970 Ready for Production?

[zigi]

Re: Re: 970 Development

Originally posted by pgwalsh
There a lot of competition for the low end server market between Dell, IBM, and Sun. This is good for Apple because they will benefit from this competition. Right now I believe Dell is the performance/cost price leader, then IBM and last Sun (Apple wasn't represented in the Forbes article). IBM has incentive because there's stiff competition and it's a growing market. However, I believe the servers that are competitive are running x86, but I'm not sure. If the PPC 970/Linux solution is good then this will reflect well for Apples' future. I wonder if Apple would ever let IBM sell OS X Server through IBM. That would make things interesting.

That would rock!! If Apple could get IBM onboard as more than just a processor manufacturer then they would be in the right direction to make inroads into the low-end server marked, not as a competitor with IBM, but filling a niche that IBM would still cash in on as it would push IBM's competitors further out.

 

[DharvaBinky]

Originally posted by roy_g_biv
if this is true -- plus the common belief that sahara G3's are faster than the G4 at non-altivec tasks -- what's to stop IBM from slapping an altivec compatible vector unit on it, like they're doing with the 970, and calling it a G3+?

would motorola have issues with that? IBM obviously has the go ahead to use altivec on the 970's, and moto obviously isnt getting it done anymore. they've been scaling back their microprocessor developement and focusing on the embedded market... so whats to stop apple from dropping them completely?

has this already been asked?

Actually, I speculated on the possibility of a pumped up G3 processor by IBM which could be numbered as the IBM PPC 8xx Series here:

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=22170

To sum up, if you look at IBM roadmaps, they clearly show dropping a vector processor and rapidIO into the G3 line in the near future. Interestingly, also, is that the G3 is the 750fx, and the 970 is coming soon... shall we have an 860 to carry our imacs and ibooks?



Dharvabinky

 

[Silencio]

Re: Re: 970 Development

Originally posted by pgwalsh
There a lot of competition for the low end server market between Dell, IBM, and Sun. This is good for Apple because they will benefit from this competition. Right now I believe Dell is the performance/cost price leader, then IBM and last Sun (Apple wasn't represented in the Forbes article). IBM has incentive because there's stiff competition and it's a growing market. However, I believe the servers that are competitive are running x86, but I'm not sure. If the PPC 970/Linux solution is good then this will reflect well for Apples' future. I wonder if Apple would ever let IBM sell OS X Server through IBM. That would make things interesting.

Following the news of IBM's CPU development from the Power4 onwards and their push into Linux, I was always intrigued by the thought of them licensing OS X for heavy duty workstations or servers whose applications fall outside of Apple's market focus. Could be a really intriguing synergy, so long as Apple learns from its mistakes with Motorola. Don't want to bite the hand that feeds you (CPUs) a second time!

Also, bear in mind that IBM is planning on licensing the PPC970 to other companies. I'm not sure what kinds of systems/devices they might be used in, but that points to IBM wanting to manufacture and sell a lot of them, driving economies of scale that will help lead to lower prices for Apple (and us, please?).

I'm very optimistic about IBM's efforts with the Power family. For one, their fab facilities and expertise blow Moto out of the water. Moto could design a great chip, but they got horrible yields. IBM has a state of the art plant in Fishkill and they want to keep it busy. Second, their team has got a serious attitude about the 64-bit market: their comments about wanting to "bury Intel" put a smile on my face. I think they're big enough and good enough to pull it off.

And even if the 970 bows later this year at "only" 1.8GHz, I will be satisfied because it will put Apple back in the performance race and give them a chip with much more upside.

 

[os4]

Originally posted by phampton81
Can someone confirm these 40-50% margin statements? I am curious as to the validity of this.

Apple's 10k for 2001 states a gross margin of 30% across the line. The pro machines probably command a higher margin, but 40-50% is probably a little ambitious. Also, remember that gross margin usually only includes costs that DIRECTLY contribute to the manufacture and sale of the machine itself. It does not necessarily include SGA and software development (including the OS).

Apple does enjoy a far higher margin than Intel-based PC manufacturers. Much of that is b/c of their vertical integration of OS, hardware, sales, software, which adds certain costs that those companies do not shoulder and don't show up on a gross margin total line.

