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Originally posted by Powerbook G5
I really don't understand how they can create 100+ watt processors and consider that normal/acceptable. I know we get all in arms when a Gx processor gets over 20-30 watts. At any rate, I'm personally quite happy with my RISC-oriented computer purchases, so if Intel is insecure about that, then I guess they are in for a harsh reality check.

Intel doesn't give a **** about your RISC purchases (unless you're buying SPARC/POWER/Alpha/MIPS, rather than the low end PowerPCs I would guess you're buying). The Itanium 2 is BIG, EXPENSIVE, and POWER HUNGRY. It is NOT a desktop chip. They've just released versions of it that can compete on power with desktop chips, but they're still $750/chip (as opposed to $4000/chip for the earlier I2s). I would guess that Itanium will hit the desktop some time in the .09 micron - .065 micron range. Basically whenever it can emulate x86 fast enough to compete on price/performance with a real x86 chip.

In response to earlier posts:

Itanium is an "EPIC" chip, which stands for "Explicitly Parallel Instruction Computing" or something like that (I don't remember the exact wording). It's basically the same as VLIW (described earlier), and is basically taking RISC and simplifying it even more (removing such things as branch prediction and out of order execution). This puts most of the work into the compiler, rather than in the chip itself. Itanium is very fast (much faster than the G5, although much more expensive), but has yet to get much market acceptance because it can't run currently used software (and because the Itanium 1 sucked pretty badly). Itanium's main competitor is the POWER4/POWER5.
 
Originally posted by Powerbook G5
I really don't understand how they can create 100+ watt processors and consider that normal/acceptable. I know we get all in arms when a Gx processor gets over 20-30 watts. At any rate, I'm personally quite happy with my RISC-oriented computer purchases, so if Intel is insecure about that, then I guess they are in for a harsh reality check.

Well, they can also make Centrinos. And think how can a 20-30 watt G4 powerbook that runs on 1ghz can now be acceptable these days for the price 2x...
 
So, if RISC is bad, then why go with an Itanium processor?

I think with the Power5, and all of this stuff we've been hearing about IBM recently, I'd say IBM has the upper hand when it comes to high end chips...

Now, if the G5 isn't all that fast, how can a university build a supercomputer that will rank in the current top 5, and pay less than they would with a Power4 or Power5 processor supercomputer? (or so that's what I'm told...)

The 970 can apparently kick some major ass in large numbers... Throw 2200 of them together, and you have a supercomputer for just a couple million...

I wonder how many Itanium processors it would take to equal the Virginia Tech Supercomputer cluster... If the cost or power consumption for an Itanium cluster is more than that of the G5 cluster, I'd be amazed...

Oh, and does anybody know how many gigaflops a dual 2ghz G5 can put out?
 
Originally posted by G4scott
So, if RISC is bad, then why go with an Itanium processor?

I think with the Power5, and all of this stuff we've been hearing about IBM recently, I'd say IBM has the upper hand when it comes to high end chips...

Now, if the G5 isn't all that fast, how can a university build a supercomputer that will rank in the current top 5, and pay less than they would with a Power4 or Power5 processor supercomputer? (or so that's what I'm told...)

The 970 can apparently kick some major ass in large numbers... Throw 2200 of them together, and you have a supercomputer for just a couple million...

I wonder how many Itanium processors it would take to equal the Virginia Tech Supercomputer cluster... If the cost or power consumption for an Itanium cluster is more than that of the G5 cluster, I'd be amazed...

Oh, and does anybody know how many gigaflops a dual 2ghz G5 can put out?

Not sure about the G5 but Itanium 2 based servers do tend score better than Power4 based servers in Linpack HPC.

NEC HPC Server TX7/i9510 (32 1.5 GHz Itanium 2s)
171.6 GFLOPS in Linpack HPC

IBM eServer pSeries 690 (32 1.7 GHz Power4++)
143.3 GFLOPS in Linpack HPC
(see IBM site for pdf)

Like the Opteron, the G5 scales extremely well and has excellent price/performance which is probably the main reason why we see these processors in some of the new supercomputers that are coming out.

