Apple Releases Dual Core PowerMac G5s

[MacRumors]

http://www.macrumors.com/images/macrumorsthreadlogo.gif

As has been long rumored, Apple released Dual Core PowerMac G5s today at their Media Event.

The new PowerMac G5s features the following models:

Single Dual-Core G5 2.0GHz $1,999
Single Dual-Core G5 2.3GHz $2,499
Dual Dual-Core G5 2.5GHz $3,299

The high end model features Two Dual Core G5 processors giving it 4 effective processing units. It is called the "Power Mac G5 Quad".

- PCI Express
- up to 16GB of 533MHz DDR2 SDRAM
- Two Gigabit Ethernet ports
- Mighty Mouse
- GeForce 6600 (128MB or 256MB)

The Quad PowerMac will be shipping in November.

[Riot_Mac]

that quad is dope, but expensive. I think I will be purchasing a PowerBook... even though the update was kind of weak.

[nagromme]

PowerPC's final months are looking pretty nice!

Don't forget that the OS itself has ways to make use of multiple CPUs even with apps that don't have built-in support. Like devoting one CPU entirely to the app, while the OS and all other processes run on the other cores.

I like that the wireless antenna is now a permanent strip down the back--no more little attachments.


Now, what to do with all your spare cash? Imagine one of THESE Mac setups with 4 cores, 4 graphics cards and 8 Cinema Displays! (Is the second setup possible? 4 of each?)

[dhan]

About time

[Don't panic]

and for US$ 21.999 you can bring home your top of the line, (16G Ram 1TB hard drive) quad!

[ipacmm]

I am about to order a Quad-core G5...I just need to press the "check out" icon...

[natehan]

Did you see the picture of the processor? It's pretty sick

[Detlev_73]

At least my trusty Dual 2.0 is still in the availability list. I'll start to worry about it when it's no longer even offered. Oh, but wait, I just realized that the first PM available is a dual CORE G5, not a dual processor.

I wonder if anyone will post the benchmarks later on of:

Dual 2.0 gHz G5 -vs- Dual CORE 2.0 gHz

[jaduffy108]

Originally Posted by Detlev_73

At least my trusty Dual 2.0 is still in the availability list. I'll start to worry about it when it's no longer even offered. Oh, but wait, I just realized that the first PM available is a dual CORE G5, not a dual processor.

I wonder if anyone will post the benchmarks later on of:

Dual 2.0 gHz G5 -vs- Dual CORE 2.0 gHz

here you go....

http://media.99mac.se/g5_dualcore/

[Neodym]

I'm waiting for the first hack to upgrade the old single-core Powermacs with Dual-Core-CPUs. Either by simple plug-it-in (does someone know about pin compatibility?) or by small adaptor pcb's...

Until then, my trusty 2.5er will do

Cheers
Neodym

[arogge]

The Mac finally has support for real graphics cards. Apple noticed that the workstation cards are also better for playing games. So, where's the Realizm support?

[wordmunger]

Originally Posted by ipacmm

I am about to order a Quad-core G5...I just need to press the "check out" icon...

Really? A quad-core, and not a dual dual? Who's selling that?

[sehix]

Originally Posted by wordmunger

Really? A quad-core, and not a dual dual? Who's selling that?

Sun Microsystems.

[daveL]

Originally Posted by sehix

Sun Microsystems.

Sun does not have quad core processors on the market.

[Nermal]

Originally Posted by wordmunger

Really? A quad-core, and not a dual dual? Who's selling that?

Um, Apple

[oskar]

Interesting how these specs are compared to the previous top of the line G5 and the 3-or more-year-old G4. No more comparisons to Intel processors?

No way Apple will go to 32-bit processors after these PowerMacs. Not that I really care for now. I think the top of the line G5 is awesome. I want one now.

[iIra]

Anyone else miss the Quicksilver G4s or the fruity iMacs? I'm literally drooling over the performance of these new G5s, but Apple's case designs lately just seem sort of cold and unemotional.

