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IBM PowerPC Announcement

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Apr 12, 2001
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This Forbes article (courtesy of MacSurfer) brings us the first news of IBM's new PowerPC Chip that has been speculated about for the past few weeks. According to the article (which references a Monday announcement), the new chip is due in late 2003 and will start at 1.8GHz.

Meanwhile, rumors of Apple involvement continues... but no official stance just yet:

An industry source said Cupertino, California-based Apple would use the chip in its Macintosh computers.
Click to expand...
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2002/10/13/ibm-powerpc-announcement-64-bit-1-8ghz/
This is good news and all, but late 2003 and we're still stuck with just 1.8Ghz (I know it says starting at, so maybe a top speed of 2.2Ghz, if we're lucky).
Don't flame me for this, but, Intel and AMD will probably have introduced brand new lines of processors by then running at 4Ghz+...somethings not quite right there, we need more POWER :(
 
official or not?

is this story based on fact, or speculation, is what i'm wondering. 1.8 Ghz, not bad compared to the 1.4 stuff some people speculated. The gap will have greatly widened by then, hopefully there will be some secrets up apple's sleeves. (if it is based on official information)

On another note, I got the first comment! (bahhh!!!!)
 
lovely.

the holy grail "G5" we've all been waiting for...

but still sucking wind at a meager 1.8 GHz. And not for another year. By then you should be able to get a cheap 5 GHz box.

:rolleyes:
 
Originally posted by edesignuk
This is good news and all, but late 2003 and we're still stuck with just 1.8Ghz (I know it says starting at, so maybe a top speed of 2.2Ghz, if we're lucky).
Don't flame me for this, but, Intel and AMD will probably have introduced brand new lines of processors by then running at 4Ghz+...somethings not quite right there, we need more POWER :(
Click to expand...


Probably not 4Ghz, but at least 3.7 Ghz I'm guessing, AMD's Clawhammer will be a 3400+ (about 3Ghz I think) so Intel would hve at least caught up to that since the AMD chip is going to be released in the first quarter.
A 1.8 Ghz Power4mini-me will likely kick some serious ass, but it just doesn't look that fast, Intel and AMD are way past 1.8 Ghz and will be even farther by the time this gets released.
 
It's not all about Mhz though... we'll see...

arn
 
"it's time"

"This is the time to introduce a 64-bit machine capable of being used on a desktop,"

As much as most posters would want to see this "lite" chip in the near future, I think IBM has positioned itself well against the 64bit competition from Intel and AMD. The 1.8 GHz clock speed is seriously impressive, seeing as the hammer is around the 800Mhz mark (there was a review on anandtech a while back). Even though MHz ain't everything :)

I'm guessing this Power 970 (speculation about single-core looks correct) will supercede some motorolla 85xx chip (85xx possibly in January?) since the release date of the Power chip is late 2003

Guess we'll get some more tidbits on the chip come the demos/papers/speeches of the microprocessor forum...

-- Dan =)
Click to expand...
 
Originally posted by e-coli
lovely.
but still sucking wind at a meager 1.8 GHz. And not for another year. By then you should be able to get a cheap 5 GHz box.

:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

hahaha. No, you won't be able to get a 5GHz box by the end of next year, but there will be a P4 at 4ghz. With the new hyperthreading support, don't expect P4 to average over 2 ops per cycle, probably around 1.5.
If the word so far is correct, the "meager" IBM chip will have a max of 8 ops per cycle... figure an average of around 4 ops per cycle if you look at the PPCs history.
I expect it will easily do twice the work per cycle as a next-gen P4. Try doing high precision math and it will pull way ahead.

1.8GHz, if the other rumors are correct, will be very very powerful. 2+ is always better, but a 1.8 GHz 64bit chip is pretty sweet. Just wait till the Mac clusters start posting scores with this chip...
 
Originally posted by edesignuk
This is good news and all, but late 2003 and we're still stuck with just 1.8Ghz (I know it says starting at, so maybe a top speed of 2.2Ghz, if we're lucky).
Don't flame me for this, but, Intel and AMD will probably have introduced brand new lines of processors by then running at 4Ghz+...somethings not quite right there, we need more POWER :(
Click to expand...

