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New Chip for Apple?

eclipse525

eclipse525

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 5, 2003
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USA, New York
Is it at all possible in this reality that Apple might go with the new Cell Processor for future Machines? After all, it's being produces by IBM in the same Fishkill, NY plant that the G5's being produces. Also, Apple is having trouble delivering a G5 at 3mHz, should they start looking for another alternative as far as chip design. If this Cell chip is as good as it sounds, from what little has been mentioned, then if seems like a good way to go.I know it's total speculation but I thought i'd throw it out there and see what you guys think.


~e
 
E

earthtoandy

macrumors 6502
Jan 18, 2003
250
0
no. there is no way. Cell processors will be in things like TVs and the playstation 3... and other media devices. besides its not a PowerPC chip plain and simple. And the G5 is making some big steps with the low power variant for example. that chip is not dead at all.
 
varmit

varmit

macrumors 68000
Aug 5, 2003
1,830
0
I believe that it will be a multimedia type chip, fast with video and graphics. But for regular day computing, like Word processing, I'm don't think it has the right stuff to be as powerful. I do believe that its based on PPC, so it will share some of the characteristics of what is in the Mac, but I think a single G5 could hold its own against this multicored Cell processor when it came to more than just video and PS3 games. Just because G5's are not in supply, does it mean that Apple is going elsewhere. IBM makes the Cell processor and the G5. So Apple really wouldn't be doing a good thing by going from one processor that is just getting ramped up in numbers being outputted, to one that hasn't even been made yet.
 
Mitthrawnuruodo

Mitthrawnuruodo

Moderator emeritus
Mar 10, 2004
14,424
1,065
Bergen, Norway
earthtoandy said:
no. there is no way. Cell processors will be in things like TVs and the playstation 3... and other media devices. besides its not a PowerPC chip plain and simple. And the G5 is making some big steps with the low power variant for example. that chip is not dead at all.
Click to expand...

According to the IBM press release the chip will be used in everything up to and including super computers. Actually the first use of this chip will be in a new brand of workstations from IBM.

So why not in Macs?

I can't wait for my new cell-driven iPod mini G5...! :D
 
daveL

daveL

macrumors 68020
Jun 18, 2003
2,425
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Mitthrawnuruodo said:
According to the IBM press release the chip will be used in everything up to and including super computers. Actually the first use of this chip will be in a new brand of workstations from IBM.

So why not in Macs?

I can't wait for my new cell-driven iPod mini G5...! :D
Click to expand...
If I remember correctly, IBM is building the "media" workstation for Sony; Sony is another member of the Cell joint venture. I think Sony plans to compete against Apple with this system. I don't know how that affects any potential use of the chip by Apple. I guess it all depends on the original agreement between Sony, IBM and Toshiba, which was inked close to 3 years ago. It certainly looks to me as though the Cell processor would be right up Apple's alley, assuming it really is PPC-like. Maybe it can be used like a coprocessor for media stuff: Altivec on steroids.
 
W

wms121

macrumors regular
Mar 1, 2003
104
0
old ars technica article

http://arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/3q02/playstation3.html

This IS a 256 bit chip guys...VLIW...possibly even ULIW.(1024/2048/4096 bit?).

Anyway...the characteristic to watch is the die size, 120nm,90nm,65nm,45nm,22nm etc...that effects the clock frequency.

The operating system is a very different animal. I posted something on this site about "cell operating systems" and then when I went to find the URL for one of the listing...IT DISAPPEARED. They are guarding the architechure's links to the software because the Cell Operating System is a brand new animal.

PLEASE..anyone with info on current versions of the "cell operating system" please post...I have people I contract with wanting answers.

WW

(POWER 4/PPC970 ~ 1.2-4.4 GHz @ 90-65nm) 20GHz chips possible*

*http://www.siliconstrategies.com/login.jhtml?_requestid=173270
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Jul/bch20030729021067.htm
http://forums.divx.com/viewtopic.php?topic=61437&forum=11
http://www.chelsio.com/10_GbE_for_HPC.pdf
http://www.phys.hawaii.edu/superb04/talks/Dubois-Felsman.ppt
 
stevehaslip

stevehaslip

macrumors 6502a
Apr 30, 2004
657
0
The Ocean Floor
wms121 said:
http://arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/3q02/playstation3.html

This IS a 256 bit chip guys...VLIW...possibly even ULIW.(1024/2048/4096 bit?).

Anyway...the characteristic to watch is the die size, 120nm,90nm,65nm,45nm,22nm etc...that effects the clock frequency.

