A Grim Possibillity (Reg. 970)

[Chaszmyr]

It's looking more and more apparent that the IBM 970 chip is Apple-bound. But it also seems that Apple is trying to further expand into the server-category, with the xserve and the soon-to-be-released xraid.

Has anyone considered the possibility that the 970 will indeed go to Apple, but find its way only into xServes?

[dricci]

Yeah, a lot of people have speculated on that. But what would go in the desktops? Motorola can't do much more with the G4, and the Desktop G5 seems to be vaporware at this point. Apple can only make the G4 last so long, so there's really no other choice but the 970 across the board (eventually) just to keep up with our PC counterparts.

[Chaszmyr]

Do current G4s produce more heat than current P4s?

[barkmonster]

Do current G4s produce more heat than current P4s?

I doubt it.

Here's a little info I found about die size, volts, watts etc...

PowerPC 970 : 121 mm, 1.3v, 42 Watts

Pentium 4 : 131 mm, 1.525v, 68.4 Watts

G4e : 106 mm, 1.6v, 30 Watts

The G4 is smaller, uses less than half the watts of a P4 and only a fraction more voltage, this really makes you wonder why they need such elaborate cooling on a G4 but Pentium 4 systems can run fairly quietly.

Seeing as the 970 info is from the 1.8Ghz version, it doesn't look like the higher clockspeed versions will be much good for laptops so I could see them being a problem in a 1 U rack case aswell.

[Jaykay]

[QUOTE]

Do current G4s produce more heat than current P4s?

I doubt it.

Here's a little info I found about die size, volts, watts etc...

PowerPC 970 : 121 mm, 1.3v, 42 Watts

Pentium 4 : 131 mm, 1.525v, 68.4 Watts

G4e : 106 mm, 1.6v, 30 Watts

The G4 is smaller, uses less than half the watts of a P4 and only a fraction more voltage, this really makes you wonder why they need such elaborate cooling on a G4 but Pentium 4 systems can run fairly quietly.

Seeing as the 970 info is from the 1.8Ghz version, it doesn't look like the higher clockspeed versions will be much good for laptops so I could see them being a problem in a 1 U rack case aswell.{/QUOTE]

Does that have anything to do with the G4 nearing the end of its life in terms of how far they can push it compared to the P4?

[Chaszmyr]

Originally posted by Jaykay
Does that have anything to do with the G4 nearing the end of its life in terms of how far they can push it compared to the P4?

Yeah, in the context it does. Everyone keeps talking about what can and can't be done because of heat... I don't know where these rumors came from, but I dont think heat is a problem, and I think Motorola could continue to push the clock frequency up if they wanted to. This may not be the most desirable option from our point of view, but that doesnt mean it won't be what Apple chooses.