Mac 360's Alexis Kayhill posted an interesting piece last Friday,
The Top 7 Macs of All Time: Read It and Weep, which she says wasn't
the article she originally set out to write. She explains that her
assignment had been to compile a list of her favorite Macs ever, but
she couldn't do it, noting that looking back over two decades as a Mac
user she can think of some favorites (and others not so much) but
concluded that not one of them compares favorably to any Mac she's
currently using.
Conducting a straw poll of Mac-using friends, family, and colleagues
determined that while everyone had fond memories of Macs past, nobody
would want to swap their current late-model hardware for an oldie
goldie.
"What's so special about Macs of 2011?," she asks rhetorically,
answering that it's largely speed, observing that sitting down with a
PowerPC machine after becoming acclimated to multicore Intel power is
like riding a Harley and then trying to get along with a tricycle.
I know what she means. A I have a foot in both worlds.
Objectively, my late 2008 model aluminum unibody
MacBook is no screamer compared with Apple's latest Core i and Core
Duo machines, but it feels like one compared with my Pismo PowerBooks - which are
both upgraded from their original 500 MHz G3 processors to the maximum
possible (for Pismos) 550 MHz Motorola 7410 G4 power. The nearly
11-year-old PowerBooks are definitely still usable for what I mostly do
on them, which is mainly composing and editing editing text, email, and
a bit of light-duty image editing. They're fairly decent performers for
Web surfing as well, but everything goes faster on the 2 GHz MacBook
with its 4 GB of RAM and Nvidia 9400M graphics.
My Favorite Vintage Mac
The Pismo is my no-brainer
pick for favorite Mac oldie, and it's simply phenomenal that they're
still a practical proposition for production work at all given their
advanced age. But were I obliged to live with just one of my present
Macs, I would choose the MacBook without hesitation - and even better
if it could be a new 13" MacBook Pro or
MacBook Air.
It doesn't surprise me that Alexis Kayhill was unable to find anyone
among her Mac-using acquaintances who wouldn't make a similar choice.
The Macs of the past several years are the best computers Apple has
ever made from a functional perspective, and it's just icing on the
proverbial cake that that they're also the most affordable.
Worst. Mac. Ever.
Worst Mac ever? I would have to agree with Dan Knight's evaluation
of the mid-90s desktop
Power Mac and Performa 5200-53xx & 6200-6320 families as the
absolute, all-time bottom of the barrel "Road Apples."
Mac Longevity
So how many years can one realistically expect to get out of a
Mac?
It depends partly on what you want to do with them. I'm doubtful
that I'll ever be able to reprise the longevity I've gotten from the
Pismos. On the other hand, my wife is still more than satisfied using
the 2004-vintage 17"
1.33 GHz PowerBook I handed down to her when I upgraded to the Core
2 Duo MacBook.
Speaking of which, I'm now just short of the 24 month mark since I
purchased it in early 2009, and while I'm convinced that it's going to
be high on list of my all-time favorite Macs, it's beginning to feel a
bit lazy compared with Apple's current offerings. And I still wish it
had a FireWire port like the 13" MacBook Pros have, although I have to
concede that I really haven't missed having FireWire as much as I had
anticipated.
My target for intervals between upgrading my main workhorse systems
has been three years ever since I bought my first Mac back in 1992, I've done pretty
well at adhering to it, and it remains my objective, which puts buying
a replacement time for my MacBook sometime in early 2012 - which is
beginning to seem a long way off.
The Upgrade Cycle
That's consistent with the way these upgrade cycles usually play out
for me. For the first year I revel in the greater power and storage
capacity of my new machine compared with whatever it replaced. At 18
months, twinges of slight frustration and dissatisfaction have started
to set in, especially after upgraded models of the computer I'm using
have been introduced, but I still really have nothing to complain
about.
However, by the beginning of year three - the point I'm at right now
in the current cycle roadmap - the aging Mac is usually beginning to
feel compromised, and the hunt begins, although for my last four
primary Macs I've managed to reach or beat the three-year replacement
benchmark.
Of course, it helps that I like the challenge of getting useful
service out of antiquated hardware, as witnessed by the Pismo
PowerBooks still in service.
Actually, I still have most of the Macs I've ever owned, and only a
few are not in working order. Our 700 MHz 12" iBook G3 died suddenly at the
youngish age of six, but it had been a virtually flawless performer up
to the day it completely refused to respond to the power button -
presumably a terminal motherboard issue. One of my daughters is still
using my old 1999
WallStreet PowerBook, and I'm pretty sure that even my first Mac,
an original form factor Mac
Plus of late '80s vintage purchased used in '92, would boot up if I
dug it out of storage, although I haven't done so for many years.
Looking forward, at this point I have a short list of two potential
replacements for my MacBook when the day comes to upgrade: the 13"
MacBook Pro and the 13" MacBook Air. One imponderable at this juncture
is that it's highly probable both models will be updated by a year from
now. A
t present, it would boil down to the Pro's lower price, larger
storage drive capacity, upgradable RAM, and FireWire support vs. the
Air's higher-resolution display, SSD speed, and downright
seductiveness. My head says Pro, and it doesn't hurt that I have been
very happy with my MacBook's looks and logistics.
We'll see
Macs notwithstanding their current relatively bargain-basement
prices in historical context are still generally more expensive than
typical corresponding Windows PCs, at least up front, so it logically
stands to reason that they should have longer useful lives.
How about you? Do any oldies still entice you, and what do you
consider a reasonable service life for your Macs?
