Apple PowerBook G4 15.2 in. (M8362LL/A) Mac Notebook

Well, despite my numerous protests, my girlfriend went and bought a laptot computer. "Don't do that - a desktop is much cheaper ! You'll be able to get more for much less !", I said in vain. When I found out she was not only buying a laptot, but a Mac, I was in real disgust. Being a Windows addict, I always found the Mac OS to be unnecessarily complicated and limited. But well, nothing I said could prevent her from making this purchase. Just as recently as last week she received her new "baby".

I must say, to this day I kind of had to keep my mouth shut... I've never ever seen anything so tiny: this computer weights a mere 5 pounds and it's only an inch thin! Despite these minimalistic features, it has a HUGE 15" wide screen.

So where do I start?

Let's see... well, there are the usual pros and cons of a laptot computer. On the pro side, you get its fabulous portability, great battery life (4 hours) and so on. On the other hand, the keyboard is a bit small and takes a little getting used to: don't plan on buying it and writing a 300-page book straight away. You'll need some time to get used to it, but the keyboard feels nice nonetheless. The mousepad is also a big turn-off for me as far as laptop computers go. I found that I'm less likely to explore its capacities because I feel so uneasy navigating on it and click-and-drag operations can be a pain. I plan to work around this problem and buy an external mouse; I'll probably even do it tomorrow.

The computer is very powerful, there's no doubt about it. It's a 400 MHz machine with 128 Mb RAM and a 10 Gig HD. But then again, I can't help comparing this to a desktop - two years ago she bought a Dell desktop which had the exact same characteristics...

Of course, all these features will come at a price: $2600 to be more precise. Well, you should actually be glad, because here in Switzerland it costs a cool $3000. It's something you really have to consider when shopping around. Do you really need the portability for this price? Here you can get for the same price a Dell desktop with a Pentium 4 1000 MHz processor and some 256 Mb of RAM, not to mention the cool 19" screen.

What really impressed me though, was the display definition. Since she has no DVD player at home, we had to make do with the computer. We turned the lights off and we had our own (small) home-theater. I was amazed at the quality of the graphics display: it was much better than that of my screen at home, and much better than that of my TV. On the other hand, every once in a while there would be a few "jumps" on the DVD, and it would take it a while longer to "think" as it was getting warmer and warmer. By the end of the movie, the thing was almost burning down and as we reached the final credits - it froze! Okay, you'll probably tell me that computers weren't made to watch DVDs on. But hey, it has a DVD player, so it should have the capacity to cope with it! I've had a couple of other freezes since while performing more mundane tasks such as checking my e-mail. Nope, no Ctrl-Alt-Del and ending tasks here; this is a Mac, so you'll have to reset the whole thing... big inconvenient!

But still, with all these limitations the darn'd tiny thing still does pretty well. Of course, you probably won't get to play any games on it, otherwise you wouldn't have looked for a laptop.

I absolutely loved its look. Its metal-plated grey look gives it a very sober and elegant look. Nothing like those colorful fruity e-books. This only looks and is pretty sturdy, albeit very thin. I also think it's cool how the "apple" on its cover lights up when the computer is on.

Mac adepts will be quickly seduced by this computer; as for PC fans, they'll be a little more sceptical like me, but some might probably fall for it sooner or later and decide to cross the line and join ranks with the other "team". I'm still undecided, weighing the pros and cons, but will probably learn to appreciate it as time goes by. I feel it's more of a question of not liking the operating system rather than the machine itself. I understand there's a new OS coming soon and it will be better. It's a question of waiting to see if the apple turns good and tasty.