Apple Ibook 14" or Dell Inspiron 6000

get the dell. i couldnt stand a 14" XGA lcd.

If Macs aren't for you then they aren't for you. There are no real reasons anymore as to why a Mac will do something better than a PC. As far as pros and cons,however, Macs are currently free of any known Spyware and Viruses, and OS X is more advanced than Windows XP.

If you can deal with XP and constantly having to be on guard for viruses and spyware and hacks then get the Dell.

you will also probably want to get a soundcard for it. the ibook doesnt have any card slots, so it will have to be external usb/firewire. you could get a powerbook, but those are almost twice as much.

and if you dont mind installing windows/ram/harddrive or even a cpu yourself, check out companies like asus. you can get notebooks that are much better than either the dell or teh apple for less money. you can order (semi)barebones systems from sites like proportable.com or geared2play.com. you can also get a fully prebuilt one, but it costs more.

iBook pros:
- 6 pin (powered) firewire

- multitasking (tho w/ a GB of RAM the Dell should do ok. however windows just handles resources poorly. imo u'd need a pentium 4 w/ HT to have a more fluid multitasking experience in windows. HT won't be included in pentium Ms till next year. the G4s have had multithreading from day one.)
---u don't get a semi-discrete solution w/ the dell until u spring for the $1400 version, which of course doesn't factor in cost of extra RAM,larger drive

- discrete graphics. also plays a role in multitasking, as less system RAM and CPU power is used for rendering displays while under load.

- no additional virus, spyware, or adware software needed to keep the platform functional.

- most media editing is done on external drives, for mobility (presentations/demos) and sharing between systems. however if the midi files u intend to work /w are smaller then maybe an internal solution is viable.

-512MB stock memory is built in. u have an open slot for an extra 1GB if u need it. w/the Dell u have to pay extra to simply get 512MB in one slot, leaving the 2nd slot open for later upgrades.

- better stock battery life. to get the 5+ hours that reviews of the Dell have noted, u'll need to upgrade to the 9 cell battery, and that's more $ of course.

- weight. the 6000 is 7+ lbs as reviewed by a number of sites (the 9 cell battery was in all of the configuration which praised it's battery life).

- no downgrade in CPU to meet a cheaper price. the $750 base dell has the celeron Ms. unless it's changed there are various power saving features which are disabled in the celeron Ms. i'll have to look into it, but i'm thinking other processor functions might also be disabled.

cons:

- no widescreen option. this depends on how u look at it. the WXGA should be 1280x800. so u get more horizontal space but vertical viewing space is marginally better w/ the Dell. to get WSXGA u of course would need to upgrade. if you're working on any long term projects the resolution issue is moot as i'm guessing u'd rather be working on a larger screen in either case. for long photoshop session i plug in my iBook to my KB, mouse, and 19" monitor and work from there. i use screen spanning Dr. to allow me to change the res to what i want on the external screen.

- can't upgrade the iBook's screen res in configuration.



with all the basic amenities the seemingly cheap $750 dell makes it's way up to $1337 before taxes. this is BEFORE adding RAM and the larger hard drive u mentioned. from what i've seen discounts aren't available on the 6000s until u get over $1499. how did u get the impression that the dell is cheaper? any discounts i'm not factoring in? the big 30% ones don't kick in until your over $1499, so maybe it works out once u add the 100GB drive?

u'll want to price out RAM elsewhere for either system, and make your decision accordingly. it may or may not be reasonable w/ dell, if u can get the discount by padding your price a bit.

if cost does end up to be marginal, and u really feel as though u don't prefer the iBook go w/ the Dell.

personally, on a performance basis for getting work done on my iBook, i can't imagine an entry level system from anyone else that would suit me better.

afaik, all midi devices for laptops are external, and typically connect via firewire or USB2. the PC card slot is best used for self contained devices, instead of dongle solutions. i.e.-if u have to have a cable connected for a device then just have the device in it's complete form connected via a given cable. that said, a PC card solution is viable for older "legacy" notebooks that don't have USB2 or firewire built in.

well i cant say i know too much about it, but i was assuming he would be using something like an audigy 2zs sound card.

and multitasking performance really isnt an issue. i think that is something taht apple/fanboys blow way out of proportion. i never have any problems multitasking on my amd, even when i use windows.

oh, and you can get an i6000 speced similairly to the ibook for 800 bucks(shipped). http://configure.us.dell.com/dellsto...0&oc=i6000RSL1

i'm speaking from my own experience w/ my systems, not from "fanboy" zealotry where "apple must be better no matter what!". short of the dual core solutions AMD chips has basically gotten their butts handed to them in re: to multitasking. prior to the HT P4s it they were likely similar in performance. after, the P4s were much more robust at completing multiple tasks. mind u AMD would come out ahead in "one task at a time" scenarios, but when multiple tasks were compared the AMD chips fell way behind. i believe anandtech was the site i remember seeing the benchmarks at, but a number of sites have started doing multitasking testing. basically, select an operation that will take 100% of your available CPU processes and then try and multitask. email, word, chatting, and listening to music or watching a movie won't give u an idea of what your system can handle. try encoding a DVD to divx at full resolution, and go from there.

u had to go there didn't u?

as u don't seem to be familiar w/ Macs i'll try and give u an idea as to what would need to be in place for the 6000 to be spec'd similarly.

as noted in my pros, discrete graphics. u need to jump up to the ATI x300 to model be in the ballpark.

