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Apple Releases Dual Core PowerMac G5s
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No, they won't ship itanium servers.
You do realize that:
a) EPIC, the Itanium ISA is not related to x86 in any way. It's not even CISC or RISC. It's VLIW (very long instructional word). Porting to Itanium would likely be more difficult than porting from PPC to x86 because more opensource work has centered around ppc to x86.
b) Itanium is dead. The Power5 is more powerful than Itanium. Opteron servers have a price/performance that is SEVERAL times greater than Itanium. Even HP has been panning Itanium lately and they helped create it.
There is ZERO chance that Apple will ship Itanium servers unless there is a sea change in computing over the next DECADE.
ffakr
EricNau said:
You do realize that:
a) EPIC, the Itanium ISA is not related to x86 in any way. It's not even CISC or RISC. It's VLIW (very long instructional word). Porting to Itanium would likely be more difficult than porting from PPC to x86 because more opensource work has centered around ppc to x86.
b) Itanium is dead. The Power5 is more powerful than Itanium. Opteron servers have a price/performance that is SEVERAL times greater than Itanium. Even HP has been panning Itanium lately and they helped create it.
There is ZERO chance that Apple will ship Itanium servers unless there is a sea change in computing over the next DECADE.
ffakr
ffakr said:
You beat me to it I was just going to type up a similar reply. I don't see anyway we could ever see Itaniums in a Mac. I wouldn't go so far as to say they're dead, but they are probably headed down that road.
EricNau, what are you basing your opinion on? Just curious why you think this will indeed be the case. 🙂
Not only that, but the early ones ran hotter than the hottest Pentium 4s. I don't know if the later ones corrected that.Skareb said:
~Shard~ said:
No displays. If you add displays the final cost is $23,420. It's the RAM that gets you to $17K.
Sorry if someone's made the point as I haven't read the whole thread but for those who are disappointed with Apple measly installed amount of RAM I'd just say this - would you prefer they shipped with more RAM at Apple RAM prices?!
I agree it's low amount for such expensive machines, but I'd rather buy extra RAM myself for half the price than be forced to pay through the nose when I buy the PowerMac. Here in the UK at least Apple's memory prices are just shockingly opportunistic and roughly double the price of buying it from Crucial or somewhere last time I looked (I don't think that's what DDR is supposed to mean!).
Oh, and more on topic the Quad looks lovely, but I'm still very happy with my G5 Dual 2.5Ghz (with lots of RAM and HD space added after I bought it!) so my next desktop will probably be an intel mac.
I agree it's low amount for such expensive machines, but I'd rather buy extra RAM myself for half the price than be forced to pay through the nose when I buy the PowerMac. Here in the UK at least Apple's memory prices are just shockingly opportunistic and roughly double the price of buying it from Crucial or somewhere last time I looked (I don't think that's what DDR is supposed to mean!).
Oh, and more on topic the Quad looks lovely, but I'm still very happy with my G5 Dual 2.5Ghz (with lots of RAM and HD space added after I bought it!) so my next desktop will probably be an intel mac.
Porco said:
I believe I made that point several pages ago ;-P but what's a point between Mac compatriots?
At least as importantly, the previous G5 chipset (G5 and the lite version in the iMac) actually supports 2CAS and 2.5CAS RAM though they ship with 3CAS memory.
If you buy less Apple memory initially, it's less painful to ditch it and upgrade on whole to faster RAM. A move from CAS3 to CAS2 can be, in the proper circumstances, a noticeable improvement in performance.
ffakr.
P.S.
I think it's safe to say a processor is dead when one of the companies who developed the architecture starts taking shots at it and when the quarterly shipments are in the low thousands. Power volumes make Itanium volumes look annemic. Apple XServe volumes are more impressive than Itanium's and Apple's has no bias working against it in the Enterprise.
I'm very new to the mac world but as a Sound guy I've decided that my next purchase will be a G5, where is this "refurb store" you speak of? Do you think it would be worth while to purchase a refurbished mac?😕cr2sh said:
Spankenrear said:
From the Apple Online Store main page, on the right side, towards the bottom is a red "sales tag" that says someting like "special deals."
That's the refurb store.
