I'm of the opinion that Apple will deliberately want to keep things simple, since at the moment the PowerBook lineup is already a bit complicated. Either CPU options will be reduced, or optical drives, or both.
Let's use this as an example:
12" PowerBook:
1 GHz G4
133 MHz system bus
256 MB DDR266 memory
60 or 80 GB hard disk
Combo drive (Superdrive optional)
Airport Extreme card optional
32 MB GeForce FX 5200 Go video
$1699 base price
15" PowerBook:
1.25 GHz G4
167 MHz system bus
256 MB DDR333 memory
60 or 80 GB hard disk
Combo drive (Superdrive optional)
Airport Extreme card optional
64 MB Mobility Radeon 9600 video
$2299 base price
17" PowerBook:
1.25 GHz G4
167 MHz system bus
512 MB DDR333 memory
80 GB hard disk
Superdrive
Airport Extreme card included
64 MB GeForce FX 5600 Go video
$3099 base price
Obviously that 15" spec might be a bit ambitious. I'm sure a lot of people would squeal with joy if they knew that the bottom-end 15" model went from 867 MHz to 1.25 GHz and improved everything else at the same time (more video memory, a larger hard disk, and so on). If Apple did it, I wouldn't be surprised if the price was actually $2399 or $2499.
But it illustrates the point: instead of having to create this major split down the middle of the 15" line between the high-end and low-end, they could reduce it to a matter of deciding which optical drive you want (or alternately, what CPU you want).
Yes, but not without reason. Mac laptops have never faced a serious challenge from x86 mobile solutions in the past. Now they do. Wintel is really there now as far as price performance goes.
To my previous list, I would like to see added a Dual CPU 17" solution for 3499-3599. If they could make it, they could sell it. Drop the SP17 into the 2999-3099 range.
The next upgrade will be the arrival of the pin compatible 7457. It'll get dropped into the PB with virtually no engineering changes yet give a significant boost to battery life AND speed.
I seriously doubt it will be easy or cost-effective to replace your graphics chip on one of the new PowerBooks. It was probably put on a separate board just for Apple's internal use - it would make repairs quicker and cheaper. But even if it was easy to replace the internal graphics, Apple would never, ever support it. They might even put in firmware to prevent the use of upgraded graphics.
And it also allows them to switch GPUs quickly as better ones come along.
Quote:
A number of widespread standards are simply not making it into Macs because Apple doesn't deem them "worthy" or something, like USB 2. If we don't even get USB 2, a feature present on just about every PC these days, then I seriously doubt we'll get any form of graphics upgradability.
This strikes me as a complete non sequitur. There are political reasons not to support USB 2 (namely, Intel's trying to muscle it in as a FireWire killer, and as an alternative to FireWire it sucks). There are no political reasons not to support BTO GPUs in notebooks.
Think about the space the PowerBook is moving into: Apple has positioned it as a portable workstation for work that would have absolutely demanded a desktop two years ago. The 17" exemplifies that philosophy. Now, if you're using your PowerBook as a business laptop, or for 2D design and layout work, you can get by with something that keeps Quartz Extreme happy, gets good battery life, and plays the odd DVD nicely (ATi over nVIDIA). If you're a gamer, you're probably willing to trade battery life for all-out polygon crunching (nVIDIA over ATi). If you're in high-end 3D, you might want something that isn't on the market yet - but whatever it is, your needs will be rather specific.
If the laptop is to replace the desktop as a professional workstation, it has to pick up some of the flexibility of a desktop. BTO GPUs are one significant step in that direction, especially given the markets that Apple is aiming for (high-end video creation, editing, etc.). After the fact upgrades will definitely remain a third party opportunity, the same way that CPU upgrades are, and who knows if or how that'll work out. But the important thing is that once the PowerBook can have GPUs built to order, it's crossed an important line as a professional machine.
stiffer Al case and better Airport aren't enough to justify this long a delay for such a small rev
EXACTLY my point! That's why I'm saying it seems too early to upgrade the 17" and it's getting late for a 15" revision... solution? Offer 2 basic configs per size! Is that really too complicated? I mean PC users actually have to choose between companies, not just between a few differnet models! Us mac users really only need to choose how much we want to spend based on performance...
Remember, the PB is geared towards the 'pro' consumer. 'Pro' means 'enough brains to be able to make a choice between six different computers based on your real needs without having smoke come out of your head'
The next upgrade will be the arrival of the pin compatible 7457. It'll get dropped into the PB with virtually no engineering changes yet give a significant boost to battery life AND speed.
Q4 2003. Just sampling now. Don't think Apple will wait that long to update Powerbooks do you?
