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G5 PowerMacs MWNY -- Read this...

Pssst! Gyroscope!

The PPC roadmap says the G5 will be 32 and 64bit. Apple won't call the G5 a 32bit and the G6 a 64bit. If they [apple] are switching the OS to a 64bit architechture, they should let developers know FIRST. Hey, what a coincidence because WWDC in coming up. So I guess that means 10.2 will be 64bit since it is what they are showing a sneak preview of. Of course it will run on 32 bit processors as well, apple wouldn't pull an ADB/Floppy/SCSI maneuver on its only OS...would they? I think the preview at wwdc will be to show developers how easy it is to write code for macs new OS. Sooner than later this will have to be 64bit code because of motorolas roadmap. The G5 WILL be 64bit. Apple WILL put this in their computers. Maybe theyll have a PRO OS with a 64bit chip, and a OS X with 32bit chip, who knows.
 
Considering that they will move the G4's to powermac/g4, and the old iMac is at imac/g3, it looks like they will be keeping the old PowerMac G4's around like the CRT iMacs. Interesting! This probably means the G5's will be introduced at a higher price...
 
Originally posted by Hemingray
Considering that they will move the G4's to powermac/g4, and the old iMac is at imac/g3, it looks like they will be keeping the old PowerMac G4's around like the CRT iMacs. Interesting! This probably means the G5's will be introduced at a higher price...
Click to expand...

Ha, now there's a no brainer. Any new machine will be more expensive, but I think there will be a limit to how high they would actually go. It can't be too much more than the top of the line machines out there now.
 
Originally posted by dukestreet


Ha, now there's a no brainer. Any new machine will be more expensive, but I think there will be a limit to how high they would actually go. It can't be too much more than the top of the line machines out there now.
Click to expand...

Of course the price can be higher. The pro line is designed for pros. Most pros are considered pros because they are professionals (right?) What I read that to mean is that pros do what they do for renumeration, i.e. cash. They compute for profit. They use their 'puters to do their work.

As such, if you do, say, a small amount of work, you could probably get by with an imac or other consumer level machine. If you do a lot more work, but maybe still have a tight budget, you probably need a Powermac or Powerbook. Now, there is nothing between the Powermacs and superexpensive machines or multicomputer setups.

So, I'm certain there are businesses and professionals who would pay 1.5-4 times what a current top of the line computer costs if it was far better/faster/more productive.

We just have to remember who the target audience is. If it is me, they can't go much more expensive. If it's pros, price is a far less limiting factor.
 
Originally posted by dukestreet


Ha, now there's a no brainer. Any new machine will be more expensive, but I think there will be a limit to how high they would actually go. It can't be too much more than the top of the line machines out there now.
Click to expand...

No kidding. That's my point. If it's TOO high, people won't buy them (except the people who can afford to drop $3.5K on a 23" HD display.)
 
No 64-bit G5

A 64-bit G5 makes no sense to me at this time and here is why:

1. What would it be used for?
64-bit does NOT speed up most computing operations. If you have 2 32-bit numbers and you wish to add, subtract, multipy, etc. them, this operation is not one bit faster on a 64-bit computer than a 32. If you are working with 64-bit numbers then yes, you do see a performance gain. But the truth is that the vast majority of applications will see no performance gain, because they have no need of that level of precision. Take photoshop for instance. I'm sure someone will come up with some operations in Photoshop that use 64-bit. But the majority will not. Why? Because the color depth you're working with is only 32-bit. So every pixel can be expressed as a 32-bit number.

What is 64-bit good for? Why do people want 64-bit chips? Databases. Very large databases get a huge boost from 64-bit. But the database market on the Mac is pretty tiny. Would Apple release a chip with a price premium just for the database market? I don't think so.

There is one thing I could see Apple going to 64-bit for, and that is film editing. Film has a much greater than 32-bit color depth. Even 64-bit is not quite up to film standard. If Apple wants to really be aggressive about going after the film editing market, it would make sense to modify the OS, FCP, and Cinema Tools so they could make use of 64-bit color depth and then go to a 64-bit chip to speed that all up. BUT...

