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IBM PowerPC Announcement

Why has this post gone on for so long

Through out this post people have been refering back to benchmarks of the chip and inane analogies when refereing to MHz comparisons.

It really doesn't matter which "chip" is faster. It's the entire experience that matters. You don't buy a mac and run windows or by a Dell and run Mac OSX. The system is a package deal.

If I could accomplish everything I need to on a PC without pulling my hair out I would still use PC's but the fact is that PC's with higher clock speeds waste a lot of that processing power on an operating system that needs to be completely overhauled.

I guess i'm trying to say that our chips may not be the fastest on the market, and depending on your measurement we may not even be in the same ball park. But, in the end that really doesn't matter yet for the customers that apple is courting at this point in time
 
Apple does need a faster processor, Video apps, 3D apps, they all need raw speed. Apple's looking for a new processor at IBM, because they need a faster one, and IBM has a solution.

Still, they have quite a large gap to fill.

I know Mhz comparison don't mean sh*t, but 1.8 vs 5, you can't just wave that away by saying Mhz don't mean sh*t.
 
Re: g4 1.25ghz and 167MHz fsb overclock argument

Originally posted by DharvaBinky
http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC7455&nodeId=01M98653

Does this page, directly from motorola, not say that the G4 7455 is a 133MHz FSB 1GHz chip? Everytime anyone says that the 1.25s from Apple are overclocked, they get their SH*T jumped by people insisting that it isn't...

<shrug> Just adding fuel to the fire... ;)

Binky
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You have proved exactly what you were trying to disprove. The 1.25's operate on a 166 mhz bus, which is 33mhz above the spec. 166x7.5 ~ 1.25 GHz. Even if it isn't a total clock speed overclock, it is a FSB overclock.
 
Re: Re: g4 1.25ghz and 167MHz fsb overclock argument

Originally posted by locovaca
You have proved exactly what you were trying to disprove. The 1.25's operate on a 166 mhz bus, which is 33mhz above the spec. 166x7.5 ~ 1.25 GHz. Even if it isn't a total clock speed overclock, it is a FSB overclock.
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Acutually, I think they were trying to say that the 1.25's are overclocked.

My question is, who the heck cares? If it's waranted by Apple. Then what's the difference?
 
I don't think Intel will be at 4-5 GHz a year from now. I am thinking 3.8-4.3 GHz. We are getting a really fast processor a year from now, so who cares about Intel. Yeah, their chip might be faster, but nobody should care because macs have everything else going for them, and Intel processors will probably be only a tiny bit faster if faster at all.
 
Originally posted by Todd H
Looks like it's time to finally start saving for a Mac. 64-bit OSX. Mmmmmmmm sweet!

I've been using a Windows PC for a while now. Can't say I've been too impressed, especially with Microsoft. I've been wanting to get a Mac, but the slowness of the processor has made me think twice. No longer. Hopefully this time next year I'll be the proud owner of a new Mac.
Click to expand...


have you tried the new duals? a dual with
1gig of ram would be awesome in my mind.
that would be great for photoshop especially
with a RAID for the photoshop scratch disk.
 
Originally posted by Akira

I know Mhz comparison don't mean sh*t, but 1.8 vs 5, you can't just wave that away by saying Mhz don't mean sh*t.
Click to expand...

just read your own statement...you said it
yourself..."I know Mhz comparison don't mean sh*t,"

mhz is an inefficiant way of getting something
done fast. it's now time to look at the processor
in other ways....we know how to push a
processor to go really fast with pure clock
cycles...now it's time to see how a processor
can be more efficient by doing more with
slower clock cycles.

i see high mhz processors as something thats
working extrememly hard to process data.
i would rather see a processor work easier
and processing the same amount of data
or more.
 
Originally posted by ddtlm
kenohki:


Since when will Intel be marketing a Itanium II system starting at like $7000 to $10000 to "Joe Consumer"?
Click to expand...

Intel has said Itanium is their next generation platform for the next decade or some catchy buzzphrase like that. Eventually (though not in the next year or two, but eventually) Intel is going to get consumers onto IA-64. They've implicitly stated x86 is done by their actions. It's a drain to have to maintain two desktop/server architectures as far as R&D goes. Besides, they just charge that much because they CAN. Put the economies of scale of the x86 line to the Itanium and they'll come down in price. It's just a matter of time to allow adoption. (HP sure is betting on it.)
 
