down into any folder. It's especially useful for those whose desktops are covered with folders (mine isn't). It allows you to choose the font and appearance of the hierarchical lists. Real lists, not "spring-loaded with icons all over the place." Another useful feature is the ability to see into .sit archives and packages. I'm also using MaxMenus quite a bit, as a replacement for pop-up folders, where I used to keep groups of applications. It can put 4 pop up buttons (little colored "wedges"), one at each corner of the screen. I like to have more than one place to put different "groups" of things, and more than one way to get to them; though, to be honest, sometimes it takes me a second to remember what and where. And my old standby, Default Folder (which lives in the dock, so it's available outside of Open/Save dialogs), whose "Recent Folders" helps me, since I tend to close windows en masse when I get confused :-| The Dock is only used for my absolutely essential apps, and whatever's running of course. It often pops out (it's on the right) when I don't want it to. But sometimes I'm glad it's there. My only 2 real complaints, which seem to be an essential problem of everyone without a high-end machine, is the window drawing, and the dictatorial font policy. I work in FileMaker Pro most of the time. I've tried TinkerTool to change the application font. No dice. I've turned off font-smoothing. It's jagged, since it won't let me choose a font that's designed for the screen, to look good without anti-aliasing (it used to be Geneva). In OS 9, you open Define Fields, or a Calculation dialog, and there it is, instantaneous, readable. In OS X, there is a half-second delay, semi-blank window, then the text. It's not a big deal time-wise, but it's a little distracting, since it was never that way before, and since the flash of an even partially blank screen causes a subconscious response, "Frozen!!" The field names are readable, though a little fuzzy; however, if you select anything, the darn anti-aliasing shadow does not highlight! So you end up with blackish text with a little white outline, then your highlight color. Looks funky. One last annoyance, text clippings. Why the heck can't you drag a text clipping from TextEdit? What kind of message is Apple sending when its own text editor doesn't support its technologies? Can't make up its mind, needs more money to hire developers? Wants us to use some kind of Services for text clippings?? I gave up on TextEdit and am using BBEdit Lite for "editing." I edited a TidBITS auto-enter dictionary file (for Eudora) with TextEdit. It used some line ending, not a regular return (Unicode?), so its edits didn't work. It's a brave new world, but I don't quite get it yet.
All and all however, OS X is usable, it looks and works pretty good (I thought OS 9 was ridiculous at first also. "What's wrong with black and white?!"). And it is the future. You will be assimilated :-) --
Hi Fenton;
Good to hear from you again. Your OS X gripes seem quite similar to mine in general, although I'm not a FileMaker user.
I almost never use TextEdit, and do the vast majority of my work in Tex Edit Plus. BB Edit Lite has a great search and replace engine, though.
Yes, I'm gradually being assimilated, despite my growling. ;-)
Charles
The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here: Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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