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Intel Roadmap leak (includes Gainestown price sheet)

Very different.

Apple can really only go for the 2.66GHz and above processors which leaves us looking at a $3,000 base price based purely on processor price differences as other components haven't changed in price (they will just get updated).

Maybe we could see:

2.66GHz x 4 : $2,300
2.66GHz x 8 : $2,800
2.80GHz x 8 : $3,600
2.93GHz x 8 : $4,400
3.20GHz x 8 : $5,200

There is the issue of Apple starting with a lower GHz than the last generation which I'm sure they won't be happy about, but I don't see how they can get around it without the much sought after xMac.

I also wouldn't be counting on a January release anymore.
 
I would wait for the second part of the road map.

Umbongo, I think 5 CPU choices is too many options. Perhaps they will drop the solo quad.

It'll be very interesting to see if Apple defaults back to the 2.66Ghz, which will be a bit faster than the current 2.8Ghz. It would be unfortunate however, and make more work for the Apple marketing team.

"Lower numbers are better. Trust us. The new slower clock speed Mac Pro".

Dreaming of: 2.93 "baseline" dual quad, 3.2 upgrade.
 
m1stake said:
I would wait for the second part of the road map.

Umbongo, I think 5 CPU choices is too many options. Perhaps they will drop the solo quad.

It'll be very interesting to see if Apple defaults back to the 2.66Ghz, which will be a bit faster than the current 2.8Ghz. It would be unfortunate however, and make more work for the Apple marketing team.

"Lower numbers are better. Trust us. The new slower clock speed Mac Pro".

Dreaming of: 2.93 "baseline" dual quad, 3.2 upgrade.
Click to expand...
Given the X5550 2.66GHz part cost at $958, I'm not so sure if Apple could put anything faster in the new Mac Pro and keep to the same price range as the current base model. :(

The marketing dept will just have to figure it out. :p
 
Pricing question

Are the prices in that document small quantities or large?

What kind of break would Apple get if they committed to buy a million pieces?

I ask because while I don't deal in chips, pricing on every other product I can think of changes pretty dramatically once you start buying in bulk.
 
m1stake said:
Umbongo, I think 5 CPU choices is too many options. Perhaps they will drop the solo quad.

It'll be very interesting to see if Apple defaults back to the 2.66Ghz, which will be a bit faster than the current 2.8Ghz. It would be unfortunate however, and make more work for the Apple marketing team.

"Lower numbers are better. Trust us. The new slower clock speed Mac Pro".

Dreaming of: 2.93 "baseline" dual quad, 3.2 upgrade.
Click to expand...

I agree that 5 is probably too many for Apple. But if they miss any of them out then it is a huge jump between any of the options. The 2.66GHz is actually supposedly faster than the current 3.2GHz, hence the prices I think. I guess at some point Apple have to actually trust that the majority of customers buying systems costing over $2,500 aren't fools. I think all they need is for a simple set of well presented graphs that highlight the base Mac Pro being better than the previous top end to show why they have lower speeds. Intel will likely keep doing this sort of thing with new technologies, especially if any major advancements are made (i.e they have 2GHz processors come out that are much faster than previous 4GHz ones).

It will be interesting to see if Apple continue to offer a single quad core downgrade. If it does end up being $3,000 for a 2.66GHz 8 core with $500 off for going 4 core, then people are going to be effectivly paying $1,400 for a processor that you get for $300 on a PC. I think the xMac evangelists will come out of the woodwork as we get more details.

MattBaker said:
Are the prices in that document small quantities or large?

What kind of break would Apple get if they committed to buy a million pieces?

I ask because while I don't deal in chips, pricing on every other product I can think of changes pretty dramatically once you start buying in bulk.
Click to expand...

If the prices are correct (and nothing to assume they aren't) then they are likely for quantities of 1,000. Apple will have been able to get good prices on the 2.8GHz part last time, probably lower than any one else in the world, due to quantity on a single component.

They have sold the base systems at around the retail price of the components so far, but to do that now is going to end up with a $3,000 Mac Pro which is surely too much of an entry point. I'm just interested to see what Apple do in this situation as it certainly isn't helpful to their ethos.
 
I did a quick Google of the Penryn price list and couldn't find one. If we could find one of those, that would give us some good perspective.

EDIT: Found one after a few more minutes of Googling.

penrynpricelist.png


Source: http://www.dailytech.com/Intel+Prices+Penryn+Xeons/article8074.htm

The Mac Pro's chips are the E5440 (2.83Ghz) @ $690, the E5450 (3.0Ghz) @ $851. The last 3.2Ghz chip was actually released in 2008, which is why it's not present on this 2007 list.

Luckily, the current Mac Pro at 10% above cost is $2200 or so (Apple does an employee purchase program through my store, Micro Center, twice a year in November and May which is where I get these numbers). So While their 25%-35% margin might, um, erode a little tiny bit, they could keep the current price point.
 
m1stake said:
The Mac Pro's chips are the E5440 (2.83Ghz) @ $690, the E5450 (3.0Ghz) @ $851. The last 3.2Ghz chip was actually released in 2008, which is why it's not present on this 2007 list.
Click to expand...