We know that the 12" and the 17" are relatively new. I would expect the 15" models to still make up the bread and butter of powerbook sales. An all new Aluminum case with all the features of the 17" but with a 15" screen and a 970 processor. The 17" would continue to use the G4 with the reason being it uses less power and they need all the power they can conserve because of the large screen. By this time a faster G4 should be available around 1.33GHz or so and maybe with a full 2MB L3 cache. The 12" would also continue to use the G4 for the same reasons, bumping speeds to 1GHz or more with maybe a 1MB cache. By autumn both the 17 and the 12 will be upgraded to the 970 but in the meantime the demand for a strong basic model should be good enough to keep laptop sales as high as Apple wants them to be.
I seriously think we will see a 970-PB (or two, or three) before too long. There is just no life left in the G4, when a 970 isn't that much more power-hungry. Granted, you won't be seeing high-frequency 970s until they go to .09 but hey, I can deal with a 1.0 or 1.2GHz 970. Heck, it's better than what we are getting now (1GHz G4).
forgive me for being a pesimist, but I reeeeaaaallly doubt that we'll see a 970 PB, I mean Apple just had a MAJOR release on the PB's short of 6 months ago. I think it will be at least a year til we see 970's in the PB's. Just think about how long it took Apple to be able to make the G4 chip run cool enough for PB's... I think they're just going to milk their current processors as much as possible, I mean look at the G3, it's been around for how long?
I think they're just going to milk their current processors as much as possible, I mean look at the G3, it's been around for how long?
But man, that is hardly Apple fault. If it were up to Apple the G3 would have been a faint memory right now, with powerful 64 bit G5's running the powermacs, and fast and low-pwer G4's running the i/e-line of macs.
I'm sure Apple will try to put the 970 in the powerbooks as fast as possible, but not so fast that they end up having to few 970's or so fast that they piss of those people that has just had their 17" powermacs delivered to them. We're talking about balancing a fine line here.
The 970 will come to the powerbook as soon as Apple sees fit, and as far as milking the G4 goes, that plan doesn's seem to be working so well with the powermacs .
I have predicted earlier that the powermacs will receive a speed bump when the 970 powermacs are introduced, as there are suddenly lots of spare G4's to go around, togheter with speed bumped iMacs and eMacs. MWSF is a probable introduction date for a 970 PowerBook.
forgive me for being a pesimist, but I reeeeaaaallly doubt that we'll see a 970 PB, I mean Apple just had a MAJOR release on the PB's short of 6 months ago.
so was the G3BW, back in 1999; started in januari, bumped in april and deleted in september.
that means nothing, but apple can as well release new pb12" and 17" ... in september and the next gen pb15" in juli to fill the needs of... me
Quote:
I think it will be at least a year til we see 970's in the PB's. Just think about how long it took Apple to be able to make the G4 chip run cool enough for PB's... I think they're just going to milk their current processors as much as possible, I mean look at the G3, it's been around for how long?
well the G4 didn't scale-up so well, did he?: till januari 2001 it was still at 500Mhz. and the 7410 had its own problems, the ppc970 has just to be scalled down to 1.2 Ghz to run cool enough, maybe they could scale it back to 1 Ghz for the pb12".
only look back to the past for justification if it concerns people, not technology.
none of us are going to change/upgrade our Titaniums until we see a 970 powerbook.
Agreed, and Apple is aware of this. They will surely get the 970 ready for powerbooks as fast as they can. So it would be nice if they could get them ready at least for the christmas buying season so I could surprice myself with a new PB. That is if I can afford one after buying a brand new PowerMac 970 or whatever they are going to be called.
did you see this year's Eurovision song contest? the boy from your country was (along with the group from estonia) the only one that contributed with a song that wasnt either stupid or ridiculous.
Yeah, I agree. I think Norway had a decent song for a change. I think the Belgian group shoud have won though, nice and different song. The Turkish song (winner) was really bad, and lets not get started on f#@*&n tatu shit, that song really stunk. But with all the eastern-european countries sucking up to each other, there's really not much of a contest any more.
While most people want 970s PBs and want them now, it's not going to happen. Apple desperately needs to revive its lackluster Power Mac G4s, and that's where the emphasis on new chips will be.
IMO Apple will introduce the AL 15" when the 12" and 17" Revision B models come out and I'm speculating they will look like this.
