|
17" PowerBook G4: More reader impressions II
March 24, 2003
by Steve Hildreth
Editor-in-Chief
More readers are sending in their first impressions of the 17" PowerBook G4. These are the most recent we've received:
From Scott Steckly: "I would like to offer my thoughts on the 17" PowerBook, which was acquired last Thursday from the Oakbrook, IL Apple Store.
As some of you know, I have been waiting for a 17? PowerBook since their introduction, and because of reasons to boring to repeat, I cancelled my long-standing order for a supposedly quicker-shipping one (SCAMazon), which of course fell through, I was left and the end of the line with no order. Well, through some pretty cool events, I now have one, thanks to some cool people and the Oakbrook Apple store in the US. It arrived yesterday, and I am ready to share my pictures and first impressions with you. I was originally going to have this available last night, but I held off pending some further investigation, providing you with more in-depth information than you would have had otherwise.
The box is constructed very well. It has a matte black appearance, which shows the silver outline of the computer very well. Very classy. Probably the nicest box so far in the PowerBook line. I like it much better than the glossy white boxes of other models (although they are much cooler than some of the unfinished cardboard boxes offered by PC manufacturers). It uses the Styrofoam/Cardboard hybrid top section as seen in the Titanium line, where when the top is opened, there is a lift-up piece of thin cardboard covering the cables and manuals. This on is glossy white with a gray Apple logo and the words 'designed by Apple in California'. Underneath, there is the standard assortment of accessories that we've come to expect from the Titanium line. We've got a printed 'Getting Started' manual, which is fairly thick, an AppleCare card detailing the support options you have including getting an AppleCare Protection Plan, a sheet detailing the actual warranty terms, a few sheets with regulatory information for the various wireless services offered by this new machine, and a four-page instruction manual for Bluetooth. On the hardware side, we see the traditional white square power adapter, with a few changes. The new version produces 65W of power continuous. It uses the same interchangeable plug/cord architecture as previous models, but the round stud that holds the side of the plug agaist the adapter, above the prongs, is now metal, and mates with a metal insert on the power cord plug. This provides the power cord's three-wire ground. When using the plug module (no cord), there is no ground, as with previous versions. I don't know why having a ground is now a feature ? possibly due to the 'static' reported in the case of some Ti owners? The power supply cord is thicker, round, and much more flexible. It seems to be exactly the same as the Flat Panel iMac's power supply cord. The plug adapter is identical to previous units, and the power adapter case itself has the fold-out 'wings' to wrap the thin power cord than connects the power supply with the computer, as with previous models. With continuous heavy use, the new power adapter doesn't seem to get quite as warm as previous versions, with an extended Virtual PC session getting the temperature of the adapter to 89 degrees (according to an infrared temperature gun). The box also includes a gray phone cord (standard RJ-11), a DVI-I to VGA adapter, and a S-Video to composite adapter. These items seem identical to those included with later versions of the Titanium (Revisions C and D). The power adapter charges the battery in the same time-frame as previous Titanium PowerBooks, with a fast charge switching to a trickle charge as the battery reaches capacity. It uses the same style plug as the Titaniums, with a light-up ring indicating charge status. The casing of the plug is now white, instead of silver, however. Apple recommends completely discharging and recharging (calibrating) the battery, which showed about a 20% increase in runtime. I purchased a second power adapter, in an Apple box labeled '65W Portable Power Adapter', which is identical to the one included in the box. If you are buying a secondary power adapter for your computer, make sure that it's the 65W version, as Apple stated that the older style may not provide enough power during heavy media drive use (I can't find the statement, however). Extra power adapters have a list price of USD$79.