You've made a m1stake, those are the 1333MHz FSB processors.

The Mac Pro is using the 1600MHz Xeons that were all released in 2008.

E5462 - 2.8GHz - $851
E5472 - 3.0GHz - $1,022
X5482 - 3.2GHz - $1,279

The original $2,499 Mac Pro used a $690 processor, which the E5440 sort of replaced and the original 3GHz upgrade was an $851 processor. I would think Apple could keep the price similar to how it is, but I wouldn't count on it.

www.intc.com/priceList.cfm always points to a current price list.
 
Screw you guys, I'm getting a name change :p

Your link doesn't list anything in the Xeon line ;)

I had this strange feeling that the base 2.8 was $851, I remember seeing it before the harpertowns were released. Oh well, it's corrected.

My guess, based on these numbers (Which are often changed, though not by much) is the 2.66 and the 2.93.

UNLESS THEY WANT TO LOWER PROFIT MARGINS WINK WINK :p

OR, perhaps we'll revisit the price of the G5 Quad: $3299! Ouch.
 
Given that with the Mac Pro range there is usually just one standard model and everything else is configure to order I guess it is looking like two 2.66GHz chips are the most likely stock.

I'd like the stock model to be the 2.93GHz with the 1333MHz DDR3 RAM but think that is looking unlikely.

I hope that if it ends up being the 2.66GHz that the single threaded performance will at least match the current 2.8GHz stock model for legacy applications. Multi threaded stuff is bound to be much better especially as the software catches up. I'm surprised to see it is looking like 2009 before these appear. I guess it may be sometime after MacWorld before the Mac Pro gets an upgrade.
 
Mattww said:
Given that with the Mac Pro range there is usually just one standard model and everything else is configure to order I guess it is looking like two 2.66GHz chips are the most likely stock.

I'd like the stock model to be the 2.93GHz with the 1333MHz DDR3 RAM but think that is looking unlikely.

I hope that if it ends up being the 2.66GHz that the single threaded performance will at least match the current 2.8GHz stock model for legacy applications. Multi threaded stuff is bound to be much better especially as the software catches up. I'm surprised to see it is looking like 2009 before these appear. I guess it may be sometime after MacWorld before the Mac Pro gets an upgrade.
Click to expand...

The 2.66GHz is supposed to be faster than the current 3.2GHz so there won't be any issues there.
 
Apple doesn't describe its computers in terms of hard numbers. They compare current versions with previous versions using flattering tests and taglines like "Twice as fast as the old MacProduct Pro."

They won't have any trouble moving these boxes even if the official clock speed is lower. Performance is performance.
 
Umbongo said:
The 2.66GHz is supposed to be faster than the current 3.2GHz so there won't be any issues there.
Click to expand...

Sounds good. I imagined this to be the case for multi-core aware applications. Have you seen any benchmarks showing this for single threaded applications by any chance?
 
They're faster clock for clock, and will only be better in multithreaded apps.

Also, because of the monolithic quad design the cores won't need to communicate through the FSB and waste bandwidth in the process.
 
m1stake said:
They're faster clock for clock, and will only be better in multithreaded apps.

Also, because of the monolithic quad design the cores won't need to communicate through the FSB and waste bandwidth in the process.
Click to expand...
Mmmm...Bandwidth :p

Can I assume I'm not the only one glad to see Intel finally did away with this problem? ;)
 
m1stake said:
Part two of the article was posted, and included no new relevant information.
Click to expand...

Not for the Mac Pro but the mobile chips give an idea about future iMac models and with only two 4 core chips in the line up it looks like the iMacs are probably going to stay as duel core machines so the gap to the Mac Pro is likely to be similar. Without the TDP data it is difficult to be sure however - maybe the quad cores will run cool enough?
 
Mattww said:
Not for the Mac Pro but the mobile chips give an idea about future iMac models and with only two 4 core chips in the line up it looks like the iMacs are probably going to stay as duel core machines so the gap to the Mac Pro is likely to be similar. Without the TDP data it is difficult to be sure however - maybe the quad cores will run cool enough?
Click to expand...
A post of Part 2 in the notebook section might give interested members something to mull over. ;) :p

It was a major disappointment on the Mac Pro side. We got all we were going to get in Part 1. :rolleyes: // Grrr... :D
 
Mattww said:
Not for the Mac Pro but the mobile chips give an idea about future iMac models and with only two 4 core chips in the line up it looks like the iMacs are probably going to stay as duel core machines so the gap to the Mac Pro is likely to be similar. Without the TDP data it is difficult to be sure however - maybe the quad cores will run cool enough?
Click to expand...

The iMac doesn't have cooling challenges that laptops have. They can put in whatever they want.
 
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