Am I Mad?

[Matt]

i dont think i am...

i currently own a shuttle, and a laptop... both windows. it was great, but thesedays i dont really need them both. i dont really play games either. i use my pc for word documents, writing cds, playing back music, chatting on msn, reading forums and checking my mail. thats pretty much it. ive decided that practically a laptop is much better for me, combine it with wireless and i can sit in bed. or downstairs. or anywhere in my house. fantastic i think (ok im being weird now, i will stop)

this is my idea... sell both my shuttle and my tosh laptop and buy an ibook. as it stands it will do everything i want it to, and a friend of mine told me about airtunes, which sounds incredibly funky. ive used his imac on several occasions and i love everything about it. im liking the 12" ibook, so here is what i thought spec wise:

• 512MB DDR266 SDRAM
• 60GB Ultra ATA drive
• DVD/CD-RW
• Bluetooth Module
• AirPort Extreme Card
• AirPort Express Base Station with AirTunes
• Keyboard & Mac OS
• 1GHz PowerPC G4
• 12.1-inch TFT display
• Two USB ports
• One FireWire port
• Power Adapter
• Battery

Price: £988.08
VAT: £172.91
Subtotal: £1,160.99

that would leave me with one thing... office. now the mac version of office is £349 (eek!) but im guessing there is going to be another package that could read and save to .doc? or will i just (sorry for the crudeness) have to bend over and pay £349 for office? i only really need word so that would kinda annoy me a little bit.

im guessing that macs come with an email client similar to outlook express as standard, and if not i can download a good one anyway for little cost. lastly i would obviously want to integrate the mac into my home network. my parents have a windows pc which would be nice to be able to share with, and i currently have NTL 750k (or whatever it is now) connected to a netgear RP114 router. im guessing i would have no hassles just plugging the airport into this and being well on my way as far as connecting to the net and the rest of the network is concerned.

sorry for the long post, but you guys seem to know a good deal about macs, and i could really do with your advice

as a final note - i looked at powerbooks, but i thought one would be a bit overkill for my needs so i partly dismissed it... if im wrong, let me know

thanks in advance,

Matt

[CocoPops]

iBooks come with a version of appleworks I think (can't remember the full name).

Don't upgrade the ram on the initial order, go check out www.crucial.com/uk it should be cheaper.

OSX comes with "Mail" it rocks, works very well I prefer it to Entourage (Outlook's equiv from Msoft).

The mac has imho always been the easiest to network, ie if your network is working fine, it's simply a case of plug it in and off you go.

Any more Q's, ask away.

[Doug]

you're not mad

only qualm with the hardware is the ram: get it with just the standard 256Mb RAM, then buy a module from crucial, you'll save a packet. save £70 off the iBook, then get the same module (here) for £35. You could probably pick up a bigger hard drive for a similar saving.

Airport Express/AirTunes looks quite funky, i've been dieing for the chance to try them out. imagine having your iTunes music library on a machine in the bedroom, connected wirelessly, your iBook sitting with you in the living room/where the hifi is, and your Airport Express plugged into the hifi. in effect, you're using the iBook as a rather expensive wireless remote connected to the remote library and remote speakers. i have visions of this in the near future

funny, our prices don't match

• 512MB DDR266 SDRAM
• 60GB Ultra ATA drive
• DVD/CD-RW
• Bluetooth Module
• AirPort Extreme Card
• AirPort Express Base Station with AirTunes
• Keyboard & Mac OS
• 1GHz PowerPC G4
• 12.1-inch TFT display
• Two USB ports
• One FireWire port
• Power Adapter
• Battery

Price: £954.89
VAT: £167.11
Subtotal: £1,122.00

as for saftware: ditch the Mail.app and grab Mozilla Thunderbird, a far better program (sorry Coco, but Mail just annoyed me ). There are plenty of options to replace Word, unfortunatelly i've no experience of them.

You should have no problems getting it going with your router, wired or wireless. my G5 happily coexists with a couple of XP boxes.

[pritsey]

Know any students? My GF works for a nui and therefore I got my iBook with a higher education discount. How about someone in school? Even the normal educational discount is better than nothing, and then you can get the office student edition too!

[Matt]

well, im glad im not insane

because to me this sounds like a stunning idea thanks for the pointers with the ram, i will definately do that, any money saving is good by me! so it all seems really simple and painless, which i must admit im really liking the sound of! my word processing is sorted, my networking queries are sorted, my mail is sorted! perfect! i think now all i have to do is sort the funds... im waiting to hear back on a job that i had an interview for today... if i get that then its all go as far as im concerned!

[directhex]

www.openoffice.org

[Matt]

www.openoffice.org

looks good to me thanks for the link! this is actually looking so painless its untrue, seems pretty perfect to me!

[directhex]

looks good to me thanks for the link! this is actually looking so painless its untrue, seems pretty perfect to me!

i had similar sentimets moving to linux (to save hardware expenses)

[Matt]

ok im pretty excited, hoping to hear that ive got a new job on monday so it will be all go then, i will possibly be able to buy the ibook before ive sold all my old pc stuff... really looking foward to being able to buy something thats going to really suit me and my needs, and is something i really want... its a nice thought