to macintel or not to macintel?

flacochala

I`m in!!
I've been doing some serious thinking the last month. I own a perfectly good iBook g4... but for some reason i wanted the black macbook the minute it hit the streets... my iBook works like a charm, and i haved it for 3 years now, but i thought it was time for a change (although buying a mac where i live is extremly difficult and expensive). So as i always do before investing a lot of money in something, i started researching about the macbook, it cons, it pros.. everything i can to convince myself that the macbook was the notebook I needed. But something happend, i started to notice that the macbook is full of problems, and everyone is complaining about a lot and different issues. Ant whats worse about it, is that everyone es covering the hole problem behind sayings like "its a rev a computer", or "its a core duo chip, its supposed to be hot". Come on people, let face the truth, apple has lost a some quality in the past few years, you only have to compare the materials of the computer to notice, look at the clamshell ibook against the icebook or the last ibook, and youll see. But, that is a lost of quality im able to bare with, because apple is in the computer bussiness and they want to make money. But with the recently change to the intel platform, apple has started to lose a lot(and i mean a LOT) of quality in its products. I personally think that apple has lost a lot by joining with intel, the new machines are no longer different, they are the same as a pc, in fact they have the same components of a pc, but in a fancy and slicker case; inside there is an intel northbridge, intel logic board, intel graphics, intel ethernet, c'mon... is an intel machine (apple is no longer controlling the hardware), inside an apple case, with osx running on top... And from what ive heard, its not running perfectly... 'cause people have been experiencing kernel panics, shutdowns, cpu throtelling, etc...
So, to conclude, i think that apple is loosing with the intel change, ill stick with my reliable, warm (not hot), ultra tought ppc computer (that only has hang on my once) until apple releases an apple ibook predecesor i can count on... not some cheesy intel box, that ill have to return in 5 days, because is discolouring, because it melted down, mooing, whining, killing dvd's with its superdrive, blowing up batterys, burning up magsafes, flaking, making noises that no one can descipher, etc... what do you think??
 
I do think there's evidence of a drop in quality with the MacBooks and MacBook Pros, and possibly the last generation of Powerbooks.
My Powerbook, though, has been pretty solid; just a failed hard drive after a year and a half of steady use, replaced free of charge under AppleCare's warranty. Hard drive failure in laptops, after a year and a half to two years seems to be not all that uncommon. Laptops use miniaturized components.
As far as the new MacIntels are concerned, they do seem to have their fair share of problems, running too hot being a big issue. Reading other Mac forums and Mac focused sites, it's pretty clear that there are no small number of new MacIntel owners with laptop problems.
I, for one, wouldn't buy one right now. I'd wait 'till the problems are worked out, probably at least another 6 months to a year(if ever!).
If Mac quality and reliability have, indeed, slipped, then who knows if and when those issues will ever be successfully addressed.
 
I'm also pondering whether or not I should upgrade. My iMac isn't what I'd call unusable, but it's definitely annoying sometimes (and extremely slow other times).

In saying that, I wanted to upgrade to something portable like a MacBook Pro. Problem is, I read somewhere that later this year the MBP could be receiving the Core 2 Duo processor. Would it be wise waiting for some kind of significant upgrade? (I'm not super desperate....yet)
 
If you can wait, wait. Only jump if it's getting dire. The reason I haven't upgraded is that Apple -to me- is a bit customer abusing in that you never know when something better is coming out. No prescheduled dates, no warning, nothing. I would have buyer's remorse a month or less after buying the "latest" hardware.
 
My mantra is: never ever buy a first generation Apple computer!

They always have some (more or less) serious issues.

Now that you can find new PowerBook and iBook laptops at highly reduced prices, I think I would rather buy one of those. (Even though the iBooks have been having logic board issues since the days of the G3 ones; they have never been fully eradicated, afaik.)

patrice
http://www.patriceschneider.com/apple-osx/blog/
 
Veljo said:
In saying that, I wanted to upgrade to something portable like a MacBook Pro. Problem is, I read somewhere that later this year the MBP could be receiving the Core 2 Duo processor. Would it be wise waiting for some kind of significant upgrade? (I'm not super desperate....yet)
It's likely that we'll see the Merom (which I think is officially called "Core 2 Duo") in MBPs in August, which is when the chip is slated for release. Apple won't want to drag their feet while the rest of the industry moves forward.