 

[mstecker]

Now I'll have something

Now I'll have something really useful to spend those unemployment checks on!

 

[suzerain]

how about now?

Originally posted by Datazoid
I just have one question about this article.....who the f*@! would vote negative on this??? Just clicking to be contrary? Negative on everything? Is your life that terrible??????? Enlighten me....what about this news is NEGATIVE?????

LOL...well, they *could* release 970s TOMORROW.

I think we can all agree that would be a better rumor...

 

[gwangung]

About margins...

Remember, those margins also include SOFTWARE margins, which (if they're anything like other software companies) are in the 40-50% range.

Talking about slashing margins is a non-starter; you're thinking that a Mac is a commodity product, when it really isn't.

Margins of 30-50% are about right, they're not overly high (not when MOST manufacturing is at 20-30%), and they're being brought up a tad by the software offerings from Apple.

 

[macrumors12345]

Originally posted by Macpoops

Number 2. How is the 970 in its current state, is not for portables, in no shape or form?
At the same speed as the current laptop g4s it consumes half as much power and gives off dramatically less heat.

WHAT are you talking about? Do you even bother to attempt to check your facts before you make such statements? I'm sorry, but in this day and age, with information so easily accessible on the Internet, there is really no excuse for making such blatantly misinformed statements and trying to pass them off as "facts".

130 nm PPC 970 at 1.2 Ghz: 19 watts
180 nm MPC 7455 at 1067 Mhz: 15 watts
130 nm MPC 7457 at 1067 Mhz: 7.5 watts

The "current laptop G4" runs at 1 Ghz, so it should dissipate 14 watts or less. So, according to your special math, 19/14 < 0.5!

You can check the facts yourself:

http://www-3.ibm.com/chips/techlib/techlib.nsf/techdocs/A1387A29AC1C2AE087256C5200611780/$file/PPC970_MPF2002.pdf

http://e-www.motorola.com/brdata/PDFDB/docs/PPCSALESFACT.pdf

 

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by punter
To tell the truth I would prefer if Apple went intel or whatever. Then there would be no more mhz race, we'd always have the market standard at mass produced prices.

Well, if you see that as an advantage, then I guess so. But for me, I see that as a major disadvantage. Let's take a look at what the PPC gives Apple that an x86 architecture won't:

-- 970 ready today, 980 coming, 990 on paper
-- 9x0 PPC is made by IBM, who CAN keep their production promises
-- 970 roadmaps to 3.5 GHz, 980 debuts at 3.0 and scales in early 2005.
-- 970 is 2x-3x faster per clock than a G4
-- 980 is 2x faster than a 970 per clock, which is 4x to 6x faster than a G4 per clock.
-- Lower heat dissipation and lower power requirements mean they can be used in portables without having to chop performance
-- In June, when announced, the 970 Mac will no longer be behind the intel world in speed, and IBM will be able to keep pace. Eventually, they will be far beyond Intel.


This is going to be the best year since 1984 for the Mac. I have no doubt. Apple is making (almost) all the right moves. The only piece of the equation they are missing is raw speed to compensate for sub-par programming... they're getting that soon.

 

[Frobozz]

Originally posted by macrumors12345
WHAT are you talking about? Do you even bother to attempt to check your facts before you make such statements? I'm sorry, but in this day and age, with information so easily accessible on the Internet, there is really no excuse for making such blatantly misinformed statements and trying to pass them off as "facts".

From what I've read, the 1 GHz G4 currently used sucks down 30 watts. The 970 will only use about 10 watts at 1.0 to 1.2 GHz.

 

[macrumors12345]

Originally posted by pgwalsh
I'm with you on this one....

I don't think Apple will ever lower it's prices to compete with the PC Market. I don't think they consider themselves as part of that market. They're nose is up in the air. I believe Steve prides himself on being able to sell machines for higher margins than any of his competitors. My understand is Apple makes 40% to 50% margins on the PowerMacs. I believe the rest of the industry is making 10% to 15%.

