I’ve loved my iBook. Despite it being 6-7 years old, despite it having only a 366 MHz G3 chip, 320 MB RAM, and a 12″ screen with a max resolution of 800 x 600 pixels, I have really liked my iBook. Things like its “stand out” design, or it’s nice “snap-back” handle (why did Apple get rid of handles on their laptops?) have made me fall in love with it. Oh, and it’s portability. Before we got the Mac mini, I used that iBook all the time despite there being two newer comps in the house. Since we got the Mac mini almost a year ago, I’ve still used the iBook quite frequently. Why? For one, I still need to have my stuff portable quite often. Furthermore, I don’t have to negotiate computer usage on the iBook like I do on the Mac mini. When Scott’s on the Mac mini, I can go on my iBook. And there’s still that undying love thing.

Unfortunately, all technology does essentially quack up, and my iBook has. For the last two weeks or so, my iBook has decided to stop charging. Heck, I would be using it while it was plugged in, and the battery would continue to lose charge while it was charging. I haven’t seen the battery indicator go above 0% since. I tried looking for solutions on Apple’s Support site, including resetting the Power Management Unit. No dice.

So I took it into the Genius Bar yesterday, and I essentially introduced the problem that it was either the power adapter, the battery, or the computer itself. The computer may be 6-7 years old, but the battery was purchased brand new in June 2005, and the power adapter was a $150 universal AC/Car/Air adapter with support for like six dozen computers purchased in July 2005. The Genius said that the fact that the computer would still work while it was plugged in meant that nothing was wrong with the adapter. He pulled out the Genius Bar’s battery, tried plugging it in, and it did the same thing. It never charged. So, he declared that it was a complete failure with the power management unit, or perhaps even some sort of logic board failure. I, uh, didn’t bother to ask about the cost of fixing it.
So I now effectively have a 6-7 year old lightweight computer that has to be plugged in all the time. The problem with that is I already have the Mac mini, which is also a lightweight computer that has to be plugged in all the time. And I still need to have my stuff go mobile. I’m going to a convention in two and a half weeks and I’m going to need a reliable laptop with a charged battery almost all the time down there. Not to mention some other things that I’m going to be doing next year (more on these soon when they are finalized) where having a laptop is going to be essential. Furthermore, now that Mac OS X Leopard has been delayed to October, my original idea of not getting a new laptop until summer now carries no water.

Therefore, I’m going to abandon my old MacBook Pro lust and now aim to get myself a white MacBook 2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo through deficit spending. After my dad’s teacher discount and then 8.25% sales tax, the total cost is $1297.92. I’m going to be doing my best to scrape every penny I have to make a down payment on that to help out my parents, and then pay them back incrementally while I’m able to over the rest of the year.

More on this will be coming soon…