If I were to buy a new mac, that's where I'd do it. Immediately after Apple releases a new model they take the old refurb models out of the store. Then about a week later they put the old refurb'd models back up... discounted somewhere between 20 and 40% off the original price.
The 20" 1.8 Imac used to sell for $1800 and its now down to $1150.
I'm not 100% sure what powermacs are up there now.... but I know there's a 1.8 single for $1100, and I believe a dual 2.0 right around $1500, which is marked down from $2000 a couple weeks ago. I think there were dual 2.3's up a while back... not sure.
I've never seen a dual 2.7 on the refurb store... and I'm not sure I'd even consider buying one, but that's another discussion.
You can also buy Applecare for refurb machines, so there's no real risk involved, from my point of view. The savings is considerable and they're still fantastic machines.. buying from refurb keeps you up to date but off the bleeding edge.
🙂
Oh boy ...
Processor price won't be 60% less. The cost of a processor involves a lot of factors, but I would be very surprised if the cost was any lower. It's twice the silicon needed for a single core processor because they're both at 90nm. Should be very similar.
DDR2 / 4200 RAM being "latency crippled" is a nasty rumor that just won't die. DDR2 RAM is only latency crippled in PC Hardware because of their bus structure. The G5 does not suffer the same latency problems, and as such, is actually one of the first computers to not suffer latency with DDR2.
The PowerMac is the first PCIe-only motherboard I have ever seen. Anywhere. Maybe there's another one somewhere, but it's certainly not a mainstream computer it's being used in. I wouldn't count any of your points as being a price reduction.
Agreed. It sucks. It's probably more for show that real world workstation usage, but it still sucks.
Again, this is a myth propogated by the review of PC motherboards when using DDR2 memory. The new PowerMac memory controller can push 8.5 GB/s. The RAM runs at a lower ratio (1.066GHz effective clock) to the processor (2.5 GHz) than the old memory did (0.8 GHz effetive clock) when it was on a slower 6.5 GB/s memory controller. Long story short-- the RAM works much better now because it can push more per cycle with more total cycles.
This is where my interpretation, and not paraphrasing from industry reviewers, takes over. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong ...
Most modern PC Motherboards run at 4 passes of 200 MHz (800 MHz FSB implementation.) So if the RAM is an even divisor of 200, you don't get latency. The problem is that the numbers you're dealing with are so slow, that any hit on latency is significant.
400 MHz Ram would work well on a quad pumped 800 MHz MB. 533 would obviously leave wiggle room and not be very effective versus 400.
On a PowerMac, the RAM runs at 533 x 2 and the path to the processor gives it half the processor speed. Let's say that's 1.25 GHz for a 2.5 GHz G5. That's 625 MHz bidirectionally, which is MORE per clock than the RAM. Not so in a PC, where it's a mere 1/3rd the speed.
jiggie2g said:
Processor price won't be 60% less. The cost of a processor involves a lot of factors, but I would be very surprised if the cost was any lower. It's twice the silicon needed for a single core processor because they're both at 90nm. Should be very similar.
DDR2 / 4200 RAM being "latency crippled" is a nasty rumor that just won't die. DDR2 RAM is only latency crippled in PC Hardware because of their bus structure. The G5 does not suffer the same latency problems, and as such, is actually one of the first computers to not suffer latency with DDR2.
The PowerMac is the first PCIe-only motherboard I have ever seen. Anywhere. Maybe there's another one somewhere, but it's certainly not a mainstream computer it's being used in. I wouldn't count any of your points as being a price reduction.
jiggie2g said:
Agreed. It sucks. It's probably more for show that real world workstation usage, but it still sucks.
jiggie2g said:
Again, this is a myth propogated by the review of PC motherboards when using DDR2 memory. The new PowerMac memory controller can push 8.5 GB/s. The RAM runs at a lower ratio (1.066GHz effective clock) to the processor (2.5 GHz) than the old memory did (0.8 GHz effetive clock) when it was on a slower 6.5 GB/s memory controller. Long story short-- the RAM works much better now because it can push more per cycle with more total cycles.
This is where my interpretation, and not paraphrasing from industry reviewers, takes over. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong ...
Most modern PC Motherboards run at 4 passes of 200 MHz (800 MHz FSB implementation.) So if the RAM is an even divisor of 200, you don't get latency. The problem is that the numbers you're dealing with are so slow, that any hit on latency is significant.
