Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Intel "Conroe" Now On OEM Roadmap
- Thread starter deanbo
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
'scuse my ingnorance in tech specs but with a novice's look at various related articles at the enquirer, wouldn't Intel's latest and greatest 3.8GHZ 'Conroe', with a 1GHZ front side bus, even in mid 2006, still be 'toasted' by a current dual 2.7 G5? And won't there be, at that time, dual core, Dual Processor G5s that would smoke the intel machine?
Like I said, excuse my lack of techinical nous, but I'm looking at this how a fair few do - comparing speeds across the board.
Like I said, excuse my lack of techinical nous, but I'm looking at this how a fair few do - comparing speeds across the board.
AlBDamned said:'scuse my ingnorance in tech specs but with a novice's look at various related articles at the enquirer, wouldn't Intel's latest and greatest 3.8GHZ 'Conroe', with a 1GHZ front side bus, even in mid 2006, still be 'toasted' by a current dual 2.7 G5? And won't there be, at that time, dual core, Dual Processor G5s that would smoke the intel machine?
Like I said, excuse my lack of techinical nous, but I'm looking at this how a fair few do - comparing speeds across the board.
Read the article a little closer, I missed it the first time too. The 3.8 ghz refers to an upcoming P4 variant. The Conroe is a different chip and clockspeed is not mentioned, just cache size.
And yes the current 2.7 G5 would for many things toast a single P4 at 3.8, but I suspect you're not going to see Apple put a single P4 in a top end PowerMac, if they use a P4 at all. Most of the speculation seems to point towards them using some future version of a Pentium M with all the talk about performance/watt.
ewinemiller said:
That makes more sense I guess. But with the 970MP just around the corner, Is there much that would keep up a with dual core dual processor G5? With what else has been announced by IBM and speculated on with the intel switch, I can't help feeling that it may yet prove to be a collossal mistake.
AlBDamned said:
Perhaps, but I'm sure that Apple has a lot more information about the future CPUs from both sides than we have.
Another couple of things to keep in mind is that IBM just announced those chips, but has not mentioned if they are shipping in volume. Back to the performance per watt, they didn't mention how much heat must be dealt with on those dual cores. A single core takes liquid cooling to keep the machine reasonably quiet, will dual cores require phase change (isn't the that the next level up)? We just don't know enough now to say.
Those low power 970s really aren't that attractive compared to the Pentium M either. IBM likes to quote typical power consumption instead of max power like Intel so we don't really know yet how much power they pull at full tilt. I measured my Pentium M after the annoucement to see if it was good or bad. The 1.6 970 is supposed to pull 16 watts typical, it sounds good at first glance, but my 1.6 Pentium M pulled 17-19 watts for the entire system running at full tilt (except hard drive which had spun down). When just doing itunes, mail, etc. (ie. IBM's typical) I was pulling 11.5-13 watts for the entire system. That's wireless, 14" lcd, chipset, audio, fan, etc. A 1.6 Pentium M will compare very well to a 1.6 G5 too, each will have tasks they excel at, but for the most part, performance is very similar and I can get a Pentium M at 2.13 these days.
From where I'm looking IBM's announcement seems a too little too late kind of thing.
ewinemiller said:
Agreed.
Time will tell I guess and there's no going back for Steve-O and Intel now.
ewinemiller said:
Also agreed, sort of. I guess the 3GHZ thing really soured that relationship though (covered plenty and by those more knowledgable in other threads so I'll leave it there!)
Collossal Mistake?
Hardly. The entire idea of the ideal switch is designed to keep all doors open.
All fat binaries will be compiled for both architectures.
There is nothing stopping Apple switching back to PPC in the years to come if it proves to be fruitful.
Hardly. The entire idea of the ideal switch is designed to keep all doors open.
All fat binaries will be compiled for both architectures.
There is nothing stopping Apple switching back to PPC in the years to come if it proves to be fruitful.
AlBDamned said:
Did any of us really think a paradigm shift to Intel processors would have been likely a year ago?
IBM is a huge company that has been a major R&D player for decades. You never know when an earth-shattering new technology discovery will occur, or from where.
Apple's plan to attempt to remain "platform independent" is Steve's way of maximizing his company's ability to capitalize on new and emerging CPU technologies. Be it Intel, IBM, AMD, TI, whoever. Makes perfect sense to me.
Likely? No. Possible? Yes.AlBDamned said:
It's just a little effort that goes to show how committed Apple is to their Hardware division. They are relentlessly pursuing the "best solution for [their] customers". They, like most companies, most likely have many different paths before them. They choose the most appropriate one at every stage. Apple seems to be making their path towards great Mac hardware. I appreciate the effort, even though 90% of their stuff wont' see daylight.