Technology 20" LCD monitor with 12" iBook?

[Santiago]

I was thinking of buying a mac mini along with a 20" Lcd monitor. Have heard some great things about the Dell 2005FPW 20” LCD. I am yet to take a final decision

What about if I combine a 12" iBook rather than a Mac Mini along with this monitor? I can get a notebook with a desktop at the same price. I am not a high end user, so the ibook processor should suffice.

What I am more worried is can the ibook handle 20' monitor. Are there compatibilty issues involved?

Am I better off with Macmini?

Thanks!

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[masterMood]

hey, i'm the person who created the other thread, there's a website called http://www.slickdeals.net/

do not buy the screen until it goes below 400 dollars, until then (and the coupons come every 2-3 weeks or so), just wait

the ibook will hook up with the 20 inch easily, but i was about to ask the same question, if i hooked up the screen would it display properly. i'm guessing it would, and the best resolution for an lcd screen is the native resolution it's meant to be. the 20 inch is like 1600 x 1280 or something (pretty damn huge), and if you can get the ibook to display in 1600 x 1280 (the lcd's native display), it would like pretty tight.

um, another thing if you go with the ibook, keep in mind that you cannot close the lid while you're using the monitor because it would cause too much heating (the ibook dissipates heat through the keyboard), so when you display things on the monitor you'll see a mirror image on the ibook (a minor inconvenienec, cause it looks like seeing the same image on a screen right next to it)

the powerbook 12 inch is better because you can expand the 20 inch to the 12 inch screen as well (using both screens for actual screen use)

 

[masterMood]

read this thread as well:

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00BpT8&unified_p=1

 

[masterMood]

i'm findind that the ibook is not a very good computer for hooking up with external screens, do some google searches on "ibook external monitor" and "powerbook external monitor" and you'll find that the powerbook was meant for this type of stuff.

 

[Santiago]

Thanks mate.
There was a deal for 384 $ on the Dell screen on 21st of this month, I guess.
I too feel, an ibook will have problems with a 20" screen. Is there a way out?

 

[Santiago]

Screen spanning hack
http://www.rutemoeller.com/mp/ibook/ibook_e.html

This one supposedly allows you to run big monitors on 12" ibook.

 

[masterMood]

voids the warranty though!

i'd recommend getting a refurbished 12 inch powerbook, i plan to do this, it'll save me about 200 dollars, but when i couple it with the student discount it'll be about 250 dollars off, so im guessing with a 12 inch powerbook, at 1.256 gigs of ram (i'll upgrade the ram myself as apple ram is overcharged by 50 percent), get the combo drive (no superdrive), applecare for 3 years, that should be around 3 years.

and if i decide that i don't like it, the resale value on apple products are really good. go on ebay.com type up g4 cube, remember that beautiful little contraption from apple? still worth al ot of money.

why go powerbook? the resolution goes up to anything you want (including the dell's 20 inch resolution of 1600 x whatever VERY BEAUTIFUL), DUAL DISPLAY (see the screen go on to the next screen, ibook only has mirroring), faster, looks sexier, better keyboard (full size and good quality), it has DVI output (the ibook onyl has analog output which means that the quality of the colors decreases as it goes to the monitor, DVI is better), powerbook has firewire 800 ports i believe, powerbook faster, better resale value, better heating system, LIGHTER.

don't buy an ibook/powerbook yet, wait until july/august as they will be updating them sometime soon.

 

[Santiago]

Thanks,
Now have to budget the whole thing.