Don't however, make the assumption that fast processors produce fast supercomputers. IBM's ASCI White, currently ranked #4 on the top 500 list, is powered by 375 MHz Power3 processors. Linux Networx's MCR Linux cluster, currently ranked at #3 on the top 500 list, is powered by 2304 2.4 GHz Xeons.
 
Originally posted by Rezet
Just bomb throwing. Everyone does it, including apple.
(Or I guess G5 is the fastest computer in the world at the moment) :rolleyes:

Yes, but the problem with the wintel world is most of them seem to take whatever m$ and intel says as gospel, or at least people in charge of the money. Why is a RISC system a risk (no pun intended)?
 
Originally posted by VIREBEL661
Yes, but the problem with the wintel world is most of them seem to take whatever m$ and intel says as gospel, or at least people in charge of the money.


LOL, your not suggesting that mac-lovers don't do exactly the same thing are you?
 
Originally posted by Powerbook G5
I really don't understand how they can create 100+ watt processors and consider that normal/acceptable. I know we get all in arms when a Gx processor gets over 20-30 watts. At any rate, I'm personally quite happy with my RISC-oriented computer purchases, so if Intel is insecure about that, then I guess they are in for a harsh reality check.
The kind of bizarre irony is that Macs typically never get a virus (virii? somebody help me)... The built in Unix firewall in X is rock solid, also... I agree totally with previous posts by more intelligent others, they want to be a serious player in the high end market. Why not say some BS regarding RISC? Again, I think they're trying to target people who control the money, but know little about IT... Many have said that nobody gets fired for using m$? Is this true with intel also? Anybody?
 
Originally posted by VIREBEL661
The kind of bizarre irony is that Macs typically never get a virus (virii? somebody help me)

"Virus" is the singular form. For instance: There has been one Mac virus in the past five years, in 1998, the AutoStart 9805 worm.

"Viruses" is the plural form. For instance: There have been many Windows viruses.

"Virii" is the plural form in hacker slang. For instance: "d00d i ju5t c0d3d som3 1337 virii!!!!"
 
Originally posted by chadfromdallas
LOL, your not suggesting that mac-lovers don't do exactly the same thing are you?

I, um, don't.. Apple makes great products, and they generally advance my ability to work and my computing experience, so I'm a fan. What's wrong with that? Aren't I among friends here?
Another thing I've noticed is that Mac users generally tend to be very critical of the Mac platform (me included), much more so than windoze users, which makes Apple kind of strive to wow us, and make things better, etc...
 
Originally posted by Phil Of Mac
"Virus" is the singular form. For instance: There has been one Mac virus in the past five years, in 1998, the AutoStart 9805 worm.

"Viruses" is the plural form. For instance: There have been many Windows viruses.

"Virii" is the plural form in hacker slang. For instance: "d00d i ju5t c0d3d som3 1337 virii!!!!"

Learned something! I guess I could've looked it up - I'm really lazy though :D!
 
Originally posted by VIREBEL661
The kind of bizarre irony is that Macs typically never get a virus (virii? somebody help me)... The built in Unix firewall in X is rock solid, also... I agree totally with previous posts by more intelligent others, they want to be a serious player in the high end market. Why not say some BS regarding RISC? Again, I think they're trying to target people who control the money, but know little about IT... Many have said that nobody gets fired for using m$? Is this true with intel also? Anybody?

Ummm... I don't think the firewall has anything to do with it. 99.99% of viruses are made for PCs since 90% of the world uses PCs... if you want your virus to spread as far as possible, that's the easiest way. Viruses that are mac-only hardly achieve the goal of mass destruction.
 
Originally posted by VIREBEL661
I, um, don't.. Apple makes great products, and they generally advance my ability to work and my computing experience, so I'm a fan. What's wrong with that? Aren't I among friends here?
Another thing I've noticed is that Mac users generally tend to be very critical of the Mac platform (me included), much more so than windoze users, which makes Apple kind of strive to wow us, and make things better, etc...

Listen to this guy; he's got a really good point.

