Cool Mac Gear

I'm humbled by the amount of interest readers have expressed regarding my system upgrade deliberations that I shared in OS X Odyssey 231 last week. The letters appear below, with a few specific replies, but I decided that a general treatment of the topic was in order, especially since I have finally come to a decision.

On Friday I ordered a new iBook. In the end, after weighing the pros and cons respectively of the basic 700 MHz model and the more feature-enhanced 800 MHz unit, I opted for the low-end machine. Here's my rationale for the choice.

The bottom line price difference, in Canadian dollars, including taxes and delivery, came to $575, or 32% more for the 800 MHz iBook. I don't think that's outrageous for the extra stuff you get in the more expensive model: a CD-RW combo drive instead of a plain Jane CD-ROM unit; a 50 percent larger (30 MB) hard drive; a 14.3 percent faster clock speed processor, and 100 percent more (32 MB) video RAM, as well as a snazzier, "Crystal" case instead of the "Opaque White" case of the base unit. The value is there's if you can afford it.

However, I reasoned that 700 MHz or 800 MHz, this computer is likely going to be a transitional machine for me. If it were not for the dual-boot termination deadline of January, 2003, I might have waited until next fall to make a system upgrade, but I simply don't want to be locked out of direct booting into OS 9 for the foreseeable future. The cash saving realized by buying the lower-priced unit gives me a good leg up on whatever machine I move up to next. I was also inclined to move before the end of the year for tax deduction reasons, can because MacWarehouse Canada was offering an Apple rebate of the full price of of a Lexmark Z-35 inkjet printer with the purchase of a consumer Mac before December 31st.

My G3 Pismo, which I plan to keep, has DVD support, which I rarely used anyway, I have a fast, FireWire CD-burner, the 20 GB hard drive in my Pismo still has about 6 GB free space, (although poorly allocated for OS X purposes), and I rather like the snow white appearance of the 700 MHz iBook. It was a tough decision, but the scales tipped just slightly in favor of the 700 MHz model. If I experience buyer remorse, and least I'll have that extra $575 still in my bank account as consolation. ;-) My biggest concern was the adequacy of Quartz Extreme support in OS X Jaguar provided by the 16 MB of video RAM in the 700 MHz model. After some research, I deduced that for use with the 1024 x 728 resolutions screen, 16 MHz should be fine.

This was not just idle or wishful supposition on my part. One set of test benchmarks I checked and (I can't remember exactly where, but I took notes), compared the performance of the 700 MHz and 800 MHz iBook, and a 867 MHz PowerBook with a dual processor 1 GHz Power Mac representing a scratch 100 percent performance benchmark.

Reboot OS X
iBook 700 - 89 percent
iBook 800 - 90 percent
PowerBook 867 - 88 percent

Copy 60 MB folder
iBook 700 - 43 percent
iBook 800 - 45 percent
PowerBook 867 - 59 percent

Copy 128 MB file
iBook 700 - 50 percent
iBook 800 - 51 percent
PowerBook 867 - 56 percent

Finder File Search
iBook 700 - 67 percent
iBook 800 - 69 percent
PowerBook 867 - 78 percent

Not too shabby a result at all from the base machine. On the basis of *those four results*, it would be pretty hard to justify the extra expense of the 800 MHz unit on performance alone.

There was also this 667 MHz vs 700 MHz, G4 vs G3, PowerBook vs iBook - A Performance Report from MacSpeedZone's David Engstrom (using the previous edition of the 700 MHz iBook with a Radeon Mobility graphics card and 16 MB of VRAM). Engstrom noted that:

"The areas where the PowerBook pulls ahead of the faster clocked iBook fall in to three categories;

• On-Screen and gaming graphics performance • In multimedia applications that have been tuned for the G4 • Work in large documents

"This is explained by the PowerBook's faster graphics card, G4 processor and the fact that the PowerBook has a level 3 cache, and the iBook does not."

However, the new 700 MHz iBook now has the same graphics card as the 667 MHz iBook did in these tests. I'm not a gamer. I don't do any serious multimedia work. And I rarely work with large documents.

