Apple Leaks G5

[Rhs_CG]

uh........what?

[beaker]

You must have something wrong because that is thats the same machine that was released back in January.


This is what the page said:

http://www.macnn.com/news/19826

- 1.6GHz, 1.8GHz, or Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5 processors
- Up to 1GHz processor bus
- Up to 8GB of DDR SDRAM
- Fast Serial ATA hard drives
- AGP 8X Pro grapgics options from NVIDIA or ATI
- Three PCI or PCI-X expansion slots
- Three USB 2.0 ports
- Bluetooth & AirPort Extreme ready
- Optical and analog in and out

[Brent Turbo]

That dual 2.0 is going to be stupid fast. Those PowerPC 970 chips are nothing to scoff at.

[Pin_pal]

Hmmm, yeah, for how much $2-$3000.00??? I can put a liquid cooled, top-of -the-line AMD system for about $650.00 Beat that Fruit computer... err Apple.

Oh, I'm not meaning to start a Mac vs. PC war either.

[takkun]

Originally posted by Pin_pal
Oh, I'm not meaning to start a Mac vs. PC war either. LOL! Them's fightn' words.

Prediction: There's going to be a couple good posts but mostly flames below this line. Have fun.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

i use a MAC, but you just get more power for your buck from PC's. Also, there are shed loads more graphic card options for pc's, if anyone knows any different then please pm me :) ok, OSX is fantastic, but unless MAC prices radically change soon then i, for one, am going to jump over to pc's at work... :shrug:

[beaker]

Apple workstations currently start at around $1500. Minus processor speed, a similar configured workstation class machine on dell.com or from boxx will cost fairly similar. Comparing to a home built machine as always your going to build a pc for much cheaper.

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

u can get them a lot cheaper from Dell, especially if u get a pre-configured pc from an order cancellation (which happens a LOT more than you would expect...)

[beaker]

Well yea, apple offers refurbished machines for 2-300 less also. Most companies offer that.

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

we're not just talking 2-300 less, here...if you go to the right places over here you can easily get 33%-40% off...

[deepinspace]

Dell!?!?! We have two dell machines in the office, and they are rubbish, also the customer service is shite (and we paid for the on site bussiness support).........I wouldn't pay more than a few hundred squid for a dell machine.

Anyway, if the new mac is stupidly fast, I wouldn't mind spending just that much more.:)

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

i've used Dell for years, never had a problem, but, there you go, that's just the way it is, etc... never used their onsite business support, though, coz we get support from an independant company, mainly for networking coz we've never had problems with the machines themselves...

[silvergun]

I seriously doubt a top end amd pc will beat these macs. As for price a 1.8 ghz 970 cost a little under $300 to produce, far from the $600+ 3.2 ghz Prescott. As for the pentium, this 120 watt producing chip will be swallowed up by apples monster. Roll on Monday and let the fight begin. 1ghz fsb...... this is too sweet!

[SMH]

Folks, there's no mention of the PPC 970 in the list, or the picture.:shrug: I think they'll actually be based on MOTO's new Dual Core G5 chips. Anyway monday isn't all that far, and boy do those specs look good...:drool:

[Marc Andreoli]

God, what is wrong with you 'but I can build a PC for $99.99' people... :annoyed:

This is the best Apple news in years. You will always find a PC that is faster/cheaper than a mac (it is a branded computer after all), but it looks like Apple is back on track with a viable graphics workstation after all. Ok, we still need to see what graphic cards are going to be supported, but things start looking good for people who prefer using macs/OSX over windows...choice is good.

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

no-one ever said they could build a pc for 99.99, i was talking about buying cheaper pc's with far better graphics cards than are currently available for MACs. At the moment it really doesn't matter what Apple do if the best graphics card available for them is a GeForce 4Ti!! I love using Apple Macs, but as far as i can see PC's are far better supported... :shrug:

EDIT: heck, if you 'really' want to talk about building your own computer, check out how to build your own G4... (http://www.macopz.com/buildamac/)

[deepinspace]

What are you talking about gForce 4 ti is the lick!:drool:

Anyway, if the rumor is true, then OS X.3 will have build-in support for highend graphics cards.

BTW, Apple is marketing PowerPC 970 as PowerPC G5 (according to a website, which I don't remeber).

