Ibook Or Powerbook??, laptop music production Options

[mazzjatazz]

Am a pop/jazz keyboardsist /pianist planning to buy a laptop for music production. My software of choice are reason and ableton live. Looking at the comparison between an ibook and a powerbook i get the feeling that the former is a much better buy. I could get one with a 1,33ghz processor and 1,25 gb ram for a price that wouldnt even get me a 12 inch powerbook with that much power. Doesn't make a lot of sense does it? I own an ibook G3 900mhz with 640 gb ram and always wanted to upgrade to a powerbook. However it just does not seem intelligent right now. Any chances of apple bringing out a new powerbook soon? I want to have the possibility to record an album at home...ambitious as it may sound. My hardware is a motu 828mkii firewire interface. Would appreciate any suggestions.
hope to hear from someone soon

[jofferman]

You have to consider that the PowerBook range has higher bus speeds and uses faster memory (PC2700 vs PS2100 in iBooks). Both have impact on the performance of your setup...

It all depends on what you want to do. If you just want to record audio, you'll probably do fine with the iBook (based on specs and word of mouth - I've never worked with an iBook). Software instruments are a lot more demanding, so if you plan to use a lot of those, an PB may be the better option.

(I faced the same dilemma some time ago and finally decided on a PB because I do use a lot of soft synths - I regularly torment my PB to the max)

hth,
Jim.