In actual figures, even with the less powerful Radeon Mobility graphics card, the May, 2002, 700 MHz iBook was only 6 percent slower rebooting, 4 percent slower copying a 60 MB folder, it was 8 percent faster copying a 128 megabyte file, 4 percent slower running a MS Office macro, 5 percent slower doing a Sherlock file index, and 4 percent faster doing a Stuffit decode. Of course on Altivec-relevant tasks, the TiBook dusted the iBook handily, but I don't use any Altivec-optimized production applications.

If Apple had seen fit to take the faster iBook to 900 MHz or 1 GHz in the last speedbump, that might have tipped the equation in favor of the more expensive unit, but when I averaged a selection of relevant to me results from another bunch of benchmark tests done by MacSpeedZone, the 800 MHz machine performed only 7.8 percent faster overall.

Having made my decision and placed my order, I was gratified to read the following comments by " Dr. Mac" Bob LeVitusin the Houston Chronicle a few hours later:

"So while I was impressed with the latest PowerBook, it was Apple's first notebook computer under $1,000 -- the latest iBook model -- that really knocked my socks off.

"Now mind you, I've said on many occasions that the G3 processor is too slow to run Mac OS X at reasonable speeds. I take it all back. The new 700 MHz iBook is the first G3-based Mac capable of running Mac OS X at an acceptable rate of speed.

"I believe it's a result of the new graphics processor, an ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 with 16 MB of VRAM, the same as the previous generation of PowerBooks.

"Unlike older G3-based Macs, this one takes full advantage of Quartz Extreme, the new and improved OS X 10.2 (Jaguar) graphics subsystem. And with the graphics card taking some of the load off the CPU, the new iBook seems positively zippy."

Sounds like this new computer is going to be fun, and I eagerly await its arrival, which, due to the vagaries of parcel delivery when you live far out in the boonies, could be as early as today, or as late as after New Years.

A couple of the correspondents below noted that I placed my order uncomfortably close to MacWorld Expo.

However, that was a big part of the point of moving now. I'm not expecting any major laptop announcements, at Expo, but any new or revised machines introduced at San Francisco at will not be dual-bootable. In any case, I have always been inclined to buy new Macs of around the end of their production runs. I bought my LC 520 two months before that model was superseded. I bought my PowerBook 5300 after production had ceased, just before the 1400 was introduced. I bought my WallStreet PowerBook in January, 1999, four months before the Lombard was introduced. My Pismo was built in October, 2000, just before production of that model ended. My son's Lombard was one of the very last ones of those produced. While this tends to keep one well back of the bleeding-edge, I think it also may have something to do with the fact that over the years we have had almost no hardware trouble with our Macs, buying them after the bugs have been worked out.

Some readers will chide me for not getting a G4 PowerBook instead of another G3 machine. However, the lowest priced TiBook sells for Can$3699, which is 2.32 times the price of the 700 MHz iBook. As noted I don't use any Altivec-optimized production applications, and what I'm really after is better Finder response in OS X than I'm getting it with my 500 MHz Pismo and its 8 MB of video RAM and RAGE 128 video card. My hope and cautious anticipation based on the benchmarking cited above is that the RADEON 7500 card and 16 MB of VRAM in the iBook will provide what I need in that department, and that the 700 MHz processor will run iListen at a more satisfactory pace in OS X.

700 MHz iBook a good choice

From Sanford Lung

Dear Charles,

Following in-line [URL and excerpt above] is Bob Levitus' column from the Houston Chronicle with his analysis of the new G4 1GHz PowerBook and the 700 and 800 MHz versions of the iBook. After reading your Odyssey 231, I thought you might be interested in his opinion.

I second the part about adding additional RAM - the difference is dramatic in OSX!

Thank you for your thoughtful daily writing. As an editor and proofreader, I appreciate what you do and am impressed with your ability to get iListen to operate so well. My experience so far isn't nearly as accurate.

Best Wishes for a Happy and Prosperous New Year,

Sanford Lung
Honolulu, Hawaii

Hi Sanford;

Thanks for the reference to the Dr. Mac article.

I use both iListen and ViaVoice, and they're wonderful helper tools, but they do require quite a bit of manual correction (I find the voice correction at its present stage of development just too slow and cumbersome in either application.)

