PowerPC 970 requires process shrink to reach 2.5Ghz

[gaomay]

According to this article on ZDNet;

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2131244,00.html

Pushing the 970 to 2.5Ghz will require a process shrink to .09micron. So it look like we won't be getting to that until early 2004.

[timbloom]

no biggie, considering the 970 is "supposed" to be 3x faster per Mhz than the current G4, just having the chip running in my mac would be worth it. 1.8 ghz is still faster than what we have.

[jefhatfield]

if apple could get a machine running on the ibm 970 for us this year, that will be great...even if it only tops out at 1.8 ghz using the .13 micron process

a .09 micron process will really be cool and i wouldn't be surprised if it took until 2004 to get that...but then the intel chips will be at 4 ghz

i can see pro apple desktops with the 970s, the pro laptops with G4s, and everything consumer with G4s at the end of this year

what i am waiting for is to see a laptop with a 970 in it but that will most likely be next year when the wintel world will have 3+ ghz mobile, low power chips

...i guess we can never catch up

[WannabeSQ]

does this mean we will still have duals? I want a dual so much because of how people rave over their performance. And Pro Tools now supports duals, so i would get more bang for my buck. MMMM Dual 1.8 970 /drool

[timbloom]

970 can have dual-core chips, iirc. Which means two processors on one chip. I think it would be smart of Apple to offer dual's still, but the need for them with these faster chips may only be ont the top end, due to the rather high prices of the 970.

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by timbloom
970 can have dual-core chips, iirc. Which means two processors on one chip. I think it would be smart of Apple to offer dual's still, but the need for them with these faster chips may only be ont the top end, due to the rather high prices of the 970.

when any new chip comes out, it is very high at first but then drops in price fairly quickly

apple will have to keep the prices more competitive to keep up market share

but us macheads being who we are, apple could stay afloat with less than a 1 percent market share...it's just that they won't really grow much and more likely than not, they will shrink

but as long as apple inc breaks even or makes a profit, there is a reason for them to survive

i think apple saw it's most recent all time market share with the crt imac back in the late-90s and that great episode in apple's history will never be repeated since it also corresponed with the growth spurt of the internet and the dot.com revolution

if apple stays a small efficeint company like bmw is to the car world, that will be ok but not optimal

...optimal would be apple inc slowly gaining market share until they became the leader in hardware and operating systems (like they used to be more than a couple of decades ago)...but with steve jobs at the helm, that will not likely happen since he is a good short term sprinter, but not a marathon runner like bill gates and microsoft

[strider42]

Originally posted by timbloom
970 can have dual-core chips, iirc. Which means two processors on one chip. I think it would be smart of Apple to offer dual's still, but the need for them with these faster chips may only be ont the top end, due to the rather high prices of the 970.

can you point me to a link where anything says the 970 has dual cores as a possibility. the power4 is a dual core chip, and although that 970 is based on that, its a single core cpu. I suppose it might be possible to make it dual core, but I haven't read anything indicating that could happen or is likely to happen. My feeling is that it won't happen.

[KingArthur]

I would like to see that site, too. I think what has happened is maybe that people have been using the two chips so synonomously that they have forgotten the difference in a way. True, a dual core (and note the usage of "dual", Ryan) 970 MIGHT be a possibility, but I don't think we will see it. Remember, the 970 is more of a consumer/low-end server chip, unlike the Power4, and I don't think that they are going to stress the dual core in Blade servers considering Blade servers are designed to be racked like the Xserve. I think the 970 will be more focused on higher Ghz rather than efficiency like dual cores or SMT (hyperthreading). I do think that we will see SMT eventually, which will be a weak replacement to dual cores, but I don't think that we will see it until Intel gets the bugs worked out of their's. I envision dual 970s for quite a while in PowerMacs. Plus, Apple didn't design an OS to operate with multiple processors (up to 32) just to abandon that feature as soon as possible.

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by timbloom
970 can have dual-core chips, iirc. Which means two processors on one chip. I think it would be smart of Apple to offer dual's still, but the need for them with these faster chips may only be ont the top end, due to the rather high prices of the 970.