2. How will developers write code for it?
This I think is the stronger reason not to beleive in a 64-bit G5.

In order for software to take advantage of 64-bit hardware, developers will have to re-write and re-compile their code. Depending on the 64-bit implementation it may be a total rewrite/recompile (like IA64) or a partial rewrite/recompile (x86-64).

It wouldn't make sense to not give developers a heads-up BEFORE you release a chip that requires this work. Look at both IA64 and x86-64. The specifications for both were out years before their introduction. When Motorola added the Altivec unit, Apple gave all the information necessary to develop for it to their developers well, well before the introduction of the G4 (and still there are many, many applications that are not Altivec aware).

When Apple transitioned from 68K to PPC developers knew about it years before it happened, and I'd be willing to bet that there is still a good deal of 68K code in use on Macs today.

Bottom line: When has ANY company EVER added instructions to a chip and NOT informed developers BEFORE they released the chip? NEVER!



Alright, that being said, there is a powerful argument for the Rapid-IO chip being called a G5. It will be manufactured using 5th generation lithography tools. It will run significantly faster than a G4. It will have a very advanced IO solution. And maybe I'm wrong on this one, but I thought I read somewhere that the Altivec unit will be improved in this chip, Altivec II or something...

I for one would be well pleased if they released a G5 at MWNY that was a 32-bit Rapid-IO, Altivec II running in the mid 1Ghz range.

This is not to say that I don't beleive Apple will ever release a 64-bit processor. But I can gaurantee we will know about it long before it hits the shelves.
 
Re: No 64-bit G5

Originally posted by wrylachlan
A 64-bit G5 makes no sense to me at this time and here is why:

1. What would it be used for?
64-bit does NOT speed up most computing operations. If you have 2 32-bit numbers and you wish to add, subtract, multipy, etc. them, this operation is not one bit faster on a 64-bit computer than a 32. If you are working with 64-bit numbers then yes, you do see a performance gain. But the truth is that the vast majority of applications will see no performance gain, because they have no need of that level of precision. Take photoshop for instance. I'm sure someone will come up with some operations in Photoshop that use 64-bit. But the majority will not. Why? Because the color depth you're working with is only 32-bit. So every pixel can be expressed as a 32-bit number.

What is 64-bit good for? Why do people want 64-bit chips? Databases. Very large databases get a huge boost from 64-bit. But the database market on the Mac is pretty tiny. Would Apple release a chip with a price premium just for the database market? I don't think so.

There is one thing I could see Apple going to 64-bit for, and that is film editing. Film has a much greater than 32-bit color depth. Even 64-bit is not quite up to film standard. If Apple wants to really be aggressive about going after the film editing market, it would make sense to modify the OS, FCP, and Cinema Tools so they could make use of 64-bit color depth and then go to a 64-bit chip to speed that all up. BUT...

2. How will developers write code for it?
This I think is the stronger reason not to beleive in a 64-bit G5.

In order for software to take advantage of 64-bit hardware, developers will have to re-write and re-compile their code. Depending on the 64-bit implementation it may be a total rewrite/recompile (like IA64) or a partial rewrite/recompile (x86-64).

It wouldn't make sense to not give developers a heads-up BEFORE you release a chip that requires this work. Look at both IA64 and x86-64. The specifications for both were out years before their introduction. When Motorola added the Altivec unit, Apple gave all the information necessary to develop for it to their developers well, well before the introduction of the G4 (and still there are many, many applications that are not Altivec aware).

When Apple transitioned from 68K to PPC developers knew about it years before it happened, and I'd be willing to bet that there is still a good deal of 68K code in use on Macs today.

Bottom line: When has ANY company EVER added instructions to a chip and NOT informed developers BEFORE they released the chip? NEVER!



Alright, that being said, there is a powerful argument for the Rapid-IO chip being called a G5. It will be manufactured using 5th generation lithography tools. It will run significantly faster than a G4. It will have a very advanced IO solution. And maybe I'm wrong on this one, but I thought I read somewhere that the Altivec unit will be improved in this chip, Altivec II or something...

I for one would be well pleased if they released a G5 at MWNY that was a 32-bit Rapid-IO, Altivec II running in the mid 1Ghz range.

This is not to say that I don't beleive Apple will ever release a 64-bit processor. But I can gaurantee we will know about it long before it hits the shelves.
Click to expand...