Intel and MS literally just say whatever the hell they want to, and everyone snaps it up. Apple really truly doesn't. Many people are blinded by Steve's RDF, obviously, but people who use Macs question EVERYTHING--pick apart everything that gets done. Remember the .Mac charge outrage? Remember Safari (built on feedback)? Remember OS X, the first consumer OS to ACTUALLY grow based on feedback submitted by users?

There is a profound difference between agreeing with everything a company says, and enjoying everything a company makes.

When Intel spouts crap like this, it makes you realize that we're pretty lucky. Our favored company basically exists to help us. Intel and Microsoft exist for profit.

Apple relies on their users. Intel and MS take money from them. That's just a sum-up, but it's largely true. Of course Apple has to turn a profit, but it's just not the same...
 
Originally posted by Bluefusion
Listen to this guy; he's got a really good point.

Intel and MS literally just say whatever the hell they want to, and everyone snaps it up. Apple really truly doesn't. Many people are blinded by Steve's RDF, obviously, but people who use Macs question EVERYTHING--pick apart everything that gets done. Remember the .Mac charge outrage? Remember Safari (built on feedback)? Remember OS X, the first consumer OS to ACTUALLY grow based on feedback submitted by users?

There is a profound difference between agreeing with everything a company says, and enjoying everything a company makes.

When Intel spouts crap like this, it makes you realize that we're pretty lucky. Our favored company basically exists to help us. Intel and Microsoft exist for profit.

Apple relies on their users. Intel and MS take money from them. That's just a sum-up, but it's largely true. Of course Apple has to turn a profit, but it's just not the same...

Well tey can back up their products with real tests.
Sorry, but trust is earned not bought.
Just about everyone knows that Stevie's Keynotes are a boat load of misleading info.
And mac fans do the same thing. Stevie said g5 is the fastest and backed it up with some bogus tests and right away it got into zealots' heads g5 is 8th wonder of the world. After 23rd of june, nooone has done any real testing but i've seen numerous posts at amd zone saying how macs are whooping their ass now... cmon. All companies think of you as a number. give them money they give you crap worth 40 times less, and try not to ask many questions... Apple Intel AMD... no difference
 
Originally posted by Rezet
Well tey can back up their products with real tests.

They can? Of course! RISC servers put your data at risk? Intel processors are the only way to access the internet? Centrino is the first laptop with wi-fi built in? (Dell says the same thing, lol) All of this is "true" according to Intel. Can you test any of it? Do they have tests to back up a word of it? If you believe anything they say at face value--really, anything at all--you're not an informed purchaser. Intel may make fine products, but everything THEY say about them is just pure BS. Third party sites/companies are the only way to verify that sort of thing.

Just about everyone knows that Stevie's Keynotes are a boat load of misleading info.
They do? Apple said the G5 was the fastest. Some MORON at Haxial decided to challenge people who build computers for a living... and got his ass handed to him. Apple sticks by their remarks, and at the time they were made, they were true. (I can't say whether it measures up to the new 3.2 GHz Intel chips, but I would imagine they hold up pretty damn well.

Apple's demos/bakeoffs are certainly suspect, as anyone's are, but they've never been terribly misleading... far less than this crap Intel spews. The Mac can do certain things quickly, and has always been able to. Apple exploits those things it excels at, but so does everyone else. This is not "misleading", this is called "marketing".

And mac fans do the same thing. Stevie said g5 is the fastest and backed it up with some bogus tests and right away it got into zealots' heads g5 is 8th wonder of the world. After 23rd of june, nooone has done any real testing but i've seen numerous posts at amd zone saying how macs are whooping their ass now...

I'm not sure what you're saying here... that no one's done testing, and that the macs are faster? Or that you don't think the Mac is faster?

The moron at Haxial (who apparently has some serious personal issues with Apple, for some reason) has devoted his life to attempting to dismantle everything Apple does. One look at the GUI for his software should be enough to convince anyone that his advice on how Apple should improve the OS X GUI is rather ridiculous... but I digress. He tried to cobble together reasons why Apple was lying about the G5, and not a week later Apple representatives explained, step by step, every single tweak that was made, why it was made, and that most of the time they were giving the Intel a better shot than it would normally have. The guy never said a word about the issue since.

Does this say anything to you?

