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All you need to know about the PowerPC 970...except when

Interesting...

Hmmmm....

Notice how on the bottom, the * means "Subject to change without notice"

Well, the production date has a *, so the powermacs COULD come very soon....
 

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Re: Interesting...

Originally posted by MacAztec
Hmmmm....

Notice how on the bottom, the * means "Subject to change without notice"

Well, the production date has a *, so the powermacs COULD come very soon....
Click to expand...

notice how it also says "estimation only" it wouldn't be much of an estimate if they were to come out with powermacs soon would it (estimate does generally mean an educated guess afterall). Nope, the 970 won't be here until more or less when IBM has already stated, and if there's a change, it will probably be later, rather than sooner. Considering they aren't even supposed to have samples until next quarter, seems pretty unlikely that they could be in full production anytime soon. Not to mention that aplpe can't just plug this thing in. they ahev to totally redesign the power mac and mac a lot of software tweaks to use this thing.
 
There doesn't need to be any software tweeks. It uses the same PowerPC arch. and is completely 32-bit backwards compatible.
 
Originally posted by yosoyjay
There doesn't need to be any software tweeks. It uses the same PowerPC arch. and is completely 32-bit backwards compatible.
Click to expand...

Almost. The OS has to have a few tweaks, but most of those have already been made (FreeBSD is 64 bit clean).

It appears that I was almost right about the IPC. IBM is saying 2.9 (compared to the G4+'s 2.31, and some model of P4's 1.8. I was guessing 3-3.5 for the 970). Don't know if those numbers of for FP, or INT, or what (The G4+'s double precision floating point can do AT MOST 1 IPC, while the 970 can do 2).
 
Hm... well if apple gets enough of these in testing we really could see these before next year, I am definatly suprises.

:fast foward to summer:
Apple computer has stuned rumor sites everywhere by releasing the G5 made by Motorola. Mac fans everywhere were baffled by the sudden release of this chip that supposed died in testing states. Some rumor sites display this as 'Shocking' & 'Totally unexpected' :eek:

:fast foward to winter:
Apple computer has release a new processor line based on IBM's Power hungry Power4, the IBM 970. :eek:

Ah! I can't imagine the first one happening, ever.

but maybe in 10 years we will start to see the apple Prototype (Moto) G5's. (Hence forth known as 'The chip which couldn't')

Edit: I see the roadmap, wtf, didn't we know the G3 can go faster than 1 GHZ?? BTW, apple, USE IBM G3's upgrade the powerbooks.

Why is IBM touting this as only having one chip cabalities... the picture says Power4 uses 2 and the 970 uses one (why not two?)
wow there is a HUGE size difference bewteen the Power4 and the 970, damn.

BTW, IBM you gave it away at the end by giving a link TO PowerPC site

Thanks for the info.
 
Similar market release timing for the PPC Business Partners

It will be interesting to see which of the PPC parents designs Apple goes with.

Motorola's G5 (apparently both 32-bit and 64-bit at 1.2 to 2GHz) has a release date of "June or July" 2003.

The 970 has roughly the same market release date. With the amazing ability to keep a secret at Apple these days, I wonder if we won't know until they pull the sheet off the finished product. Though my guess would be that Apple will see the 970's SOI desing as a better ready-made path to future development.

But the PPC partners will know ahead of time which one Apple has choosen. Maybe they're not as good with secrets. That's something that baffled me though. I recall when Apple announced that Motorola - it's chip maker at the time - was partnering with IBM to design a new chip - the PowerPC 601. When did two different development efforts emerge?

Also - what the heck - no L3 Cache?
 
Re: Similar market release timing for the PPC Business Partners

Originally posted by law guy
It will be interesting to see which of the PPC parents designs Apple goes with.

Motorola's G5 (apparently both 32-bit and 64-bit at 1.2 to 2GHz) has a release date of "June or July" 2003.

The 970 has roughly the same market release date. With the amazing ability to keep a secret at Apple these days, I wonder if we won't know until they pull the sheet off the finished product. Though my guess would be that Apple will see the 970's SOI desing as a better ready-made path to future development.

But the PPC partners will know ahead of time which one Apple has choosen. Maybe they're not as good with secrets. That's something that baffled me though. I recall when Apple announced that Motorola - it's chip maker at the time - was partnering with IBM to design a new chip - the PowerPC 601. When did two different development efforts emerge?

