just a thought

[egypturnash]

I've been saying it's about time to upgrade my machine, when I have funds.

Apple announced that their next wave of machines will be Intel-powered rather than Power PC.

"AAAGH!" people cry. "My brand new Mac is insta-obsolete!" Despite the fact that they have an emulation layer planned, and a fat binary mode, and all that good stuff to ease the transition. "I have to unload it NOW because it's OBSOLETE!"

Maybe it's time to start watching prices of used Macs drop like a rock. And buy one. Sure, man, I'll be happy to take your brand new fifteen-inch deluxe Powerbook off your hands for half of what it was when it was new a few weeks ago. It's got no future. Yep. Sucks, doesn't it? Resale value's shot because who wants to buy a machine that's about to go through an architecture shift?

It'd still be faster than my dual-450 by a long shot! And more portable. And probably good to run new releases of software for at least a year or two into the time when all new Macs are Intel. That's targeted for the end of 2007, and there's a lot of PowerPC Macs out there right now to buy tools for...

Comments

[turbinerocks.livejournal.com]

Laptops are always useful, even ancient laptops!

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I'm getting a lot of use out of a laptop that'd drive me mad for normal use, but is fine for checking email and LJ and sometimes mucking from bed...

[grrrowly.livejournal.com]

Yup, and they'll have a thing like OS 9 where you can run the old software in the new machines. Tis called Rosetta Stone, I believe.
I think this is a bad move on Apple's part, it'll lose them customers, but just as long as there's SOME way to keep the old programs, I'm slightly more okay with it than I was when I first heard of it.

[kamenkyote.livejournal.com]

Crap, you know, I hadn't even thought of that. I, too was thinking if I did ok at AC that I'd look to update (since I'm the only person I know regularly running OS 9.2 and stone-age versions of Adobe software- made with real adobe!). Gah. Update just in time for everything to go useless. Or wait -another- two years. Wonderful.

Well, it had to happen, I guess.

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

Well. How long have you been running OS9.2? It's still pretty damn useful, obviously, given what you do. And you'd be jumping ahead something like 3 or 4 revisions of the tools, to a much faster machine, if you upgraded now. You run AI8, right? Going to a recent used machine would let you leap ahead to CS2, which is AI12. There's been some handy additions since then.

Also, I seriously expect prices on Macs to DROP because of this. Maybe not new ones, but the market for used ones will be a definite buyer's market. And one or two generations behind is a big fat upgrade for you. It's a pretty good one for me, too; if I got a current Mac, I think it'd be impossible to get one slower than mine.

[kamenkyote.livejournal.com]

I've been using 9.2 since it came out. I have a lime green iMac. My version of AI is 7.0 and PS is 4.0! This little machine has chugged on and on for me without major complaint since I bought it. And you're right; if I do upgrade, even before the switch, I will still be doing myself a favor. Playing with AI CS was SO nice...

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

Let's see, the rainbow iMacs were new when I started working around Spümcø. Around a decade ago. You're using a machine that's around eight to ten years old.

Apple says they expect it to take until the end of '07 to completely stop making PPC machines. I figure there's a couple of years of software support left for the PPCs afterwards - you'll probably be able to get whatever version of AI is out in '08, 09, maybe even the 2010 release, and have it run fine.

(And it feels weird to type '2010' so casually.)

And maybe by 2015, when you're starting to feel that your 2005-vintage Mac is getting really, really old and slow compared to the current crop, and it's time to upgrade, they'll have switched to another architecture. They've already moved from the 68000 series to the PPC, after all.

Sure, it'll be "old" and "unsupported". But if the damn thing works, and runs the tools you need at an acceptable speed, who cares that it can't run stuff that's only available on the new Intel architecture?

[turbinerocks.livejournal.com]

I have PS 5.5. I see no reason to upgrade. :D

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

AI 7 lacks transparency.

And a lot of other cool stuff that I lean on hard in my work.

But when Adobe added transparency in AI9, every Illustrator user pretty much came spontaneously.

[kamenkyote.livejournal.com]

The machine's not quite that old! It's really only about 5, according to "About this Macintosh." It wasn't top of the line when I got it, but a hell of a lot better than my old 68000 machine. The sad thing is, I haven't owned a Mac that's needed replacing for any reason other than software. My Mac Plus still runs, though no one uses it. So does the 6300 CD. I run at 333 mhrz with 160 meg of RAM and a 4 gig (at the time, HUGE!) drive. Amazingly slow by today's standards, but when it's mostly used for web surfing, email and older apps, who can tell?

But yes, transparency is too cool to miss, as is the brushstroke feature.

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

As for me...

As long as gcc continues to support PPC, my machine will remain useful.

[neillparatzo.livejournal.com]

Blasphemy I know, but I do occasionally enjoy using programs that other people wrote and/or compiled.

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

*grin* I see no contradiction.

I use Microsoft Office every day. And I use lots of pre-compiled software (not just from Apple).

But as long as I have access to a recent version of gcc, my system will remain useful to me.

[cobaltie.livejournal.com]

I have nearly as old a Mac as someone up there previously...so /anything/ will be an improvement on this ancient heap. DV Special Edition iMac, only a paltry 450 Mhz thing on 128 of RAM...and I'm still making the thing run Panther. Sigh.

I'd so totally dig having a Powerbook of some sort, for the portability and possibility. If I could figure out what I'd actually /do/ with it, since the thing is I don't really /need/ a new Mac, since I got a PC that does about the same stuff I was going to do with the Mac, and more. But I really want to run Tiger now. O.o

(On a side note, since my PC's currently not quite working, I can actually see this journal again as you intended it, in Safari on a Mac. Very pretty!)

[orb2069.livejournal.com]

The machine I'm whining and kvetching about down below is a 700mhz G3 iBook/CDRom that went for $400+shipping...

[barberio.livejournal.com]

Dont worry! It'll be backwards compatable! Just like OS X is!

[strredwolf.livejournal.com]

Nah. It'll still work. That's what Linux is for!

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

*shudder*

[strredwolf.livejournal.com]

Seperate posts for the geeks. BSD, which MacOS X is based on, runs on Intel (see FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD). Apple's also going whole hog open source (which is why GCC is on it now). Add PearPC for the compatiblity "layer" and MacOS XI is an eazy port.

I guess Steve figured out how to get people off of 10.3.9...

[orb2069.livejournal.com]

First were four different beige units that I got a 'deal' on, then eventually had to give away because their upgrade paths were so convoluted/expensive that it would have been cheaper to go out and buy something new....

Then there's my first B&W G3/300, which had a Revision 1 motherboard, complete with that darling IDE glitch that corrupts Hard Drives over 6GB. - I tried to correct that by buying an Adaptec hard drive controller - That Apple dropped support for in 10.2...

Then I bought my latest G3/300($30), with it's unsupported video card, which was so agreeable that it actually enticed me into buying one of the late-revision(700mhz) G3 iBooks - working, From an actual dealer - This is the first computer I've paid more than $100 for since I bought my Atari Falcon030, new. It's arriving TODAY (unless UPS screws it up) for crying out loud - I ordered it the day before the announcement.

Thanks for the housewarming gift, Steve-o.

For those of you looking for macs, a good place is Low End Mac's Deal Index (http://lowendmac.com/deals.shtml).

[ghostangel.livejournal.com]

Ooooh! I didn't think of that! ^_^ Resaled laptop here I come! :D