[nycbug-talk] Apple as a BSD review.

[Chris McCulloh]

> Powerbook. Without a doubt. You get what you pay for. ibooks are great
> for their price, but they have nuances that eventually stick out that'll
> make you regret not getting a PB.

Gerald --

Thank you for the comments, and from my past experience I completely agree
with the rest of your message.  However I was wondering if you, or anybody
else, could elaborate further on some of these nuances.  Especially the
kind that may be of importance to those of us jumping (back) into Apple
from the x86 *nix world. 

Figured I'd share some of the things I've been discovering in my own
research, as I'm looking to make the same decision within the next month
or so.  I would imagine that most people who are comparing the two aren't
deciding between an 800MHz iBook and a 17" 1.33GHz PowerBook, so I've kept
my comparisons between the iBook and the 12" & lower-end 15" PowerBooks. 
Video memory seems to be the same amount on the iBook as the lower-end
PowerBook (32MB), although the actual chipsets are different (ATI Mobility
Radeon 9200 on the iB, and NVIDIA GeForce FX Go5200 on the PB).

One big thing I've seen on the iB is that it lacks native audio input
ports -- it only possesses a headfone output jack, whereas the PB also has
a line-in port.  External audio input can be added via a USB device, which
seems to run around $100-$150 for non-professional versions.  Ouch.

iB lacks built-in bluetooth support, add $50 for that if you need it (or
just wanna hack around at it).  And the on-CPU cache is different: 256k on
the iB compared to 512k on the PB.  Hard drives appear to be UltraATA/100
on the PB, but only listing UltraATA on the iB.  I'm assuming this is
UltraATA/66?  And the 15" PB does have the single CardBus slot.  

Also something nobody has mentioned -- the base iBook is actually $1099
for the 800MHz 12".  That's its biggest advantage, as the base PowerBook
is $1599.

Thoughts anybody else?

-chris

-- 
Chris McCulloh
Secure Systems Architect
Sinetimore, LLC

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