I agree. I seriously doubt that a 64 bit chip would be like IA-64, because that would be as big a transition as the transition from 68k to PPC. I thing it's much more likely to be like x86-64 when it comes, and I think MWNY is going to have a 32 bit chip. A very speedy 32 bit chip though :)
 
...




im tired of newbies pretending to know $h1t about computers on these forums. your statements about 64-bit processing make you look truly stupid. 64-bit processing in personal computers at an extremely low price (sub-$1000 processors) is a holy grail of computing. shut your mouths, do some research, and complain somewhere else.

vector-based and matrix math. extremely high-res video acceleration. increased thirdparty hardware capabilities. insane multitasking. enhanced compilers. severe multiprocessing. basically, windows95 and its variants are a result of the move to 32-bit processing. 32-bit still has to "fake it" in order to do high level math functions and such. OS X will be the first consumer level 64-bit OS with a consumer level 64-bit processor.
 
Originally posted by sparkleytone
vector-based and matrix math. extremely high-res video acceleration. increased thirdparty hardware capabilities. insane multitasking. enhanced compilers. severe multiprocessing. basically, windows95 and its variants are a result of the move to 32-bit processing. 32-bit still has to "fake it" in order to do high level math functions and such. OS X will be the first consumer level 64-bit OS with a consumer level 64-bit processor.
Click to expand...

You know, no matter how few things a consumer might do that would require 64 bit processors, there is a lot of software those same consumers use that could benefit from the change.

I mean, if all i ever do is word processing, watching video, using the internet, etc., but the software running it, and the OS is far superior to what we have today because it makes use of a 64 bit processor, I'm all for it.

I don't have to multiply a 64 bit number by a 64 bit number to want a 64 bit processor.

Oh, and don't tell me if some bad *ss game came out that required 64 bit processors, everyone wouldn't be clamoring for the new chip.

Horsepower is a funny thing. You can't have too much.
 
mcrain that was spot on. just because we consider ourselves enlightened and intelligent; that doesnt mean we have to deny that we have completely human characteristics, such as wanting bigger better faster. i have a new favorite saying i think, and its going to become my signature...stay tuned......
 
hey sparkleytone chill,

The issues Cattfish_Man and wrylachlan made are vaild points.

Also would you care to elaborate on the random statements you made

vector-based and matrix math. extremely high-res video acceleration. increased thirdparty hardware capabilities. insane multitasking. enhanced compilers. severe multiprocessing. basically, windows95 and its variants are a result of the move to 32-bit processing. 32-bit still has to "fake it" in order to do high level math functions and such. OS X will be the first consumer level 64-bit OS with a consumer level 64-bit processor.
Click to expand...

How exactly does 64-bit procesing help vector and matrix operations when they are performed in the AltiVec unit?

Please let me know how 32-bit 'fakes' high level math function, and what exactly you term 'high level math functions'.

do some research
Click to expand...

unless Apple releases a 64bit processor before Q1'03 then OS X will not be the first consumer level 64-bit OS. Versions of both Windows and Linux are ready for the release of the AMD's X86-64 processors.
 
again, be smarter with your words. Consumer Level OS. Linux is not consumer level, and 64-bit Windows is not a product that can be bought off of the shelf.

And also, while AMD's 64-bit offerings look promising, the Clawhammer isn't due for a good while. They will roll out their server offerings first, and the consumer level chips are well down the road.
 
If you check AMDs roadmaps consumer Hammer based solutions are planned to ship Q1'03.

Okay Linux isn't consumer based, but WinXP-64 is ready, of course it's not on the shelves because there's no Hammer CPU's available to consumers currently.
 
ahhh roadmaps...'nuff said.

getting off the point though, i'll say something that has no real base at all.

i just have this feeling that XP-64 is going to fall flat and m$ is going to scramble to revert to 32-bit. It's just a feeling. AMD and m$ are going to be at each others throats while intel kind of rides the waves. I could easily be wrong :O
 
AMD is releasing the Athlon (ie consumer) version of the Hammer line (aka 'ClawHammer') first, and the Opteron (ie server) version of the Hammer line (aka 'SledgeHammer) later. (http://www6.tomshardware.com/cpu/02q2/020424/opteron-01.html) Whether or not they get it out on time is up in the air (I kind of doubt it, they're way late with the Athlon XP 2200+... announced to be available at the end of March).

