For those users after the shift away from a Microsoft world to an OS X platform, Apple have got a deal for you. Starting at a mere $1699, you can pick up an G4 iBook capable of more than just entertainment uses, but for the intents of this roundup we'll focus away from the productivity side.

Supplied with Mac OS X 10.3 and Apple's iLife '04 which includes iTunes, iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto and GarageBand, you're ready to go out of the box, Apple giving you the DVD playback and creation software and a way to record music. Apple are particularly good with providing software, the iLife bundle is a great example of the changes from the PC platform to a Mac environment, giving you applications rather than forcing users to go out and buy the software they've then purchased the device to achieve. That's awfully nice of them given this is the cheapest notebook on show in our roundup.

Whilst this particular configuration doesn't include an optical SuperDrive for DVD creation, they are available at roughly an additional $300 and will give you total freedom while you're out and about.

The display on our iBook was great, providing a clear sharp image during our DVD movie testing, best of all its wide viewing angles without distortion made it suitable for multiple watchers without needing everyone to be dead on in front to view properly.

Unfortunately we were unable to benchmark the iBook as we did the other nine notebooks in our roundup. With no common multi-platform benchmarks available, we opted to review the unit from a feature point of view, exactly the reason you'd want to purchase a multimedia capable notebook. Whilst the iBook is significantly lower clocked than some of the other 'books on show at 1.2GHz, Apple have kept it minimalist, locating all peripheral ports on the left hand side of the chassis. These include RJ11 phone jack, Ethernet port, monitor out, FireWire and a pair of USB ports. The right hand side features a slot-loading combo drive. Whilst for years high specification machines have been pushed for power users, this little Mac can do it all and hardly breaks a sweat. Capture and edit videos, listen to music, watch a DVD and browse the web all without Microsoft stealing your thoughts.