Thoughts and Questions from a new PB 12" Owner

imacfanimacfan
Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014
Hi,



I cracked and bought a superdrive 12" PB. I think it's great, as I have upgraded from a 466 iBook. The screen is much brighter and clearer, the battery lasts longer and the internet seems much snappier. The most striking part though has to be the size of it - I mean this is SMALL!



Anyhow, on to the questions I have, any help would be greatly appreciated.



1. I'm going to upgrade to 640Mb of RAM. If I get Classic to start up on start up, will this degrade OSX performance?



2. I've got a Maxtor 80Gb Graphite/White FW HD that I bought a couple of years ago now. I seem to remeber that there were OSX utilities available for it to download, but I can't find them. Does anyone know where they are?



3. The 'book does get very hot, but I gather that this is par for the course. Am I right?



4. Any idea for a good game to get that would be OSX Native, run well on the book and have good gameplay. (Just so that you know, my favourite game ever so far is Deus Ex)



5. I seem to remember a while ago that you could download some quite good desktops and screensavers from Microsoft for OSX. Anyone know the link, or another good site to get these from?



6. Finally, I also remember downloadable extra backgrounds, sounds etc for iMovie from Apple. Anyone know where to find them?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 14
    david101david101 Posts: 73member
    I can't answer most of your questions but i findmac desktops and the apple collection good for desktops images
  • Reply 2 of 14
    ghost_user_nameghost_user_name Posts: 22,667member
    Well...





    1. YES it will.



    2. Try Maxtor's site... if not there then google it.



    3. Yes they do get very warm... but if you can cook eggs off the 'book then there is a problem.



    4. MOHAA



    5. Make your own... and feel proud.



    6. I don't know
  • Reply 3 of 14
    jobjob Posts: 420member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by \\/\\/ickes

    4. MOHAA



    Return to Castle Wolfenstein is pretty good too.
  • Reply 4 of 14
    augustwestaugustwest Posts: 157member
    Only thing I can add from my experience with iBooks:



    the more RAM you get, the quicker your battery will drain.



    That's just the way it is...



    Enjoy your Powerbook!
  • Reply 5 of 14
    cidercider Posts: 14member
    Yeah that's quite amazing but true : adding a simple 256Mb Ram into my G3/300 iBook reduced its battery life from 4h30 down to...55 mn !
  • Reply 6 of 14
    imacfanimacfan Posts: 444member
    Well, I've added 512Mb of Kingston RAM (Well, I didn't but you know what I mean), and I have not noticed any significant drop in battery time. Maybe the quality of the RAM matters, or maybe DDR is better when it comes to power consumption.



    David



    PS - one annoying thing is that a key on the keyboard is wonky - if I press the 'Y' key on the top right, the bottom left sticks up slightly, until I click it down by pressing on the bottom left. Now, this is not a major thing, as I don't notice it most of the time I am typing, but I called Apple to see if there was anything I could do. Apparantly, they do not send out new keys (Surely this would be possible - I know that the Apple knowledge base has instructions to refit a scissor action and keycap on an old PBG4 keyboard, and I didn't think that that part of the keyboard had changed) So, they would have to replace the keyboard, and that entails a complete disassembly of the machine.



    Therefore I sticking with it. I have all my info in there, the RAM maxed out (not by Apple), and a pixel-perfect screen - there's no way Apple is getting their mits on it unless they have to!.



    Anyhow, rant over...
  • Reply 7 of 14
    imacfanimacfan Posts: 444member
    Oh, and another thing, I bought SimCity 4 - Looks very good. I know that it threatens to be slow in big cities, but it looks interesting enough to play through it.



    David
  • Reply 8 of 14
    scottscott Posts: 7,431member
    The feet came off mine. So ... keep an eye on them.
  • Reply 9 of 14
    cakecake Posts: 1,010member
    I've heard about the feet coming off and the associated huge cost in replacing them via Apple.



    I've really been careful when I'm moving my 12" and that sucks .

    These things should be very robust or very easy/ cheap to replace.
  • Reply 10 of 14
    imacfanimacfan Posts: 444member
    One final question:



    Will I be able to write to DVD-RWs with my superdrive? - The Apple site does not list it as being able to, but neither does the page for the powermac.



    thanks,



    David
  • Reply 11 of 14
    cubs23cubs23 Posts: 324member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by iMacfan

    One final question:



    Will I be able to write to DVD-RWs with my superdrive? - The Apple site does not list it as being able to, but neither does the page for the powermac.



    thanks,



    David



    yes, you can burn dvd-rw's. You have to "trick" iDVD. What you do is when you go to burn the disc. Insert a normal DVD-r. Once it has recognized the disc, eject it, and then put the dvd-rw in its place. Then it will burn as normal.
  • Reply 12 of 14
    stoostoo Posts: 1,490member
    Unfortunately, the iDVD trick doesn't work with the 12" PowerBook G4. Annoyingly, the drive (Matshita UJ 815) can support DVD-RW, it's just that Apple's firmware doesn't.
  • Reply 13 of 14
    murbotmurbot Posts: 5,262member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Cake

    I've heard about the feet coming off and the associated huge cost in replacing them via Apple.



    I've really been careful when I'm moving my 12" and that sucks .

    These things should be very robust or very easy/ cheap to replace.



    They are.



    Just go to the local hardware store and get some of those little rubber bumpers. They're clear, and I guess you'd use them on a cupboard door, under a glass table top, etc. I grabbed a pack for a few bucks that had 16 of them or so.



    Or, another idea, is to use the felt padded ones. Same size, but with a softer felt bottom. I used them on my iBook, and I was then able to spin it around on my desk, easily slide it out of the way, etc. I'll probably stick these ones on my new PB again.
  • Reply 14 of 14
    hobbeshobbes Posts: 1,252member
    One addendum about #1, Will Classic Degrade OS X Performance?



    In a nutshell, yeah; if you don't use it, it's best to keep it off. However, if you need Classic for something that you use often and don't want to wait for it to start each time, you should know that if no Classic apps are running after a short time it will put itself to sleep, and use very little CPU. Not a bad compromise if you need it.
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