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

how does GeForce 4 Ti compare to Quadra and Wildcat cards? :shrug:

[deepinspace]

Don't know really, I use lightwave and it looks the same on anything:rolleyes:

[beaker]

Originally posted by SMH
Folks, there's no mention of the PPC 970 in the list, or the picture.:shrug: I think they'll actually be based on MOTO's new Dual Core G5 chips. Anyway monday isn't all that far, and boy do those specs look good...:drool:
I doubt it. Motorola has been trying to sell off their microprocessor unit for years. They are so far behind, I doubt they could ever produce a 1.8 ghz proc, let alone a 2 ghz one(The g4 has only gone up by 200 mhz every 6 months for the last 2 years). It is just too big of a coincidence that the specs have a 1 ghz bus and the same exact processor speeds as ibm has announced for their 970 blades.

[Marc Andreoli]

Originally posted by PHILL_JAMES2000
no-one ever said they could build a pc for 99.99, i was talking about buying cheaper pc's with far better graphics cards than are currently available for MACs.

It is called 'exaggeration' ;)

I agree about the gaphic cards (although the gForce4 is not much slower than entry level Quadro's, it just doesn't feature antialiased hw wireframe accelleration etc. I think), but we don't know what is going to be used in those new machines either...

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

Originally posted by deepinspace
Don't know really, I use lightwave and it looks the same on anything:rolleyes:


:surprised

[policarpo]

Let's just hope that this helps to swing Apple back to the forefront of innovation, because in reality, Apple really understands what it means to be a living breathing creativie individual who loves to make things which help to inspire the world!

I'm getting all choked up, 'cause I may finally come back to Apple after a 6 year hiatus in which i switched to the PC in order to learn 3D!

Damn...having LightWave on a Duo dongle makes switching to Apple again almost a no brainer....now if only Digital Fusion were on the Mac, i'd be set. :drool:

Anyone want to help me start a petition to get DF on OSX?:bounce:

[beaker]

Just use Shake :)

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by beaker
Apple workstations currently start at around $1500. Minus processor speed, a similar configured workstation class machine on dell.com or from boxx will cost fairly similar.

What you're conveniently ignoring is that the Dell will run screaming circles around the mac at the same price point -- and most of them also now have a richer feature set than a mac.

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

Originally posted by Thalaxis
What you're conveniently ignoring is that the Dell will run screaming circles around the mac at the same price point -- and most of them also now have a richer feature set than a mac.

exactly...

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by silvergun
I seriously doubt a top end amd pc will beat these macs.


That's SERIOUS optimism... actually, that's more than optimism.

It is highly unlikely that even an IBM workstation using these processors will be able to match a high-end x86 rig.


As for price a 1.8 ghz 970 cost a little under $300 to produce, far


Where did you get that from?

[b]
from the $600+ 3.2 ghz Prescott. As for the pentium, this 120
[b]

Intel has FAR more volume to amortize costs over, a less expensive process, and a smaller die in addition to FAR more capacity. IBM is using a fairly large die here, and a rather expensive fab process, and you think that it will cost IBM LESS to make a comparitively small-volume part than it will for Intel to make a part with massive volumes?

[policarpo]

I'd use shake...but i've already invested in Digital Fusion. :) I can sell you my license for the cost of Shake on OSX. :)

These discussions are funny. Everyone is all of a sudden an expert of economics, technology and marketing.

Everyone should just be happy that Apple has upped the ante, because in the end, we the users will benefit. Regardless of platform.:p

[dark_lotus]

One interesting thing that was pointed out by Sarah Lane on TechTV, when she was first using OS X, on a powerbook, was that it makes you feel more creative.

Actually the only reason I got Apple, was that I was furious with Dell. My experience with them was terrible, and I'll never be buying a computer from them ever again.

But I love both PC's and Macs, so I'll just have to build my next PC.

But Panther and G5, Ohh so pretty. I've also heard that Panther will have something similar to WINE, so that you can run windows applications without an emulator. A response perhaps from Big Evil's buyout of Connetix Virtual PC.

