[TriLUG] Bought my first Laptop--a new Apple Powerbook with OSX--With Linux software in mind I have three questions:

[John Franklin]

On Tue, Jun 04, 2002 at 05:51:37PM -0400, al johson wrote:
> Another great response to my three questions.
> >I doubt you would buy a Mac to run something you could run on cheap
> > PC hardware.  That said, I tend to run NetBSD on old Mac hardware.  Not
> > really for the newbie, though
> 
> The main reason I decided to go with a mac laptop was that if I were to get
> the features I wanted (esp. an S-video connector on the back of the
> laptop---so I can easily surf the web on my 36" Sony Wega) , virtually all
> of the laptops were about the same price ($2000+). 

Yes, I noticed that when I was shopping for my iBook.  I conisidered 
getting a low-cost PC laptop and found that for the features the Mac 
laptops were very competitively priced.  I couldn't justify the PowerBook
(as much as I wanted to), but I could justify the top-o-the-line iBook.
Which I am very happy with.  Ultimately, it was the 6 hour battery life 
(4-5 under reasonable load and with wireless running) was what sealed it.

> Second, if you get a Mac
> you can run virtually any OS you desire: Mac, Windows (there is an excellent
> emulator), Linux, and finally BSD (which you already have), etc. Finally, I

Virtual PC?  Sluggish on my G3.  Having to emulate the instruction set
hurts performance.  Still, I can run NetBSD/i386 in a window on my Mac
laptop, which has a certain geek appeal.

> enjoy doing a lot of sound and graphics work, and as you know the Mac excels
> in these areas as well. I may curse it a year from now, but I haven't seen
> anything yet that I disliked. But then I really haven't had it longer than a
> few days.---Al Johnson

That's a hard argument.  There are a lot of high-quality graphics and sound
cards for PCs.  Though finding them in a laptop may be more difficult.

Don't get me wrong on Macs... I love 'em.  This message here is being 
typed out on my happy, shiny 14" iBook while I watch Cameroon beat Saudi
Arabia.  PVRs rock.

jf
-- 
John Franklin
franklin at elfie.org
ICBM: 35°43'56"N 78°53'27"W