Originally posted by ddtlm
Oh, and for those people thinking Apple is pioneering this whole 64-bit thing, or even those that think it will be the first 64-bit desktop, you should look at this Sun computer:

http://www.sun.com/desktop/sunblade150/

Similar models have been available for a year or two, starting at about $1000. And lets not forget what porovaara said about 64-bit Linux on Hammers and Itaniums... quite true.
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Oh please. That's not a desktop. How many housewives are sitting at home running Solaris with their HotJava browser and zilch consumer software support? They could probably hardly handle the installation of Solaris much less figure out CDE. That's a low end workstation for developers who don't need lots of horsepower but need to work in the Solaris environment.

Barring some of the stuff used in game consoles, the PowerPC 970 and Athlon branded Hammers are going to be the first 64-bit home/desktop targeted chips.
 
Originally posted by ddtlm
MacBandit, others:

Where in the heck is this low-clocked Intel chip rumor coming from? I know that there is going to be a new chip for latops that clocks lower, but it is not the Pentium 5.

Someone needs to provide linkage to back up this whole low-clock Pentium 5 thing.
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It has nothing to do with the Pentium line of chips. It's the Intel Itanium that has been held back. It has barely been able to achieve of 1Ghz. It may be approaching 2Ghz now though. I haven't read about it in about 6months.
 
Originally posted by alex_ant

We do now
Click to expand...


Does anyone actually know what quantity they are buying these chips in. Are they going to buy them for production or just testing. Also these chips will not even be produced until late next year. So the question is still there will Apple use them. Just because they are buying them doesn't mean they plan on going in to full production with them. They could just be being used for testing of possibilities of what they can do if there current plan fails completely. Remember Apple has dozens of different test mules running all the time and sometimes the final product doesn't even come from them.

Still massive assumptions going on building false hype and hope.
 
But Intel has had some 'difficulties' as of late, so I think that will make apple have a better chance of having a faster processor.
 
Re: g4 1.25ghz and 167MHz fsb overclock argument

Originally posted by DharvaBinky
http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC7455&nodeId=01M98653

Does this page, directly from motorola, not say that the G4 7455 is a 133MHz FSB 1GHz chip? Everytime anyone says that the 1.25s from Apple are overclocked, they get their SH*T jumped by people insisting that it isn't...

<shrug> Just adding fuel to the fire... ;)

Binky
Click to expand...


So here's the the problem.

A) How old is this page and does it correctly represent the current production?

B) The reason people get there **** jumped on is if you refer to overclocking in reference to a manufacturor you sound like an idiot.

Overclocking is a term used to describe end user actions on a processor and can not and should not be used in describing a manufacturor. If a manufacturor is capable of getting 3Ghz out of a 500Mhz chip using refrigeration then the chip tests good at 3Ghz and thusly is a 3Ghz chip. The speed that a processor is rated at has nothing to do with manufacturoring its simply the speed the chip test good at with the motherboards cooling properties.
 
SPEC numbers ...

Originally posted by arn


If you must focus on numbers, see this link ddtlm posted. And look at the Spec scores of a 1.3ghz Power4 compared to a 2.8ghz Pentium.

arn
Click to expand...

A few notes about the SPEC numbers:

1) While the SPECint numbers are quite a bit higher for Dell's Intel P4 implementation than any of the 64-bit brethren, note that the FP numbers for all Intel (and, inexplicably, AMD ... some say this has to do with the Intel-provided compiler used to compile the SPEC benchmark for the AMD chip ...) are significantly lower than any of the 64bit chips enjoy.

2) Note that only a single core is tested by SPEC tests. The dual cores of the POWER4 are not used. Likewise the pseudo-dual-cored P4 3.0GHz will not be measured with SPEC for future reference. Benchmarks tend to be single-threaded scripted entities, as multi-threaded benchmarks are inherently more complex to create and analyze. Applications and users, however, tend to be multi-threading banshees.