12" PowerBook - $1799
867GHz G4
Combo Drive/Superdrive $200 extra BTO
40GB HDD
Present feature set with the addition of DVI video and level 3 cache
15" PowerBook - $2299
1GHz G4
Combo Drive/Superdrive $200 extra BTO
40GB HDD
Same feature set as present 17" PB except no back lit keyboard and only 256MB DDR266 SDRAM
17" PowerBook - $2999
1.2GHz G4 (best case scenario, worst case the speed will remain the same)
Comments
Let's use this as an example:
12" PowerBook:
- 1 GHz G4
- 133 MHz system bus
- 256 MB DDR266 memory
- 60 or 80 GB hard disk
- Combo drive (Superdrive optional)
- Airport Extreme card optional
- 32 MB GeForce FX 5200 Go video
- $1699 base price
15" PowerBook:- 1.25 GHz G4
- 167 MHz system bus
- 256 MB DDR333 memory
- 60 or 80 GB hard disk
- Combo drive (Superdrive optional)
- Airport Extreme card optional
- 64 MB Mobility Radeon 9600 video
- $2299 base price
17" PowerBook:- 1.25 GHz G4
- 167 MHz system bus
- 512 MB DDR333 memory
- 80 GB hard disk
- Superdrive
- Airport Extreme card included
- 64 MB GeForce FX 5600 Go video
- $3099 base price
Obviously that 15" spec might be a bit ambitious. I'm sure a lot of people would squeal with joy if they knew that the bottom-end 15" model went from 867 MHz to 1.25 GHz and improved everything else at the same time (more video memory, a larger hard disk, and so on). If Apple did it, I wouldn't be surprised if the price was actually $2399 or $2499.But it illustrates the point: instead of having to create this major split down the middle of the 15" line between the high-end and low-end, they could reduce it to a matter of deciding which optical drive you want (or alternately, what CPU you want).
Originally posted by McCrab
- Mr Predictable
Yes, but not without reason. Mac laptops have never faced a serious challenge from x86 mobile solutions in the past. Now they do. Wintel is really there now as far as price performance goes.
To my previous list, I would like to see added a Dual CPU 17" solution for 3499-3599. If they could make it, they could sell it. Drop the SP17 into the 2999-3099 range.
Originally posted by Luca Rescigno
I seriously doubt it will be easy or cost-effective to replace your graphics chip on one of the new PowerBooks. It was probably put on a separate board just for Apple's internal use - it would make repairs quicker and cheaper. But even if it was easy to replace the internal graphics, Apple would never, ever support it. They might even put in firmware to prevent the use of upgraded graphics.
And it also allows them to switch GPUs quickly as better ones come along.
A number of widespread standards are simply not making it into Macs because Apple doesn't deem them "worthy" or something, like USB 2. If we don't even get USB 2, a feature present on just about every PC these days, then I seriously doubt we'll get any form of graphics upgradability.
This strikes me as a complete non sequitur. There are political reasons not to support USB 2 (namely, Intel's trying to muscle it in as a FireWire killer, and as an alternative to FireWire it sucks). There are no political reasons not to support BTO GPUs in notebooks.
Think about the space the PowerBook is moving into: Apple has positioned it as a portable workstation for work that would have absolutely demanded a desktop two years ago. The 17" exemplifies that philosophy. Now, if you're using your PowerBook as a business laptop, or for 2D design and layout work, you can get by with something that keeps Quartz Extreme happy, gets good battery life, and plays the odd DVD nicely (ATi over nVIDIA). If you're a gamer, you're probably willing to trade battery life for all-out polygon crunching (nVIDIA over ATi). If you're in high-end 3D, you might want something that isn't on the market yet - but whatever it is, your needs will be rather specific.
If the laptop is to replace the desktop as a professional workstation, it has to pick up some of the flexibility of a desktop. BTO GPUs are one significant step in that direction, especially given the markets that Apple is aiming for (high-end video creation, editing, etc.). After the fact upgrades will definitely remain a third party opportunity, the same way that CPU upgrades are, and who knows if or how that'll work out. But the important thing is that once the PowerBook can have GPUs built to order, it's crossed an important line as a professional machine.
and there is already a 1Ghz Ti 15, so where's the bump?
stiffer Al case and better Airport aren't enough to justify this long a delay for such a small rev
970 is what we want, Steve
Originally posted by curiousuburb
stiffer Al case and better Airport aren't enough to justify this long a delay for such a small rev
EXACTLY my point! That's why I'm saying it seems too early to upgrade the 17" and it's getting late for a 15" revision... solution? Offer 2 basic configs per size! Is that really too complicated? I mean PC users actually have to choose between companies, not just between a few differnet models! Us mac users really only need to choose how much we want to spend based on performance...