How is Linux not a "consumer level" OS? Many popular distros (RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE) have a version intended for consumers. (In fact, I'm writing this post from one... Linux Mandrake 8.1 Standard Edition)

64-bit processors don't intrinsically work any faster then 32-bit processors. They just work on 64-bit words as opposed to 32-bit words. It gives you integers larger 4 billion. Say I want to multiply 3,850,345,765 by 2... with a 32-bit processor, the result would be out of range and it would return incorrect results. A 64-bit processor would perform the operation and return the correct results, because it's well within the range. However, the 64-bit processor can't perform the operation any faster by nature of being 64-bit.
 
Originally posted by sparkleytone
ahhh roadmaps...'nuff said.

getting off the point though, i'll say something that has no real base at all.

i just have this feeling that XP-64 is going to fall flat and m$ is going to scramble to revert to 32-bit. It's just a feeling. AMD and m$ are going to be at each others throats while intel kind of rides the waves. I could easily be wrong :O
Click to expand...

Or more likely, the 64 bit version of Win XP will have twice as many security holes as the 32 bit version!!!
 
people want to be able to install programs that they think are cute and fun. they also dont want the install to require a masters in CS. This has yet to happen for Linux, please don't even start the crap about how it has if you were thinking it. Linux is total **** as a consumer OS, I don't care how many grandmas are fabled to be using it.
 
Installing a program doesn't require a masters in CS. I download an RPM of a program, double-click the icon, have the RPM Manager pop up, click "Install"... and it installs. I decide I don't want the program, so I open up the RPM Manager, click on the program, and say "Remove"... and voila! it's gone. Even installing from source is easy... "make" to run the makefile, "make install" to install, and if there is an uninstall included "make uninstall" to get rid of it.

Yes, there are problems with depedencies during installs, but those can easily be worked around.

But for a consumer OS (running email, web browsing, text editing, etc), it works quite well. Yes, there are failings, and running Windows apps obviously doesn't work (wine's coming along, but it still isn't good enough, IMO).
 
sparklytone said

i just have this feeling that XP-64 is going to fall flat and m$ is going to scramble to revert to 32-bit. It's just a feeling. AMD and m$ are going to be at each others throats while intel kind of rides the waves. I could easily be wrong :O
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure MS is working closely with AMD from what I've read, but WinXP-64 will have two versions one for x86-64 and one for the fabled intel skunkworks 64-bit extensions.

Either way I agree that XP-64 will fall flat on it's face, XP won't become a great OS just because it has 64 bit extensions.

Linux is total **** as a consumer OS,
Click to expand...

I think that comment was a bit dismissive. Okay linux isn't as easy to use as windows or mac OS for the average joe, but it wasn't originally intended for the average joe. If you use a recent release of any major distro the user friendliness has increased by orders of magnitude in a small amount of time, it's still not on a par with a commerically funded OS, but dismissing it a **** is unfair to many hundreds (if not thousands) that freely give their time to try and make computers more accessible.
 
Originally posted by mcrain


Or more likely, the 64 bit version of Win XP will have twice as many security holes as the 32 bit version!!!
Click to expand...

Yes mcrain, I agree completely. Windows has more holes than a sieve, and any new version of windows that is more complicated than the current version is certain to be full of bugs and security problems. :eek:
 
It's good to see you agree with yourself mcrain:D

I once had an argument with myself and I'm still not talking to myself:confused:
 
x86-64...

...will not succeed because it's 64 bit, it will succeed because it's running on AMD Hammers. I don't care if you don't like x86 (I don't either), the Hammer is an awesome chip. Hopefully the G5 will have an on chip DDR controller like it does. To give you an idea (this is according to AMD):
the move from DDR 133MHz bus (266MHz effective speed), to DDR166 (333) on chip controller provides a 20% performance gain. With Macs (if the G5 has the same system), it'll be the move from SDR133 bus (133), to DDR166 (333) on chip controller. Imagine the performance gains from that...
 
RDRAM would actually be a better choice if the g5 is going to be as highperformance as rumored. take a look at any highend p4 benchmarks with DDR v. RDRAM, and Rambus wins hands down. It's just plain faster.
 
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