Like I said, every company exists for profit, and Apple's profit margins are rather excessive. But it's obvious to most Mac users that they do care about their customers, or they wouldn't go out of their way to make things pleasant. Free overnight shipping on iPod service. Listening to feedback. Designing an OS that works the way people want it to, not necessarily the way they think it should (Apple's corrected its own interface blunders based on user input--has Microsoft *ever* done this?). Have you ever been to a good Apple Store? And you honestly don't think Apple cares about their customers... heh. Salespeople recommend cheaper products, encourage people to wait before buying a model that's going to be discontinued, supply information based on the needs of the customer, and offer help on getting the computer set up... all free, all going far beyond the typical computer sale.

Apple's in it for money, but they also know that without their fanbase they are nothing, and they want new fans. They DO work hard to keep us all relatively happy (some of us more than others). The point I'm getting at is that Intel/MS have guaranteed market share, and so they don't care about their users. It's all natural, an influx of money no matter what happens. Apple, in a minority position, is also in a caring position. If the positions were reversed, I've no doubt that Apple would act just like Microsoft--it's the way big companies are. Fortunately they've only barely begun to act like that, and for the most part they really do still try to make life easy for people. A computer is supposed to help you, not to become an endless drain on finances and time... and Apple makes Macs that last a long, long time. Why do you think they would do that, if they could just make them cheap and crappy so that people would give them more money, more often?
 
Originally posted by VIREBEL661
Yes, but the problem with the wintel world is most of them seem to take whatever m$ and intel says as gospel, or at least people in charge of the money. Why is a RISC system a risk (no pun intended)?

Thats funny, I don't seem to recall any wintel folks, even Intel fanboys quote comparisons and benchmarks produced by Intel. They seem to prefer to get their numbers from third party review sites (Toms Hardware, Extremetech, Barefeats).

Quoting corporate produced benchmarks (other than our lovely SPEC/LINPACK/LAPACK) and slogans ("velocity engine, worlds first desktop supercomputer") seems to be something unique to the Apple community (even though we see less of it today).
 
Yeah, the G4 is a supercomputer on a chip...along with it's blazingly fast 167 MHz bus :) As far as the business ethics of companies go, I agree about Apple. You know they are out for your money, but they try to make sure that the money you give them is for something you both want and need. Whenever I go to the Apple Store, they are extremely helpful. I'd look at a software title for $300 and the lady there would point me to a program just like it for $100 or she'd tell me to wait until next week when they put a promotion on that title to save even more money. They also talked my my friend out of getting a PowerBook and buying an iBook that was hundreds less simply because they didn't want him spending an extra $500 on extra computer power he wouldn't need for school. If you were going to the Dell kiosk at the mall, they'd do whatever they could to convince you why you need a gig of RAM and a 256 meg video card just to use Microsoft Word.
 
Originally posted by Powerbook G5
Yeah, the G4 is a supercomputer on a chip...along with it's blazingly fast 167 MHz bus :) As far as the business ethics of companies go, I agree about Apple. You know they are out for your money, but they try to make sure that the money you give them is for something you both want and need. Whenever I go to the Apple Store, they are extremely helpful. I'd look at a software title for $300 and the lady there would point me to a program just like it for $100 or she'd tell me to wait until next week when they put a promotion on that title to save even more money. They also talked my my friend out of getting a PowerBook and buying an iBook that was hundreds less simply because they didn't want him spending an extra $500 on extra computer power he wouldn't need for school. If you were going to the Dell kiosk at the mall, they'd do whatever they could to convince you why you need a gig of RAM and a 256 meg video card just to use Microsoft Word.


Can't say anything to that. 100% agree.
Official apple stores are pleasure to go to. I've actually been to Gateway official store not too long ago, and yes, those guys will bs you into buying anything.
 
Not to be cynical :) but are you sure the iBook wasn't PM'd by the company. Having worked from the business position of a large retailer with both an extremely large wholesale group and a smaller direct retail business (much like Apple's setup), items get PM'd all the time to do a few things: (1) boost employee moral and to reward employee sales
(2) move an item that the company has a large stock of

It's quite effective in retail businesses.