[rolandf]

The top-end machines seems nice, although not enough pre-installed memory. But what is not workstation like, are the hard-drives

[sehix]

Originally Posted by rolandf

The top-end machines seems nice, although not enough pre-installed memory. But what is not workstation like, are the hard-drives

Not these days. Sun, and other workstation vendors, are shipping workstations with SATA drives standard, and have been shipping ATA drives in workstations for several years at their low end.

[ffakr]

Originally Posted by rolandf

The top-end machines seems nice, although not enough pre-installed memory. But what is not workstation like, are the hard-drives

Um, it's configurable with any amount of memory you like. Given Apple's markup on memory, I'd rather have less so I can load up on faster Crucial or other 3rd party, first tier memory. You can get low latency DDR2 from a good vendor for less than Apple's normal latency. If I were buying a quad core machine I wouldn't hobble it with normal high latency DDR2.
I'm not able to confirm that the new controller supports lower latency DDR2 but the iMac G5 and the Older G5s support DDR down to 2 CAS though they ship with CAS3.

Also, what's not workstation-like about Hitachi's 250GB and 500GB drives? These are the same drives in the xServe RAID.
Granted, I like the Maxtor 300GB with 16MB cache but those aren't terrible drives (I run the MaxLineIIIs in my XServe and Dell 1U and they smoke).
So, they don't have incredibly overprices SCSI drives or way overpriced Raptors.. they have fast, reliable, large SATA drives.

My only real complaint about drives is.. no hardware mirroring or striping. If you've got a good disk-to-disk backup system, this thing would scream with L1 RAID (it does double you chance of a volume failure after all).
I suppose I'd also like NCQ. It's SATA-150 which can have NCQ but I do believe NCQ is standard on SATA2-300.

Overall I love the new machines. It's like Tiger, polish everwhere.
Dual GigE you can aggregate, PCI-E, built in Airport wireless antenna....

Originally Posted by howard

is a dual core 2ghz faster than a dual 2ghz? if so why?

Dual core can be faster because, the cores can snoop on each other's caches.. they can cooperate more efficiently...
Dual core can be slower because two cores now share a Front Side bus while dual processor machines generally have their own busses. This should be fairly uncommon though as the FSB has way more bandwidth than the memory bus.

If the code threads with a very low level of parallelism where the threads are dependent on the results of other threads, dual-core should be better.
If the threads are very memory intensive and very independent.. then dual processor may be faster.

These dual-cores do have an extra advantage. Not only are they dual core on a very fast FSB, they have twice the L2 cache of the old CPUs.

[MacNemesis]

Originally Posted by ffakr

Also, what's not workstation-like about Hitachi's 250GB and 500GB drives? These are the same drives in the xServe RAID.
Granted, I like the Maxtor 300GB with 16MB cache but those aren't terrible drives (I run the MaxLineIIIs in my XServe and Dell 1U and they smoke).
So, they don't have incredibly overprices SCSI drives or way overpriced Raptors.. they have fast, reliable, large SATA drives.

Actually the Xserve raids DO NOT use SATA drives, however the Xserve G5 systems do. Xraids still use Ultra ATA drives. Which stinks because it means you have to have extra drive modules for both systems that are incompatible. I do wonder what having SATA drives in the Xraids would do for performance. It would likely be faster, but would obviously require a rework of the controller. FWIW The drives in the Xraids are compatible with G4 xserves.

[turtlebud]

Originally Posted by ipacmm

I am about to order a Quad-core G5...I just need to press the "check out" icon...

and don't forget to hit the "place order" button after that...

[zoran]

I was xpecting a dual-core iMacG5, why the hell didnt they make that upgrade!
Damn!

[Detlev_73]

Originally Posted by zoran

I was xpecting a dual-core iMacG5, why the hell didnt they make that upgrade!
Damn!

Probably because the iMac is not a pro machine, just a consumer machine. I hear ya and feel ya, but that's probably what others are going to say.

[ncoffey]

Originally Posted by zoran

I was xpecting a dual-core iMacG5, why the hell didnt they make that upgrade!
Damn!

Have a look at the size of the heatsink on those dual-core processors in the powermac. That's why!