3) While previous versions of SPEC could easily be manipulated by adding L2/L3 cache (Spec92 coulde fit entirely in 4MB cache ...), SPEC2000 is supposedly less manipulatable. However, one should always assume that if the benchmark has a weakness then at least some manufacturers have found it and are exploiting that weakness. For this reason, one must look to "odd" jumps in performance (say, a 10% jump in CPU speed engendering a >10% jump in marks. Also, one must recognize that while SPEC* are aimed at the CPU alone, they are affected by the rest of the system (which is why Dell can get much better numbers than HP or even Intel can from their configurations), a fact which is highlighted by the fact that a large gain in CPU speed base rate with no fundamental rearchitecting engenders a fairly small SPECint rating increase (say, from the Dell 2.4GHz to the Dell 2.8GHz).

4) While summaries are good, I'd prefer to look at the "raw" spec numbers. You can see the per-test numbers for the various platforms below by clicking on the "Disclosures" links to their right:

SPECint:

http://www.specbench.org/osg/cpu2000/results/cint2000.html

SPECfp:

http://www.specbench.org/osg/cpu2000/results/cfp2000.html

Finally, let me just say that a 1.8GHz 64-bit processor in late 2003 is right in the middle/low end of the "GHz rating" game, both on the server and on the desktop. On the other hand, I'm not sure that's particularly good for the "educate consumers on the meaningless of MHz across platforms" goal ... We will, however, have Mac performance (meaning, user-visible performance) much more in line with P4 speed at that time, especially with the vaguaries of ~AltiVec vs SSE instruction optimizations thrown in the mix.
 
Originally posted by Choppaface
isn't the jump to a 64 bit platform going to be equal to, if not greater, than the jump from OS9 to OSX?
Click to expand...

It shouldn't have to be. The Power4-lite (970) from IBM will run existing 32-bit code, and I believe it will do so "seamlessly" alongside 64-bit code although I haven't seen that specifically stated yet. This means that OS X and the various applications you have now will run just fine on a 64-bit 970. Upgrading to the "64-bit" version of each component might give you a slight increase in raw speed (a major bump in some cases).

We haven't seen any comparison between Instructions Per Cycle numbers for 32-bit mode of the 970 vs, say, the G3, so I can't say how well 32-bit code will run on a new 1.8GHz 970 versus a 1.8GHz G3/G4 processor. However, note that the real bottleneck of Apples these days tends to be the CPU-to-System Controller bus, and the 970 pops that particular bus way up from what any G4 now supports (IBM G3s support more, but not G4s).

I see people in general maybe upgrading OS X and their "multimedia" apps very soon after getting a 970. I suspect that most other apps will just get upgraded in the "normal" cycle of upgrades.

One can point to the Win95 16-32 bit upgrade debacle and say that this might be as horribly executed. However, I should hope that Apple is smarter than MS was (and all history indicates that Apple does such rollovers far more smoothly than MS). I would be surprised if running a 32-bit app in 64-bit OSX involved expensive mode switching with every shared library or Quartz call, as was the case with Windows.
 
I've always thought that Apple could get the upper hand by being one of the first to go all out 64bit. And since Apple really doesn't have anything to lose on the "mega-hertz myth" it works to their advantage. It'll just look like Macs are getting fast while AMD and Intel PCs are getting slower, and that of course doesn't bode well for them. That along with Microsoft's whole Paladium thing, Apple could be surely on their way up. But sheer speed isn't going to save them, dedicated developer support will, rather than Mac being that other computer we may or may not [insert app or game here] develop for it has to be the main priority. Once that happens Apple will be made.
 
Originally posted by astrocity20
Once that happens Apple will be made.
Click to expand...


This is the statement that worries me the most. So IBM will start to PRODUCE these late next year. Assuming that no problems occur with the developement of the chip, that the yields are good, and that the other hardware is in place, we can expect to see these in January 2004 hypothetically. What is Apple going to do in the interim? Sure, they'll release slightly faster G4's (I'd guess they'll get up to 1.4 or 1.5), but will people buy them? The danger of this announcement is that now the IBM chips are the next best thing, so why buy a 32 bit processor now when in less than a year you can get a 64 bit one that will be tons faster? Is there a compelling reason to buy a G4 now? Yes, it will most of the software coming in the next 3-4 years, but why pay $3500 for a top of the line 32 bit Powermac when in 1 year you can get a top of the line 64 bit Powermac for probably about the same? Granted, this is the same problem that has always existed for those purchasing a new computer, but with this flury of press releases and the promises of 64 bit, this is much bigger than just a clock speed bump.

