some miniPB's here are getting discounted all of a sudden in the range of $200 CDN.
ymmv, but an announcement next week might not be a surprise
if not, then definitely WWDC
WWDC will be all about Panther. If they do update the PBs at or around the time of WWDC, it will be a small and quiet incimental update. The same way the just updated the ibooks and emacs.
Based on past history, I would guess the 12 inch PB will get an update around November of this year. This PB just started shipping. It will be six months or so till it gets anything more than a minor update.
Possibilities:
FW800
Faster processor
better cache
better GPU
less weight
If the 15 inch PB gets a 970 chip this summer then that will allow more room for the 12 inch PB to get a larger speed bump.
the biggest drawback IMO is the 12" has a VGA video out (i.e. it does not support newer Apple Flat Panel Display) and only a CRT/VGA type monitor. This is needed because when you are not traveling, you can hook this little baby up to a flat panel at home/work.
i'd wait until rev b. this was a big oversight IMO and i am surpirsed that only one person on this thread mentioned this.
p.s. maybe this is doable with a double video out conversion but this is not pretty.
I installed the game [Demios Rising] and it played poorly. What part of my verbage don't you understand?
This reply is coming late, but... I've played Demios Rising on my 12" Powerbook, and never noticed dropped frames and stuttering, even with the processor set to reduced performance in energy saver. I'd suggest there's something else wrong with your machine.
[...]
Quote:
p.s. maybe this is doable with a double video out conversion but this is not pretty.
Actually, you can do it with this. It's pretty pricy, about twice the cost of a DVI->ADC converter, but it's available.
Matsu if you don't want to test your computer fully then be quiet please.
There is either a SEVERE hardware or software problem regarding graphics acceleration with the 12" PowerBook. Captain Bumper has "lines" of image of image shift and has poor frame rate. Same with NES and SNES emulators. There is NO excuse for this. NONE. The 12" PowerBook is APPALLINGLY slow at games in terms of fps and the "lines" of image shift which I have noticed in other Mac systems like the TiBook and an old G3 iMac. The latter, the lines, are caused by old video cards or the general crappiness of NVIDIA. Why can't a GeForce 4 Go play a simple game on a NES emulator, or Captain Bumper, without having lines of image shift? Does anyone here know enough about graphics to know what is going on with that? I think a few people here from time to time have weighed in that know their stuff. Splinemodel aren't you a graphics guy? I don't know anything about graphics systems but I dropped 2 G's on this thing and it just sucks at games especially with the image shift lines.
That said, and this will sound weird, the 12" PB is the BEST MAC EVER! Keda congrats, isn't it great? I know that was weird but if you own one and look closely at it you'll see what I'm talking about. I'm hoping a driver update will fix it or most of it. I am not crazy, this is really happening. It is usually because inferior vid cards like in the iMac with ATi, but come on card on 2 G plus system shouldn't stutter on Captain Bumper!
I posted screenshots of this on Paul's iDisk a while ago in a thread about this, I don't feel like digging them up after a long day of work but just trust me on this one. Nevertheless the 12" PB is the best machine Apple's made to date I think. It always seems their best machines have crippleware somewhere, like the Color Classic, iBooks (original had 66mhz bus for no reason, 100 would have worked) and the G3 Blue and White with the anti-G4 update firmware patch. No doubt the next 12" will be solid though and I don't know if I will be able to handle it. I might have to pull a tonton.:eek:
There might be some problems, with your machine, but for now I will not take that as evidence that anything is seriously wrong with the PB. Mine displays perfectly, when playing games or DVD's, on the LCD or connected to a TV, not here. Is it possible to have gotten bad VRAM on the motherboard' video chipset itself?
There is either a SEVERE hardware or software problem regarding graphics acceleration with the 12" PowerBook. Captain Bumper has "lines" of image of image shift and has poor frame rate. Same with NES and SNES emulators. There is NO excuse for this. NONE. The 12" PowerBook is APPALLINGLY slow at games in terms of fps and the "lines" of image shift which I have noticed in other Mac systems like the TiBook and an old G3 iMac.
Either you've got hardware problems, or there's problems with your OS install. I've had none of the problems you mention running the Captain Bumper demo. For the games mentioned in this thread, I've had absolutely no problems with my 12" PB.
He11, I dont' even have problems running Lightwave on this machine, and that's with displaying models comprised of tens of thousands of polygons... Is it slow? Uh, yeah. But it doesn't have any of the image shifting or other problems you guys have mentioned.
