PowerBook waiting list.

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PowerBook waiting list.

I have a birthday of arbitrary numeric significance coming up and because of that, and a new secret project I'm starting, I've been able to convince my better half that I need one of the new PowerBooks. I've never owned an Apple before, so I'm pretty excited about this (despite the buzzkill build timings that Matt posted yesterday). I've wanted an Apple ever since my Dad brought home a TRS-80 back in the late 70s. I used a Mac for a while in the 80s and ported some software to MacOS back in the 90s, but I always hesitated to buy a Mac for myself because Macs were all GUI and no command-line. Now, Macs have the finest GUI plus the finest of command-line interfaces (UNIX and bash) and I'm on the waiting list for a new 15" PowerBook.

Dave Johnson in Mac 05:51PM Apr 20, 2004 Comments [6]
Tags: mac

Comments:

Happy 50th Birthday Dave!. Powerbook will definitely open your eyes to a new world!

Posted by Shawn Osteen on April 21, 2004 at 01:11 AM EDT #

You're a few years off there "Shawn" but thanks just the same.

Posted by Dave Johnson on April 21, 2004 at 01:16 AM EDT #

Nicely done!. I love powerbooks but just wanted to suggest a couple of recommendations when you buy your new Powerbook.
1) Try to get the 512MB memory.. 256 doesn't seem to be enough to do most of the tasks..
2) Try to get the Apple Care Protection plan thats optional, even though its a bit hefty. One of my kids some how managed mess up the LCD display (which is not very hard to do).. She decided to clean my laptop when I was asleep with a CompUSA laptop cleaning solution, and some how managed to get the cleaning solution behind the LCD!. I took to apple store only to realize that the cost of LCD is 1300 bucks!, i.e. the cost of the laptop itself. I believe with Apple Care you get a free lcd screen.. May be they'll just charge you for the labor.. Just make sure you check that, because that is one downside of apple.. Their laptops cost the same as their screens.

All the best with the Powerbook purchase :)

Posted by Shawn Osteen on April 21, 2004 at 01:37 AM EDT #

I just took a random guess initially :) (numerical significance)..

Well I decided to get you updated quickly on softwares you'd need on the new Mac to get productive.. I know you haven't got the Powerbook  yet but you can always check this blog when you've received it.. These are the softwares I ve downloaded and pretty much feel very comfortable :)..

Excellent article on  things you can't live without on Power Book  <span style="text-decoration: underline;"></span><a href="http://www.osnews.com/printer.php?news_id=5297">http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=5297. I would definitely recommend Fire (IM), X-Aqua-Chat (IRC) , NetNewsWireLite (RSS/News), WireTap
LaunchBar is a must have for persons who like VI or Emacs (which I presume is you, since you did not buy your macs for poor CommandLine interface all those years).
Remember to download the text editor <a href="http://homepage.mac.com/asagoo/tofu/">Tofu. Its makes reading web pages very convienient, because of the way it arranges texts in small columns as in News Papers. Very comfortable on eyes. I routinely read web articles from server side, java world , onjava,  wired  and IBM dev works  using tofu.. It also lets you read word documents. Very highly recommended..
iTerm is a really cool terminal shell.. I really like it and beats the default Mac terminal hands down
Mr Bruce Togazinni has a cool link on apps you need :) . <a href="http://www.asktog.com/columns/060MonsterMac.html">http://www.asktog.com/columns/060MonsterMac.html. I am not sure I agree with him entirely on WindowShades but the rest of them were great..
Since you seem to be the Wiki + Blog person I would recommend <a href="http://flyingmeat.com/voodoopad.html">Vodoopad. This is a wiki like editor, but much better than the windows version you stated in your previous blogs..
Oh yeah since you seem to be the Unix Geek you definitely need <a href="http://fink.sourceforge.net/">Fink
As a newcomer to Mac its high likely you'd need to talk to Windows to access your work machine.. Thankfully microsoft provides a <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx?pid=download&location=/mac/DOWNLOAD/MISC/RDC.xml&secid=80&ssid=9&flgnosysreq=True">Remote Desktop Client that would enable you to access windows machines from your mac..
Since you seem to have kids I would recommend getting<a href="http://www.apple.com/ilife/garageband/"> iLife and GarageBand!. This is stuff made for Gods!.. I am amazed at the quality of apple's software by just this one app..
You may already know eclipse & netbeans run on OS X..
Make sure even if you don't use it that you download the apple development tools.. Its highly likely that you'd be doing manual builds and need gcc to compile :)..
 Ah finally remember to set the iTunes Importing to use MP3 instead of AAC -> got burned on it for too long.

Posted by Unknown on April 21, 2004 at 02:41 AM EDT #

BTW your timeserver is an hour off from East Coast time

Posted by Shawn Osteen on April 21, 2004 at 02:48 AM EDT #

Got my 15" just before they upped the speed. I have a 1Ghz processor with 512MB of RAM. I love it. It's not fast like other PC laptops by any means, but the fact that the whole OS is SO MUCH more enjoyable to work with, I think makes up for the difference. That said, I would love to get my hands on the same laptop with 1.5Ghz, 1Gig of RAM, the 128MB of VRAM, and the faster 80 Gig drive. That ought to make for a very speedy machine. From what I've read, it should account for close, if not more, than double the speed of my current setup. Now THAT would be perfect. Welcome to the bright side. R

Posted by Robert Sfeir on May 25, 2004 at 10:46 AM EDT #

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