A pro Mac mini / cube would be great but I cant see Apple canabalizing iMac sales by pushing out a highly speced mini machine...
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Dual-Core PowerMacs, New G4 PowerBook, and G5 Mini?
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Single dual-core will be faster than today's dual G5 systems
One story on the 970MP announcement said:
It's important to look at the overall system, not to focus on a single item (the shared FSB) and decide what will happen.
The parable of the blind men and the elephant comes to mind....
While what you state about the shared bus is true, it's mostly irrelevant....tgorochowski said:
- The bottleneck in the G5 isn't the FSB, it's the shared memory controller. A single FSB is a lot faster than the memory, so having one FSB or two FSB's won't be significant for the overwhelming majority of applications.
- The G5 (2.7) FSB is 10.8 GB/s, the G5 memory controller is 6.4 GB/s. Does it matter much whether you have one or two 10.8 GB/s busses bottlenecked to a 6.4 GB/s memory controller? (data from http://www.apple.com/powermac/architecture.html)
- The 970MP doubles the size of the L2 cache to 1 MiB per CPU. w00t ! This will improve performance far more than the "loss" due to sharing the FSB, and reduces memory traffic - further mitigating the effects of the slow memory controller and shared FSB
- An SMP system has significant overhead doing inter-processor communications and maintaining cache coherency - in a dual-core chip this can be done in the chip itself, without going onto the bus like mult-chip systems must. (Note that Intel's first dual-core chips don't have this optimization)
One story on the 970MP announcement said:
eWeek said:
It's important to look at the overall system, not to focus on a single item (the shared FSB) and decide what will happen.
The parable of the blind men and the elephant comes to mind....
mugwump said:
They will be much better for consumer uses, the big question is the pros. I except there to be an intel model by next june, but in the case of the PowerMac and Xserve, PowerPC versions as well.
fordlemon said:
Uhhhh... I'm pretty sure Woz isn't at Apple any more. And this is a pretty necessary transition: the PowerPC is evolving SLLOOOOOOOOWWLLY.
I only ask that it be something good (i.e. PB update) and not something crummy like a video ipod.
Kobushi said:
As the saying goes, "We shall see".
Personally, I'm hoping that the PB 12" gets brought up to snuff well enough that I can convince my wife that its a better option than a 12" iBook, since I've already talked her into getting a 12" PPC laptop in lieu of an iPod photo to support offloading a new digital SLR into while on vacation. When you look at the PB 12" spec's right now...256M on the motherboard, etc...its clearly not worth the roughly 50% increase in price vs the iBook, unless you're really desparate for one of the other minor differences (of which absolutely none of which can be justified for my simple "upgunned digital wallet" application).
-hh
I was planning to get my first mac (a powerbook) in the next week or so, but have decided to wait until the Paris Expo to see what happens first. One thing that does concern me, is if the new intel power book (not sure of what it's being called) has a considerate cosmetic change. Does anyone consider this likely? I just don't want to buy a powerbook now and have it look out of date in January or whenever people are estimating the new ones will be released! 
al3000 said:I was planning to get my first mac (a powerbook) in the next week or so, but have decided to wait until the Paris Expo to see what happens first. One thing that does concern me, is if the new intel power book (not sure of what it's being called) has a considerate cosmetic change. Does anyone consider this likely? I just don't want to buy a powerbook now and have it look out of date in January or whenever people are estimating the new ones will be released!
Maybe there will be something minor (like when the Powerbook switched to Aluminum and got a sliver keyboard), but I can't think of any reason to change the design (besides making it a bit thinner). I think it's safe to get the revision coming at Expo Paris. Especially since the Intels are gonna arrive around WWDC next year.
From what I have read in magazines ( like MacWorld ) , the earliest that Intel based macs will become available next year is June 2006 . That gives Apple 12 months to get those units out onto store shelfs . Also I read that Apple intends to make the lowend macs switch to Intel first . Makes sense in that , the Mac Mini sells in numbers that dwarf the sales of the more expensive machines. I expect the Mac Mini , the eMac , and possibbly the iBook to be the first to switch to Intel.
With this in mind, Apple has the time to release one or two updates for the Mac Mini. The Mac Mini only received a memory increase in July . Switching the Mac Mini to a G5 computer is not going to cause any real commotion in the retail market. Remember that the Mac Mini is the machine that they sell to many customers that buy the ipod . If there are many ipod changes in the year, the Mac Mini may need to change just as frequently. A G5 Mac Mini released in October would be in time for X-Mas sales.
I could easily see a dual-core Powermac released this fall as well. It radically changes the Powermac line. One 2.5 GHZ dual-core Powermac , a 2.0 GHZ dual-core Powermac , and a 2.7 GHZ dual 970FX G5 Powermac would make a good Powermac productline.
As for the Powerbook update , it is more than expected. Some students have been patiently waiting for it. However, is there really an reason why Apple couldn't release A G5 Powerbook in January 2007 ? A modest speed increase of a 1.8 GHZ low-power G5 would help sales of the Powerbook next year until Apple is ready to switch the Powerbooks to Intel. If IBM had a 1.6 GHZ low-power 970FX G5 in July , is there really any excuse to not have those chips speed bumped up to 1.8 GHZ in 6 months ?