400 MHz Ram would work well on a quad pumped 800 MHz MB. 533 would obviously leave wiggle room and not be very effective versus 400.
On a PowerMac, the RAM runs at 533 x 2 and the path to the processor gives it half the processor speed. Let's say that's 1.25 GHz for a 2.5 GHz G5. That's 625 MHz bidirectionally, which is MORE per clock than the RAM. Not so in a PC, where it's a mere 1/3rd the speed.
Where did you get your information?Frobozz said:
The G5 bus structure has severe latency problems with DDR memory, do you have proof that this has been remedied in the new northbridge?
anandtech said:
DDR2 does have more latency than DDR1...that's an inevitable part of the DDR2 design. Unlike a typical Windows PC bus, the G5 has the bus speed to fully take advantage of DDR2 memory. However, like AidenShaw stated, the G5 has inherent memory latency issues. This most likely limits the gains from DDR2 to some extent.Frobozz said:
wrldwzrd89 said:
i thought the 1mb level 2 cache masks the latency problem to an extent where it doesn't matter in real life anymore.
i also thought when uploading large amounts of data (video stuff) the ddr2 is faster because of the faster clock speed and latency isn't an issue there.
therefore apple got the faster memory for large amounts of data while overcoming most of the latency with the cache.
correct me if i'm wrong.
The 1MB L2 cache does help mask the latency quite a bit, but it can't eliminate its effects entirely. A larger L2 cache would help even more. As far as large amounts of data go, that's true of all memory improvements, not just DDR2. Other than those minor niggles, you are correct.andiwm2003 said:
masks latency for some applications, doesn't help others
Remember that the cache does nothing to help latency until you make the second read from the same cache block (128 bytes). On the first read, it does not help you - the 2nd and subsequent reads are much faster because they come from the cache.
Programs that make widely scattered references will get misses on virtually every read, and will see the latency each time.
Most programs have some measure of locality, and benefit from the cache. As the cache size is increased, more programs meet the "some measure of locality" point, and benefit.
So, larger cache is definitely good - but it is overstating the goodness to say that it means that high latency "doesn't matter in real life anymore." Any application that spills out of cache will still see the high latency.
The amount that the larger cache offsets the latency is quite dependent on the application.wrldwzrd89 said:
Remember that the cache does nothing to help latency until you make the second read from the same cache block (128 bytes). On the first read, it does not help you - the 2nd and subsequent reads are much faster because they come from the cache.
Programs that make widely scattered references will get misses on virtually every read, and will see the latency each time.
Most programs have some measure of locality, and benefit from the cache. As the cache size is increased, more programs meet the "some measure of locality" point, and benefit.
So, larger cache is definitely good - but it is overstating the goodness to say that it means that high latency "doesn't matter in real life anymore." Any application that spills out of cache will still see the high latency.
Frobozz said:
DDR2 is just as latency-crippled on Macs as it is on PC. PC's do have a benefit of running faster RAM (667Mhz and up), whereas G5 uses the relatively slkow 533Mhz RAM There is nothing "magical" in Macs when it comes to latency (in fact, G5 is pretty bad on the latency-front). If you want really low-latency machine, look at Athlon64's/Opterons (which happen to be PC-machines).
Well, you are quite mistaken 🙂. Where would you put A64 and Opteron on your description? They have 1GHz FSB (a bit slower than on fastest G5's), but they have integrated mem-controller, which means that the RAM has a dedicated channel to the CPU (and that channel runs at same speed as the RAM does, so it's not bottlenecking the RAM), and the RAM and CPU talk directly. Remember: there are other PC-CPU's besides Pentiums....
RE: Quote:
Originally Posted by BGil
....................................................
Bottom line: The top-end PowerMac is very nicely priced but the two other models aren't even worth half the price Apple wants for them considering dual core PC's start at about $800 with 1GB ram, dual layer DVD burner, PCIe, and a 200-250GB drive.
RE RE:
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Nice summary of the thread and a bit of perspective on this matter!
My 2 cents worth is that unless you are a power rendering pro or likewise are lucky enough to have a "mandatory 😉" tech budget to blow every year, then these upgrades are not mandatory like the G4 to G5 jump was.
