Well, while everybody is celebrating the PowerMac upgrade (or really just that LCDs are getting cheaper, gee whizz), here's why it means that I will automatically be disappointed when they release the update for the iMac (finally!):
Let me pretend for a minute that Apple wasn't out of their minds and made the lowest available PM a dual 1 GHz. Then my logic would be the following: Apple has now available G4s at 1GHz, 1.25 GHz, and 1.42 GHz. Since it needs a dual 1.42 GHz to come anywhere near the top PC performance, nobody really wants to hear of clock speeds slower than 1 GHz for desktops anymore. So the update to the iMac has to be:
Very slow: 1 GHz, a bit faster: 1.25 GHz, decent: 1.42 GHz.
What else, really?
And it would make perfect sense: to every iMac model there is a corresponding PM which has double the processor and of course can be expanded in future, unlike the iMac. Yes, the 1.42 GHz would come close to the dual 1 GHz PM, but that is just what it should be like. The top "consumer" machine should be close to the bottom "professional" machine. At any rate, this would mean giving the consumer the benefit of the technology that is actually available to Apple (no matter how outdated it may be). Offering anything else simply means crippling the hardware on purpose.
But then, Apple decided to release the most nonsensical piece of hardware I can think of, a single processor 1 GHz PM?!?
You've got to be kidding me. But it makes one thing breathtakingly clear: Apple is not going beyond 1 GHz with their single processor iMacs in their next update. Otherwise who would buy that PM? (Not that I think many people will anyway...) So the top of the line iMac update will be outdated hardware, even in comparison to what Apple can deliver right now.
Apple's message to potential switchers is apparently: if you want our nice software and great design, you will have to buy crappy hardware (or shell out mega-bucks for a dual 1.42 GHz PM to get decent, not great, hardware). We are not even trying to pretend that we are bringing you the best hardware we can.
Yikes,
Ingo
Let me pretend for a minute that Apple wasn't out of their minds and made the lowest available PM a dual 1 GHz. Then my logic would be the following: Apple has now available G4s at 1GHz, 1.25 GHz, and 1.42 GHz. Since it needs a dual 1.42 GHz to come anywhere near the top PC performance, nobody really wants to hear of clock speeds slower than 1 GHz for desktops anymore. So the update to the iMac has to be:
Very slow: 1 GHz, a bit faster: 1.25 GHz, decent: 1.42 GHz.
What else, really?
And it would make perfect sense: to every iMac model there is a corresponding PM which has double the processor and of course can be expanded in future, unlike the iMac. Yes, the 1.42 GHz would come close to the dual 1 GHz PM, but that is just what it should be like. The top "consumer" machine should be close to the bottom "professional" machine. At any rate, this would mean giving the consumer the benefit of the technology that is actually available to Apple (no matter how outdated it may be). Offering anything else simply means crippling the hardware on purpose.
But then, Apple decided to release the most nonsensical piece of hardware I can think of, a single processor 1 GHz PM?!?
You've got to be kidding me. But it makes one thing breathtakingly clear: Apple is not going beyond 1 GHz with their single processor iMacs in their next update. Otherwise who would buy that PM? (Not that I think many people will anyway...) So the top of the line iMac update will be outdated hardware, even in comparison to what Apple can deliver right now.Apple's message to potential switchers is apparently: if you want our nice software and great design, you will have to buy crappy hardware (or shell out mega-bucks for a dual 1.42 GHz PM to get decent, not great, hardware). We are not even trying to pretend that we are bringing you the best hardware we can.
Yikes,
Ingo