According to the information I have read from both rumors and real news sites, the 970 will be a cheaper part than the g4. The 970, if I'm not mistaken, will only have a single core.

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by KingArthur
I would like to see that site, too. I think what has happened is maybe that people have been using the two chips so synonomously that they have forgotten the difference in a way. True, a dual core (and note the usage of "dual", Ryan) 970 MIGHT be a possibility, but I don't think we will see it.

Yeah, I agree. I think that it makes more sense to provide a SMP capable single-core chip. It's a more flexible design. They can be used in a varety of applications, either as one chip, in tandem, or in fours, etc. But the customer, Apple, has that option and is not forced to pay higher prices, produce more heat, and eat more power than the single core chips.

[type_r503]

This seems to be sandbagging by apple. They don't want IBM to jump the gun. This will reduce our hopes and increase the wow factor when they introduce a 2.5GHz DP 970 PMac, in June.

Apple probably got word of the PR and had IBM take it down and leak some contradicting info. This seems to contradict what apple is saying about market share and revenue predictions.

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by type_r503
This seems to be sandbagging by apple. They don't want IBM to jump the gun. This will reduce our hopes and increase the wow factor when they introduce a 2.5GHz DP 970 PMac, in June.

Apple probably got word of the PR and had IBM take it down and leak some contradicting info. This seems to contradict what apple is saying about market share and revenue predictions.

i don't think a rather small 7,000 person company like apple could have any leverage over a giant company like ibm

but whatever the speed of the 970, as long as it is even marginally faster than the g4, will still wow the mac crowd because it will be the next generation pro processor

[KingArthur]

Let us not forget that the 970 is a 64-bit processor, too. Designed to move large amounts of data and do double the precision of existing 32-bit processors. We probably won't see a big difference in speed of programs at first other than that caused by the faster processor, but once companies start developing 64-bit software, we might see some big improvements. I don't know exactly they build programs in machine code, but think if they could optimize a program that, when having to add the same thing to two different numbers, it combined them into one number, added the number to both sides of the decimal, and then seperated the number back into two parts. I know it probably doesn't work that way, but at least it is something to think about. There has to be some way for things to be optimized for the 64-bit archectecture.

[MrMacMan]

I'd like to see the 970 come out this year, I mean I don't expect the 2.5 to come this year but there are few sources near this chip that are leaking so, not much to say.

[Dont Hurt Me]

I wish someone had that original ibm post. i thought it said they they had reached the 2.5 mark on current process and that zd net is misquoting?Ibm pulled that thing fast. Someone correct me but didnt that Ibm release say they had hit 2.5 on the current process. Maybe thats why it was pulled because ibm misquoted themselves.???

[ffakr]

I think the zdnet article is crap. They seem to miss-represent a number of points in the article. I had the distinct feeling that some junior writer [who didn't understand the tech, or didn't bother to research well] pen'ed the piece.

The page at IBM Germany that leaked the 2.5 GHz blade servers SPECIFICALLY noted that the 970s in the blades would be built on .13 micron SOI copper. I tend to believe IBM over ZDNet.

Of interest, however, is the claim that IBM will be showing off the blades at CEBit in Germany... pre-production units of course. I just noticed today that CEBit is next week! We may get news of how far along the CPU is and how powerful it is in under a weeks time!

OK... stuff I didn't like about the ZDNet article...
...PowerPC 970 chip that eventually will reach 2.5GHz...
The poor choice of words here implies that the 970 is expected to top out at 2.5 GHz though no one has any idea how fast the CPU will go before the design is maxed out.

.... expected to arrive on the market in the second half of this year and reach 2.5GHz speeds in a future incarnation ....
even worse, now the implication is that the 970 won't even make 2.5GHz, but that a later version may scale that fast.

... at last October's Microprocessor Forum, and at the time said the chip would run up to 1.8GHz, suggesting that a manufacturing process upgrade would be necessary before higher clock speeds could be achieved....
This seems like the author is trying very hard to read into what IBM said. This doesn't sound like Fact (I certainly don't remember IBM stating this 'fact'). Inferences that are read into statements belong on rumor posts... not in supposedly professional reporting.