Charles

Quartz and iBook choice

From Murray Unger

Charles,

Anyone contemplating a purchase of an Apple product should always consider that an impending MacWorld a scant fortnight away means WAIT! Maybe the scent of change around MacWorlds might mean an end to this but up till now anyone buying just before has often found themselves cursing their purchase timing. New models breed deals on existing ones.

I know you feel pressure due to your year-end tax situation. But I believe that can be changed depending upon how you structure your tax situation. Failing that, begin to think of taking those capital expenditures in the beginning of the year/ January.

As for the decision about the iBook: I'd get the faster processor, bigger hard drive, burner ...for $500 bucks Canuck that's good. Better resale ...less worries about hard drive usage/partition for 9 ...and less stuff to lug about if you do find yourself somewhere needing to cut that disc. Though I'm led to believe that the older iBook ice is better looking than the new white ones???

I applaud your ethics but in this day and age when MD's get unsolicited Titanium Powerbooks from drug companies to "track their studies" I'm amazed that a premier writer in the Macdom hasn't received a deal from Apple or an advertiser like Smalldog to help you out. There must be a gazzilian evaluation pieces of hardware floating around. But then, you are just a guy doing a job fairly.

Which brings me to the issue of piracy and the like. Anyone I've ever seen buying knock-offs or "pirating" software always says the same thing: they do it because the real thing costs too much.

I think some companies don't price their products fairly for market conditions. Some do. The big U.S.-based car manufacturers actually sell cars in Canada for less than the USA! They are responding to market/income realities. Some of their product is slightly decontented but mainly it is the same. This also reflects the situation in Canada for groceries. Our produce is priced at the same amount as U.S. grocery items but in Canadian dollars. That lime or avocado is the same price but effectively cheaper here in the "True North". We pay 98 cents Can. -you pay 98 cents U.S. In a similar way our pharmaceuticals are much cheaper here because of market conditions. That gets a little more complicated to explain away but think of us as a much tighter and smaller set of buying groups negotiating for entire provinces versus individual HMO's.

If companies wanted to reduce local piracy or knock-offs they should consider reducing prices in certain parts of the world according to household incomes ...market conditions.

Why don't Americans buy cars in Canada? Already GM and other companies restrict the selling of their goods across borders. Dealers found to be doing this may find themselves selling used Yugos. I can't buy a Mac from most vendors on the web to send to Canada ...that eliminates the fear of destroying local markets by having them source from cheaper ones.

Good luck on whatever decision you make. I expect that forced to use a pencil and paper or quill and ink you'd still produce informative and intelligent blather. Scribble away! May your New (business) Year be great

Murray Unger

Hi Murray;

On the MacWorld issue, see my comments in the column above. Ditto for 700 MHz vs. 800 Mhz.

I'd be delighted to accept a nice evaluation TiBooks from Apple or whoever. So far, no one has called. :-(

Marketing is marketing. Many years ago, I sold Mercury outbard motors. The 9.8 HP model had just two tiny engine parts different from the 7.5 HP model, which cost about 25% less. They were otherwise identical.

Charles

Mac laptop and Quartz Extreme

From John Bice

Hello,

I noticed your article and remembered wondering the same thing. I had been told by an Apple salesman that Quartz Extreme would not work on the base 700 MHz iBook. Ultimately, I decided to go with the 700 MHz model anyway because my wife does primarily word processing, and I didn't think Quartz Extreme would matter much.

My wife loves the iBook, and the speed feels just fine. Also, I just ran the app you mentioned in the article (Quartz Extreme Check) and the app reported that the Ibook display was accelerated.

Unless you need a built in CD-RW for portable backups, I would recommend the base model, it's a real bargain.

Also, for a great portable file backup idea, check out the little USB flash drives. I bought a 16 meg version with the 700 MHz Ibook for my wife to do backups on (they go all the way up to 1 Gig capacity). It's light, small, fast, and requires to battery or drivers. She keeps it clipped to her keychain.

http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?dpno=545563

Cheers,
John

Hi John;

We're on the same page philosophically. Thanks for the encouraging report.

Charles

No more ruminating allowed

From James Boyd

See the 'Book, be the 'Book. Don't wait if you have a mind to do it. Just go get a 700 or 800 mhz iBook. I think it will finally be the key to your OS X speed concerns. However, you do realize you will be breaking the number one rule of buying a Mac just before a Macworld.