[Per-Anders]

I'm looking forward to seeing some benchmarks on these new systems, especially when x.3 comes out with full support for cards like the x1, wildcat quadro etc.

on a further note i find it disturbing that there are PC users who are so insecure that they need to jump onto every thread related to apple and start flame wars here based conjecture masquerading as fact (do you really know how these new machines will operate real world?). As an owner of several PC and Apple machines i can only say this news is a good thing, I'm looking forward to seeing what wintels reply wil be, and how macs will now develop from here, remember if the new G5 is no longer a moto chip, then this is only the start for Apple and their users (if that's a little too cryptic for you then remember AMD's history and how they started out).

[silvergun]

why is it everytime something good on a mac comes along you pc zealots stop saying crap like "oh, but forthe same price we can have a dell or whatever that runs alot faster". Now that is a load of tosh..you wont beat the dual 2ghz 970s and when the dual 2.5 come at the end of the year. it's game over. As for price yeah your pcs might be alot cheaper but still you'll always be running windows.

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by dark_lotus
One interesting thing that was pointed out by Sarah Lane on TechTV, when she was first using OS X, on a powerbook, was that it makes you feel more creative.


So what you're saying is that creativity comes from bright colors?

[pomme]

what I like about Apple is the quality control. But maybe that's in the eyes of the beholder, and I behold a mac now and am very happy with it.

[PHILL_JAMES2000]

Originally posted by silvergun
why is it everytime something good on a mac comes along you pc zealots stop saying crap like "oh, but forthe same price we can have a dell or whatever that runs alot faster". Now that is a load of tosh..you wont beat the dual 2ghz 970s and when the dual 2.5 come at the end of the year. it's game over. As for price yeah your pcs might be alot cheaper but still you'll always be running windows.

i'm a Mac user, i learned a lot of stuff on the Mac, all of my work is done on the Mac, and i'm still saying that you get more power for your buck on a pc :p

EDIT: but, at the end of the day, this is all just an evolved version of the old "Atari ST's VS. Amiga's" and "SNES Vs. Mega Drive" arguments, and, to get around that, i bought them all! We'll always have stuff like this, no one system is totally better than the other, swings and roundabouts for each :buttrock: :buttrock: :buttrock:

[matty429]

Who cares about the new mac.....

Plus all you guys comparing it to intels and microsoft

give me a dual opteron and linux/windows dual boot..and if something doesn't work I can fix it myself...It's all about the upgrade path

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by silvergun
Now that is a load of tosh..you wont beat the dual 2ghz 970s and when the dual 2.5 come at the end of the year. it's game over.

Fanatacal much?

(It's funny that "creative" types rag on PC users because of the fact that they use windows... and then complain that we're insecure when all we're doing is using a better tool for the job.)

[Lockstar]

Thalaxis,

You clearly don't understand why people use macs do you. I use macs because they are the nearest thing to a drawing board that I know, it's personal. I use windows and Linux as well, and neither capture this feeling.

Regarding speed.

When it boils down to it a shit piece of work is a shit piece of work regardless at what speed it's rendered at.

Your comments such as bright colours, plagiarised ideas, clever marketing, in this and previous posts. I think is slightly hypocritical. Afterall I see you own some Bang & Olufsen Headphones, now if thats not paying for pure design, I don't know what is. Price does not enter into it for some people.

If you are not interested in Apple, and can only offer negative posts, or posts which are so overly technical that they become irrellevant to the majority of people, then why even get involved? why not let the people just enjoy themselves?

[clusterfuq]

a new processor can only be good news for the cg world! I remember salivating over the new g4's, now g5, these are gonna be cool. well done apple!

seems such a shame that ANY apple news has to turn into a slagging match. :rolleyes:

(oh, and SNES was SO much better than megadrive :p )

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Lockstar
You clearly don't understand why people use macs do you. I use macs because they are the nearest thing to a drawing board that I know, it's personal. I use windows and Linux as well, and neither capture this feeling.


Actually, if you listen to most of the people who try to convince newcomers to the industry to buy macs, statements like yours are the exception... not the rule. There's very little by way of rational logic (even to express personal preference) in most cases.


Your comments such as bright colours, plagiarised ideas, clever marketing, in this and previous posts. I think is slightly hypocritical. Afterall I see you own some Bang & Olufsen Headphones, now if thats not paying for pure design, I don't know what is. Price does not enter into it for some people.


How is that hipocrisy? Did it ever occur to you to ask WHY I bought B&O headphones? Or did you just assume that like Apple, B&O design for style to hide a performance deficit?

