Help me Switch my girlfriend!!

andykun · May 17, 2004 2:37PM

I mean she's been using dell's for years, but she's now studying Graphic design at University. We went to look at some macs today and I might have convinced her to get an Ibook 1ghz ( she's likes it 'cause it's cheap), but I was thinking that it might not be enough for her in the future so she had a look at the the Powerbook as well which is harder to sell.

Then 'disaster' there was a Sony 15" 2.8 ghz P4 512 ram 64 mb 9200 Radeon for almost the same price as the ibook

(£79 more). Including Bluetooth which she wants as well.

She is not interested in what is better about iLife and OSX so what's best for her??

iBook g4 1ghz

Powerbook 1.33 ghz

or a Sony?

Appreciate your help!!

zodiac · May 17, 2004 3:44PM

If she knows anything about the guts of computers, tell her that the powerbook would be equally as fast because thay have far shorter pipelines.

Tell her macs don't have viruses. They come with a lot of the apps she'll use and maybe more. Macs don't crash. They look beautiful. And all of the graphics design programs she needs can easily be bought. OSX is the most stable OS there is.Powerbooks have much better video cards than the sony.

Also, If she is doing graphics design, get a 15" PB 1.5 Ghz with the 128mb card if you can afford it. She won't regret the cost after the extra screen space,proccessing power and graphics power if she chooses to go powerbook.

zodiac · May 17, 2004 3:51PM

And don't forget to tell her how painfully slow longhorn is being devolped. Not until 2009!

buckeye · May 17, 2004 4:27PM

Don't go iBook for longevity.

What's the price difference between the Sony and the Powerbook? If the Sony is $600 cheaper, I would consider it, but I always believe that the Apple OS and ease of use add between $400-$500 worth of value in comparisons. Not esactly logical, but it has served me well so far.

I can't remember what life was like before my Powerbook.

res · May 17, 2004 4:31PM

If it is a full P4 in the Sony it will be a lot faster then the ibook (or the powerbook for that matter). If it is the mobile version of the P4 then it will not have a speed advantage.

If she has been happily using PCs for years, has a ton of PC software, and doesn't care about the iLife applications, she would probably be better off with the Sony.

thedustin · May 17, 2004 4:41PM

It was a process to get my girlfriend to switch until one night she lost about 4-pages of a paper on her HP machine which got her to look at the Macs. I told her, "if a Mac locks up, which it almost NEVER will, it saves the current work and you can rescue it." After a month or so deliberating between the two her father convinced her that the "real world" was PC only. I explained that Macs are completely compatible with all Windoze networks, and VPC is fine if you REALLY need it. She ended up buying a Sony comparable to the 12" PB. TWO days later that brand-new machine crashed, she lost all of her work that she transfered from the HP AND the paper she was working on at that moment, not to mention the headache I went through getting it to work on her Linksys Router. ANYWAY, three days later she had a brand new 867 12" PB and she has not looked back. She LOVES it! Not one problem for almost an entire year to this day. Plus, she loves having people come up to her in school telling her how "cute" it is and how they want one too, like it is puppy or something. Oh yea, it helped me to show her that Carrie Bradshaw (Sex and the City) uses an Apple

_thedustin

giant · May 17, 2004 6:58PM

Who do you want to switch her for?

gon · May 17, 2004 7:22PM

Quote:

Originally posted by zodiac

If she knows anything about the guts of computers, tell her that the powerbook would be equally as fast because thay have far shorter pipelines.

Tell her macs don't have viruses. They come with a lot of the apps she'll use and maybe more. Macs don't crash. They look beautiful. And all of the graphics design programs she needs can easily be bought. OSX is the most stable OS there is.Powerbooks have much better video cards than the sony.

Also, If she is doing graphics design, get a 15" PB 1.5 Ghz with the 128mb card if you can afford it. She won't regret the cost after the extra screen space,proccessing power and graphics power if she chooses to go powerbook.

1) Your first argument should go like, "if she doesn't know anything about the guts of computers", because the 1.33GHz G4 will never, under any real world task, deliver performance equal to a 2.8GHz P4. Wishing won't make it so.