Charles, I can echo Dr. Mac's impressions on running OS X on the new iBook. However, I actually think OS X Jaguar still runs fine on my decrepit Pismo 400, so maybe my reference is a little lower than his.

I recently sold my "business book", an icebook 500. My Pismo used to smoke that machine due to cache and bus speed. However, I loved the form factor of the icebook. Very much like my old Duos except without the limitations! So I simply bought a new iBook 800 with the combo drive. I added 256 Meg and an Airport card. Updated the OS to current 10.2.3 and installed the dreaded Microsloth bloatware.

I can report that although the 'Book looks like my old icebook, it is considerably hotter inside (pun only folks). Now it is very punchy in almost all respects. I haven't had it long enough to comment on any gaming or graphics oriented work, but that is not my intended use so those possible limitations don't concern me.

The creak in the hinge seems to have been corrected. The combo drive will be nice for those Airport DVD shows and it will be nice to not cart the FireWire unit around anymore. Can you think of a slicker all in one package than the ultra compact 12" iBook? I think not.

For the record, I was considering the 700 mhz model as well. I was just about to pull the trigger on a $989.00 refurbed combo unit when they sold out. I guess I'll never know how the "lesser" machine compares now, but I'm happy I got the most machine available at the moment. Now I wont have to wonder if I underdid it.

However, if Steve goes and intros a 1 Gig ibook for the same price I'm going to go through a serious bout of buyer's remorse.

Hi James;

It was ever thus. Whatever and whenever you buy, something cooler is always in the works. Personally, I like mature technology, and have always tended to buy new Macs fairly late in their model run.

No flies on either the 700 MHz or the 800 MHz iBook. It was a tough decision. I think I'll be happy with the 700 MHz unit, but I don't dispute the value of the 800 MHz machine.

Charles

iBook

From Sean Windrim

Merry Christmas, Charles, from Peterborough, Ont.

1. Dr Mac, Houston Chronicle, Dec. 26, - w. I got to thru Macsurfer a few mins back - may help you with you with your 'Book' deliberations.

2. If you're ever up this way, look me up.

3. I never pass on anything I know is written by you or Dan Knight, and I absolutely agree w the sentiments of the pair of you with regard to the policies of the chauvinist despot of Cupertino; - I don't have the cash to be able to afford the THOUSANDS of $ I need to upgrade S/W, scanners, graphics cards, and other H/W, just to run OS X on my B&W G3 350.

Don't ever back down!

Sean W.

Hi Sean;

Yes, the Dr. Mac article made be feel great, since I had already placed my order.

Thanks for the invite. Reciprocated.

Thanks also for the kind words about my writing, and I'm no backer downer. ;-)

I suppose I'm about halfway through my gradual peripherals transition.

Charles

Quartz Answer

From Alec Kinnear

Hey Charles,

Unless you are going to do monitor-spanning the 16 MB VRAM will be just fine for Quartz Extreme acceleration. I had a similar dilemma about which iBook to buy (I did sell the WallStreet as I couldn't get it to run reliably with 10.2 and it was too slow with 10.1.5). now my iBook was my second string computer (I have a dual G4 500 dual display, 2 GB RAM and DVD-combo drive). I didn't want to duplicate a lot of the functionality of this machine in what was supposed to be my out and about computer so i was planning to purchase the 700 MHz model.

But when I went over to Digital Prototypes in Toronto to buy the iBook, I looked at both the 700 and 800 MHz models. the finishing on the 700 MHz model is nothing like any of the other dual-USB iBooks. It is very basic white without any metal trim. the very sterile white plastic looks like some kind of hospital tray.

So in the end, I took an end of the line 600 MHz CD model with the RADEON Mobility. I have been able to enable monitor spanning with it with no ill effect. without monitor spanning, Quartz Extreme works just fine. Unless you plan to play games I don't expect you'd notice much difference between the two RADEON chips.

I should note that even with Quartz Extreme, the iBook is noticeably more sluggish than my tower which doesn't have Quartz Extreme on either monitor (RAGE 128 built-in, add-on RADEON 7000 PCI). even on office work.

