iBook Fan Book: A Review

© 2005 Lawrence I. Charters

Washington Apple Pi Journal, Vol. 27, no. 4, July-August 2005, pp. 9.

Apple has an irritating habit of calling all their computers a Power Mac, a PowerBook, an iBook, or an iMac. This is confusing since, for example, an iBook of July 1999, shaped like a colorful, oversized Chiclet, has almost nothing in common with the sleek white iBooks of today.

And it is for these sleek white powerhouses that the iBook Fan Book was written. Subtitled Smart and Beautiful to Boot, the iBook Fan Book is a fan book – it sings the praises of the iBook – but the bulk of the text is a nicely condensed user manual. The new iBooks actually come with a printed user manual (the original iBook came with a multi-panel cross between a quick-reference guide and a poster), but it spends most of its time telling you how to use it or upgrade it. The iBook Fan Book tells you – briefly – how to use it.

Less than six inches on a side and only 130 pages (including introduction and index), the iBook Fan Book is tiny, and will easily slip into the slimmest carrying case. It contains advice on the care and cleaning of the iBook, good carrying cases, how to care for the screen, and other physical maintenance tips.

It also talks about connecting to the Internet, using Web browsers and Mail, using the Address Book, iCal, Stickies, the various iApps (iPhoto, iTunes, iMovie) and other basics. A section on “Extend your iBook’s memory” is really about storage, and talks about USB keychain drives and iPods as places where you can stash stuff in a hurry, and on the go.

It isn’t a comprehensive guide to the iBook. It won’t tell you how to install additional RAM; the manual that came with the iBook covers that. But if you want a quick, portable, attractive guide to using the iBook, the iBook Fan Book may be just what you need and no more.

Derrick Story, iBook Fan Book. O’Reilly, 2005. xvi, 104 pp. $14.95 ISBN 0-596-00861-9. http://www.oreilly.com/