Intel Mac mini at MacWorld San Francisco in January?

[alaskaunbound]

Just imagine, a low-end Pentium M based Mac mini is going to be compared against faster celeron or P4 desktops in similar price ranges. The Mac mini is going to look like it has a slow processor for the price. The Pentium M they choose might not be a much faster chip than the current G4 is. Then we have Rosetta slowing it down as well. So it might not be much faster than a previous generation Mac, or it might even be slower

Can you imagine the press reaction when Apple releases its first intel-based computer and things are SLOWER than the previous generation? People would pile on to say how overpriced Apple is compared to other PC makers that use similar chips.

The only hope I see is that the Mac mini performs at par with the current G4 machine on common tasks and is less expensive. A price drop would help difuse any negative press about the lack of performance gains.

A current pentium M will beat a celeron for sure and will have a good shot at the Pentium 4. If its a yonah, it will smoke both of them. The P4 has a 31-stage pipeline and is very inefficient per clock. The pentium M has like a 12-13 stage pipeline and is very efficient.

 

[heisetax]

I don't understand why they cannot go ahead and do the transition instead of dragging it out. They've already confirmed that OS X will work on Intel. They've confirmed that all the software out right now will run on Intel with Rosetta.

Who cares if the developers are ready?

There's more to it than just waiting for Intel to produce the chips. Some will be out soon, some may be close to a year. The really good ones, an upgrade to those coming out in the near future could be 2 years off.

Talk to someone that wants to run an OS 9 program with the current Macs. Most will tell you that for the most part it works, but not with every application. I know that I need to have a Mac around that will bot into OS9 just for that reason.

If it wasn't because of the fact that Apple needs to have the developers producing IntelMac software from day one, not down the future line some time. Ask the Quark people how long some time can be.

Just have a little patience on this change. As for me I have not been convinced that the new IntelMacs will really be any better than what we already have with the PPC Mac. I would think that it will be late 2007 or 2008 before we see any real increase over what we had before the last changes in the PowerMac & iMac. The PowerBook, iBook, & MacMini will be able to show gains much faster since they are a generation or two behind the PowerMac iMac group of computers.

Bill the TaxMan

 

[Les Kern]

Going to MacWorld Sunday to Saturday.... Going to be a hoot, but leaving the credit card home.

 

[Les Kern]

What a sick joke.

Have fun idiots. Your platform is self-destructing right from under you.

Congrats Jobs, your incompetence is turning Apple into Dell on the Intel processor roadmap trainwreck.

Lay off the caffeine and smokes dude. And I'd suggest a little Paxil.

 

[plinden]

I used to squirm at the thought of an intel inside sticker,
but I wouldn't care if they put it on the back by the ports or something.

Sheesh, what's this thing about stickers? The first thing I do with a new PC (even before tweaking for performance) is remove the stickers. It's not a big deal. Although, rehearsing this in my head, I think it would gall me to have to do that to a Mac out of the box.

Besides, I seriously doubt there will be any Intel stickers - even Dell is considering not putting any stickers on their machines. Apparently the 10 seconds it takes to do is a large percentage of the total build time for their PCs.

 

[plinden]

I hope this is true I really need to replace my old PC its barly running as it is now.....

Get an iBook or a refurb iMac to tide you over till next year.

 

[plinden]

And whomever thinks they're going to use the Centrino chip is completely delusional. They're so bad even most peecee makers are trying to distance themselves from it, machines built with it in often aren't mentioned excpet the fine print. Even Apple, for all their cheapness sometimes (need I mention video cards like someone did above), wouldn't be THAT cheap! I've watched people run a bake-off where the original PIII from 98 dusted a new Centrino and supposedly the Centrino is based on the PIII. Apple is going to be using the M chips (and beyond), and developers are being told to code to that, not Centrino. Pay attention before you post.

What are you talking about. Centrino is not a chip, but rather an aggregation of cpu, chipset, and networking interfaces. It's just intel's marketing name which manufacturers can use provided they adhere to certain hardware requirements. All "centrino" notebooks to this point have included some variant of the pentium m processsor, but not all notebooks with a pentium m are centrino based...Make sense? ....Now I'm confused.

I think he's confused Centrino with Celeron. The Pentium M is as fast as a P4 clocked at about 1.5x the PM clockspeed - i.e. my 1.6GHz PM Thinkpad is as fast as a 2.4GHz P4.