One of the advantages to Apple's switch to Intel is that now they have more direct competition, which will force them to stay on their toes a bit more. We can also better predict when Apple will revamp their machines based on Intel's public roadmaps. One of the disadvantages is that now they, like other companies, might be racing to get releases out quickly, sacrificing testing time and quality.

It's always a good idea to wait a while after a product is released, so you can hear of any issues early adopters are having. But of course, if you wait too long, then a new model will be just around the corner! So there's the choice: Brave the dangers that come with being an early adopter, or buy a machine that's likely to be "obsolete" soon.

You might want to think in terms of software updates instead of hardware; Apple will probably release Leopard in 6 months or so. If you'll want the latest software, and your current machine is getting the job done, then it makes sense to wait a while and save yourself the $129 to buy Leopard.
 
Gotta weigh in here... I've seen and used iBooks from all generations. Clamshell, all the whites and even the last G4 ones. And now I've got the MacBook.

Yes, the MacBook does get warmer indeed. - But then it also performs much better. Think of it as a dual processor G5 in a notebook factor. Speedwise. And it only gets too warm if it has to _do_ too much. Predictable. So keep it on your knees when you're going to type for an hour or two _without_ a problem, but for watching a movie (decoding uses processor a bit) or working other CPU-intensive tasks, you might want to have it on a table or something.

Quality... The clamshell iBook was fine. The first white iBooks were fine. Then it went down. Suddenly you had the motherboard failures (looooooooots of them!) and creaking hinges and _more_ motherboard failures... The MacBook is solid. It _feels_ more expensive. None of that "ah, it's a _cheap_ Mac" feeling that you might get with an iBook sometimes. Definitely a big step forward.

Sure: The Rev. B is probably always better than the Rev. A - but then for the white iBooks that wasn't true. At the end, it only matters if _your_ specific iBook or MacBook has a certain flaw or not. My MacBook seems very fine to me. It doesn't turn yellow/orange on the palmrests (which probably has to do with people's sweat or something), it doesn't get too hot, it performs wonderfully and gives me almost 6 hours of battery life when just typing in my stories. While the iBooks also give good battery life and are even cooler running, they simply don't perform, compared to the core duo computers.

About waiting for the _next_ generation of MBs and MBPs: You can _always_ do that. I'm sure that when Merom arrives in Apple's notebooks, there'll be talk about the generation _after_ that, though.
 
yeap fryke... i see your point.. and that you should only change your mac when the one you have doesnt fullfill your needs... but, let me express my idea a bit better... im a little dissapointed at apple, im a mac user for some time now, i dont consider myself a blind fan, but i developed a good relationship with my actual ibook, and with the apple brand. And to be totally honest y expected more... dont get me wrong here, i think the macbook is a fantastic machine , just take a look at those specs, that machine will probably blow mine, but i also see that has lowered its standards to compete with the "pc world"; the machine are experiencing problems that a macs didnt have in the past, such as whining, mooing, extreme hot (ok, the g4 cube, but it didnt have a fan, the intel macs do), its seems like the material the cause of the problem with the yellowing is the material, etc... and i cannot avoid to think that this problems may be related with intel being part of the building of the new macs, but this is just my point of view. I just wanted something more macintoish, more "think different", not a pc laptop cased in a mac suit. But thats me, and as you say, ill probably buy one when my current goes to mac heaven, and ill probably wont be so anxious to get that new mac, as i was when i got my current one
 
Yeah well but that's you. It certainly is _not_ intel at fault here, and I have a perfectly different view about the quality of the MacBook. So all I can say is: Consider it. Go look at it. And if you still think you keep your 'book: What's your point? ;)
 
I'd love to get my hands on either the MacBook or the MacBook Pro.
My sister recently purchased a pc laptop equipped with those dual core intels. After messing around with it, I'm glad that the Apple notebooks will also have these intel chips. The only reason I'm not getting one now is
because I'm buying a new car. I also like the idea of having OS X and windows on the same laptop. I'm sick of carrying 2 laptops to work.
 
For people with this exact problem, the new MacBooks (all models incl. Pro) are really great. BootCamp and Parallels give you almost the perfect solution already. (It'd be perfect if you could use one Windows installation for both a virtual machine and direct-booting into XP, of course, but I'm hoping that's coming sooner or later.)
 
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