Apple iBook G4 12"?

[mat]

im looking for a nice little notebook. i dont need a desktop replacement, just something to use at my university.
First i considered a Centrino system, but when i read this from the apple site

iBook G4 with 12.1-inch display: 50-watt-hour lithium-ion battery provides up to 6 hours of battery life on a single charge

i think i'm getting my first Apple system. (allways wanted to try one)

what do you think about the new iBooks?

(i first wanted to post this on a Apple Site, but i think its better to ask this not on a Apple fansite)

 

[Dio]

I'd take any battery life figure with a pinch of salt. Only once in my experience has a manufacturer's quoted battery life come out with much resemblance to the actual (that was a Dell PDA).

I don't know much about the Apple notebooks, but I've seen a bunch of reviews of Centrino and the best top out at about 4-5 hours battery life, I think. Note that a 12.1" screen is pretty small nowadays.

 

[Entropy]

The smallest iBook G4 is a very nifty little computer.
If you can live with the limited screen real estate, you will love the portability it offers. It's also pretty rugged - built to take student (ab)use. My wifes iBook is very silent - I suspect that the fan in the G4 iBook might kick in more often than in the G3, but I lack personal experience. OTOH the G3 iBook is the quietest retail computer I've ever encountered.

Advice
- max out the memory. Don't do this via the Apple store though, you can find cheaper memory in several places.
- max out the harddrive. DO this via the Apple store as you buy your iBook. I just installed an 80GB harddrive in my wifes iBook and it was NOT for the faint of heart. And it would have been completely impossible without a pirated service manual. You'll need that drive space.
(iTunes is a great program. You'll use it more than you think. And odds are you will get an iPod - it is just too easy to justify having access to an external start-up disk for emergencies, which doubles as external short term back-up, triples for fast data transfer and pick-up, and quadruples as a superb way of having your music collection available everywhere, all the time.)

Take the plunge. It's cheap.
And Apple stuff keep their value surprisingly well, so you'll be able to get rid of it and still get a fair part of your money back if you don't like it.

Entropy