How about making the 12-inch PowerBook widescreen, like the 15 and 17 inch models? That may allow for better heat disappation given the case would be wider and have more room for cooling. Additionally, I think that the 12 inch PowerBook should have features that make it comperable to it's bigger bretheren. I don't know why I should have to sacrifice important features like L3 cache, DVI output -- then be chained by soldered RAM just because it's a 12 inch model. Afterall, it's a PowerBook! Clearly they were able to add the SuperDrive as sort of a come on, so I wish they'd just make the whole thing a come on with the features the other PowerBooks have which the 12-inch lacks.
Conventional wisdom has it that the 12" PB was originally supposed to be the G4 iBook, but for what ever reason, Apple decided to just bring it out as a low end Powerbook instead. At least, that's the speculation as to why the 12" has the compromizes it has (no Firewire 800, no DVI, no L3 cache, no PCMCIA slot) when compared with the rest of the Powerbook line (Ti -> Al differences not withstanding). It seems like it was a pretty good idea on Apple's part, at least for the short term, because neither sales of the iBook nor sales of the other Powerbooks seem to have been too adversely effected by it's introduction...
Conventional wisdom has it that the 12" PB was originally supposed to be the G4 iBook, but for what ever reason, Apple decided to just bring it out as a low end Powerbook instead.
Conventional wisdom??? I don't think Apple will make an alu iBook, at least not as long as the powerbooks are alu. So you have the G4 alu iBook and the G4 alu powerbooks, and the only thing to separate them is L3 cache and FW/Bluetooth. I think the iBooks will stay in the plastics department for a while. If it were true that Apple were to make a 12" G4 alu iBook, what about the 14". If they made the 14" alu and it got a decent G4, even if it didn't have the L3 cache or FW800, it would compete to closely to the coming 15" alu powerbook, at least if it were priced about the same as the 14" iBook 2. The alu powerbooks signals pro as in "professional" while the plastic iBooks signals consumer/school, and I think it has to stay that way. We'll probably see a new iBook design again, but it will probably use plastic for most of its design, maybe with some chrome / aluminium elements in it. So the iBooks will probably stay in plastic for a while yet, at least until the powerbooks can get the 970.
The problems aren't quite what you think. FPS is kind of disappointing and the lines are sort of visible. You just don't see them. Trust me they are there, if I had your machine I could show you them Matsu. It's better for you if you don't see them, as that traitor talking to Smith would say, "Ignorance is bliss." I saw it on a store unit. I saw it on an iMac. I saw it on a TiBook. It's just under-performance. Which is weird considering how good video cards are today. But I don't see that on PC games with NVIDIA GeForce 4s. I think I'm just nitpicking but it probably wouldn't happen if the 12" had a Radeon 9000 or 9600 mobile.
How would it be widescreen? They could chop an inch off the length but I dunno if that would be enough to fit widescreen res. I'd just like to see it shaved an inch lengh and width wise and half an inch of height so there's no bezel around the display and they keys are pretty much the same size, just shorter edge keys and no side border. How cool would it be if the PowerBook Mini gets smaller? Now that would be a sub.
How funny is that. I make a conscious effort not to visit AI for a few days, and the minute I get back, Aquatic calls my name.
I have to admit that after two years with my 12" iBook, I have grows to love that form factor. The 12-inch PowerBook is even a tiny bit better. I loved the Yu-Plan keyboard I had on my PowerBook 2400c. But after typing on a full-size keyboard for the last 24 months, I'm no longer willing to go back to anything smaller. So, personally, I see Apple making the 12-inch PowerBook thinner and lighter, but not smaller in footprint or screen size.
Back to a widescreen mini PowerBook. I think we could make the 12-inch PowerBook about .75 to 1" less deep, keep the width where it is, and make the screen wider but less tall. In other words, I could see the PB retain a 12" screen, but with a different aspect ratio. Would a 1200x750 resolution (16:10 aspect ratio) work?
Comments
ymmv, but an announcement next week might not be a surprise
if not, then definitely WWDC
Originally posted by curiousuburb
some miniPB's here are getting discounted all of a sudden in the range of $200 CDN.
ymmv, but an announcement next week might not be a surprise
if not, then definitely WWDC
WWDC will be all about Panther. If they do update the PBs at or around the time of WWDC, it will be a small and quiet incimental update. The same way the just updated the ibooks and emacs.
Possibilities:
FW800
Faster processor
better cache
better GPU
less weight
If the 15 inch PB gets a 970 chip this summer then that will allow more room for the 12 inch PB to get a larger speed bump.
i'd wait until rev b. this was a big oversight IMO and i am surpirsed that only one person on this thread mentioned this.
p.s. maybe this is doable with a double video out conversion but this is not pretty.