Even so, the Celeron M is almost as fast as an equivalently clocked PM. It's just missing PM's speedstep technology so it doesn't have the same battery life (about 40% that of an equivalent Centrino laptop).

I have a feeling the first Mac Mini intels will have a Celeron M, since battery life is, of course, not important.

 

[ezekielrage_99]

It would make sense that Apple would replace the G4 Processors with the Intel Processors ASAP, it will give Apple the chance to get the bugs out of the Intel stuff before releasing it on the professional Powermac line.

I also believe there are quite a few people hanging off buying a Mac until the Intel Macs are released, early Mactel Systems after Xmas would also give the general public an idea what the whole Intel Apple thing is all about and what to expect in the coming year.

Personally I think we will see the Mac Mini, iBook and the Powerbook with the first generation Intel Processors by March at the latest, because lets face it the G4 is a good CPU but still old and slow compared to the newer Intel chips and processors.

 

[runninmac]

Just imagine, a low-end Pentium M based Mac mini is going to be compared against faster celeron or P4 desktops in similar price ranges. The Mac mini is going to look like it has a slow processor for the price. The Pentium M they choose might not be a much faster chip than the current G4 is. Then we have Rosetta slowing it down as well. So it might not be much faster than a previous generation Mac, or it might even be slower

I can say confidently that that will NOT happen. Apple will surely show some sort of demo showing how much faster it is than the PPC Mac mini.

 

[aafuss1]

Not to mention the fact that the G5's in the iMac are faster than a lot of the Pentium M's floating around.

No, the Mac Mini will get a Pentium M but it will be low-cost and thus not a top 'o the line CPU. Kinda like the current Mac Mini.



That's becasue the eMac is dead AFAIK. Apple killed it.

Actually, could Apple revise the eMac in the future, to keep its education sales strong?

 

[aafuss1]

PowerBooks should be due for Intel first.... The last "update" wasn't even really an update... Just a few "enhancments" to hold us over until the switch.

We shall see come January.

I'd also love to see Fox, NBC, & CBS to jump on the iTunes Video wagon.

How about more kid's shows and animated series-like Invader Zim, Skyland, Avatar, Lilo & Stitch, Dragon Tales, Sesame Street, PBS shows.

We already we have Suite Life of Zack and That's So Raven on the iTMS

 

[DeathChill]

http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.php?t=263394

What speed increase?

Fun test, interesting notes:

Dell 1.4GHz Pentium M: 2:53
Mac Mini 1.25GHz: 2:23
IBM 1.6GHz Pentium M: 2:14
1.5GHz PB: 2:04
Dual 800 G4: 2:03 (That's a 4 year old machine)

iMac G5 2GHz: 1:46


Dualcore Pentium D 3.2GHz: 56s
Dualcore G5 2.3GHz: 42s
Dual 2.7GHz G5: 37s

If those are all the photoshop tests then that's just proof of Rosetta's awesomeness, as well as the power of the Pentium chip line (excluding the P4's). Running a MASSIVE application in an emulated environment and still being competitive with the machines running it natively is insane.

EDIT: Unless that's on a Windows machine, but that'd be an odd comparison as they're for two different architectures and two different OS's. It's like comparing apples and oranges. xD

 

[AidenShaw]

OSx86 is 32-bit SSE2 - definitely confirmed

Has Apple confirmed whether OSX Intel will support SSE3 or an earlier version?

Apple is saying 32-bit, SSE2 only is the base guaranteed configuration for OSx86. You need to do a run-time check to see if SSE3 is supported on the current system.

(see the Apple developer pages at http://developer.apple.com/hardware/ve/sse.html#ISA_Overview)

 

[AidenShaw]

A "Celeron M" is a "Pentium M"

A current pentium M will beat a celeron for sure and will have a good shot at the Pentium 4. If its a yonah, it will smoke both of them. The P4 has a 31-stage pipeline and is very inefficient per clock. The pentium M has like a 12-13 stage pipeline and is very efficient.

There are "Celeron M" chips that are the same chips as "Pentium M" chips, but with smaller cache and slower clocks.

The current "Celeron" chips are 64-bit "Pentium 4" chips with smaller cache and slower clocks.

