Not trying to embarrass you but felt the need to educate. There is no such thing as Windows 2000 ME. There is Windows 2000 and there is Windows ME. If she's your basic consumer then she probably purchased it with ME which does suck bigtime. Windows 2000 on the otherhand is the best OS MS has ever produced and is quite nice from a performance and stability side of the fence. Better than Windows XP thus far in my experience.
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Business model for Quad G4s
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Not trying to embarrass you but felt the need to educate. There is no such thing as Windows 2000 ME. There is Windows 2000 and there is Windows ME. If she's your basic consumer then she probably purchased it with ME which does suck bigtime. Windows 2000 on the otherhand is the best OS MS has ever produced and is quite nice from a performance and stability side of the fence. Better than Windows XP thus far in my experience.
Thanks. Fixed. I was a bit confused as I have to use 2000 at work every day. It is relatively stable, but the software we run on it is buggy as all get-out---we have system-wide slowdowns and outages daily. Mom uses ME, just as you supposed. Thanks for not out-and-out flaming me on this...
I decided to resurrect this thread to find out if anybody out there thinks this is even a remote possibility for MWNY next week.
Any Quad prognostications? Or just hopeful fantasies (like mine)?
Any Quad prognostications? Or just hopeful fantasies (like mine)?
I'd love to see a tower with horse power. Sure, one could merely buy several Xserves, but only some software can be clustered.
We need a rhino of a desktop machine, that's targeted at video professionals: a quad-1.4GHz G4 machine with all the fixin's like DDR and a faster system bus.
If that system doesn't appeal to video professionals, I don't know what does.
We need a rhino of a desktop machine, that's targeted at video professionals: a quad-1.4GHz G4 machine with all the fixin's like DDR and a faster system bus.
If that system doesn't appeal to video professionals, I don't know what does.
And how about growing up? Posts like these are posted just to get under peoples skin in the name of fun. You're not doing anyone any favors except bringing the thread to the top with a nonproductive post.
At least be a little original and have a little style.
Why am I under the impression that the xserve actually has room for two more g4s inside (although right now, the g4s are placed catty-cornered, to allow room for proper cooling)?
Maybe I'm remembering speculation about that red motherboard with the firewire 2 port. I personally do not think a quad CPU model is out of the question, yet probably unlikely due to the following reasons:
1) There are not enough apps that can take proper advantage of the multiprocessing, if you needed all four processors chugging away on that one app, although I'm sure the ones directly from Apple would have no problems, FCP, iDVD, any Logic based music app or iApp, the probable 3d and compositing apps in the works. And you could always be running multiple programs, with the processor overload from the other programs going to the extra CPUS.
2) Offering a 4 CPU G4 model would pretty much bury Motorola's iffy reputation completely-- it would probably hint that there is no way they are going to have the g5 ready by MWSF in decent numbers, and suggest we are stuck with g4s for another year and a half -- and this is a very bad signal to send.
Therefore you will not see quad models until the g5 is available, if at all. Because there are some Xserve blades apple would be more than willing to sell you until then, they will just not have the PCI and AGP slots that someone needing multiple G4s would probably want to have. If you want multiple CPUs, buy multiple Xserves.
Maybe I'm remembering speculation about that red motherboard with the firewire 2 port. I personally do not think a quad CPU model is out of the question, yet probably unlikely due to the following reasons:
1) There are not enough apps that can take proper advantage of the multiprocessing, if you needed all four processors chugging away on that one app, although I'm sure the ones directly from Apple would have no problems, FCP, iDVD, any Logic based music app or iApp, the probable 3d and compositing apps in the works. And you could always be running multiple programs, with the processor overload from the other programs going to the extra CPUS.
2) Offering a 4 CPU G4 model would pretty much bury Motorola's iffy reputation completely-- it would probably hint that there is no way they are going to have the g5 ready by MWSF in decent numbers, and suggest we are stuck with g4s for another year and a half -- and this is a very bad signal to send.
Therefore you will not see quad models until the g5 is available, if at all. Because there are some Xserve blades apple would be more than willing to sell you until then, they will just not have the PCI and AGP slots that someone needing multiple G4s would probably want to have. If you want multiple CPUs, buy multiple Xserves.
I keep reading people saying that paying 8k for a mac is stupid and nobody but businesses would buy it...Thats the whole point. From a consumer standpoint, 8k for a machine would totally suck. Who has that kind of money to burn? But design firms and post houses have a bit more money to spend. I know for a fact, that if apple released a quad g4 for under 6k, ($5999, which seems totally doable) lots of post houses would pick up a few. For one, nothing on the peecee side can match up to it. Sure they got dual Xeon workstations, but quads? You would have to fork out a whole lot more than 6k. And forget about SGI, you're looking at at least 12k for a single 500-600 mHz R14k proc, (granted its 64bit). If a house bought, say 10 of them, not only did they just aquire some wicked fast hardware to run MAYA, PHOTOSHOP and the like, they also now have 40, count 'em 40 procs to render with at night without the LINUX racks to take up space. That's a deal if I ever saw one.
BTW, does anybody have 60k to lend me?
BTW, does anybody have 60k to lend me?
Well, from a technical standpoint, a quad-G4 system is entirely possible. Apple once built a server with, I believe, 16 G4s.
Here is a question regarding how multiple CPUs are used. Forgive my lack of expert technical knowledge. I'm new and have pretty much just USED Macs w/o much caring how things got done inside it.