I know full well that B&O are not the best-sounding headpones ou there... but they do sound quite good, and their comfort is enough to justify the comparitively small premium, combined with the even smaller performance deficit. But then, I know how B&O designs their gear.


If you are not interested in Apple, and can only offer negative posts, or posts which are so overly technical that they become irrellevant to the majority of people, then why even get involved? why not let the people just enjoy themselves?

Because reminding the morons of how stupid they are is more fun than working? (For the humor-impaired, that is not the real answer.)

I started reading this thread out of curiosity. The only time I responded was to inject a dose of reality into the situation, but when I started seeing the idioicy that the fanatics started spewing, my contempt slipped out.

I know not all mac users are fanatics... but that doesn't excuse the stupidity of the fanatics. I don't have any more respect for other fanatics, though; I reamed a certain AMD fanatic for spewing similar misinformation at one point, even though I happen to be an AMD fan -- case of being honest and losing patience.

[policarpo]

He who has the most toys win!

That's it!:beer:

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by policarpo
He who has the most toys win!

That's it!:beer:

That's what having a job is for, right? :)
:beer:

[Saurus]

Me? Don’t really care what apple does. I have invested way too much on my Win PC to jump on a “faster apple”. It’s a waste of time and money for a few speed gains. PC speed war can easily get back on track once AMD produce a faster processor than Intel. I don’t think IBM has the stomach to compete in that ring. Apple’s smaller market and the tendency for Mac user to hold on their system longer than their PC counter part doesn’t justifying IBM to spend the extra bucks in keeping up with the other companies. Plus Macs doesn’t run Battlefield 1942 and C&C Generals...some of my investments:buttrock:

Saurus

[Emre]

Forget the benchmarks or prices or anything else... the real difference is (i think) FONTS .

if you'r a graphics designer, mac would do you more friendly because mac does adjust the spaces between letters. i dunno how and why but pc software don't care about typing with right spaces.so everytime you have to do it manually.maybe that's because thousands of pc users modify fonts (bad) and publish them with the same original name.

anyway i'm a graphics designer and use pc... hate mac. (no right button on mouse) :)

[policarpo]

Originally posted by Emre
Forget the benchmarks or prices or anything else... the real difference is (i think) FONTS .

if you'r a graphics designer, mac would do you more friendly because mac does adjust the spaces between letters. i dunno how and why but pc software don't care about typing with right spaces.so everytime you have to do it manually.maybe that's because thousands of pc users modify fonts (bad) and publish them with the same original name.

anyway i'm a graphics designer and use pc... hate mac. (no right button on mouse) :)

WHATTTT are you talking about?

I'm a Print and digital media designer and have been using a PC for 6 years and there are absolutely no problems with fonts on the PC or on the Mac...they are the same. A Quark file on the Mac is the same on the PC. Make sure your fonts are legit.

Also with the new standard of OTF fonts, the future is bright because we finally have platform independant fonts.

Plus any good designer only needs Helvetica, Univers, Meta, and Dinn. We can make the rest oursleves. :drool:

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by policarpo
WHATTTT are you talking about?

I'm a bit surprised that he hasn't been jumped on about the mouse comment... while I agree that a one-button mouse is silly, I'm well aware of the fact that there is hardly a shortage of options on the mouse front for mac users.

I just think it's funny that a company like Apple whose only real advantage is their ergonomics designed one of the worst mice in history.

[Brent Turbo]

Wow, another PC vs. Mac debate. Just thinking about it makes me want to fall asleep.

But before I do, chew on this analogy: There are cars out there that cost $500, and cars that cost $500,000. Essentially, they all do the same thing -- move your body from one location to another. People buy cars based on numerous factors, including personal taste/preference, and budget constraints. Now why is it that when someone buys a BMW, you never hear people saying "what an idiot, you could have bought 2 Nissan Altimas with that money!" Because at least in some arenas, people respect other people's ability to make thier own decisions about what they purchase, and assume that they're buying within their budget. Why this doesn't happen in the world of computers, I'll never understand, but I certainly wish people would use a touch of logic when talking about computing platforms. After all, they're just computers... who cares?

Regards,
Brent

[Peter Reynolds]

As someone has already hinted at: the more competition the better.

3D graphics wouldn't have progressed as fast if it weren't for things like Maya eating into Softimage market share in 99. Now look how far apps like Maya, XSI, Max, C4D and Lightwave have come. And lets hope Mirai makes a big comeback.