I doubt that the margins are as high as 40-50%, but as high as 30% for the Pro machines is conceivable. But that is not really the point. Apple doesn't keep the margins high because they "don't like to sell too many machines," as you are implying. They keep them high because they have to defray the costs of developing their own OS! That is why they are NOT making a profit at the moment, despite these margins (if they are overcharging you so badly, then why aren't they making any money??). Now, if they expand marketshare, then they could allocate the cost of developing OS X over more units, and thus sustain themselves on lower margins. But they it's not as if they can just slash prices and magically gain a ton of marketshare overnight and everything will work out fine. If they do that, they will likely go out of business. So they need to be smart about it, and they need to be careful about it, and they need to look for the right opportunities.

I, for one, hope and think that the PPC 970 machines will be a bit more expensive than the current crop of G4s, but not much more (maybe only 10-15% more at each "grade"). And of course Apple will sell a ton more of them because they'll be so much faster, so Apple's bottom line will definitely benefit. The machines will probably still be somewhat more expensive than the "equivalent" HP or Dell or Gateway towers, but I think they'll still be much better values because now both the software AND the hardware will be superior. So I will happily buy one, if and when they are released (as long as they have dual-channel DDR!).

 

[MrMacMan]

Re: how about now?

Originally posted by suzerain
LOL...well, they *could* release 970s TOMORROW.

I think we can all agree that would be a better rumor...

Some people are like "PowerMacs Updated 600 MHZ faster and $1000 cheaper" and they will still vote negative, I don't get it.

Go mass production! We need these chips, Hell yeah bring them on!

 

[pgwalsh]

Originally posted by macrumors12345
Apple doesn't keep the margins high because they "don't like to sell too many machines," as you are implying. They keep them high because they have to defray the costs of developing their own OS! That is why they are NOT making a profit at the moment, despite these margins (if they are overcharging you so badly, then why aren't they making any money??).

That's not what I was implying, but that's how you read it. I'm referring to the fact that if you don't sell many units you nead to raise your prices to stay profitable. As you said, if they can sell more units they can spread the cost. So, tell me how they can sell more units amd lower the margins? If they could they would, but they can't and haven't. Whatever gave you the idea that I thought Apple kept margins hight so they couldn't expand market share? That's not at all what I was saying or thinking.

If they could sell more units they would in a heartbeat, but there's no way to gurantee they can, so they have to be conservative and keep prices higher to make up the costs as you suggested.

But if you can tell me how Apple can increase market share and sell more units then please do....

 

[minux]

August 1996- 603e Introduced in PM 5300 LC and PB5300 series
November 1997- Both Powermac g3 and Powerbook g3 introduced.

>Both CPUs you speak of were the "Lite" versions of their father desktop CPU. No "Lite" version of the G5 is available. Though, IBM is working on one. But, it will not be ready until the Winter of next year.

Number 2. How is the 970 in its current state, is not for portables, in no shape or form?
At the same speed as the current laptop g4s it consumes half as much power and gives off dramatically less heat. But i guess that means it is not ready for mobile release. Considering it is already more suited to the mobile platform then the G4 is.

>The G5 sucks a lot more power then the G4, not to mention the problems with the heat displacement of the G5. If Apple was going to release a G5 notebook tomorrow you would be rubbing ointment on your lap for a month.

Number 3. OS X was written as 64 bit clean. Which means all that would be required to make use of the 64 bit processor would be a simple recompile. NOT a complete rewrite of the OS.

>OSXver.64bit was recompiled for the G5. In no way shape or form is Apple able to release the 64 bit version of their OS (hint hint, that's the way the developers cry).

>Mike

 

[Kid Red]

Originally posted by dongmin
If you're gonna make outrageous claims like that, please provide links. IBM has announced the 750fx at up to 1 ghz (with 200 mhz bus) but they haven't made public anything higher.

My guess is that Apple will keep the iBook on the G3 until they move the entire PowerBook line to the 970, which may not be until they move the 970 to a .09 process. The 970 dissipates 19 w at 1.2 ghz, which is great, but that number goes up to 43 w at 1.8 ghz, which is not great. I'm guessing that the 970 at its current design will be too hot for the PowerBooks beyond around 1.5 ghz. A possible time table: 1.2 ghz 970 PBs in late June; 1.5 ghz in Dec/Jan 2004; and 2.0 ghz 970 using a .09 process in summer 2004.