... IBM says a later PowerPC 970 will reach 2.5GHz using a 90-nanometre manufacturing process. ...
Funny, I've been keeping up on any 970 news and I've never heard IBM say this... In fact the IBM Germany link specifically states this is not the case.

... Even at the lower end of its range, 1.8GHz, the upcoming chip will run nearly twice as fast as IBM's quickest existing PowerPC chip, the 1GHz 750FX...
I think this would entirely depend on what metric you use. I think that "as fast as" is a very bad way to describe MHz on totally different architectures. How about SPEC? ... some other bench? I don't care if the 970 runs at 50MHz as long as its computational power is multiples of a G3.

... In a few years, enthusiast home users will be asking for greater amounts of memory. ...
What the hell is this writer smoking? P4 and G4 have 38bit memory addressing (athlons probably do also). You can buy Macs with 2GB of ram now and PC servers (32bit) with 6GB of ram. Macs could support more than 2GB now if Apple wanted to.
How much memory will a consumer need in a few years? I have 768 MB and I consider myself a poweruser (ie. someone running sendmail, apache, mysql, and at least a dozen apps at any given time). I NEVER run out of memory. I have the distinct feeling that if I had 2GB, I'd be doing just fine with Office XI and Safari 3.0.
Consumers aren't going to need 64bit memory addressing in a few years.

[ffakr]

Originally posted by KingArthur
Let us not forget that the 970 is a 64-bit processor, too. Designed to move large amounts of data and do double the precision of existing 32-bit processors. We probably won't see a big difference in speed of programs at first other than that caused by the faster processor, but once companies start developing 64-bit software, we might see some big improvements. I don't know exactly they build programs in machine code, but think if they could optimize a program that, when having to add the same thing to two different numbers, it combined them into one number, added the number to both sides of the decimal, and then seperated the number back into two parts. I know it probably doesn't work that way, but at least it is something to think about. There has to be some way for things to be optimized for the 64-bit archectecture.

it doesn't work this way. 64bit chips don't pack registers like vector units pack registers.
64bit processors offer larger memory addresses (2 petabytes??? ...too lazy to do the math). They also offer greater precision integer math. BTW, You can do 64bit integer math on a 32bit processor, it just takes a lot longer.

Average users won't benefit much from the fact that the 970 (or the Athlon 64) are 64bit processors. They'll benefit from the fact that they are brand new designs that benefit from decades of research. They will be inherently more powerful because they are designed better, not because they have wider integer registers.

Now, 64bits will benefit the hell out of scientists, researchers, 3d artists, CAD designers, database developers or anyone doing very high precision and/or memory intensive work. It may benefit encryption/decryption speed depending on that algorithm ... but I'm not an expert in such things.

[timbloom]

Well, I tried to google any sources about a possible dual core 970, and I did not find anything about it. So, I could easily be completely mistaken... don't mine me
I have just heard it so many times from people in these forums..

[ryan]

Originally posted by timbloom
no biggie, considering the 970 is "supposed" to be 3x faster per Mhz than the current G4, just having the chip running in my mac would be worth it. 1.8 ghz is still faster than what we have.

Actually, I think the estimates are that the 970 is "supposed" to be 2x faster per MHz than the G4. Regardless, having the equivilent of *only* a 2.8GHz G4 in few months works for me.

[ryan]

Originally posted by timbloom
970 can have dual-core chips, iirc. Which means two processors on one chip. I think it would be smart of Apple to offer dual's still, but the need for them with these faster chips may only be ont the top end, due to the rather high prices of the 970.

I thought the 970 was a dual core chip too until somebody (on this forum I believe) slapped me down and had a good link stating that it wasn't.

[DarkNovaMatter]

Ok, I am wondering one thing: When are the Blade servers coming out? I thought they would be coming out soon? Why would IBM announce their servers based on the 970 up to 2.5 Ghz if they they need a .9 micron process? Does this mean that the .9 process is coming sooner than originally said? or are the servers not coming out till next year when the .9 process was sappose to be used?

[nuckinfutz]

Hmmm interesting times.


ffaker I noticed the PR "did" mention 2.5Ghz at .13 Micron. Hell we all pretty much could assume that the PPC 970 could hit 2.5 at .09 Micron. The big stir was if IBM could pull those "megahurts" out of the current process.