Although it goes against the grain of having discussion groups based on rumors, wait until the week has played out and some technical details have become available.

We need throughput (power if you wish to call it that). But we probably need memory bandwidth before we need Mhz (as Arn sez later as well). a g4 with an internal clock rate of 2Ghz would probably not be much faster than a 1.25Ghz G4.
 
Another year of overclocking?

This PowerPC 970 sounds very impressive...Shame it is coming so late, and it still is unclear if it supports AltiVec (which has kept us shackled to the lead turkey G4 and Motorola), which is crucial.

So, what can Apple do for the next year? More overclocking/hacking of the embedded/telecoms focused irrelevance that is the 'Motorola MPC 7455 Host Processor'? Look at Moto's own official documents: The chip does NOT support DDR in any form, or a 167mhz FSB, or an official speed of 1.25ghz, or modern features like out-of-order processing (where instructions are executed in the fastest way possible, rather than just in the order they were issued)...That 7lb heat sink in the latest Macs gives it away, the latest G4s have been overclocked and hacked to the gills by Apple, as they have no choice but to squeeze tiny improvements out of an expensive, out of date CPU that was never designed with Macs in mind.

So what now? Until the 970 arrives, will Apple have no choice but to hack and overclock some more, maybe using exotic cooling methods to force 1.33 or 1.4ghz, and a 200mhzish FSB? Or will Apple come up with another hack (like their 'DDR' implimentation), and shove 4 of these lead balloons into a Mac (never mind they only support 2-way SMP)? Combine this with Apple's 10.2 and .mac rip-offs, forced X booting, underspeccing of machines, etc. and we will lose yet more market share.

If Moto's rumoured '7470' comes along, built on an 0.13 micron process and modernised a bit (real DDR333, 266mhz FSB, 512k L2, 4mb L3, and speeds of 1.6ghz+) we might get some breathing space. If the rumoured '7500' or '8500' (there is already a 'G5'-class CPU, Motos impressive MPC8540, but it is a System-on-a-chip with no AltiVec and is an 'Integrated Communications Processor') with the enhanced e500 core, DDR400 with fast on-chip memory controller, and RapidIO 500mhz FSB then we will be given a new lease on life until IBM comes around.

Dont get me wrong, the 970 is great news, and it is the first real desktop-focused PowerPC since the original G3. The POWER4 is the most powerful CPU available anywhere, and even a 'lite' version will be great, as will be a closer relationship with IBM. I am going to hang on to my maxxed out G3/400 and maybe stick a 7455 in it when i can and wait for Macs that can truly compete and compell again....
 
If this is a Power4 Lite with Altivec as we've been speculating, the MHz myth will finally be over.

If any of you have seen or used a 1GHz Power4 in workstation guise (lowered L2 from server), you know it is prolly the fastest chip you can get at a desk.

I'm sad to hear that it is a year away, but I can tell you that Forbes has better intel (pun intended) than we do.
 
Ya know, geek.com had a few months back an article, (which I ca n not find now :rolleyes: About IBM announcing in thier R&D division a 250 or so GHZ cpu, no that anit an error :] The article went on to say 300 ghz was doable and if they wanted, it could be on the self by end of next year.

Granted, this would be probably a 100,000$ chip, but it makes me wonder if Intel. AMD and IBM already have 5 + ghz pretty much ready to go.

I know they couldn't release them (the market wouldn't like that), who would buy a new compter a year later? Why would you need too with that speed?

While I half agree with Arn re; mhz anit evertything, it is sounding a mantra to sooth all dissapointments in the lackluster cpu speed from Apple. I don't blame Apple, I think they are caught in the middle, switch to IBM or stick with Moto, or *gasp* go with Intel or AMD, (my opinion would be AMD, while I am not crazy about thier chips, I do think they would be more agressive and inovative than Intel).