Moving on, beneath the upper Styrofoam piece is the PowerBook, nestled in another piece. The fit between the top and bottom piece is not that good, however, which is the cause of the eerie rattling in the box. This is normal, so don't worry if you have this happens to you. The PowerBook itself is wrapped in a weird sleeve that provides some actual padding (the Titanium used clear plastic wrapping). It is nearly opaque white, and sealed with the traditional Apple 'you must agree to the terms' label. Upon lifting it out of it's packaging, it seems right-off to be extremely heavy and big. More about this later. The fit and finish of the machine is utterly jaw-dropping. The hard-anodized aluminum finish feels smooth, but upon close inspection, it has a very light texture, providing a tactile feel. It is feels much nicer to the touch than the Titanium finish. Around the edges of the screen and base are thin strips of gray plastic pressed into the seams of the case. These were all properly seated when the machine arrived, and have continued to be through over a full day of use. They look quite nice, and contrast well with the Aluminum finish. This same material is pressed in around the ports ? which will protect the edges against scratches and wear when the plugs are scraped against the edges of the ports. It also looks very classy ? filling up the empty space around the ports and case. On the left side of the case is a Kensington-style security slot, power port, RJ-11 connection for the internal modem, a USB 1.1 port, PC card slot (with a solid-aluminum door, and matching button), and audio input and output ports. On the right side is a DVI-I output, S-Video Output, Gigabit Ethernet port, FireWire 800 and 400 port, and a second USB 1.1 port (great as a direct connection for a wired mouse when traveling). The screws that are present around the sides and bottom of the case are tiny Phillips-head screws, and they were all tight, and there are no stripped (or even damaged) screw heads. You open the screen by pressing against a wide, glossy metal button, in the same position as the button on the Titanium models. There is a small white LED on the left side of the button that pulses on and off indicating sleep (it was on the lower screen bezel on the Titaniums). Pressing the button requires a firm (but not overly so) touch, and the screen pops open about an inch. The screen either has a VERY smooth hinge or a sprung counterweight, because it feels nearly weightless to operate. As with the newer iBooks, the screen drops behind the body of the computer when open, rather than hinging from the top like the Titanium. The trackpad is quite a bit wider, and is slightly recessed into the casing. It has a more tactile feel, which I really like. The button is soft-touch and very quiet, but it does make a nice click. By far the best notebook trackpad I have used. It would be easy to contact the upper corners with your palms while typing, sending the cursor rocketing around the screen, so thankfully, Apple includes an 'Ignore trackpad while typing' option in the Keyboard pane of System Preferences, which works as advertised.
The expansive screen is just beautiful. When you first open the PowerBook, you'll let out a gasp (I know I did!). There is a sheet placed between the screen for shipping ? made out of the same material as the wrapper mentioned earlier. In the words of Steve Jobs: 'It's a lot of glass'. It certainly is. The screen how has two magnetic drop-down latches, instead of the one present on the Titanium. The 'hooks' are much beefier than the previous Titanium's, but they appear to be made of plastic (rather than metal). There are also two hard-rubber pads near the 'hooks', which prevent the screen from closing to far. The material that the 'hook' 'hooks' to in the base of the computer is now metal, instead of plastic as in the Titanium, which is a welcome change, as I had a plastic one break at one point. The display latches positively when closed ? no 'pushing down' on the screen to get a full latch as with the Titanium. It also provides a nice 'click' upon latching. The keyboard is beautiful appearance-wise, with it's painted laser-etched keys. The new font used on the key caps is VERY cool, in my opinion. You can't tell that light is intended to shine though ? with the light on, the text looks dark gray. The keys are also nicely rounded. The keyboard requires a slightly heavier touch than the Titanium keyboard, and provides more tactile feedback, which I greatly prefer. Since this keyboard is not removable, there is absolutely no flex. They keyboard uses the familiar key layout of the previous PowerBooks, but adds new controls for the keyboard backlighting on the F8-F10 keys.
On to the usage and performance of the PowerBook. The power button is slightly stiffer than the one on the Titanium, which will prevent accidental activation, at least slightly. It is glossy silver. The PowerBook starts up normally into OS X (this computer will not boot into OS9). Upon viewing the desktop, I get a grasp of the enormity of the display. I ran PixelCheck on it, and to my surprise, it's a perfect screen. It's been a long time since I have had a perfect screen, so that's really cool. After playing around with the desktop, I finally see how much real estate there is to work with. To take the words from that guy in the Apple promo video, 'It doesn't feel like the world is falling down around you anymore'. The extra real estate will do wonders for my productivity and general happiness when using the system. It seems to be about the same brightness (at max) than the Titanium screens, and seems to be viewable from a much wider angle. But the size! Man, is it nice.
The system seems very snappy with the powerful 1Ghz processor, and base 512MB of RAM. I can't tell a big difference than from my 800Mhz Titanium, but windows seem to open that much quicker, and I haven't even had a chance to run graphics intensive apps or games yet to test the video board. I'll post an update here when I get to (this evening or tomorrow).
