Anyone own new 15" PB?

[lieb39]

Hello everyone,

Anyone here own the new 15" powerbook? if you do, any comments on it? Have you noticed the horizontal line bit, and does it bother you?

Asking because I plan on getting one on Monday

Thanks,

lieb39

[GoogleNinja]

Hello everyone,

Anyone here own the new 15" powerbook? if you do, any comments on it? Have you noticed the horizontal line bit, and does it bother you?

Asking because I plan on getting one on Monday

Thanks,

lieb39

586768886[/snapback]

Horizontal line bit? :huh:

[lieb39]

Horizontal Lines appearing on screen -

Macrumors Forum Discussion - Horizontal Lines in New Powerbooks

Apple forums - New Powerbook 15" Monitor

To sum it up -

Alberto Ferrari1@Apple forums

Some friends of mine have reported that monitor of their pb 15" (with new display resolution) shows very slight but evident horizontal lines everywhere on the surface.

From User: VisualForces at Macrumors:

:(

-lieb39

[GoogleNinja]

Horizontal Lines appearing on screen -

Macrumors Forum Discussion - Horizontal Lines in New Powerbooks

Apple forums - New Powerbook 15" Monitor

To sum it up -

From User: VisualForces at Macrumors:

:(

-lieb39

586768976[/snapback]

Interesting. I will try to check this out tomorrow (might not be able to until Monday though) and let you know what I discover.

[j0sh]

I just got mine the other day. I didn't notice the horizontal line until I found the thread about it on the Apple forum. You can only really tell it's there if you get close and actually look for them. For being my first Apple, I'm very pleased.

[Joshie]

Must it be called PB? Horrible memories of a certain brand of IBM-compatible computers...

[GoogleNinja]

Must it be called PB? Horrible memories of a certain brand of IBM-compatible computers...

586769056[/snapback]

You speak of Packard Bell? :laugh:

[SnowRanger13]

I own the 15" Powerbook. I haven't noticed any problems yet. I'll check mine out. I like it a lot so far.

[the_snitch]

Oh that sucks...After reading the Apple forum thread it sounds quite serious - especially for graphic artists that need to stare at the screen down to every last detail. I hope apple fixes this soon, as i was about to buy one.

[Vice]

I have one of the new ones I received it yesterday.

The line thing is there but it is so small that I have to touch my face to the screen to see it. I do graphic design so I am always looking at the screen and little things like screen imperfections would **** me off but this "problem" is really no problem at all. You cannot see it at all unless you are right touching the screen with your face and squinting.

I paid a small fortune for my Powerbook and if it was a problem I would take it back immediately but there really isn't one look how close that guy stuck the camera to the screen to view the lines. That is how close ur face has to be to even barely see it.

I am in love with my Powerbook. It's more quiet then my iBook the screen is evenly lit - looks fantastic more vibrant and better colour depth runs like a dream.

[lieb39]

Well I was worried before about getting my PB, and had thought about not getting it anymore - but I can see now that this isn't an issue. And just for the heck of it, I went really close up to my Compaq LCD.. I think it may have the lines as well, never noticed it before.

Thanks everyone, hopefully I'll have a Powerbook 15" on Monday & report back here :p

-lieb39

[Vice]

Anything else you want to know about it?

[the_snitch]

Im glad its not too much of an issue then.

Apple will probably cover it up by proclaiming its the new System-wide hardware enabled pinstriping of Aqua.

[Vice]

Im glad its not too much of an issue then.

Apple will probably cover it up by proclaiming its the new System-wide hardware enabled pinstriping of Aqua.

586769593[/snapback]

:laugh: That would be funny.

[lieb39]

Anything else you want to know about it?

586769560[/snapback]

Have you run Virtual PC on it? How is it's performance if you have?

That's about it :p [for now]

Thanks,

lieb39

[Vice]

I have but I run Windows NT on my Virtual PC and not Windows XP (for speed reasons) most programs work within NT as-well.

Speed is awesome but it was on my 800MHz iBook as-well (due to it being NT of course)

[lieb39]

I'm not planning to run XP, I don't need it. Just planning to run Windows 2000 Professional for the few applications and whatnot. With all the un-needed settings off [index service, GUI settings], i don't think I'll have a problem :)

Cheers,

lieb39

[Fusion]

I have the new one, with a 100gb 7200 drive and 1GB memory.

I love the new screen. No matter what people say, it is slightly less bright than the previous generation. I have owned two with the 1280 resolution and two with the 1440 resolution and the newer screen is for sure slightly less bright and has a worse calibration setup. That being said, it is still one of the most beautiful screens (because of the high dpi) and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

I do have the horizontal line, in fact, I think everyone has them, just some don't notice them. They do not bother me and9 9.9 percent of the time I don't even know they are there. Every once in awhile working in photoshop they will catch my eyes, but again, this doesn't affect work or anything. The screen is also just incredibly sharp. It looks beautiful I always thought OS X would look great on high DPI and I was right, it's where it should be. I look at my wife's 12" iBook now and it looks like a kids toy GUI. I can't imagine how the 14" would look to my eyes now, lol.

