Everyone keeps talking about Merom and Yonah, will these still be considered Pentium M's?
And I feel stupid for having to ask this, but what is x86?
And I feel stupid for having to ask this, but what is x86?
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Intel Mac mini at MacWorld San Francisco in January?
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not quite *all* points
I would not be surprised to see Yonah dual-cores and Dothan single cores released together in the first wave of MacIntels.
All points except Apple's own instructions to developers - which say that there will be Dothan systems.... (yet another link to a post I wrote almost 2 months ago)gregoryp said:
I would not be surprised to see Yonah dual-cores and Dothan single cores released together in the first wave of MacIntels.
"Merom" and "Yonah" are Intel codewords for two architecturally distinct descendants of "Banias" and "Dothan".EricNau said:
"Banias" was the original Pentium M (the CPU component of the Centrino group of chips). "Dothan" is the current Pentium M, done on 90nm instead of 130nm and with double the cache and some other improvements.
Yonah/Merom will definitely be in the family of Pentium M systems, so you wouldn't be wrong to loosely group them as Pentium M systems.
Whether Intel markets them as "Pentium M" or "Pentium M2" or "Pentium M²" or something new is up to Intel's marketing, and often isn't known until the product starts to ship.
Intel codenames, however, often give more information than the marketing name - the marketing name changes less frequently than the chip design. Remembering the codename can be useful long after the marketing name is chosen.
For example, if I have a Pentium II, it's pretty significant whether it's a Klamath or a Deschutes - although the marketing name "Pentium II" is the same (http://www.pcguide.com/ref/cpu/fam/g6PII-c.html).
"Banias" and "Dothan" are both "Pentium M" chips, but Dothan is significantly better in a number of ways.
"x86" is the name for the ISA (Instruction Set Architecture) of the 32-bit Intel/AMD CPUs. It describes the binary machine language (the "assembly language") of the Intel compatible chips.EricNau said:
The P3 (i386 or 80386) chips were the first generation in this family, and defined the basic architecture that is called "x86" today. It has evolved slightly through the P4 (i486), P5 (Pentium or i586), P6 (Pentium Pro/Pentium II/Pentium III or i686) and P7 (Pentium 4 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_P7)), and suffered through a series of vector extensions (MMX/SSE/SSE2/SSE3)).
On this timeline, the "Pentium M" is has gone back to the P6 lineage with some P7 features. Yonah/Merom are sometimes called "P8" chips (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_P8).
This sounds like a lot of incompatible change, but in truth nobody really cares about writing new software that is compatible with 10 year old chips - so today "x86" usually is the same as saying "P6 or newer". Also, the changes are forwards compatible - a P6 or P7 chip will execute P3 code exactly correctly. (A P3 chip, however, may choke on code that has P6 "improvements".)
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Beyond x86 is the 64-bit extension to the x86 ISA called by various names. I'll call it x64, since that's the name that both Sun and Microsoft use (if Macnealy and Gates agree on something, go with it!). Other names are EM64T (Intel), AMD64 (guess), and x86_64 (Linux).
x64 extends x86 to make the registers wider for 64-bit operands and addresses (similar to the way that 64-bit PowerPC makes the registers and address wider).
Unlike PowerPC 64-bit, however, x64 doubles the number of integer and vector (SSE) registers available to the compiler. This is why, unlike PPC 64-bit, x64 is often somewhat faster than 32-bit x86 - the extra registers mean that more data can be kept in high-speed register memory and fewer exchanges between registers and cache/RAM need to happen.
(BTW, no question is stupid.... I hope that we're all here to help people understand what's out there, regardless of our personal biases.)
SmegFirk said:
It's more they hate anything that isn't traditionally Apple. I've heard the type complain when 68k was dropped in favor of PowerPC. I've heard them complain when SCSI was replaced by IDE. I've heard them complain when Copeland was cancelled in favor of Rhapsody (the precursor to OSX). Notice a pattern? They'll use it, learn to like it, and move on like everything else.
Waiting...
I've thought long and hard about buying the quad G5 and in my conscience I just can't do it. I just can't spend $4000 on something that's already obsolete. I know that it's powerful, but my original dual 2ghz will do until Intel comes out.
I've thought long and hard about buying the quad G5 and in my conscience I just can't do it. I just can't spend $4000 on something that's already obsolete. I know that it's powerful, but my original dual 2ghz will do until Intel comes out.
Ok, Apple is involved...
Anyone that thinks that a normal Intel processor is going to be involved is nuts when Apple's new computers arrive.