My own feeling is that for a primary computer one should buy the 800 MHz model (CD writing ability plus access to DVD and Quartz Extreme dual monitor spanning) but for a secondary computer I would recommend either the 700 MHz (if you don't care about cosmetics) or an end of the line 600 or 700 MHz RADEON Mobility. In any case, I expect better iBooks will be out soon as the processors are already ready. At that point, I will upgrade again as I find that I use my small iBook constantly. they are great little computers. the 14 inch screen version is as heavy and clunky as a WallStreet so I didn't consider it.

If you are primarily keeping the computer at home, you should really consider a used dual G4 450 and upgrade the video card. it would put an end once and for all to most of your complaints about OS X and probably cost less than the iBook.

Whatever computer you decide to buy, if you're running OS X, max out the RAM. It makes a huge difference.

best of luck,
Alec Kinnear

Hi Alec;

Thanks for your comments. I also figured that for use with the built-in monitor, 16 MB would be sufficient. I was also aware of the cosmetic difference in the 700 MHz model. I like white. ;-)

I tried a G4 Cube last year on the premise of more power for less money. It was a cool computer, but it didn't take with me. I'm a consummate laptop aficionado. I do have a big old UMAX S-900 tower, so I know whereof I speak. I am just more comfortable with small computers.

I plan to upgrade the RAM to 640 MB.

Charles

New Computer Purchase

From dxtr

Hi Charles,

Just a couple of thoughts on your computer purchase reasoning in Odyssey 231. You now own a computer that was the top of the line a little less than 3 years ago. Your reluctance to go with the 800 MHz iBook because of the price to performance ratio and no other reason seems to be defeating the purpose of replacing the Pismo in the first place. If the Pismo is not adequate for you to do your job now, really for the last year and a half, will only 16 MB of VRAM be adequate in 6 months, let alone 2 years? If 16 is the minimum now, actually 6 months ago, what will it be for X v3?? Will 32 MB of VRAM be the minimum or maybe 64 MB which is already available in the Ti!! What do you think these specs will do for the above average, which you are, Apple buyer in one year let alone two, salivate or yawn?

1GHz PowerPC G4
1MB L3 & 256K L2 cache
133MHz system bus
512MB SDRAM memory
60GB Ultra ATA hard drive
SuperDrive (DVD-R/CD-RW)
ATI Mobility Radeon 9000
w/64MB DDR video memory
Gigabit Ethernet
56K internal modem
1 FireWire & 2 USB Ports
AirPort Card Included

That's the top banana, so to speak, at Apple right now. I would not even bet it will last past January 7th 10:00 a.m. PST.

Keynote:
•Steve Jobs, Apple‚s CEO
•When: Tuesday, January 7, 9:00 a.m. PST
•Where: The Moscone Center

Now for the hard drive reality check. How many times have I read in Odyssey that you have just finished trimming your hard drive to gain space for X swap files? Even if you still have 6 MB free, I have 13 GB on one drive, it will not be enough.

If you feel you must have the ability to boot into 9 and you can possibly afford the faster iBook, GO FOR IT!! I think you will be happier down the road......Remember whatever you can buy is already obsolete!!

seeya
dxtr

Hi dxtr;

Actually, the Pismo is more than adequate for me to do my job right now -- in OS 9. I'm not replacing it, but rather the 233 MHz WallStreet that I used as my main workhorse up until last August 1.

As the benchmark figures I cite above indicate, the performance gains I would realize *in the type of work I do* with a G4 TiBook would not be remotely commensurate with the vastly higher cost. For folks doing multimedia work, high-end graphics, video editing, serious gaming, etc., the extra power is worth the cost if they can afford it. For me, it would be nice, but not really justifiable -- not least to my wife. ;-)

As for the future, who knows? I'm not expecting any laptop enhancement announcements at San Francisco so soon after the significant upgrades of two months earlier.

As for the hard drive, I think I'll have plenty of room with 20 MB for the foreseeable future. I will certainly configure the partition map differently on the iBook to give OS X plenty of breathing rrom this time. I also will keep only one OS 9 system on the iBook instead of the two OS 9s I have on the Pismo, which will free up more space.

Charles

CM

Charles W. Moore