Even if this mythical 2 ghz G3 exists, don't get your hopes up about Apple maxing it out right away. The iBook's clockspeed will ALWAYS be lower than the PowerBooks, no matter what chip is in the PB. Simple marketing rule Apple has obeyed over the years

After Apple puts these new chips to use, next up in the PowerPC 750fx line is a chip code-named "GOBI," which will boast even higher speeds. While the chip line has been publicly announced as high as speeds of 1 GHz, the GOBI chips will clearly exceed that.

and..

Mojave, which will start at 1.6 GHz, will be based on a 0.10-nanometer process and feature dynamic voltage and frequency scaling. As a result, this bantamweight will be able to run at its base speed at 1.2 V and eat up only a Callista Flockhart-size 10 W.


But what of the eagerly awaited PowerPC 970, a k a GPUL? After a year or so of production (at speeds of up to 1.8 GHz), IBM plans to pop out a 970+, which should include a few niceties that will bring it to 2.5 GHz. While much remains obscured beneath the burning sands, there is an undefined ?Next Generation? chip - and it?s not based on the GPUL but the Power5 successor to IBM?s current server silicon. Haha te whenua, haha te tangata!

 

[Rincewind42]

Originally posted by Macpoops
Number 3. OS X was written as 64 bit clean. Which means all that would be required to make use of the 64 bit processor would be a simple recompile. NOT a complete rewrite of the OS.

I agreed with most of your post, but here you aren't entirely correct. You are correct in that OS X is 64-bit clean, and would probably only require a recompile (for the most part) to run cleanly on a 64-bit processor. However, this is not the only concern. You will want the OS to take advantage of 64-bits, but unless they have been really good, just recompiling will only get you as far as running, not necessarily bug free. Additionally, that still only gets the OS on a 64-bit processor. You still have to build APIs for developers to use to develop 64-bit apps and tools to create 64-bit apps. These concerns may have already been handled, but without actual 64-bit hardware to run on these capabilities are only a little better than being only on paper.

 

[minux]

Rince you bring up a good point. All “compile” means is the software is able to run, which is not even half of the battle. Apple needs to worry about optimization, something that took Apple over three years to do for the G4.. Now as any programmer would no just because you can get your software to run does not mean it is running in its entirety. There are laundry lists of bugs in the 64 bit version of X.

Mike

 

[Rincewind42]

Originally posted by macrumors12345
130 nm PPC 970 at 1.2 Ghz: 19 watts
180 nm MPC 7455 at 1067 Mhz: 15 watts
130 nm MPC 7457 at 1067 Mhz: 7.5 watts

I've seen you post these numbers before, and while I believe that you believe these numbers, I fear that the PDF you show doesn't tell the entire story. In fact, we know this because it doesn't mention 1.25 or 1.42 Ghz G4s at all, yet we know that they exist since Apple is using them.

I fear that the power estimates that you keep quoting are for 1.1 volt G4s. If this is true, then we need to know the voltage that Apple is supplying the G4s in their PowerBooks to really give a comparison. It seems logical that they would use the lowest power G4s, but motherboard architecture (which hasn't changed greatly since the original PowerBook G4) may not support the 1.1v part. If this is true, then the 1Ghz 7455 part will consume about 20 watts, not 15. And if it is worse than that and it only supports the 1.6v part, then your talking 30 watts. Unfortunately, Apple doesn't document the electrical requirements of their motherboards in that detail, so I cannot tell you what the truth is in relation to Apple's products.

What I can tell you is that the PPC 970 is estimated to be 19 watts at 1.2 Ghz. We won't really know how much power it consumes until it is released. But compared to the current G4 at 1Ghz the 1.1v 970 @1Ghz should use about 17 watts. True, this is over twice what the 7457 is estimated to use at 1.1v, but given that the 970 is also estimated to be about twice as fast as the 7455 (which the 7457 doesn't claim) I think that I would trade the power use for the speed, and I think that a lot of other people on the board and off would also.

We also trust IBM to be able to fabricate the 970 more reliably and sooner than Motorola can fabricate the 7457. But all of this is based on rumors, thus we really don't know if Apple will go with IBM's 970 or Motorola's 7457. But we do know that Apple has been burned over the last 3 years, many times, by promises that Motorola just couldn't deliver.

 

[Haberdasher]

Re: June with WWDC??!