Note: the above statement in no way implies application superiority via its order of mention, or any other application inclusions or omissions.

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by PHILL_JAMES2000
i use a MAC, but you just get more power for your buck from PC's. Also, there are shed loads more graphic card options for pc's, if anyone knows any different then please pm me :) ok, OSX is fantastic, but unless MAC prices radically change soon then i, for one, am going to jump over to pc's at work... :shrug:

OSX is just BSD with a windows management, yawn
not really its own os anyway...
You should go unix all the way and benefit from all that BSD can give you... or Linux for that matter

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Rich Suchy
OSX is just BSD with a windows management, yawn
not really its own os anyway...
You should go unix all the way and benefit from all that BSD can give you... or Linux for that matter

Actually, other than maturity and native XWindows, OSX IS UNIX.
It doesn't have the millions of hours of testing, pounding, fixing,
and optimizing behind it that BSD and Linux have, but that doesn't
make it any less a UNIX os. It's just a less compatible, less
optimized, and less robust UNIX flavor than the other flavors out
there, though it has a prettier UI (which of course is more than
enough to make up for a lack of robustness or maturity in the
eyes of the "faithful").

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by Thalaxis
Actually, other than maturity and native XWindows, OSX IS UNIX.
It doesn't have the millions of hours of testing, pounding, fixing,
and optimizing behind it that BSD and Linux have, but that doesn't
make it any less a UNIX os. It's just a less compatible, less
optimized, and less robust UNIX flavor than the other flavors out
there, though it has a prettier UI (which of course is more than
enough to make up for a lack of robustness or maturity in the
eyes of the "faithful").

no... it is BSD with a windows manager and a few tools thrown in. I didnt say it was like BSD, It is built on top of BSD and called an OS... the OS part IS BSD. I read about that quite a while back... for some reason people just dont seem to understand it. OSX is not an OS in its own right but More like a BSD distro with a propriatary windows manager on top.

[beaker]

Originally posted by Rich Suchy
no... it is BSD with a windows manager and a few tools thrown in. I didnt say it was like BSD, It is built on top of BSD and called an OS... the OS part IS BSD. I read about that quite a while back... for some reason people just dont seem to understand it. OSX is not an OS in its own right but More like a BSD distro with a propriatary windows manager on top.
Yes and No. OSX is actually based on the Open/NeXT Step operating system which is about 15 years old and the Mach kernel which is over 20 years old. Though it does have the inclusion of many parts of Freebsd in it, it is not just BSD with a pretty window manager. Most of the freebsd based stuff is the user based commandline tools (bash, grep, awk, etc...). This makes up maybe 10-15% of osx.

here is a good link that elaborates more on what part of bsd is osx.
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthread.php?threadid=25034

[RichSuchy]

thanks beaker, that is enlightening

[easy]

All i want to see one day is that Apple release a new Mac that is as fast as PC...because then Intel, AMD will have to release a faster processor to compete. I think Intel and AMD have got it too easy.

Ok there's competition between AMD and Intel but I bet they are helping each other. It happens in other industries, a sort of a compromise, "you broke our patent, but if you let us use your patent we'll call it even. <- they corner a market but make it look like they are fierce competitors.

As it is now I suspect when Intel release a new processor it is only slightly faster than the previous making us, the users, spend more money then we need to. Well this happen when the Pentium first came out.

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by easy
All i want to see one day is that Apple release a new Mac that is as fast as PC...because then Intel, AMD will have to release a faster processor to compete. I think Intel and AMD have got it too easy.




thats a moot point... even if the do, amd or intel releases a faster one each couple of months.

[silvergun]

eeer i'd like tp reply to the guys comment on hating macs because they have 1 button. The new machines have 3 button mice, the 1 in the center is like an ipod type scroll wheel and can be used as a button so you have no excuses to not buy a mac. It'll be alot easier to use than that god aweful scroll wheel thats on most pcs..Anyone ever use that apart from looking at websites? These new mice will be used in a much better way and Just watch the keynote on monday with an open mind, i'm sure you'll be impressed

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Rich Suchy
no... it is BSD with a windows manager and a few tools thrown in. I didnt say it was like BSD, It is built on top of BSD and called an OS... the OS part IS BSD. I read about that quite a while back... for some reason people just dont seem to understand it. OSX is not an OS in its own right but More like a BSD distro with a propriatary windows manager on top.

An OS:

Provides memory management
File system management
Process management
Hardware abstraction
A user interface

Which part of that is not in OSX?

Do you consider DOS to be an OS (a crappy one, but that's not
the point)?

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by easy
All i want to see one day is that Apple release a new Mac that is as fast as PC...because then Intel, AMD will have to release a faster processor to compete. I think Intel and AMD have got it too easy.

Easy? Do you know how hard what they are doing IS? AMD is hanging on by a thread... because Intel steamrolled them with the P4.

Besides, Intel is going after the big iron now (UltraSPARC, POWER4), and AMD is going after one of Intel's biggest markets (low end + mid-range servers).

Intel is in a very tough situation -- their hardware is far too powerful for the vast majority of their customer base to use, let
alone want more of.


Ok there's competition between AMD and Intel but I bet they are helping each other. It happens in other industries, a sort of a compromise, "you broke our patent, but if you let us use your patent we'll call it even. <- they corner a market but make it look like they are fierce competitors.

Anyone want to take bets on whether or not Intel wants AMD around competing with them for revenue? Think Intel's happy about the fact that thanks to AMD, their Rambust gambit got toasted, and they lost close to 50% of the chipset market?


As it is now I suspect when Intel release a new processor it is only slightly faster than the previous making us, the users, spend more money then we need to. Well this happen when the Pentium first came out.

Yet look at where we are now compared to where we were at the
end of the PentiumIII's livespan, and consider how much more power we have than we had then; the Cinema rendering benchmarks show that the current flagship P4's (which actually cost less at intro now than PIII flagships did) are reaching past 5x the performance of the fastest-ever PIII's, and they've not hit
their limit yet.

And who knows what Intel's cooking up in Tejas, or whether or
not they plan to push the Itanium family down to the consumer
desktop in the future. My guess is that they'll be going after the
workstation market with that, since they'll be able to offer
unmatched floating point performance, and still undercut the
competition in price, while at the same time broadening the
market for Itanium, and it's also a step toward moving it to the
desktop.

But that's just a guess, partly based on their publicly disclosed
roadmaps.

[RichSuchy]

Originally posted by Thalaxis
An OS:

Provides memory management
File system management
Process management
Hardware abstraction
A user interface

Which part of that is not in OSX?

Do you consider DOS to be an OS (a crappy one, but that's not
the point)?

Well, I had been misinformed previously that the Kernal was BSD... and that that BSD handled that stuff...

But it seems I was wrong. In my understanding before, BSD was the OS and what they called an OS was just a display and behavior. IT is a little more than that as I have been re-informed, If what I have read more recently can be counted as truth. You cant trust what you read in magazines or the internet so now I'm not sure what to believe.

[Lockstar]

Info From Arstechnica and pricewatch.

Chip........Die size mm2...watts...theoretical yield....approximate cost
.............................................per 300mm wafer............US dollars
----------------------------------------------------------------------
IBM 970.........121.........42..........584.................???
1.8 GHz

Intel Itanium ...374.........130..........188...............$2750
Madison 1.5GHz

Pentium 4.......131.........64..........539................$370
2.8 GHz

Motorola........106.........30..........666............$300 for 500 MHz G4
G4e 1.0 GHz

And who knows what Intel's cooking up in Tejas, or whether or not they plan to push the Itanium family down to the consumer desktop in the future. My guess is that they'll be going after the workstation market with that, since they'll be able to offer unmatched floating point performance, and still undercut the competition in price, while at the same time broadening the market for Itanium, and it's also a step toward moving it to the desktop.

Who is being optimistic now? or perhaps a little fanatical?

I don't think we'll be seeing the itanium in any desktop for a long time. heat dissipation and cost dictate this.

It takes three 970s to output the same heat as one Itanium.

Face it. Intel is concerned with the fact that a Dual970 workstation that can run OSX or Linux is imminent. A chip which can easily compete with any of the intel desktop offerings.

The PPC970 cannot compete with Itanium, but why should it, they are a different class altogether. Maybe you should compare the Itanium with the power 4/ 5 or UltraSparc.

[matty429]

Originally posted by Lockstar
Info From Arstechnica and pricewatch.