With this in mind, Apple has the time to release one or two updates for the Mac Mini. The Mac Mini only received a memory increase in July . Switching the Mac Mini to a G5 computer is not going to cause any real commotion in the retail market. Remember that the Mac Mini is the machine that they sell to many customers that buy the ipod . If there are many ipod changes in the year, the Mac Mini may need to change just as frequently. A G5 Mac Mini released in October would be in time for X-Mas sales.
I could easily see a dual-core Powermac released this fall as well. It radically changes the Powermac line. One 2.5 GHZ dual-core Powermac , a 2.0 GHZ dual-core Powermac , and a 2.7 GHZ dual 970FX G5 Powermac would make a good Powermac productline.
As for the Powerbook update , it is more than expected. Some students have been patiently waiting for it. However, is there really an reason why Apple couldn't release A G5 Powerbook in January 2007 ? A modest speed increase of a 1.8 GHZ low-power G5 would help sales of the Powerbook next year until Apple is ready to switch the Powerbooks to Intel. If IBM had a 1.6 GHZ low-power 970FX G5 in July , is there really any excuse to not have those chips speed bumped up to 1.8 GHZ in 6 months ?
joecool85 said:
I've often wondered that of 17" owners, I know it's very solid but when you have something so thin yet vast in the other two dimensions are they ever scared of it bending? Yes, it's silly, the machine is reinforced very well but I just can't get my head around it.
fordlemon said:
With the current development in X86 processors you can hardly call "standard" RISC processors superior anymore, mainly because all new Pentiums are RISC processors (since the Pentium Pro days) with a little attachment at the front which converts the X86 CISC commands into nice short RISC commands.
Basically all new Pentiums and Athlons are RISC chips which "emulate" the x86 instruction set. This emulation or conversion step, depending on what you want to call it, is so fast these days and takes up so little die area that i don't think a RISC chip could be faster overall. Although RISC chips do have the benefit of extra registers. However just like the battle between X86 and powerPC, the Athlon and Pentium(4) each have strengths and weaknesses, the former excels at gaming and the latter excels at video compression for instance.
DISCLAIMER: I'm pretty sure that what i say about the Pentium being a RISC chip with a CISC frontend is correct but i don't have first hand knowledge so i could be wrong.
spot on, mate
To put it simply, RISC is a 30 year old idea that solves a problem that no longer exists.
If you don't understand what I mean by that, you might want to read a short piece by David K. Every called "RISC or CISC: Which is Better?".
It describes the origins, evolution, and merger of the ideas of RISC and CISC.
You are correct - even to the point of the Pentium Pro being the first RISC Pentium.TBi said:
To put it simply, RISC is a 30 year old idea that solves a problem that no longer exists.
If you don't understand what I mean by that, you might want to read a short piece by David K. Every called "RISC or CISC: Which is Better?".
It describes the origins, evolution, and merger of the ideas of RISC and CISC.
digitalbiker said:How do you know that an Intel PB will be released in less than a year? I think a timed release using the Intel 64 bit Merom chip, along with 64 bit Leopard will be announced for the PB at MWSF 2007. If the lag times are typical, Jan. announcement means a March 2007 delivery. That is more like 18 months from Paris 2005 and sounds just about right.
That's true, didn't Steve Jobs say at WWDC this past year that the consumer line will go Intel first in 2006 and then the pro line in 2007?
I got tired of drinking the rumor Kool-Aid after being burnt occasionally. I'll just wait and see and not start hallucinating about a 3 GHz PowerBook G5 at Apple Expo Paris.
Freg3000 said:
I don't think anyone ever claimed that it was a lock but you can logically deduce that it probably will happen. Would Apple introduce the 17" PowerBook anywhere but MW or WWDC? Or what about the new iMac? Or the Mac Mini or the revamped 15" PowerBook? Yes I was wrong about the iPod being released at Mac Expo but in both of those cases it was delayed for a reason: Cancer causing jobs not to be there for the expo and 9|11 causing the expo to be canned. *blows whistle* I call extenuating circumstances in those cases.
I don't think its a stretch to say that Jobs will introduce new x86 hardware at MW with a shipping date anywhere from that day to a couple months later. They did it before with the first G5 PowerMac. They did it with the 17" PowerBook when that came out too. What was it? 3 months later or something?
Apple wants the biggiest audience to see their wares. There isn't going to be anything bigger then MW '06 and any hardware that would be introduced a couple months later at a "special event" is already up and running by the time MW comes around. If they are still stuck in development in January '06 Apple is in deep ****. So anything that could be introduced a few months later could be introduced at MW.
And Again I will quote Jobs:
keynote transcripts
What part of this isn't clear that Apple plans to be shipping x86 systems BY WWDC '06. Which means introing it sometime between NOW and 6.5.06. Do people really think Apple is going to let a major device out the door without an event?
This is Jobs we are talking about. The guy gets off on standing infront of everyone wowing them. MW '06 guys. Mark my words, bookmark this page. Whatever.