The operating system is a very different animal. I posted something on this site about "cell operating systems" and then when I went to find the URL for one of the listing...IT DISAPPEARED. They are guarding the architechure's links to the software because the Cell Operating System is a brand new animal.

PLEASE..anyone with info on current versions of the "cell operating system" please post...I have people I contract with wanting answers.

WW

(POWER 4/PPC970 ~ 1.2-4.4 GHz @ 90-65nm) 20GHz chips possible*

*http://www.siliconstrategies.com/login.jhtml?_requestid=173270
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Jul/bch20030729021067.htm
http://forums.divx.com/viewtopic.php?topic=61437&forum=11
http://www.chelsio.com/10_GbE_for_HPC.pdf
http://www.phys.hawaii.edu/superb04/talks/Dubois-Felsman.ppt
Click to expand...

PC Pro news article

its gonna be manufactured at 90nm process, also 64bit.
when you had a 16 bit mega drive and a 32 bit playstation is that the same form of measurement as a 64 bit G5?
 
daveL

daveL

macrumors 68020
Jun 18, 2003
2,425
0
Montana
wms121

Hmmm ... according to the linked article above, it's basically a multi-core, multithreaded 64-bit processor with great floating point performance. That doesn't sound like VLIW to me. I guess we'll have to wait till February to find out more.
 
hvfsl

hvfsl

macrumors 68000
Jul 9, 2001
1,867
185
London, UK
Well I remember Apple were working with Sony a year back on some sort of OS (many people at the time were suggesting they were working on the OS for the PS3).

If Sony made Cell based PCs with an OS designed by Apple that could run PS3/2/1 games, then they might actually be able to challenge M$ in the OS market.

Well one can dream. :D
 
W

wms121

macrumors regular
Mar 1, 2003
104
0
"Cell" is old stuff.....

....found this rummaging around:

http://cap.anu.edu.au/cap/reports/report/debugging.html

One development company was working on Sun's MAJC chip and it bit the dust.

Makes me wonder if big steve..should hold his horses until they are darn sure about the "bugs" here. Yep it's 64-bit internally, but it's the bus and the way they code the architecture that has everyone worried. As soon as the industry accepts it..we will have another "defacto standard".

Sort of like the 8086 and DOS.


More BORG-pie Captain Picard?

WW
 
gekko513

gekko513

macrumors 603
Oct 16, 2003
6,301
1
I think it's very possible that we'll see the cell processor in Macs. It's not ready to be commercialized until 2006 at the earliest, so I think well see the next revisions of the PowerMac go with the dual core 970, then Cell. I imagine it will be great for rendering, encoding and filtering. Video, music and graphics are the core markets for Macs, so that is a good match.
 
Catfish_Man

Catfish_Man

macrumors 68030
Sep 13, 2001
2,579
2
Portland, OR
I'm not sure where people are getting their info.

It IS PowerPC. It IS planned to be used outside of entertainment. It is NOT 256 bit (it's 64 bit. 256 bit would be totally pointless in a non-vector arch like PPC).

As to seeing it in Macs... it would definitely be a bitch to code for. Poor single thread performance, but great throughput. Also, it remains to be seen what vector ISA it supports. If it supports Altivec.... I'd say that means either that Apple is interested in it or IBM is trying to consolidate vector ISAs a bit.
 
flyfish29

flyfish29

macrumors 68020
Feb 4, 2003
2,175
4
New HAMpshire
A few highlights from http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=19941

IBM, Sony firm up Playstation Cell chip plans

It won't go into mass production until 2006, but IBM will show off the chip at a chip conference in February next year.

As we revealed here, the Cell processor will have a Power PC base, and likely have eight vectorial processors, each with its own allocation of memory.

The 64-bit core will also be used as part of dedicated high definition TVs made by Toshiba.
 
eclipse525

eclipse525

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 5, 2003
850
0
USA, New York
taking into account when the Cell Chip will actually go into production and other factors that previous posts have mentioned, this Cell Chip is VERY likely to be considered by Apple. It's the only thing that show's possibility for future advancements. The only thing that will change this is if someone comes out with another chip technology that can rival it. There is many different groups doing all kinds of research regarding new and radical chip technology. The use of "nano-tubes", "DNA (bio-mech) chip", Qbits (I'm not familar with this one but if someone has some info., please post.)", "chips that utilize optics and others i'm sure we haven't even heard of. The only thing that's real at the moment is the Cell Chip. All i know it's gonna be interesting.

~e
 
eclipse525

eclipse525

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 5, 2003
850
0
USA, New York
"The Cell processor has peak performance in excess of 200 GFLOPS - which equates to 200 billion floating-point operations per second - as measured during initial hardware testing."

NICE!....... Apple should take a good look.
 
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