Chip........Die size mm2...watts...theoretical yield....approximate cost
.............................................per 300mm wafer............US dollars
----------------------------------------------------------------------
IBM 970.........121.........42..........584.................???
1.8 GHz

Intel Itanium ...374.........130..........188...............$2750
Madison 1.5GHz

Pentium 4.......131.........64..........539................$370
2.8 GHz

Motorola........106.........30..........666............$300 for 500 MHz G4
G4e 1.0 GHz



YOU MISSED ONE!

Amd Opteron 193....... ..?.......148 Out of 200.........$280


Not to mention An On die memory controller

And Using the Cpu on an Nforce 3

Backwards Compatible...32/64 bit

[Lockstar]

True, and I will personally be purchasing to run linux (as well as a Dual 970 OSX).

on the subject of AMD. I'm interseted to see how the hypertransport system on the 970 will affect things.

[Emre]

hey i mean using legit fonts.... i know the problem. what i want to say is you can't find fonts which are "not legit" for mac.that's why mac is better with fonts..

you mean you can create your own font? hmm i thougt there were a few designers that can create "real fonts"(fonts that can tell the story). you must be one of these.

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Lockstar

Who is being optimistic now? or perhaps a little fanatical?


Well, you picked last year's P4, compared it to a PPC970 that
isn't available yet, and ignored the rest of the Itanium family, not
to mention their relative performance, in addition to the upcoming
Prescott. Hence it seems pretty clear that your research is
flawed.


I don't think we'll be seeing the itanium in any desktop for a long time. heat dissipation and cost dictate this.


Yes... and Intel has lower-power versions on their public roadmap.


It takes three 970s to output the same heat as one Itanium.


And Madison has 2x the floating point performance as one 970, and 12x the on-die cache. Given its target market, where it's competing with processors that use as much as 128 MB of cache per procssor (that would be Power4+), what's your point?


Face it. Intel is concerned with the fact that a Dual970 workstation that can run OSX or Linux is imminent. A chip which can easily compete with any of the intel desktop offerings.
[quote]

Easily?

[quote]
The PPC970 cannot compete with Itanium, but why should it, they are a different class altogether. Maybe you should compare the Itanium with the power 4/ 5 or UltraSparc.

I know that. Intel's roadmap, however, indicates rather clearly a trend toward moving the Itanium family into the same space that the Xeon presently occupies, which brings it to one market segment above (cost-wise) the desktop market (though admittedly the high end of it).

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Lockstar
hypertransport system on the 970 will affect things.

Just to be precise, the PPC970 itself does not use HyperTransport.
IBM did not join the HyperTransport consortium.

Also, that does not in any way preclude Apple's using HT (Apple
DID join), of course.

[Lockstar]

Maybe the research is a little outdated, but please show me some figures that alter the argument dramatically.

Point is that I see the Itanium in a very precarious position. and I think Intel do also (Why, when the 970 press releases aired were Intel so quick to refute claims). Why are Intel releasing a speed bump on Monday? a futile attempt to deflect attention from WWDC?

At the moment, the itanium hasn't really got a solid justifiable place in any sector.

It's going to take time to develop itanium into something that is economically viable for the workstation, or powerful and stable enough for mission critical serving (Remember IBM and Sun have a proven track record, do you think this will easily be swept aside?) I think Intel is worried not about Apple (Apple are a niche sector, always have been, always will be) I think they are worried that the PPC970 will make inroads with Linux and steal the workstation market. i'ts cheap, it's efficient, it's scalability is rapid and most importantly it's available. (please don't forget Altivec)

APPLE are rumoured to have implemented Hypertransport into the G5. What are the implications? anyone shed any light?

[Lockstar]

Thalaxis, i'm not disputing the itanium family is impressive, I just don't think it's a clear cut victory. I'ts too early in the race. infact it's not even started yet.

Plus any good designer only needs Helvetica, Univers, Meta, and Dinn. We can make the rest oursleves.

Plus any good designer knows that Helvetica is the bastard son of Akzidenz and truly does not deserve to be mentioned in the same breath.

[SMH]

Looks like the guy who leaked those specs lost his seat at Apple:

This is a newly posted job ad on Apple's site:

https://jobs.apple.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/Employment.woa/wa/jobDescription?RequisitionID=1978437

It does seem to be real after all.