Having said that, the move to new dual dual 2.5 PPC's and the dual 2.7's is about as close as Steve can get us with the IBM chipsets to the promise of 3.0Ghz machines by late 2004. I think that piggybacking was the only quality response from Apple to IBM's slow development of the platform.
As for a few people's disgust that 2.0Ghz machines are still on the latest list, it does make some people feel good. I got a rev A 2.0DP and it is still nice to see it clinging on, even in its new configuration.
Having said all this, most people on this forum would be flying through all their apps on any G5 DP with ample RAM and decent video card.
Originally Posted by BGil
....................................................
Bottom line: The top-end PowerMac is very nicely priced but the two other models aren't even worth half the price Apple wants for them considering dual core PC's start at about $800 with 1GB ram, dual layer DVD burner, PCIe, and a 200-250GB drive.
RE RE:
andiwm2003 said:
---------
Nice summary of the thread and a bit of perspective on this matter!
My 2 cents worth is that unless you are a power rendering pro or likewise are lucky enough to have a "mandatory 😉" tech budget to blow every year, then these upgrades are not mandatory like the G4 to G5 jump was.
Having said that, the move to new dual dual 2.5 PPC's and the dual 2.7's is about as close as Steve can get us with the IBM chipsets to the promise of 3.0Ghz machines by late 2004. I think that piggybacking was the only quality response from Apple to IBM's slow development of the platform.
As for a few people's disgust that 2.0Ghz machines are still on the latest list, it does make some people feel good. I got a rev A 2.0DP and it is still nice to see it clinging on, even in its new configuration.
Having said all this, most people on this forum would be flying through all their apps on any G5 DP with ample RAM and decent video card.
numediaman said:
Cripes, are you buying RAM from Apple?!? Don't do that! You can get it much cheaper, Apple prices their RAM like they're selling it from an Airport (not to be confused with Airport, the product). Check out a RAM comparison site like dealram.com and find a low but certified RAM and save yourself usually from 50-75% of the ridiculously out-of-step prices Apple charges.
(Edit)
In fact I just played at the Apple store for poops and grins, Apple is charging $11900... almost $12000, for 16 MB of RAM!?!?! ARE THEY SMOKING SMACK?!?!? Sometimes Apple does these things like this where it makes me wonder just how much they're marking up their machines as well. Apple RAM is for rubes, or those with money to blow (you can send it to me if you'd like and I'll buy you the RAM and pocket the profit).
I went to dealram.com, you can get 16 GB for as low as $1600. Hmmm, I dunno, $1600 vs. $12000... they're close in price... NOT!!! If you want more certified worthy RAM you'll get up to around $2000 and save yourself, ready for this, $10,000!!! For $10,000 you can buy yourself three 30" Cinema Displays with video cards.
Sometimes I wish Apple would read these forums and look around to realize just how way out of touch they are on RAM prices, and have been since I started buying Macs 20 years ago.
To use 16GB RAM on the PowerMac you need to install eight 2GB DIMMs. The price of 2GB DIMMs is still high, but you can find them for about $350 or $400, so a good price would be around $3000. Still much less than Apple's prices.Photorun said:
Were you looking at 2GB DIMMs?
robc2323 said:
While you CAN get a dual-core machine for that money it might still be.... well, crappy. The components might be nice (fast CPU, large HD), but the overall machine might not be as good. You can get a Ford that is faster than BMW for less money, but does that mean that the Ford is better? No it does not. Yes, the single-CPU PM's could be a bit cheaper, but they are not outrageously expensive.
ksz said:
i don't think there is 16GB for $1600 out there. that's just one of those unqualified "apple is freaking expensive and elsewhere is cheaper" posts. i apologize if i'm wrong.
even with the $400 ram you have to be careful. there are tons of internet companies out there that lure you with great offers anfd then try to oversell you with other stuff (e.g. if you don't buy the extended warranty your shipping time goes up to 3 month).
or you order and the product unfortunately is out of stock but you can get a similar ram for twice the price.
compare apple to other reputable companies. apple looks not freaking outrageous offending expensive anymore but only expensive.
That explanation makes a lot of sense...thanks AidenShaw, I guess that's cleared up now.AidenShaw said: