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Worth getting a Powerbook now?

post #1 of 12
Thread Starter 
Hi, the other day I met a friend that was willing to sell his powerbook g4 12inches for 1300$ dollars. What do you think people? Is it worth buying this notebook or wait for the newer, more expensive intel core duo notebooks.

I thought it is interesting because Adobe has said that it will not renew it's Creative Suite until 2007, meaning that powerbooks will reign until 2007, because the intel macs are running photosop under rosseta. So in that perspective it's a good buy, and especially after all those problems starting to pop on the Macbook pro.

I will need a laptop for college in fall, so i started to do the research,
post #2 of 12
what speed is it?
post #3 of 12
Thread Starter 
Its a 1.5 Ghz with a 60GB drive and I think a superdrive, with 768 of Ram
post #4 of 12
are you saying that you can get it for 1300USD? or CAD? because a brand new one if you are speaking in US currency isn't that far off. That said, with apple it's not really much about having the latest hardware, there are still people out there that have G3 computers that are running the latest software, I believe that if you get the 12inch powerbook at a good price it will still be usable for years to come. Seeing that you need it for college and not for gaming it shouldn't matter much. Now if it were a pc laptop for example and you wanted to play the latest games, this is when you would NEED the latest hardware because pc gaming requires you to always have the latest hardware. I say go for it if the price is right, however if it's in USD, you should think about getting a new one because the price isn't that far off
post #5 of 12
Well, I probably wouldn't buy it from your friend since a new one will only run $100 USD more. They are working hard on a universal binary Adobe CS, and I think it will come earlier than '07.
post #6 of 12
1300US isn't bad and CAD would be even better, particularly w/ the extra bit of RAM in there. u may want more but for most uses it's a decent amount. not a bad deal particularly if there is some warranty left allowing u to buy the extended applecare warranty. if it's in good condition there's really no difference between a new one and what you'd get fromyour friend, and since it's from a friend u can give it a test run to check out dead pixels and such b4 u decide. that or u could wait for the smaller intel mac notebooks which seem to be just around the corner.
post #7 of 12
If his looks good, then you can buy it from him. But if you buy a new one, the only difference is that it is new, obviously, has 80GB hard drive, and 512MB ram.

How new is the computer? Does it comes with iLife 06?
post #8 of 12
hi there, Just wanted to give you my take on getting a powerbook now. 2 weeks ago i got an intel imac and loved it, it ran quite well, as a matter of fact you can see my review in the review section. i really like it so much that i said i wanted to get a portable mac so i can take it everywhere. I gave back my imac seeing that i got it from a store that allows you to give it back in 14 days, i then got the 17inch powerbook from the same store. 1.67ghz G4 with the new 17 inch monitor. To be totally honist with you I am in no way impressed with the powerbooks performance, the performance that of the imac was waaaaaaaaayyyy better, now i'm actually going to give this back and just get the macbookpro. i'm not saying that the powerbook sucks or anything, however the performance compared to the new intels is faaaar behind. to prove this I tried watching the HD trailer of Xmen 3 while using garage band and i photo at the same time. the powerbook goes down to a crawl and the movie starts skipping, on the imac you can do much much more and the movie will still play without skipping.



here is the imac i use to have

post #9 of 12
I got a 12" PB off the refurb Apple site, 1.5GHz, 80GB, 768MB, SuperDrive for 1199$ shipped. Go that route if you're going to get a 12" PB.
post #10 of 12
Thread Starter 
So you people are saying it's better to spend more cash and get the new intel macs? my friend is going to loan it to me for a day or two, so i'll see if it's new or kinda worn..
post #11 of 12
I am new to the mac community but i have recently made a huge plunge. I now have a G4 Powerbook similar to the one your looking to purchase from your friend. I love it. The Adobe and Macormedia Suites run amazing. Aperture and Final Cut run well as well. I don't know what the new Intel ones are like but from what i hear for programs that universal binary's aren't out for seem to run oddly slow using Rosetta. Its your call but if its in good condition and you require something small and powerful i think its a good buy. Currently MacBook's only come in 15 inches and the Spurdrive's are slower for DVD burning for some reason. My superdrive is 8x while the macbook pro's come with a 4x burner. Regardless its a good buy either way. Hope you are happy with you decision whenever you make it.
post #12 of 12
i wouldn't pay $1300 for it. maybe $1000, then i'd do it
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