My one and only complaint with this machine is that I opted for the 100GB 7200 drive and I wish I would not have. Apple has been using two drives for this configuration, the Seagate and the Hitachi. With both Powerbooks I got the Hitachi unfortunately and it is an extremely loud HD. Someone on another forum said they have the same drive and it is silent but I have a hard time believing that when I have two, from different stores in different areas and they are both loud. It is very noticeable clicking when the drive is active. I especially noticed it the other day when I was recording a speakerphone interview with someone via Audio Hijack Pro and they kept asking what the clicking was... it was the HD on the PowerBook sitting 6 inches away from the phone! On all my previous PowerBooks, 2 15's and a 12, the HD's were silent, both the 4200 and the 5400. So all in all, I wish I would have just ordered the 5400 120gb instead, but I picked them up from an Apple Store and they did not have that configuration available.

Some other things I noticed:

Battery life is incredible compared to previous PowerBooks. On the previous ones I would hard stretched to get 3 hours so I always carried an extra battery with me. On these ones, 5 hours is not a problem. Wow! I was sincerely impressed. It beats my wife's iBook now.

Manual processor management is no longer available. You still have the energy saver profiles, i.e. better battery life, better performance. But you used to be able to set the speed of the processor itself, i.e. lowest, automatic and highest. This is no longer available due to the new stepping technique for better battery life and I do think performance has suffered a bit from this. However, I think I would rather have the longer battery life than the small extra performance so no big deal.

The new smart sleep option can be slightly annoying. This option pages out all the memory to disk instead of leaving it in RAM, so when you wake it up your whole screen is gray with a little progress bar and it takes awhile for it to come back to life. It's like the "hibernate" mode in windows. I have not figured how to shut this off yet. I never had a problem with the normal sleep so I never saw the need for this and I am pretty good about saving documents, etc... It doesn't happen often, most of the time I get normal sleep mode, but when it does, it's slightly annoying.

[lieb39]

Wow, thank you for that :) Helped me out

I'm getting a stock so hopefully the 80GB hard drive isn't loud, getting the extra GB separately and although I think that the removal of the manual processor management is a mistake, I'm sure I won't miss it :p

Cheers,

lieb39

[Fusion]

Wow, thank you for that :) Helped me out

I'm getting a stock so hopefully the 80GB hard drive isn't loud, getting the extra GB separately and although I think that the removal of the manual processor management is a mistake, I'm sure I won't miss it :p

Cheers,

lieb39

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No problem. The stock 80GB drive is silent as a mouse. You shouldn't hear a thing. I had the same drive in a previous generation PB and it never made a peep.

[j0sh]

lieb: I got the pbook w/ the 80 GB and it's silent as can be. I also ordered (from newegg) a 1 GB Crucial stick for a total of 1.5 GB and it just flies.

Fusion, what battery setting are you using to get 5 hours? The most I was able to get on mine (probably had a custom or better performance profile selected, I don't remember) was 3.5 hours. I've calibrated the battery according to the instructions from Apple.

[Vice]

Wow, thank you for that :) Helped me out

I'm getting a stock so hopefully the 80GB hard drive isn't loud, getting the extra GB separately and although I think that the removal of the manual processor management is a mistake, I'm sure I won't miss it :p

Cheers,

lieb39

586773316[/snapback]

I have the stock 80GB drive and it is 100% silent it is so Quiet I have not heard it once in the 2 days that I have had the powerbook. no tell tall clicks no spinning up cant hear nothing its just absolutely quiet.

I can hear my iBooks 60GB drive spinning up and I thought that was quiet but my Powerbooks one is just unbelievably quiet. The drive in mine is a Seagate ST9808211A http://www.seagate.com/cda/products/discsa...081,636,00.html Gives nice performance aswell.

[Fusion]

lieb: I got the pbook w/ the 80 GB and it's silent as can be. I also ordered (from newegg) a 1 GB Crucial stick for a total of 1.5 GB and it just flies.

Fusion, what battery setting are you using to get 5 hours? The most I was able to get on mine (probably had a custom or better performance profile selected, I don't remember) was 3.5 hours. I've calibrated the battery according to the instructions from Apple.

586773416[/snapback]

Josh,

I'm using just the "Better Battery Life" setting from the batter menubar menu. I had a 3 hour class the other night. On my old PowerBook, it would be just dying at the end of the class, but on this one, the timer shown 2:30 left! I imagine this would have gone down a bit with some heavier usage, but I have consistently been getting this.

This is also with screen brightness at about half, airport on and just typing notes, browsing web, IM, Mail, etc... I wasn't doing any processor intensive work.

I also never calibrated my battery. The first time I got 5 hours I just decided to leave it because I was so happy with the time.

Josh & WinMacLin, Yeah, the stock drives, either Seagate or Hitachi seem to be the silent ones. I also believe that they other 5400 drives, the 100gb and 120gb drives are dead silent.

The Seagate 100gb 7200 is slightly louder, but so quiet you would never actually notice what you are hearing.

And then my blasted drive, the Hitachi 100gb 7200 is just plain obnoxiously loud, for a desktop OR a laptop... I imagine if it annoys me anymore I'll be ordering the 120gb 5400 off of eBay or something and swapping them out.

[elstatec]

so this lines issue, is it irritating as i dont want to see anything get in the way of photoshop.

also are there any more planned updates on the g4 powerbooks before the intel powerbooks come out?

[Vice]

On page one I mentioned about the lines. and I still cannot see them unless I touch my eyeball to the screen. I cant even see them if I squint at the screen from normal sitting range (end of keyboard)