While I believe that the new chip will be nothing short of amazing, I want to remind you that, when the Pentium 4 was in developement, it was an amazing chip. It was insanely fast, had tons of cache, and ripped apart any processor that existed (which would've been Athlons and P3s) at the time. However, it was way too big, way too power hungry, put off way too much heat, and in order to make it a consumer item, they had to effectively cripple the things that made it good in order to make it a viable consumer processor. That meants stripping out FPUs, lots of the cache, and other components that left it to be the CPU we know and chastise today. I'm not saying IBM will do this, but we should be wary about setting to high of performance expectations out of this chip. The Power4 we know is not a consumer chip- it's a server chip. To make it viable for the consumer market lots of things will have to go, and we don't know what exactly they will cut. Our best bet would be to not make claims of how much faster it will be, but rather be happy with the fact that it will be faster.
 
Re: Re: MHz Obession is unhealthy....

Originally posted by ktlx


If you are primarily working with image manipulation on 32-bit pixels, a 64-bit processor does not bring anything to the table other than the ability to manipulate images larger than 4GB more efficiently. A 64-bit processor does not perform two 32-bit arithmetic operations per clock cycle.
Click to expand...

Correct. 64-bit is not twice as fast as 32-bit unless you are specifically using it as such. 2+2=4 is calculated just as fast on a 32-bit processor as it is on a 64-bit processor. In fact, it is processed just as fast on an 8-bit processor.

A 64-bit processor #1 gives you the ability to easily perform straight math on 64-bit wide integers (which allows greater unit precision but less range than operating in 64-bit floating point). While 64-bit math in a 32-bit processor generally takes 4+ operations, the same procedure would take one operation on a 64-bit CPU. But then, how often do we deal with 64-bit integers?

However, if you are dealing with masking operations, a 64-bit processor will be twice as fast as a 32-bit processor (4x as fast as a 16-bit processor, etc) because a single instruction will mask off 64 bits (8 sets of 8-bit data, 4 sets of 16-bit, or 2 sets of 32-bit) instead of just 32.

Of course, you also have 64-bit memory access thrown in in case 32-bit access just doesn't give you enough GB of memory at your direct-access disposal. The directly-accessible range of memory for the processor jumps from 4.3 GB to 18 Billion GB (18 Giga-Giga-Bytes?). Which, one would hope, should carry desktop computing through the next decade fairly easily. This doesn't mean that the rest of the system will support 18GGB, just as you still see P4 and Athlon systems out there with 1GB max memory. However, it opens the door for the other system components to step through.


A 64-bit processor does bring a lot to the table for anything that consumes large amounts of memory or lots and lots of long integer or floating point calculations. For chunking on a 300MB TIFF 8-bit color image or running iMovie, you probably are not going to see any improvements beyond those provided by the large cache and newer design.
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Well, not sure what you mean by "chunking on a 300MB TIFF", but if there is non-arithmetic data manipulation involved, 64-bit operations would likely be helpful. Running iMovie: no, probably won't help much there, but only because iMovie should already be usint AltiVec for its DCT and vectoring masks on a 64-bit register won't be any faster than what AltiVec already provides.

I imagine the 3D rendering guys and movie producers have to be eagerly anticipating Apples based upon this chip. For most of us using PowerMac G4s today, the Pentium 4 will still offer more useable horsepower.
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Well, 64-bit processing power allows most typical server uses to run faster. That is, by-the-buttload data manipulations. No, Mozilla won't load a page faster and Word won't make you type faster because there is a 64-bit processor underneath. However, for many of the tasks where one would want a "faster" computer in general, 64-bit computing will help matters.
 
Originally posted by locovaca
The Power4 we know is not a consumer chip- it's a server chip. To make it viable for the consumer market lots of things will have to go, and we don't know what exactly they will cut. Our best bet would be to not make claims of how much faster it will be, but rather be happy with the fact that it will be faster.
Click to expand...

This is the biggest problem as I see it. People are getting way too hyped on this. There is no guarantee Apple will ever sell a product with this chip. There is also no way of knowing the performance of it.