The media drive works quite well. It sucks the discs in and spits them out in the same manner as later model Titaniums (it doesn't use the pinch-roller feed of the first-revision Titanium), and is MUCH quieter. A disc can be in there going full speed, and all you hear is a pleasant whirr rather than the buzzing and incredible vibration of the Titanium. It can burn CD's at 16x (instead of the 8x advertised), DVDs at 1x, and can read DVD-Data, DVD-Video, CD Data, CD Audio, and PhotoCD discs. The hard drive is a Fujitsu 60GB, and is also incredibly quiet. You can hardly hear it when idle, and it makes only tiny clicks when reading/writing. It sounds surprisingly much like an iPod's hard drive. The backlit keyboard is a bit confusing when you are first trying to figure it out. It should be better documented in the User's Manual. When trying to use the keyboard buttons for the backlight, it pops up a dialog just like the brightness or volume buttons do, but there is a small circle with an 'X' through it (universal 'no' symbol) at the bottom. I was worried that this was a malfunction at first, but found out that it will only come on when the ambient light sensors (located under the speak grilles) indicate that it's dark enough ? there is no manual override. You can turn it on and off and adjust the fully variable brightness from the keyboard. It works amazingly well. When it's dark enough that you would need a keyboard light, it completely lights up the key cap letter, and also provides an outline of the keys. When you turn it on and off, it gradually dims up and down ? very classy. The keyboard light, which seemed to me to be more a a gimmick than anything, will be an incredibly useful and incredibly cool addition to an already cool machine. To dispel a rumor ? the light is white, not blue.
The battery bay is at the bottom at the center of the computer. It has five status lights now ? and when you press the silver button, they come on in sequence ? one right after another ? one more really cool, if not exactly useful, feature. The battery pops out with the activation of two silver metal latches ? no more batteries popping out because of the the latches snagged on something. When you push the battery back in, it provides a very tight, secure lock. The battery in this model is incredibly thin, nearly half the thickness of the Titanium battery. It has a slightly larger surface area, however. Underneath the battery are three tiny Phillips screws that you remove to take off the access panel for the RAM slots. I was very worried that the screws would end up being stripped like the ones on the heatsink of the Wallstreet PowerBook, but they are made of a very strong material, and are resistant to stripping when the proper screwdriver is used. Here's another tip: DO NOT use anything but a Size 00 Phillips screwdriver. You may not have one, but DO NOT try to use something else. If you get the proper kind, you will not have to worry about stripped screw heads. Also, be sure to keep constant downward pressure on the screwdriver to prevent the tip from riding out of the head, another cause of stripping. Once the cover is removed, you see the two RAM slots, which accept ONLY 200-pin PC2700 333Mhz DDR RAM (184-pin will not work). The one slot is filled with the standard 512MB module. This module is double-height (probably in the interest of cost reduction). The secondary slot will not accept double-height memory. That is the only thing accessible from this slot, but you can clearly make out the power connectors and hard drive cable. The cards are a standard snap-in affair like in any previous model. Another pointer: the screws that hold the cover in place are TINY! Don't lose them, you'll never find any more.
The speaker grilles are much wider, and have smaller holes, than those on the Titanium. They take up the entire space from the edge of the keyboard to the edge of the case. The speakers are on par with those from the Titanium ? although they seem to have slightly better bass response, and are capable of a higher volume without distortion. The much-lauded ambient light sensors are under each grille. They are surprisingly effective. You set the screen to a brightness you like for the current lighting situation, and the sensors will adjust it exponentially if the ambient light gets dimmer or brighter. You can test the sensor by covering the grilles. You can turn off automatic screen adjustment and automatic keyboard lighting as well, if you prefer.
On to the issue of heat. When connected to the Power Adapter (whether it's charging or not makes no noticeable difference), the left palm rest area only starts to get warm after about 15 minutes of use. It maxes out after about an hour of use, at only a moderately warm temperature. Nowhere near hot, but more than lukewarm. When running off the battery, it is slightly warmer. The majority of the heat is concentrated over the left palm rest, but the rest of the heat seems to be uniformly spread over the entire computer. I haven't had a chance to do processor-intensive tasks yet (playing games, or extended Virtual PC or rendering tasks), but I'll post an update soon. Is there a fan? I sure haven't heard one come on. There are two long vents on the left and right sides of the computer, nearest the user. There is a long vent behind the screen hinge.
As for battery life, I get between 2.5 and 3.5 hours. 2 hours with the media drive reading, less when writing. 2.5 with screen fully bright, and 3.75 near the low end of screen brightness with limited processor and hard drive activity. Not great, but when you consider the size of the screen, I'm surprised it isn't less. AirPort reception is much improved. Where I got 55%-60% signal, I now get over 80%. Great improvement. I don't have an AirPort Extreme base station, just an old 'snow' 802.11b unit. My connection speed nowhere near pushes the speed limitations, so I have no reason to upgrade until this unit fails. The new version of the AirPort Admin Utility works perfectly with the older station, and no connection problems. I wouldn't know that this isn't an 802.11b card.
