the time has come. i have got a well paying job and am looking at getting an iBook. i was gonna get the $999 on, but am unsure, is apple support pretty good. and do the ibooks hold up to heavy use? iam really unsure about buying one, i could just go with Dell and know that iam getting awsome support as i have delt with them before. but iam just so unsure.


and one last quick question, which is better iWork '04 or Office 2004?

iWork is better
Apple are better
Get the iBook, YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED!

iWork is better
get the ibook!

YAY!

I would have to disagree with the two posts above on what's better....iWork at its current state is no-where at the level of Office 2004. I have tried both and trust me on this productivity and compatibility wise Office is much better.

iBook.
Office 2004.

iWork only has Pages and Keynote, but with Office you can get Word, Excel and PowerPoint which are more useful.

Even though Pages can convert to Word format, I think you'll be more comfortable with the "PC" Office 2004 and the way it works.

iWork is designed for simplicity. Office gives you a ton of things your dont actually need. It's also very unreliable, my dad has complained about it for lots of reasons and is switching to iWork. To be honest, I'm a PC user, and obviously, i cant get iWork, but playing around with keynote (gotta love those fancy charts) and remembering powerpoint, I noticed how superior it was, and I expect the same from iWork!

OOPS, keynote 2 comes with iWork, I was talking about playing with keynote 1.

dell.........so many other companies and you HAD to say Dell....jezz...let me tell you, ever since my father got his bulkass laptop that over heat it self every 10 second under idle (no there is nothing wrong with it) I will never trust anything with Dell again...

now...for the Apple hardware...

if you have a well paying job...why not a PowerBook? It's a lot more powerful and it is up to heavy duty stuff..trust me I would know. I do video editing, photoshop all day and the PB handles it fine...and not to mension the fact that I dropped it twice...and it still works perfectly well with minor scratches..

And get Office 2004...

in my experience, office 2004 is faster signifigantly faster

it also seems to have more features and ensured compatibility with office for pc

"And get Office 2004..."
You have a well paying job! GET IWORK AND OFFICE 2004!

Go Linux
OpenSource!!!!

get the laptop, boost the ram to 512 and get tiger, iwork and office 2k4

If your father's Laptop is overheating every 10 seconds under idle or not there is something wrong with it. I have had no problem with mine. Even playing the latest games for hours. No heat problems, no problems at all. But you are free to think what you what.

when i seid a well paying job, i mean about $700 a month to do anything i want with, i just turned 18 , am still in high school, and all i have to worry about paying every month is car insuance which is about $120 a month, so i will have about $570 left to pay for this, i would like to keep the price low so i can pay it off asap.

iBook G4 - wait till the new ones come out. New ones are expected in the next 2 - 4 weeks.

Go with Office 2004 Student Edition cause iWork is just a version one app with heaps to improve on.

How is iWork better than Office can you explain to me?

well you could always just go with the apple credit plan like im going to do with a powerbook, a 15 inch 1.67 g4 powerbook with 512mb ram 80 gig hd and ati radeon 9700 pro 128mb is only 46 dollars american a month, imo thats the way to go if you have the extra funds. im doing it for college and of course i will have to pay that for like 3 or 4 years but a machine like that will last you a while...

but to do that you need credit and a lot of people don't have that, especially those at 18 and still in high school. Some get lucky, some started early but most dont have the credit. Plus buying a computer and paying it monthly is not that smart to me. I have problems paying my finance company $250 a month for my car and a computer, where the tech is constantly changing, would make me feel even worse.

well if you can you get a small interest free loan from family? the iBook is a gerat machine but you'll definatey want to put more ram in.. a powebook while a bit pricier fromt he ones i've had a play on do seem a fair bit snappier.

this thread will not turn into a bitch fest, i just want to know what people think, not how good your debating skills are
thanks

and thanks everyone for your comments

Fine with me if you just believe everything anyone says and end up buying things you may not like.

It just depends on what you are looking for...

If you want something new and a bit different go with the mac, I enjoy mine...

But I'm still and I think always will be a windows user at heart, and my windows machine will always be my main machine...

The main reason I didn't get a windows laptop ( was really looking at the hp dv- series ) is because I couldnt see having a windows machine and a windows laptop, why not get the best of both worlds?

And if you have $500+ extra a month just save up a couple months and then get something really nice...

Also, wait for tiger to come out so you dont have to pay extra for it...it'll only be a couple more weeks...

If you decide to go the iBook wait till Tiger is released then at least you can have it loaded on the iBook straight off.

I got an iBook about two months ago (12") for college and it has stood up to being in my backpack with heavy text books fine, I wouldn't worry.

If you want one get Tiger.

I shouldn't have said that really because I've never used it
But I mean, whos software is usually better? Apple or Microsofts?
(dont bother replying to this because I wont be checking for replys)

Ok, best bet is to go for:
Power Book (They've been recently upgraded) with 512 RAM.
iWork (It's tons cheaper and you're not wasting money on programs you don't need, plus it looks better and you can do so much more with your work)

I also quote from something hotdog found a while ago on the news page on the Apple website, which is probably gone by now:

"Oh wait. I take that back. She has had one nagging issue with her Mac. One program keeps crashing in the middle of her work, for no apparent reason. It is baffling and frustrating and makes you shake your head and want to scream.
The program in question? Microsoft Word."
^ If you're getting an Apple computer, get Apple software.

Office is better, IF you use most of the features.
iWork is too simple for me as it doesn't let you do enough in my eyes, but try to have a go on someones machine or somthing as its a personal thing.

does anyone know when apple will put the G5 into the ibook?

also, sence iam a student in high school, does that mean i can get the education discount, or do i have to be in college for that?

okay, i might do this, get a Mac Mini for $499 and then get a Dell Laptop for $699, however i really want a mac and a laptop all in one, i am just not sure about paying that much for an ibook

k-12 discounts are not for students, and the ADC student membership is not available to highschool students either so you must either wait for post-secondary or have someone else buy it on your behalf (teacher, college going brother, PTA executive)

Apple store (under "hot deals"):


If you don't want the CD-RW you can drop down to a standard CD-Rom and bring the total to $799


G5's are not showing up in portables any time soon. Yesterday an apple executive repeated that "A G5 powerbook is the mother of all thermal challenges". A G5 will find it's way into the high-margin powerbook long before they stick it into the iBook. You're much better off hoping for a more refined G4. The e600 is the "good" one but the 7448 is much more likely, and still much nicer than what's in there today.