Thanks for listening :]

*kicks the soapbox to the next macrumors poster...*
 
Neither will AMDs ClawHammer nor Intel's Itanium will be over 3 GHz next year... you're getting Athlon and P4 clockspeeds mixed up with their 64bit variants which wont be clocked as high! So quit sweating the MHz myth now will ya!!!
 
i hate to be another pessimist, but 1.8 ghz in a year is pathetic. there are lots of people who've been waiting for the g5 since about '98 and the best we're going to get is a 1.8ghz pushing the begining of 2004? i certainly hope that those of you with more faith, who have stated that this is very sufficient, are right, because unless this chip can process at lightspeed, the future of apple looks rather dismal if they go ahead with the power4. if moto came out of leftfield with some badass chip in 6 months, i'd be absolutely shocked, but very happy.
 
The one thing that I am hopeful for is the bus speed. IBM's G5 has been rumored to support 6.4GBs of throughput, while their G3 supports 3.2GBs. Using some math....

If 3.2GBs = 200MHz x 2 system bus (200MHz with DDR) = 400MHz

Then 6.4GBs = 200 x 2 x 2 (200Mhz with DDR and double-pumped) = 800MHz
 
It should be noted that there was an article a while back about the "Pentium 5", and how it *gasp* only clocks at 1.2-1.4 GHz, with almost identical performance to a 1.25GHz G4. It would, of course be suicide for Intel to release it, and marketing is probably why they haven't yet. 2003 and 2004 are going to be some interesting years for the computer industry.
 
Originally posted by daRAT
Ya know, geek.com had a few months back an article, (which I ca n not find now :rolleyes: About IBM announcing in thier R&D division a 250 or so GHZ cpu, no that anit an error :] The article went on to say 300 ghz was doable and if they wanted, it could be on the self by end of next year.
Click to expand...

The last stuff I read on this was from a defense journal (after being told about it by an old lecturer of mine) - it was a 50Ghz chip (a few years ago now), BUT these are small micro-controllers not chips that are intended for use as CPUs. No doubt used for very specific tasks too...

I can't remember any more details, but I'm sure some of the guys here could shed some more light on this...

Summary - 300Ghz is a no-go...

-- Dan,
 
i hate to tell you guys this but SPEC came out with there new stats on floating point and other used processing methods for chips and the power 4 at 1.3 ghz got spanked by the 32 bit 2.8 ghz p4, even the 2600 from amd beat it flat out. this was posted in another thread just days ago, that the power 4 will not be faster than a new p4 or amd. mhz is not everything, it means nothing, stats and bench marks do. and all mac benchmarks against pcs, always have to use like a horrible bad pc to make it even look close, like taking away all pc technology so that it is closer to the mac and thus more equal. a 1.8 power 4 lite, will not be able to beat whatever is out on a pc, i wonder if it would even beat what is out now, forget next year. i truly hope that 1.8 is the low end and like 2.5 or dual 2.2 is the high cause they will need it to even compete. especially since pcs today that are custom built and i stress custom built, are as stable or more stable than macs. just an opinion, not based on how awesome osx is, cause that's what i use and i love it.
 
How can they already know what the lowest speed will be.... My guess is that they don't know what speeds they will be at, and they will know early next year. But not now. And some people are forgetting that 1.8 is the lowest speed - according to the article. A ~2.2GHz will perform as fast as anyone needs it to. I am more concerned about the pricing, and not the speed. Apple's machines are waaaaay overpriced right now, if they can lower their prices then their market share will go up a bunch...
 
Originally posted by edesignuk
This is good news and all, but late 2003 and we're still stuck with just 1.8Ghz :(
Click to expand...

just calm your noodle ed...this is gonna rock.
 
Re: Another year of overclocking?

Originally posted by wumpus

So, what can Apple do for the next year? More overclocking/hacking of the embedded/telecoms focused irrelevance that is the 'Motorola MPC 7455 Host Processor'? Look at Moto's own official documents: The chip does NOT support DDR in any form, or a 167mhz FSB, or an official speed of 1.25ghz
Click to expand...

The 1.25GHz Motorola Processor is NOT overclocked. It's officially a 1.25GHZ chip.

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?threadid=12115
arn
 
Why is everyone freaking out about it only being 1.8 GHz.... That is very fast - you have to look past that number that comes right before the GHz....
 
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