So, to sum up, the 17? PowerBook was certainly worth the long wait. I would have waited twice this long to get my hands on this beautiful machine. This is a terrifically strong Revision A compared to the Titanium, but there are a few (very minor) flaws. One is that the audio ports are kind of loose. Not so loose that there is a bad connection, but I would prefer a tighter fit. The plugs also don't go in fully ? you can see a little bit of the silver shaft when fully engaged, although the connection is still perfect from what I can tell. No static or anything, even when the plug is moved around. Another 'flaw' (it's not a flaw) is that when using the PowerBook on a flat surface, your hands can get it the way of the bottom part of the screen (due to the 'dropped' screen design). This is not an issue, as I use a CoolPad Podium to raise the computer up to a more comfortable height (which works great the the 17?, by the way). The ports that are now on the sides make connection from a seated position much easier, and also look much cooler, but there is a mess of wires when you use most of the plugs when at your desk. But, here again, the benefits of side-mounted plugs far outweigh a minor inconvenience. The unit is noticeably larger an heavier than the Titanium, but not extremely so. Since the weight is spread out over a larger area, it doesn't seem much heavier than a Titanium. The added size is not a problem. It seems larger than a Titanium by a lot, but when you actually do a side-by-side comparison, there is very little difference. It fits comfortably on a lap, and reasonably well in an airline seat. There's no question that it's bigger than the Titanium. Is it 'too' big and heavy? Absolutely not."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
"Overall impressions after an hour of use...WOW! The LCD display is beautiful, there is NO heat problem, and the unit is extremely quiet....both the fan and hard drive are barely audible. The speakers sound very good and you can actually hear stereo when playing stereo material. The construction is very solid, with good fit and finish, and the screen is rigid enough to open and close by grasping on one corner. When the screen is closed, there is a very slight amount of play, as if it's not fully latched...even though it is. I haven't had it long enough to evaluate the battery life, but will give an update in a day or two. Very happy so far....."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
"Picture of 17" PowerBook setup:
http://ouray.cudenver.edu/~rjhollin/images/pb17.jpg"
---------------------------------------------------------------------
"The Apple Store at Willow Bend Mall in Plano, TX called me last Friday (03/21) to let me know they had a 17" PowerBook for me. I picked it up after work, charged it up at the airport, and then flew to San Diego for the weekend. After being open on a desk all weekend, I now find that the top does not stay shut when I close it. It is not warped. It seems that the back hinge is so tight, the magnetic latches cannot overcome the tension placed on the mechanism when I close up the laptop. Another call to the Apple Store resulted in an invitation to return to the store and have my PowerBook examined, which I will do Monday. I'll let you know what the geniuses say...
I had a similar problem with one of the first Dual USB 12" iBooks. Has anyone else experienced this problem?"
---------------------------------------------------------------------
"I received my 17 inch PowerBook with 1 GB of RAM on 3/21/03 from Apple.com
The Styrofoam box was a bit smelly, but the smell went away after I removed the computer and closed the box. The computer was very well packaged, so there was no risk of a scratched lid. I am disappointed that I am going to have to scar the box in order to take advantage of the HP printer rebate. Performance is much better than the PowerMac 8500 it replaces. It is certainly adequate for a portable.
The screen is great. No dead pixels apparent using Pixel Check. Anti-aliasing did not seem to be at the optimal setting by default. Not only does the keyboard light up when the room gets dark, but the screen dims as well. You can see this by placing covers over the speaker grills. I was able to drive my external 20 inch monitor, at the same resolution that my 8500 was running at, in a dual-display setup.
The keyboard is fine. I think it may be more ergonomic if the keyboard was closer to the edge, instead of being close to the monitor, so there is less chance of resting my palms on the flat surface by the track pad. I don't have a mouse for the yet, but the track pad works well. I really wish it had more than one button, or maybe the track pad scrolling feature found on my colleague's HP.
I did not notice any hot spots. Underneath the keyboard got warm after a while, but not hot.
The machine is very quiet. Much more quiet that my 8500, and even quieter than my Dell workstation. The noise level was a big factor in my decision to go with a laptop. The only sound is this faint electric clicking from the hard drive and a whisper quiet fan. It would be even better if the hard drive was completely silent. The CD drive noise is not excessive. When the computer is not being actively used, it is completely silent.
The computer's size and weight are fine. It is the same weight and half the thickness of my previous Dell Inspiron. The extra couple inches on the side are the trade-off for the larger screen.
Down-sides:
The extras I ordered with the system arrived 3.5 months earlier and sat in boxes while the warranties slowly expired. The extra battery I was sent does not fit the 17 inch model. Apple provided shipping labels for the return.
Overall, a good computer that I am happy with."
|