The base systems start at $1425 w/ discrete graphics. mind u, the base x300 is not a pure discrete solution, but it's better than the intel 900 integrated graphics)

- add $50 to simply have an additional RAM slot open and opt for 1 bank of 512MB. (iBooks have 512MB built in w/ a slot open for upgrades).

- add $89 to a DVD burner to compliment the one in the 14" iBook.

- add $39 for bluetooth.

- add $99 for the 9-cell battery required to get the 5+ hours of battery life the 14" iBook gets.

- add $49 for "help desk" support for 30 days. w/ a Mac u get 90 days of call in support w/ the standard warranty.

- add $59 for MyDVD, DVD creation and editing software, to be similar to iDVD which comes w/the iLife suite in every Mac.

- add $39 for acrobat elements, to give windows the basic PDF creation ability that OS X has built in.

thus far that's $1799 to be similarly spec'd to what u get w/ a 14" iBook. once again, this is before adding the extra RAM and the 100GB hard drive he's interested in. w/ the 100GB drive, add $125. i won't suggest the dell memory upgrade as he's better off doing that from newegg, and it would cost him roughly the same for the iBook as well.

with some of the discounts Dell has, he can likely get it for a bit more than the cost of the stock iBook. the basic iBook u can have for $1175 flat after rebate from amazon, but then he'll have to do this math for himself as he may have paid full retail plus tax from apple.

if the price difference is only $100-200, then he needs to decide what benefits the dell may or may not offer based on a similarly spec'd system. as it sits now his decision-maker was price and windows familiarity. if the price is basically moot or perhaps even more expensive w/ the Dell, then he needs to determine whether the extra price is worth his feeling out of sorts in OS X.

lol, well i guess u took matters into your own hands! now u'll be able to see how they each do, hands on. just curious, did u pay taxes on the Dell?

Multitasking: i was referring to being able to browse the web while burning a dvd or switching between apps. it works pretty good on an amd, and with yonah coming out next year, it will be even better. the onyl demanding task i do on my desktop is gaming, and that is just one single task. for everyday use, there is no difference in multitasking. when youre doing a million processor intensive things at a time, im not really sure cause ive never done it on either system. i would try to encode a DVD and see how that hurts my system performance, but i dont own any. that said, i can have bittorrent running in the background with no problems

about your pricing thing, i used to be naive like that a few years ago. i was trying to justify purchasing an emac to myself and would go on dells site and buy every single piece of software/accesory i could find. then i realized that half the stuff i didnt need at all and the other half i could get for free on the net. and i have tiger x86 on an i6000 with integrated gfx and quartz runs fine. seeing as how thats all a video card can do at this level, i see it as an even configuration.

ill go down your list, just for the fun of it

RAM- it is cheaper to just put one 256 stick on ebay and get a 1gb stick off of newegg for 90 bucks.

dvd burner- i personally have a hard time justifying the extra cost to get one. i dont see how it can be usefull to a music editor, cd-rw's and winrar work too. you can compress a large file, cut it down to 700mb chuncks and put it on cheapo CD's.

bluetooth- again, why? just because apple has something integrated into their notebooks, doesnt mean it is usefull or worth paying for.

battery- how about no? the 6000 actaully gets very good battery life with the 6 cell, especially when undervolted. note quit 5 hours, but not too much less than that. and for an extra $30 you can get BOTH the 6 and the 9 cell battery.

Support- fhelpdesk is a waste of money for anyone who isnt a complete moron. neither I nor the TS will ever pay for it, so why bring it up?

MyDVD-it already comes with nero AFAIK.

acrobat elements- seriously? first off, WHY???? the only reason why macs support pdf is because they cant support anything else. its not a cool new feature, its just a guaranteed way for mac users to be able to communicate with us simple folk without having to deal with format problems. its not an issue for pc users. second, there is an app you can get for free which converts .doc to .pdf, or better yet, you can download openoffice.org which has that feature built in.
and again matztoyz, have you checked out asus?

Yeah, but Nero is really not that great of an app. And, it's amazing how often trying to open a pdf on a PC will lock the system up.

But anyway, for multitasking...

Open iTunes and start some music playing. While you're at it, burn a data cd or dvd. Maybe encode some video while doing all of this. Oh, and open up 5 or 8 other apps in the background and just let them run. Maybe chat on IM and browse the web, too. Maybe have photoshop do some action filters on psds. How's the system holding up?

I have all of that going on right now with no problems. Even opened up a few quicktime files and had both of them running at the same time. I hit expose and effortlessly switched between them.

That is multitasking.

I have a 600m & I like it alot.

thank u frankt. it's funny isn't it? how the "look how much more u get w/ a PC for the money!"-spews forth so readily, and when it's actually addressed what the disparities are, the defense is "well u don't actually need all that stuff". ah, i get it. when the PC is cheaper than the Mac then u "need" it, but when a comparably equipped Mac comes out as the same price or cheaper, it's a bunch of stuff that's extraneous. riiiight...

XGA on a 14.1" screen is so 2002...

What's wrong with a 14.1 screen? It's small & cute!