I look forward to Cebit

As for Dual Cores no I have not seen one iota of evidence supporting Dual Cores.

I think this may happen perhaps in 2004(Late). Dual Cores would be preferential to two seperate CPU's because of the more efficient Cache Coherency between the cores. Sure SMP systems handle that but that's more traces and pins to account for.

I'm pretty much sure that we'll see SMT coming. Keep in mind Intel's version of SMT(Hyperthreading) is different from IBM's. The Power5 will have SMT and we'll get to see how it affects performance and how efficient it is. IBM has been rumored to claim "up to 80% efficiency" but as always take that with a grain of salt until you see it overall.

I do think that SMT is going to be the next thing. Intel is using it already(The P4 kind of needs it since it doesn't support SMP).

SMT will be a natural for Dual Core procs. Imagine Dual Core with 2-4 threads per core and you have multitasking at it's best.

I expect Apple to eventually synce with BSD 5.0 which offers enhanced SMP support(Fine Grain Locking) I hope this can be brough over to Darwin.

Let's just say come 2006...we'll be running some damn good Hardware!

[macmunch]

I think its nearly clear we will see one more Revision or even two till we see the first PPC970 in Mac.

According to the last Moto Roadmap its seems not so bad I think.

See --> The next PM will have a PPC7457 we now dont know if he will have full DDR ! He will clock to 1.8.

The next Revision of the PM will be one with the ...( I forgott the name) the G4 Revision with Rapid IO and this will surely have full DDR. Will Reach 2 GHz I think or even more.

So, the Januar Revision of the PM will have I think Dual 2 GHz at the Top out with Rapid IO and full DDR. So, he will be very fast I think. And the then coming PPC970 will boost the Mac in Front.

The Start using the PPC970 with 0.09 so they wait one Revision to take him than with higher clock rates which Moto will not reach with the G4.

[nuckinfutz]

I think its nearly clear we will see one more Revision or even two till we see the first PPC970 in Mac.

According to the last Moto Roadmap its seems not so bad I think.

See --> The next PM will have a PPC7457 we now dont know if he will have full DDR ! He will clock to 1.8.

That wouldn't make sense though. Even if you add DDR support to the MPX bus it's still not going to speed up Macs enough to be competitive. Keep in mind Spec scores show a HUGE disparity

PPC 970@1.8Ghz = SpecFP 1050 SpecINT= 937

PPC 75xx@ 1Ghz SpecFP= 187 SpecINT= 306

There simply is NO contest here. Why would Apple and Motorola redesign the MPX bus to support DDR for only one to two generations. Doesn't make sense.

The next Revision of the PM will be one with the ...( I forgott the name) the G4 Revision with Rapid IO and this will surely have full DDR. Will Reach 2 GHz I think or even more.

Not going to happen. Moving a 7 Pipline G4 to .13 Micron will probably yield a %20 increase in clockspeed. We'll be lucky to hit 1.6-1.8Ghz with a G4 this year. Moto won't be shipping these chips for a while and in the meantime PPC 970 based systems will be demoed in a week

So, the Januar Revision of the PM will have I think Dual 2 GHz at the Top out with Rapid IO and full DDR. So, he will be very fast I think. And the then coming PPC970 will boost the Mac in Front

The PPC 970 is equivalent to a roughly a 3.4Ghz G4 if Spec scores are any indication so unless 2x G4 Chips plus adding 1-2MB of Level 3 Cache is cheaper(hint..it's not) than a PPC 970 system then Apple would be shooting itself in the foot.

People it's altogether possible that we might not see PPC 970 based Macs in 2003 but it's unlikely.

1. IBM is showing PPC 970 Blades at Cebit

2 IBM is already booting Power5 based systems

There's no reason to think that a late summer release isn't possible.

[phampton81]

I think it is possible that the confusion on the subject of the 970 being dual core may have originated from the thread on the Power5 and it's possible derivitive. Correct me if I am wrong but I believe there was much speculation saying that if, or when the Power5 derivitive was made that it would have dual core capabilities.