Also - what the heck - no L3 Cache?
Click to expand...
This bad puppy wont need it! L3 was to help the g4 do better thats all. Iam guessing sept but sure would like to see it sooner and I know apple would too. iam guessing some of the recent changes in the power mac line is prepping it for whats to come! DDR in the units right now doesnt really do that much but with the 970 hold on! ill say it one more time small moto bumps and this summer THE POWER WILL BE BACK IN THE MAC!
 
Originally posted by MrMacman

Why is IBM touting this as only having one chip cabalities... the picture says Power4 uses 2 and the 970 uses one (why not two?)
wow there is a HUGE size difference bewteen the Power4 and the 970, damn.
Click to expand...

You just answered your own question. Including two chips on one piece of silicon takes twice as much space (and costs more, and draws twice as much power). The 970 does support multiprocessing (up to 8 processors, iirc), it just doesn't have 2 processors on one die (yet, the .09 micron version of it may).
 
Originally posted by MrMacman

:fast foward to winter:
Apple computer has release a new processor line based on IBM's Power hungry Power4, the IBM 970. :eek:

Why is IBM touting this as only having one chip cabalities... the picture says Power4 uses 2 and the 970 uses one (why not two?)
wow there is a HUGE size difference bewteen the Power4 and the 970, damn.
Click to expand...

The 970 doesn't seem particularly power hungry to me.

The reason IBM says this only a single core chip is because thats what it is. the 970 is NOT the power4. it merely is based on some of its basic architecture, but there are a LOT of differences between the two. Its market isn't the same as dual core processors, its doesn't need to be as reliable or redundant as large server chips. its a totally different chip. Maybe future revisions will sport some more power4 like features like that, but its still a different chip, so its actually not all that good to compare it to the power4.
 
Re: Re: Similar market release timing for the PPC Business Partners

Originally posted by Dont Hurt Me
This bad puppy wont need it! L3 was to help the g4 do better thats all. Iam guessing sept but sure would like to see it sooner and I know apple would too. iam guessing some of the recent changes in the power mac line is prepping it for whats to come! DDR in the units right now doesnt really do that much but with the 970 hold on! ill say it one more time small moto bumps and this summer THE POWER WILL BE BACK IN THE MAC!
Click to expand...

hey, why stop putting an L3 on chips now?? with this + an L3 not only would we have real power but it would move so fast .....

damn!! i damaged my carpet with drool :D
 
Re: Re: Re: Similar market release timing for the PPC Business Partners

Originally posted by benixau


hey, why stop putting an L3 on chips now?? with this + an L3 not only would we have real power but it would move so fast .....

damn!! i damaged my carpet with drool :D
Click to expand...

INTEL thinks so as well. While their current high-end Itanium 2 processors have upto 3 MBs of L3 cache, the next generation 64 bit Itanium - (codename: Madison due for release in Q3 2003) will have a L3 cache of 6 - SIX by golly - megs. A G5 equivilent in a new workstation level, SUPER POWER Mac would be something.
 
512k running at processor speed is all that will be needed L3 was making up for bottlenecks etc if iam not mistaken and its costly. this bad boy will have a nice wide 900 frontside bus, the current powermacs have a 167 and 2 cpus fighting for that, now couple with ddr and what you have are no bottlenecks sees all, does all,faster in faster out. Also the power4 was heavy commercial stuff so thicker oxides on the gates which meant slower switching but super reliable in the server market i think, so with out these resrtictions this thing should smoke. Now ad 64 bit processing with programs written for this and it should fly. 2 gigs of ram will really look small compared to what will connect to this. Heck you might not even see hard drives in the near future just a large block of memory that is instantly accessible to the chip! excuse me had to wipe my drool before it fell! Now who needs L3?


But then again we might get stuck with motorola and their itsy bitsy tiny winy bumps and all this was just a dream!
 
Re: Similar market release timing for the PPC Business Partners

Originally posted by law guy
... But the PPC partners will know ahead of time which one Apple has choosen. Maybe they're not as good with secrets. That's something that baffled me though. I recall when Apple announced that Motorola - it's chip maker at the time - was partnering with IBM to design a new chip - the PowerPC 601. When did two different development efforts emerge? ...
Click to expand...

I think it was about the time of the 604. IBM wanted to pursue copper technology (I'm not sure what that is) and Motorola had other plans. Or something along along that line... a difference of opinon led the two companies down different paths. I don't remember the reason for Apple staying with Motorola and not choosing IBM.
 
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