(PM = promotional markdown originally, but now it just refers to items that are put on a list with attached incentives. For instance, for every iBook 14" you sell, we'll give the sales associate an additional 5% of the sale besides their regular commision/hourly-wage. Looking at Apple's retail stores, it seems they are running on group commision (meaning the rewards are treated to all the employees verses individual employees competing over a sale (which looks bad to customers and forces sales associates to have "clients"; this model these days is used almost exclusively in boutique stores and phone-resellers because of the bad public image it presents) In group commissions, the "competition" is other Apple retail stores nationwide thereby masking any animosity/competition from the consumer.)
 
Originally posted by Rezet
Well, yeah, that all depends on what you want to put an emphasis on. Apple's legal team worked long enough on the slogan so that it would mislead people, but at the same time if legal troubles arrive, they wouldn't get suied for false marketing.

I doubt the legal team worked on it for any amount of time whatsoever. There's no legal hot potato in making the sort of claims Apple has. "False marketing" is not something you can be sued over.

False advertising -- a deliberate bait and switch -- is.

If Apple were advertising 2.0GHz G5s as 3.0GHz models, they'd be up for a lawsuit. Ford had to buy back Cobras from buyers when the HP output turned out to be lower than advertised. They'd have no problems if they said "most power in its class," though, even if it wasn't necessarily true.

Now, false marketing can destroy your reputation, which is what they worry about more than being sued.

Here's an example: Honda ran ads for the Insight hybrid saying it was the "most fuel efficient car on the planet" while the EPA ratings of 61/70 flashed on the screen. Ironically, the commercial showed the Insight next to a 60's VW Minibus, and VW makes a car, the "3L Lupo," that uses just 3l/100km.

That's over 79 mpg US. Where's the lawsuit?
 
Originally posted by pseudobrit
I doubt the legal team worked on it for any amount of time whatsoever. There's no legal hot potato in making the sort of claims Apple has. "False marketing" is not something you can be sued over.

False advertising -- a deliberate bait and switch -- is.

If Apple were advertising 2.0GHz G5s as 3.0GHz models, they'd be up for a lawsuit. Ford had to buy back Cobras from buyers when the HP output turned out to be lower than advertised. They'd have no problems if they said "most power in its class," though, even if it wasn't necessarily true.

Now, false marketing can destroy your reputation, which is what they worry about more than being sued.

Here's an example: Honda ran ads for the Insight hybrid saying it was the "most fuel efficient car on the planet" while the EPA ratings of 61/70 flashed on the screen. Ironically, the commercial showed the Insight next to a 60's VW Minibus, and VW makes a car, the "3L Lupo," that uses just 3l/100km.

That's over 79 mpg US. Where's the lawsuit?

I've noticed that many people here in the US think "USA" when they hear something along the lines of "the planet" or "the world" and since we don't have the Lupo on the American market, when Honda says the Insight in the most fuel efficient car on the planet, we just think that's what it is since our scope of the planet stretches from Seattle to Miami in most minds.
 
Originally posted by Rezet
OK.. maybe. not sure about this. But what does it has to do with my previous statement? Sun was in this large business computing solutions all their life. Intel is mostly a consumer oriented company. Like i said i dont think they are bidding too high on risc technology.

Intel has put everything on the Itanic. If it fails to take off and businesses need 64-bit addressing, then what does Intel have? AMD has a 64-bit X86 chip and Intel has nothing. Intel wants to be the dominant player in the enterprise, they have said this many times. Intel knows all about RISC, they sell RISC chips.

Intel is more then just a consumer-oriented company. They sell very little that the end-user buys directly. They sell a lot of Flash products, processors for PDA’s, SCSI controllers, chipsets, etc.
 
Originally posted by legion
Looking at Apple's retail stores, it seems they are running on group commision (meaning the rewards are treated to all the employees verses individual employees competing over a sale

My friend works at the Apple store, and they get paid a flat hourly wage, it doesn't matter how many computers they sell, they get paid the same amount no matter what. What Apple really wants is for them to attach AppleCare and .Mac to every computer purchase. Although they still get no perks for attaching them.
 
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