Originally posted by Frobozz
This is going to be the best year since 1984 for the Mac. I have no doubt.
1994 was pretty big. I think the introduction of the PowerPC in the first place was huge.
Now, another issue is the IBM vs. Moto issue. Moto was Apple's processor supplier ever since the Apple I, when Woz decided to get the Moto processor because it was cheaper than the Intel processor. (It wasn't Moto then, Moto later bought out that company.)
From 1984 to 1994, Apple used the 68k processors from Motorola. Consistently, the 68000, 68020, 68030, and 68040 were outperformed by the Intel 8086, 80286, 80386, and 80486, respectively.
In 1994, Apple decided to ally with Motorola and long-time rival IBM in the AIM alliance. This alliance would retain Motorola as a direct chip vendor to temper the alliance with the hated IBM. (IBM was the Microsoft of the time, remember.) The idea was to change IBM's POWER series of high-end workstation processors into a viable PC processor.
The first PowerPCs were the 601, 603, and 604. There may have been another, but Apple didn't use it. The 601 was the main chip, the 603 was the low-power chip, and the 604 was the big, powerful chip. The 601 was produced only by IBM. Motorola bought the 601s from IBM, stamped "Motorola" on them, and sold them again to Apple. No Mac user wanted to buy IBM, so this was necessary.
(Remember, we were more cultish back then.)
Anyway, the 603 and 604 were designed at the joint Motorola-IBM facility, Somerset. Somerset lasted well into the G3 period.
The G3 was based on the 603e (an enhanced 603, more powerful than the 601). In mid-1997, it was put into PowerBook and Power Mac form. By 1998, the entire line was G3. It wasn't too much later that Somerset broke up, as Motorola pursued an AltiVec-enabled G4 and IBM pursued copper processors (first copper processor was the copper G3, introduced in the blue-and-white G3.)
The point?
First, there is precedent supporting the notion that 970 will spread to the entire line quickly. The G3 was enough of a boost over the 604e to do so. Second, the IBM thing isn't new. It dates from 1994.