2) No shit, the Powerbook has a better graphics card than this particular Sony? The Sony's competing in price with the iBook. If you want to throw Powerbook money at a PC laptop, you'll see something very different.

3) If she's doing graphic design, she might need an external display, a scanner, pen and tablet, or similar stuff. She will do absolutely nothing with 64mb more VRAM.

gon · May 17, 2004 7:34PM

And to answer the original question: I'd try to "sell" her the iBook. It's very portable and has enough power to do a lot of graphic design work. It needs an additional 512MB of RAM and the Bluetooth chip.

If she really is not interested in the productivity/security of OS X and Apple hardware together, the only things Apple has over others is portability (size and weight - Centrinos are better in battery life) and design. I feel iBooks remain a good deal even if you're indifferent to the OS. Powerbooks do not.

andykun · May 17, 2004 8:23PM

Oh trust me i've been pointing out all the Macs inmovies an tv shows which I think prepared her for the ibook. which she now still wants or wnated until she saw the Sony. She just went - so if thispc is faster why buy Macand so I startedrambling again. bla bla it never crashes... Unfortunately in her case at University they've got the first imacs running os9 or somethingand they crash all the timeplus whenever theygo to a new website they have to log-inwith password. I tell her it's the network stuff and OSX is different, but Isuppose it's still a bad experience. altough I'm impressed she's got the hang of Appleshare on the network which is like rocket science on the pc.

I've had an Athlon 2500, 512 ram, 128 geforce 3 for a year(short of moneyand needed something to write cv and make a reel on) I'm telling ya it's been a nightmare. first of all the box was supposed to be super quiet then the graphics card fan went bezerk and strted to sound like a vacuum cleaner. I never got the built in sound on the motherboard to work 'cause it was six 1millimeter plugs that was supposed to be fitted in the right order and they were not the same as in the manual, so guess what It's impossible to get it to work!! Then I got a weird loud sound whenever there was a pop-up window or a warning even though I turned off the volume. My pc genius friends couldn't even work it out. then there was lovebug and other viruses plus my IP provider called to let me know people were using my computer to send spam and stuff and during this time I lost all the stuff on the hard disc 3 times.

I remember the days of my the Commodore 64 andtunig into the right frequency on the tape recorder and the Amiga 500. No problems, the imac used to crash now and thenbut so did pc's.

anyway I suppose the P4 Sony (not a Pentium m or centrino or whatever) is a tad faster and got more ram, but I also know who's expected to sort out all the BS if she gets a pc!

telomar · May 17, 2004 9:23PM

The reason I wouldn't touch a p4 in a laptop is simply the battery life. I'd want my portable to travel a bit. If she was looking at a P-M I'd say go for it but not a p4.

paul · May 17, 2004 10:39PM

Spyware, adware, viruses, windows updates and critical patches...

IE targeted ads...

there are SO many reasons for getting a mac...

hobbes · May 18, 2004 5:31AM

If she's interested in being a print designer, the vast majority of design firms, ad agencies, magazines, newspaper, and so forth use Macs. It's much better to become familiar with ColorSync and Macs and get all that experience under your belt.

If she's interested solely in interactive/web design, either the Sony or Mac will probably do fine. I prefer Macs either way, but it's her call.

ipodandimac · May 18, 2004 8:51AM

I let one of my friends get a Vaio and he came running back to me after not too long cause he couldn't make a slideshow. iPhoto to the rescue! The point is, if she would stop caring about processor speeds, she wouldn't feel like the 'Book is slow. Let her get the Vaio, but be prepared for hours of helping her do lots of things that are jsut too damn easy on a mac.

kraig911 · May 18, 2004 9:09AM

I was interviewing awhile back, and there were a bunch who came in who had regular chop block portfolios, you know the ones with the drop shadows and no layering

and whichever ones went ow, you're all mac? or eww I never called back

. I'm not that old myself but you'd think some people would have the knowledge to see that if a shop is all mac, then you obviously don't say such things.

andykun · May 19, 2004 6:07PM

thanks guys!

She's ordering an ibook g4 1ghz!!!

Yeayyy my first switch

Help me Switch my girlfriend!!

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