Originally posted by copperpipe
Why is everyone saying september? Doesn't this all make sense that it will be one big June release with 10.3? That would be awesome, to release it all ready to rock and roll in one big swoosh. Sounds like steve's style to me!

Like FCP4, they may ANNOUNCE it in June, but the release would be september for flat-out production. Make more sense too, giving enough lead time, not too much to crush G4 sales, and coincide like you said with other releases.

Sounds good to me.

 

[Rincewind42]

Originally posted by minux
Both CPUs you speak of were the "Lite" versions of their father desktop CPU. No "Lite" version of the G5 is available. Though, IBM is working on one. But, it will not be ready until the Winter of next year.

The G5 sucks a lot more power then the G4, not to mention the problems with the heat displacement of the G5. If Apple was going to release a G5 notebook tomorrow you would be rubbing ointment on your lap for a month.

I don't recall there ever being a 603 or G3 'lite' of any kind. The variants of the G3 that existed in that day were the 740 and 750, with the difference between the two being that the 740 didn't have support for a backside L2 cache. However, Apple's developer note for the original PowerBook G3 specifically states that they used the 750 (oh for that kind of convience in today's developer notes ). As for the 603, the primary differences between the various incarnations were the available core speeds. So there wasn't a 'lite' version for the portable market. Granted, the hardware built around the CPU was definately different from those on the desktop.

As for power consumption in the G4 vs 970 there are a lot of variables that have been missing, the primary one being core voltage. There are two quotes for the 970, 1.2Ghz on a 1.1v core at 19 watts and 1.8 Ghz on a 1.3v core at 42 watts. For the G4 we have confirmed 15 watts at 1.067 Ghz (from Motorola's PDF) and a 'street' quote of 30 watts at 1Ghz. Both of these quotes are probably correct if you put them in core voltage context (15w@1.1v, 30w@1.6v). I think that we all have agreed that we won't see the 1.8 Ghz part in a laptop any time soon. But the 1.2 Ghz part doesn't end up using that much more power than the G4. I went over all this in my last post, so I won't repeate it here. So saying that the 970 won't be in a PowerBook soon (relative to the PowerMac), or that it will be a huge power drain compared to the G4 is probably extreme.

 

[macrumors12345]

Originally posted by Frobozz
From what I've read, the 1 GHz G4 currently used sucks down 30 watts. The 970 will only use about 10 watts at 1.0 to 1.2 GHz.

Did you even LOOK at the IBM document?!? The link may not work, but it's quite easy to find if you just go to the PPC section of IBM's website because they only have ONE document about the PPC 970!

At any rate, it EXPLICITLY states that the 970 at 1.2 Ghz dissipates 19 watts. There is nothing to debate here: I have no idea where your made-up numbers are coming from (but they're certainly not from IBM), and they are just plain wrong.

Also, the current G4 in the Powerbooks DOES NOT dissipate 30 watts. If it did, the Powerbook would barely last over one hour! As the Motorola PDF that I posted states, the latest version of the MPC 7455 dissipates 15 watts at 1067 Mhz (the MPC 7457 will be only half that at 1067 Mhz - 7.5 watts). We don't know for certain if this is the version that Apple is using, but I'm sure their version definitely doesn't dissipate 30 watts!!!

 

[minux]

Funny thing, MOSR just copied and pasted my past post into their website. Amazing.

Mike

 

[MacFan25]

Come on 970s! Let's give intel some competition!

 

[mathiasr]

Originally posted by pgwalsh
I know a few developers that would switch, but they don't like the price/performance ratio. A lot of these developers want a cheap, but fairly fast machine.

Real developers would look at what Cocoa has to offer !

 

[bb0ys]

never watercooling

Originally posted by hvfsl
Apple would have had samples of PPC970 chips for a while now if this rumor is true. What the rumor is saying is that the PPC970 is now ready for mass production, so I have no doubt Apple will be ready for the chip. This is what I would like to see in the next PMac:

1.6Ghz-1.9Ghz PPC970 (maybe duals)
PCI extreme (much faster than PCI and AGP 8X and backwards compatible with PCI)
900Mhz system Bus
Serial ATA
Firewire 800
USB 2
Airport Extreme
BlueTooth
Water Cooling, so there is no fan noise

We won't see water cooling in this mass produced computer. period.