BTW beaker, I think you're right about the 970 being the new G5.:thumbsup:

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Lockstar
Maybe the research is a little outdated, but please show me some figures that alter the argument dramatically.

Actually, the data you showed should be sufficient; the P4 at 2.8 GHz has almost exactly the same SPEC scores as the 1.8 GHz PPC970, according to IBM's estimates at MPF.


Point is that I see the Itanium in a very precarious position. and I think Intel do also (Why, when the 970 press releases aired were Intel so quick to refute claims). Why are Intel releasing a speed bump on Monday? a futile attempt to deflect attention from WWDC?

Precarious? Almost every major system vendor that sells high-end
enterprise products (including IBM) has announced a committment
to sell Itanium solutions.

As for the new speed bump on Monday, remember Opteron?


At the moment, the itanium hasn't really got a solid justifiable place in any sector.


That's not at all true. It's competing quite nicely against the Power4 and the UltraSPARC III (pathetic as the latter is, yes).


It's going to take time to develop itanium into something that is economically viable for the workstation, or powerful and stable enough for mission critical serving (Remember IBM and Sun have a proven track record, do you think this will easily be swept aside?)


Actually, Intel also has a proven track record... as evidenced by the fact that 80% of server sales in the past couple of years have been Intel-based, and the sheer number of OEMs that are on board with Itanium2 isn't going to hurt. This is AMD's biggest hurdle.


I think Intel is worried not about Apple (Apple are a niche sector, always have been, always will be) I think they are worried that the PPC970 will make inroads with Linux and steal the workstation market. i'ts cheap, it's efficient, it's scalability is rapid and most importantly it's available. (please don't forget Altivec)


That nature as a nich-player is exactly Apple's problem. Intel in the last year ended up in almost every major studio that didn't invest in Athlon's instead. (Remember PIXAR? WETA Digital?)

Intel can outperform PPC970 in every way other than SIMD and heat. And SIMD isn't panacea.


APPLE are rumoured to have implemented Hypertransport into the G5. What are the implications? anyone shed any light?

That rumor is false, the processor does not use HyperTransport.

Now if I misunderstood you and you are referring to the machine,
however, then the rumor is just a rumor, and is quite
plausible (especially given Apple's presence on the HT
consortium). That the processor doesn't use it has no impact on
whether or not it's used elsewhere in the machine.

The implications? Well, faster interconnects... lower system cost
(potentially)... and then there's still the possibility that the new
rigs aren't even based on PPC970's, but rather on a processor
that uses HyperTransport (which as I said, the PPC970 itself does
not).

In other words, it doesn't narrow down the list of possibilities
very much :)

[Thalaxis]

Originally posted by Lockstar
Thalaxis, i'm not disputing the itanium family is impressive, I just don't think it's a clear cut victory. I'ts too early in the race. infact it's not even started yet.


Exactly my point... the Itanium2 is the first implementation of the
McKinley core, and is built on an older process... and is only the
second implementation of iA-64 so far.

The race is just getting started... but in many ways, Itanium is
starting with a signfiicant lead (i.e. performance, and the best
fabs in the biz).

The current Itanium2 is already faster than everything but
Power4+, and the SPEC results for Madison are quite a bit ahead
of even that in floating point.

[Lockstar]

Do you work for Intel?

Your knowledge of hardware and technical issues is impressive, unfortunately your judgement is clouded by the same fanaticism that you accuse others. You simply refuse to acknowledge others beliefs and opinions. Your views are narrow minded and more importantly not your own. On a supposed creative forum I find this tragic.

I'm personally glad of the choice that our present world offers us. I use Apple, I use Linux and I occasionally use Windows. If all I had as an option was Windows and Intel, I would quit in a second. I like a challenge, I like to question what is put infront of me, I like choice. and it is my belief that if we accepted others views and choices the world would be a more civilised place.

We can spout facts and figures all day but where will it get us? Nothing in life is clear cut, black and white as you would like to believe. If your view was correct, then I think I would still be using Betamax.

Let us see what unfolds.

On a lighter note, I'm not an Apple fanatic, but good luck to them for Monday, and most importantly, CONGRATULATIONS. A 3/5% insignificant user base that can still create discussion to rival one of 70/80%.

[Array]

http://students.depaul.edu/~dshklyar/forums/macpc.jpg

*sigh*

thread closed

[mjm]

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