On another note I do believe we will be pleasantly surprised by a new chip from Motorola in a tower by July of next year.
 
Originally posted by ddtlm
kenohki:


Since when will Intel be marketing a Itanium II system starting at like $7000 to $10000 to "Joe Consumer"? And why does everyone here think that the P5 will be clocked lower, when all indications are that the "P5" will simply be a modified P4 on 90nm process tech? I swear, everything about P4's and Intel is distorted to suit people's wildest fantasies and their deep insecurities about current Mac hardware.
Click to expand...

P5 aka "Prescott" is not a P4 with a smaller die. It is a rearchitected core, possibly with additional instructions (and some suspect that it will take on Yamhill 64-bit extensions to IA-32). It does, however, look to be designed around a 0.09nm process. You should educate yourself before blathering on. I can see how you would make this mistake, however, as many rumor sites called the P4's 0.13nm core "Prescott". This appears to either have been an error, or Intel has gone to naming all their projects with the same code name. I suspect the former.

Also, note that when Prescott comes out, "Deerfield", Intel's "Desktop 64-bit" processor hopeful, should be debuting at around 1.0 GHz. UltraSPARQ V should be at around 1.8-2.1GHz as well. Which is why I say that IBM 970 should be right in the middle of the 64-bit GHz ratings.
 
Re: g4 1.25ghz and 167MHz fsb overclock argument

Originally posted by DharvaBinky
http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC7455&nodeId=01M98653

Does this page, directly from motorola, not say that the G4 7455 is a 133MHz FSB 1GHz chip? Everytime anyone says that the 1.25s from Apple are overclocked, they get their SH*T jumped by people insisting that it isn't...

<shrug> Just adding fuel to the fire... ;)

Binky
Click to expand...

Searchecd for "overclock" on that page. Nothing. It notes that the FSB is 133MHz, but that does not equal "overclocked".

People get jumped all over for saying a processor that the CPU manufacturer has RATED at a specific frequency is overclocked because frankly it is logically impossible. Overclocking means exceeding the manufacturer's rated frequency (by whatever means you choose to employ ... modifying the FSB, changing clock multipliers, spilling liquid caffeine on the motherboard ...). A manufacturer, by definition, can not RATE a processor as "above the manufacturer's rating".

I mean, that's just as logically inconstent as claiming that I might ever be wrong!
 
Originally posted by kenohki


Intel has said Itanium is their next generation platform for the next decade or some catchy buzzphrase like that. Eventually (though not in the next year or two, but eventually) Intel is going to get consumers onto IA-64. They've implicitly stated x86 is done by their actions. It's a drain to have to maintain two desktop/server architectures as far as R&D goes. Besides, they just charge that much because they CAN. Put the economies of scale of the x86 line to the Itanium and they'll come down in price. It's just a matter of time to allow adoption. (HP sure is betting on it.)
Click to expand...

"Deerfield" (Q3 2003) is Intel's projected 64-bit desktop PC. Some suspect that the P5 may have 64-bit extensions akin to AMD's Hammer, but that is unconfirmed (and, if unleashed, would radically alter Intels forward-looking CPU map).

So, using many of the same techniques IBM is applying to POWER4, Intel will have an "Itanium 3 lite" out at about the same time. However, it will be running at ~1GHz, which isn't much faster than the current Itanium line (although I3 might be more efficient than I2 so you never know).

IBM 970 is not a "home run" "game winner" for Apple, but it sure puts us back in the performance game.
 
What if its a completely new pro product?

I know that many of us have been championing for a more powerful line of powermacs, but what if this chip is destined for a completely new power product other than the powermacs or X-serve? (Assuming that sources are correct that Apple will use the new PowerPC 970 chips in the first place.)

Think about it. Apple has bought some powerful and well-respected software/companies in the last year or so, not limited to Shake, Nothing Real and Emagic.

What if they are going to create some kick ass pro solution that has nothing to do with the powermacs?

A sort of Borg of pro macs...

If that's the case, I doubt that the price tag would be within comfortable reach of the typical prosumer who buys powermacs.

I'm waiting to buy a powermac, but we could be thinking in the wrong direction.
 
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