Good morning, fellow lowenders.
As you might remember, in my last column I
was contemplating the replacement of my ailing two-year-old iBook, giving me
the choices of buying a "no name" run-of-the-mill i686 running Ubuntu Linux, a new G4 iBook (maybe with a future
price reduction from Apple when they clean out their stock), or wait
for the new Intel iBooks.
I asked you, the readers, to give me your opinion on what my best
options are - and you certainly rose to the challenge.
Eric McCann reminded my what side I was writing for:
"Besides, you're writing for LEM, you should know how
to stretch life out of a new G4...."
Ouch. That hurt. Of course, he's right.
On the other hand, I was very happy to do all my emailing and
document processing on an SE/30 with 1 MB of RAM, so I
feel only slightly hurt.
Owen Strawn just put the boot in a bit deeper:
"Sounds to me like you should be looking at a nice
used laptop. Hey, this is Low End Mac after all."
Jerry Freeman brought up a good option that would at least give me a
warranty:
"A simpler solution would be a refurb 12" PowerBook
from the Apple Store. Full one year warranty, greater hardware
features - exception[al] AirPort range, and I would wager two years
before any software incomparability problems arise."
Floyd Gilmore believes in Apple's commitment to it's PowerPC
customers:
"I doubt that Apple would dare to offend all those
people who plunked down their $500 or more on a G4-based Mac mini or iBook G4 by rendering
them obsolete in less than two years. Support for those models should
reach out to 2008 or so, but that's more tea leaf readings and not
based on facts."
I would certainly hope so. As you can see, a pattern begins to form.
I think the consensus is moving towards a used G4 portable machine.
Bryan Taylor, a fellow Kiwi, sold his old TiBook and bought a nice
used machine on TradeMe, the
local equivalent to
eBay. There was only one problem:
"An interesting point, I found it hard selling the
TiBook, I found I had a ridiculous emotional attachment to it
:-)"
The most comprehensive email came from David Ip. His email earned
him a very stylish and incredibly exciting Oamaru fridge magnet. He
told me about his recent similar dilemma and added some helpful
financial realities. His closing statement rang very true to me:
"All computer equipment becomes obsolete eventually,
so you can't really buy for the future (with a notebook, anyway).
Evaluate your needs and buy accordingly within your budget - and if you
can, buy used and let someone else take the new computer tax hit (15%
in my area!)"
How very correct.
What do I do with my iBook? Email, word processing, iTunes, and
surfing the Web. A preloved 2005 iBook G4 with enough RAM will be
plenty for another two years. By then the Intel iBooks will have enough
native applications to make them interesting.
But a 2005 G4 isn't really a low-end Mac, is it?
So I'd better shut up - otherwise somebody will email from his
PowerBook 150, telling me what a
big sissy I am. 
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