How to Make Geeks Gasp, the Story of my 17" Powerbook G4

Author's Rating:

Pros: Display size, thin, quiet, Mac OS X

Cons: It's still a PC world. Heat.

The Bottom Line: 
Probably the best portable on the market today. Features that rival that of many desktops in a notebook that pushes the boundries of size.

Author's Review
There are two basic types of computer users out there.

There are ones who memorize technical jargon and numbers, know what they mean, and can recite them like a sports buff giving batting averages.

Then there are users like me, who quietly and patiently listen to the first group and then ask "so is that good?"

When that question pertains to my 17" Powerbook the answer has always been an exasperated "YES!"

The keyboard lights up in the dark.

I am currently a student who needed a computer for commercial level graphical work. I had had my eye on the 15" Powerbook G4 until January when Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced the 17". This new Powerbook came with a G4 processor at 1 GHz, 512 MB of RAM, upgradable to 1 GB, and a 60 GB hard drive. This new computer weighed in at under 7 lbs. and was only 1" thick. I am a married man, but must admit, I lusted in my heart. I had to have this new piece of Apple machinary. I didn't just want it, I NEEDED it. The 17" display is incredibly enticing and very welcome in my line of work as it gives an enormous amount of screen room to work on an image and keep all of my pallets and toolboxes out of the way. The display has a native resolution of 1440x900 pixels, but supports many lower resolutions.

Now before you start telling me about that Sony VAIO you saw's processor speed let me tell you that at 1 GHz, this thing runs faster than most desktop PC systems I've seen with Pentium 4s running at much higher speeds. I use my computer quite a bit, rendering and adjusting images and models, and I can't think of anything I've tried to do with it so far that hasn't been accomplished in seconds, or milliseconds. I can only imagine how fast this baby would process images if I upped that RAM to 1 GB.

This Powerbook comes with one optical drive option and that is the "legendary" Superdrive. It's a CD Reader, CD Writer and ReWriter, a DVD Reader, and yes oh yes, a DVD Writer, all in one slot loading drive less than 1" thick. I've done everything with this drive besides burn a DVD, but that is coming soon. The drive is a bit noisy but not continuously. This noise is a welcome tradeoff for such a small size.

Did I mention that the keyboard lights up in the dark?

Ports? Name it. OK, maybe there aren't that many, but we've got quite a few here. Let's see, on the left I've got: a phone jack for the internal 56K modem, 1.0 USB (look for 2.0 on future revisions), a PC card slot, mic in, and a jack for your headphones. On my right: DVI port, S-Video out, Ethernet port, FireWire 400, FireWire 800, and another USB 1.0. All of these ports are conveniently located on the sides instead of the rear as with the 15". I like to think that this allows for a more reliable hinge in the back. Also notice the presence of a USB port on each side, good news for people who enjoy using an external mouse, great news for leftys who wish to do so.

Odds and ends abound. Stereo sound from speakers located on either side of the keyboard (You're not getting THX quality out of these folks, but for a portable, they're breathtaking), a keypad option for you calculators out there, large trackpad and button and all sorts function keys to control brightness, volume turn the num-lock off and on, and adjust the keyboard brightness. I did tell you that it lights up in the dark, right? Ambient light sensors below both speaker grills control the brightness of the display and turn on and off a fiberoptic light beneath the luminecent keys. This is the single greatest way to get the geeks gasping. There is also AirPort Extreme (802.11g) wireless networking built-in. Set up a wireless base station and you can surf the internet from the toilet! There is also built-in Bluetooth for wireless communication with Bluetooth enabled peripherals.

Mac OS X. If you're still using Windows XP, Me, 2000, 98, or blast from the past 95 you probably get tired of learning about the latest fatal error that the OS caused. XP users are probably getting tired of deciding wheter to send or not send that latest error report. You won't find these things on Mac OS X. This puppy's stable, and I do the digital equivalent of hitting the foundation with a sledgehammer at times. Only once have I experienced a mishap that forced me to restart, and this was 2 days after I'd gotten the system. Never again has this happened. Aesthetically, Mac OS X is beautiful with it's aqua interface.

The fan on this thing rarely comes on, but when it does, it roars like a beast. However, that roar never seems to last long as it must scare the heck out of any clinging heat and dies down. This and the sound made when first loading a disc into the drive are the two only times the machinary makes a peep.

OK, I've raved enough. Time for a couple of gripes.

This baby can get hot on it's underside. I didn't say warm, I said hot. Your not going to become a burn victim from this thing, but I have actually pulled my hand away from the bottom wincing. On the flip side, literally, it stays relatively cool on the upper surface (trackpad and keyboard area). For this reason, I don't call this a laptop. It's a portable. A laptop should be able to sit comfortably in your lap, without making your thighs sweat (ewwww).

And lastly, it is, unfortunately, still a PC world. And while there is some great compatability between the two, it is still lacking. I'm not going to throw blame on this however, I'm just going to concisely gripe about it here.

Purchase Tip: If you are a college student, check out Apple's ADC discount program for students. A $99 membership can save hundreds of dollars on a new system. It worked for me.