Remember, the PB is geared towards the 'pro' consumer. 'Pro' means 'enough brains to be able to make a choice between six different computers based on your real needs without having smoke come out of your head'
The next upgrade will be the arrival of the pin compatible 7457. It'll get dropped into the PB with virtually no engineering changes yet give a significant boost to battery life AND speed.
Q4 2003. Just sampling now. Don't think Apple will wait that long to update Powerbooks do you?
Originally posted by RANSOMED
I think they're just going to milk their current processors as much as possible, I mean look at the G3, it's been around for how long?
But man, that is hardly Apple fault. If it were up to Apple the G3 would have been a faint memory right now, with powerful 64 bit G5's running the powermacs, and fast and low-pwer G4's running the i/e-line of macs.
I'm sure Apple will try to put the 970 in the powerbooks as fast as possible, but not so fast that they end up having to few 970's or so fast that they piss of those people that has just had their 17" powermacs delivered to them. We're talking about balancing a fine line here.
The 970 will come to the powerbook as soon as Apple sees fit, and as far as milking the G4 goes, that plan doesn's seem to be working so well with the powermacs
I have predicted earlier that the powermacs will receive a speed bump when the 970 powermacs are introduced, as there are suddenly lots of spare G4's to go around, togheter with speed bumped iMacs and eMacs. MWSF is a probable introduction date for a 970 PowerBook.
Speculation follows: Why confuse the market with 6 models, when you can have 3 standard models and let customers BTO what they want?
12" PowerBook - $1799
867GHz G4
DDR266
Combo Drive
40GB HDD
GeForce 4 Go, 32MB, Mirroring
FireWire 400, 10/100 Ethernet, Airport Extreme ready, Bluetooth
15" PowerBook - $2299
1GHz G4
DDR266
Superdrive
60GB HDD
Radeon 9200M, 64MB, Spanning
FireWire 800, 10/100/1000 Ethernet, Airport Extreme, Bluetooth
17" PowerBook - $3299
1.2GHz 970
Dual DDR266
Superdrive
80GB HDD
Radeon 9600M, 64MB, Spanning
FireWire 800, 10/100/1000 Ethernet, Airport Extreme, Bluetooth
Apple will introduce the new 15" first, then a new 970 based 17" 3-4 months later. The 12" will stay the same until late this year or early next year.
Barto
Originally posted by RANSOMED
forgive me for being a pesimist, but I reeeeaaaallly doubt that we'll see a 970 PB, I mean Apple just had a MAJOR release on the PB's short of 6 months ago.
so was the G3BW, back in 1999; started in januari, bumped in april and deleted in september.
that means nothing, but apple can as well release new pb12" and 17" ... in september and the next gen pb15" in juli to fill the needs of... me
I think it will be at least a year til we see 970's in the PB's. Just think about how long it took Apple to be able to make the G4 chip run cool enough for PB's... I think they're just going to milk their current processors as much as possible, I mean look at the G3, it's been around for how long?
well the G4 didn't scale-up so well, did he?: till januari 2001 it was still at 500Mhz. and the 7410 had its own problems, the ppc970 has just to be scalled down to 1.2 Ghz to run cool enough, maybe they could scale it back to 1 Ghz for the pb12".
only look back to the past for justification if it concerns people, not technology.
none of us are going to change/upgrade our Titaniums until we see a 970 powerbook.
and we want them cheaper. ?3,300-4,000 for a laptop (not counting applecare) it's just insane.
Originally posted by jindrich
none of us are going to change/upgrade our Titaniums until we see a 970 powerbook.
Agreed, and Apple is aware of this. They will surely get the 970 ready for powerbooks as fast as they can. So it would be nice if they could get them ready at least for the christmas buying season so I could surprice myself with a new PB. That is if I can afford one after buying a brand new PowerMac 970 or whatever they are going to be called.
did you see this year's Eurovision song contest? the boy from your country was (along with the group from estonia) the only one that contributed with a song that wasnt either stupid or ridiculous.
IMO Apple will introduce the AL 15" when the 12" and 17" Revision B models come out and I'm speculating they will look like this.
12" PowerBook - $1799
867GHz G4
Combo Drive/Superdrive $200 extra BTO
40GB HDD
Present feature set with the addition of DVI video and level 3 cache
15" PowerBook - $2299
1GHz G4
Combo Drive/Superdrive $200 extra BTO
40GB HDD
Same feature set as present 17" PB except no back lit keyboard and only 256MB DDR266 SDRAM
17" PowerBook - $2999
1.2GHz G4 (best case scenario, worst case the speed will remain the same)
Superdrive
60GB HDD
Same feature set as present 17" PB
no way...its more than 6 months since they have it with 1ghz
they will be available in july
--- pure speculation