I have heard arguments back and forth regarding the real-world efficacy of multpile processors, and it seems to follow the same line of thinking as AltiVec; that is, only under certain circumstances does it actually help speed things up. Some argue that any "multithreaded" task or tasks can take advantage of dual processing, while others maintain it only works with programs which are optimized for more than one processor, in much the same way that only AltiVec-coded applications experience the usefulness of AltiVec.
My question is simply this: Is there a way that the new Jaguar OS X could further optimize the division of labor over multiple CPUs, making the idea of Quads more appealing for anyone other than Photoshop and FCP users?
Also--wouldn't just adding dual processor cards be a great way to scale up towers in future upgrades, like a "cluster-in-a-box?" This kind of thinking flies in the face of the PC world, which would have you rebuy your system every 18 months or so. It would be nice to say "hey--my work output has finally challenged my system's capacity to keep up--time to drop in another 2 CPUs" instead of "time to buy another $3k system, I guess..."
Yes, I know that advances come quickly and that the RAM and mobo speeds would outdate the old machine in a hurry. Then, for that matter, what if Apple kept all CPU sockets univerally backwards-compatable for the foreseeable future--then if you bought a new G6 with 2 3ghz chips in 2007, you could still plug in your dual 1ghz G4 and dual 2ghz G5 boards as well, continuing their use.
No flames please--just politely tell me why I am hopelessly naive about such things.
I have heard arguments back and forth regarding the real-world efficacy of multpile processors, and it seems to follow the same line of thinking as AltiVec; that is, only under certain circumstances does it actually help speed things up. Some argue that any "multithreaded" task or tasks can take advantage of dual processing, while others maintain it only works with programs which are optimized for more than one processor, in much the same way that only AltiVec-coded applications experience the usefulness of AltiVec.
My question is simply this: Is there a way that the new Jaguar OS X could further optimize the division of labor over multiple CPUs, making the idea of Quads more appealing for anyone other than Photoshop and FCP users?
Also--wouldn't just adding dual processor cards be a great way to scale up towers in future upgrades, like a "cluster-in-a-box?" This kind of thinking flies in the face of the PC world, which would have you rebuy your system every 18 months or so. It would be nice to say "hey--my work output has finally challenged my system's capacity to keep up--time to drop in another 2 CPUs" instead of "time to buy another $3k system, I guess..."
Yes, I know that advances come quickly and that the RAM and mobo speeds would outdate the old machine in a hurry. Then, for that matter, what if Apple kept all CPU sockets univerally backwards-compatable for the foreseeable future--then if you bought a new G6 with 2 3ghz chips in 2007, you could still plug in your dual 1ghz G4 and dual 2ghz G5 boards as well, continuing their use.
No flames please--just politely tell me why I am hopelessly naive about such things.
Actually, that sounds like a great idea. However, it just isn't possible with current motherboards, etc. Size really becomes an issue.
Not only that, but it isn't Apple's desire for their consumers to merely buy upgrade cards. They want the whole $3k purchase.
It is a great idea, and I wish it were true. When I'm running more than one app on either my Mac or PC, the second processor becomes very noticeable, let alone 4 or 8 processors (drools).
Not only that, but it isn't Apple's desire for their consumers to merely buy upgrade cards. They want the whole $3k purchase.
It is a great idea, and I wish it were true. When I'm running more than one app on either my Mac or PC, the second processor becomes very noticeable, let alone 4 or 8 processors (drools).
Perhaps a new case/motherboard design that lends itself to better scaling down the line would be in order. Again, keeping connections uniform, standardized, and backwards-compatable could make this possible.
I wouldn't care if it were a tube 5 feet high in the corner of the office if it meant you could use the chassis for MP upgrades for years to come. And yes, I know that in the short term that this would make less money than reselling computers every 2 years, but what a way to guarantee the platform's longevity.
And maybe the motherboard itself could be of a modular design, so that once bus speeds begin crippling the processor power one could simply load in a new one and put all of one's processors back in it, with a standard front and back panel for new connections (FireWire4, GigaWire 3, superduperultraSCSI 9, holographic lightpipe, etc.) so that the system itself is perpetually upgradable.
"Listen here, Sonny. Yer ol' grandad bought this Mac nigh unto 12 years ago, and while we've added three new motherboards and have gone through 6 processor additions and upgrades, she still keeps cookin' in that same ol' case with that old-school bulletproof power supply. We call 'er 'the ol' smokestack'--ain't she a beaut? Now let's go ahead and recalculate the movements of every subatomic particle in the universe, boy. And this time don't leave out the dark matter and antimatter particles, either... "
I wouldn't care if it were a tube 5 feet high in the corner of the office if it meant you could use the chassis for MP upgrades for years to come. And yes, I know that in the short term that this would make less money than reselling computers every 2 years, but what a way to guarantee the platform's longevity.
And maybe the motherboard itself could be of a modular design, so that once bus speeds begin crippling the processor power one could simply load in a new one and put all of one's processors back in it, with a standard front and back panel for new connections (FireWire4, GigaWire 3, superduperultraSCSI 9, holographic lightpipe, etc.) so that the system itself is perpetually upgradable.
"Listen here, Sonny. Yer ol' grandad bought this Mac nigh unto 12 years ago, and while we've added three new motherboards and have gone through 6 processor additions and upgrades, she still keeps cookin' in that same ol' case with that old-school bulletproof power supply. We call 'er 'the ol' smokestack'--ain't she a beaut? Now let's go ahead and recalculate the movements of every subatomic particle in the universe, boy. And this time don't leave out the dark matter and antimatter particles, either... "