Anyone that thinks that a normal Intel processor is going to be involved is nuts when Apple's new computers arrive.
Exactly what incentive would Intel have for making custom processors for Apple? Maybe if Apple wanted to completely pay its production and development costs, but somehow I don't see that happening. The computing world works by money, not Steve Jobs snapping his fingers and everyone falling in line.
Yonah Is a Normal Intel Processor
But you can't seriously believe Intel will be making special primary processors for Apple. Such a processor would cost way more than Apple would ever want to pay. While there is a lot of prestiege attached to having Apple as a customer, Intel does not need to make anything special for Apple to make that happen.
I'm not sure what you mean by this. Intel is not going to supply Apple with special Apple only processors. They will be the same processors that will be in advanced Windows Operating System computers as well. According to the newest presentation on Yonah I witnessed last Saturday at the Portable Media Expo, over 200 computers are in design that will use this processor. What Apple will add is other chips, bus architecture and OS X. Intel might be making support chips for Apple that are of Apple design.bdkennedy1 said:
But you can't seriously believe Intel will be making special primary processors for Apple. Such a processor would cost way more than Apple would ever want to pay. While there is a lot of prestiege attached to having Apple as a customer, Intel does not need to make anything special for Apple to make that happen.
Exactly, someone is on crack thinking their tiny computer vendor really amounts to anything in the big scheme of things..
Let's just put it this way, the cost to R&D and to fab a specially "Apple only" processor... Intel might as well just buy Apple over and sack Steve, cheaper that way, and probably more profitable too.
Let's just put it this way, the cost to R&D and to fab a specially "Apple only" processor... Intel might as well just buy Apple over and sack Steve, cheaper that way, and probably more profitable too.
I keep coming back to the point, would Apple really make a huge Intel change over and use the Celeron to open the Intel change over?
Celeron I think not, Apple has the reputation for always bringing out a 'new' spin on things but I don't think they would be silly enough to put the bottom of the Intel range in any of their low end desktop or laptop series.
Lets face it with a company buying a large amount of Intel Chips and Processors there probably would be very little price difference from a Celeron and Slower Pentium M. From a consumer conscious POV the Pentium has always had the better consumer recognition/reputation compared to a Celeron and to an extent even any AMD Processor.
And just think, Apple's consumer image has always been built around being a fast, feature rich, well built quality products. Putting the cheapest processor in an Apple would kind of cheapen the Apple image to an extent.
Remember Think Different, not Think of the Cheapest Intel Chip and Put it in any old Apple product 😉
Celeron I think not, Apple has the reputation for always bringing out a 'new' spin on things but I don't think they would be silly enough to put the bottom of the Intel range in any of their low end desktop or laptop series.
Lets face it with a company buying a large amount of Intel Chips and Processors there probably would be very little price difference from a Celeron and Slower Pentium M. From a consumer conscious POV the Pentium has always had the better consumer recognition/reputation compared to a Celeron and to an extent even any AMD Processor.
And just think, Apple's consumer image has always been built around being a fast, feature rich, well built quality products. Putting the cheapest processor in an Apple would kind of cheapen the Apple image to an extent.
Remember Think Different, not Think of the Cheapest Intel Chip and Put it in any old Apple product 😉
gregoryp said:
The Yonah? You give Apple way too much credit.
Considering that Apple loves to make a 20% margin on everything, on a $500 Mini it will probably be $100 of gravy for them. What are the odds that they will spend $290 on a CPU from the new line, and build the rest of the computer (including the harddrive, and bluetooth, and airport extreme) for only $100?
Not very likely.. perhaps if Apple were less greedy about their own 20% cut might it be possible.
Apple Will Get Deep Discounts From Intel For Each Processor
There is no way Apple is putting Celerons in any MacIntels.
You radically exagerate how much Apple will pay for each Yonah processor. Intel is likely to be giving Apple an outstanding discount as part of the deal to make the family switch from PPC to Intel.generik said:
There is no way Apple is putting Celerons in any MacIntels.
Multimedia said:
They probably will, and make the macmini part of the "throwaway" consumer line and segment the hell out of their userbase by charging a premium on the machines with normal desktop CPUs.
I love Apple like the next guy, but I am being realistic.
Multimedia said:
Don't count on Apple getting that much of a discount. Apple is already getting the better of the deal. They get a reliable CPU supplier and probably some assistance. Intel gets a little bit of prestige and a relatively minor (for them) order of CPUs. The computer industry does not revolve around Apple.