I installed the game [Demios Rising] and it played poorly. What part of my verbage don't you understand?
This reply is coming late, but... I've played Demios Rising on my 12" Powerbook, and never noticed dropped frames and stuttering, even with the processor set to reduced performance in energy saver. I'd suggest there's something else wrong with your machine.
[...]
p.s. maybe this is doable with a double video out conversion but this is not pretty.
Actually, you can do it with this. It's pretty pricy, about twice the cost of a DVI->ADC converter, but it's available.
Originally posted by Gamblor
[
Actually, you can do it with this. It's pretty pricy, about twice the cost of a DVI->ADC converter, but it's available. [/B]
Thanks a lot Gamblor! That helps a lot.
There is either a SEVERE hardware or software problem regarding graphics acceleration with the 12" PowerBook. Captain Bumper has "lines" of image of image shift and has poor frame rate. Same with NES and SNES emulators. There is NO excuse for this. NONE. The 12" PowerBook is APPALLINGLY slow at games in terms of fps and the "lines" of image shift which I have noticed in other Mac systems like the TiBook and an old G3 iMac. The latter, the lines, are caused by old video cards or the general crappiness of NVIDIA. Why can't a GeForce 4 Go play a simple game on a NES emulator, or Captain Bumper, without having lines of image shift? Does anyone here know enough about graphics to know what is going on with that? I think a few people here from time to time have weighed in that know their stuff. Splinemodel aren't you a graphics guy? I don't know anything about graphics systems but I dropped 2 G's on this thing and it just sucks at games especially with the image shift lines.
That said, and this will sound weird, the 12" PB is the BEST MAC EVER! Keda congrats, isn't it great?
With 970s.
Hopefully.
Lemon Bon Bon
There is either a SEVERE hardware or software problem regarding graphics acceleration with the 12" PowerBook. Captain Bumper has "lines" of image of image shift and has poor frame rate. Same with NES and SNES emulators. There is NO excuse for this. NONE. The 12" PowerBook is APPALLINGLY slow at games in terms of fps and the "lines" of image shift which I have noticed in other Mac systems like the TiBook and an old G3 iMac.
Either you've got hardware problems, or there's problems with your OS install. I've had none of the problems you mention running the Captain Bumper demo. For the games mentioned in this thread, I've had absolutely no problems with my 12" PB.
He11, I dont' even have problems running Lightwave on this machine, and that's with displaying models comprised of tens of thousands of polygons... Is it slow? Uh, yeah.
Originally posted by Gamblor
Conventional wisdom has it that the 12" PB was originally supposed to be the G4 iBook, but for what ever reason, Apple decided to just bring it out as a low end Powerbook instead.
Conventional wisdom??? I don't think Apple will make an alu iBook, at least not as long as the powerbooks are alu. So you have the G4 alu iBook and the G4 alu powerbooks, and the only thing to separate them is L3 cache and FW/Bluetooth. I think the iBooks will stay in the plastics department for a while. If it were true that Apple were to make a 12" G4 alu iBook, what about the 14". If they made the 14" alu and it got a decent G4, even if it didn't have the L3 cache or FW800, it would compete to closely to the coming 15" alu powerbook, at least if it were priced about the same as the 14" iBook 2. The alu powerbooks signals pro as in "professional" while the plastic iBooks signals consumer/school, and I think it has to stay that way. We'll probably see a new iBook design again, but it will probably use plastic for most of its design, maybe with some chrome / aluminium elements in it. So the iBooks will probably stay in plastic for a while yet, at least until the powerbooks can get the 970.
Any ideas Escher?
Originally posted by Aquatic
How would it be widescreen? ... Any ideas Escher?
How funny is that. I make a conscious effort not to visit AI for a few days, and the minute I get back, Aquatic calls my name.
I have to admit that after two years with my 12" iBook, I have grows to love that form factor. The 12-inch PowerBook is even a tiny bit better. I loved the Yu-Plan keyboard I had on my PowerBook 2400c. But after typing on a full-size keyboard for the last 24 months, I'm no longer willing to go back to anything smaller. So, personally, I see Apple making the 12-inch PowerBook thinner and lighter, but not smaller in footprint or screen size.
Back to a widescreen mini PowerBook. I think we could make the 12-inch PowerBook about .75 to 1" less deep, keep the width where it is, and make the screen wider but less tall. In other words, I could see the PB retain a 12" screen, but with a different aspect ratio. Would a 1200x750 resolution (16:10 aspect ratio) work?
Escher