The Celerons start out life identical to the faster chips - they are even cut from the same wafers. If a Pentium M chip or a Pentium 4 chip has some defective cache or can't clock as fast as the Pentiums, it's rebranded as a slower, smaller cache Celeron. (A couple of quick blasts from a laser can disable (the defective) part of the cache and/or lock the clock rate slower.)

 

[AidenShaw]

Of course those are Windows boxes....

If those are all the photoshop tests then that's just proof of Rosetta's awesomeness, as well as the power of the Pentium chip line (excluding the P4's). Running a MASSIVE application in an emulated environment and still being competitive with the machines running it natively is insane.

Of course the Pentium systems are Windows boxes running the Windows version of Photoshop. But why is that Apples/Oranges?

And, of course, the test uses only one AltiVec-friendly filter....

 

[840quadra]

EDIT: Unless that's on a Windows machine, but that'd be an odd comparison as they're for two different architectures and two different OS's. It's like comparing apples and oranges. xD

Possibly Not,

As PS will be coded to run on the Intel and PPC processors with Universal Binaries in the future. The new code will be able to take advantage of the intel architecture, or PPC (depending on what is available when installed). The tests run on windows systems would give a relative baseline, and or starting point to compare the processors.

One thing that may help out, is the way OS X loads and runs programs when compared with Windows. The software may just run faster on a Unix based system, as compared to Windows running on the same or similar processors.

::EDIT::

And, of course, the test uses only one AltiVec-friendly filter....

That's a good point, I didn't even consider the type of filter for that test!

The baseline test should have used multiple features within PS, both Altivec and non Altivec freiendly technologies.

 

[mambodancer]

MacWorld Surprise

I wouldn't be surprised if it's not an intel Powermac that's introduced at Macworld as well. I wouldn't put it past Jobs to introduce a 3-4Ghz + dual core Powermac ahead of expectations to wipe the embarassment of missing the 3Ghz G5 prediction of a year or so ago. I'm sure he'll stage another, "Oh, and one more thing..." event that may surprise a lot of people.

I'd also like to see Front Row bundled with the Apple remote and receiver so that it could be purchased and used with older Macs and see an iSight and Photobooth bundle too. And of course there's iLife '06 and iWork '06 around the corner.

 

[2nyRiggz]

bring em all out. im looking foward to all the product line....i love when new macs come out even if i dont get them.


Bless

 

[Frobozz]

Umm, what? These are what you call Pro users. You know, the ones who buy all the new expensive hardware?

Say what you want about Quark (I do!) but it still dominates the industry.

You mean the dying print industry that, on average, runs 4 year old machines as primary workhorses? Some of which still run OS 9? I have a feeling we're agreeing, more or less. I'm just taking a more jaded angle.

Pro users, while their demographics are varied, will be doing far more than pushing pixels around. Aside from huge print banners, I'd say 3D graphics, video, and scientific computation are the three dominant professional reasons to need a PowerMac, not Quark.

 

[oober_freak]

After reading many posts here, I don't know why people want to run Windows on a Mac?!?!

I understand that students who have to use applications which are Windows-only would be benefited by the intel macs.. but why the people who want to use their macs just for office work?

I mean come on.. why did you switch? Also for the average joe, Virtual PC is good enough.. for running small programs etc.

Also, some people on osx86project.org have reported that Vista beta builds don't install on disks with hfs+ partitions... so even if 1 partition out of 10 is hfs, vista won't install. Then I may be wrong.. not sure about this. Any MSDN guys here who can confirm?

Edit: http://forum.osx86project.org/index.php?showtopic=2559&hl=vista This is the thread where the guy couldn't install Vista with hfs+ partitions present

 

[one3]

Something that may mean nothing:

Fairly large chain store in Canada (London Drugs) has the MacMini 1.42 on sale from $749.00 to $599.00 at their stores (while quantities last) - not sure why? They never have Macs on sale unless they are clearing out old inventory to replace with newly released products. Yet of course in this case there are no new Mac minis ... unless you count the reports of updated Mac minis appearing in place of slower ones here and there without an official Apple release.

Again this is probably nothing at all ... but thought I'd pass the info on as it's very unusual to see a "sale" on Mac systems like this.

 

[EricNau]

Sorry, I didn't have time to read through all of this, but...
What processors will Apple use in the Mac mini? I'm hoping for at least a P4 if not something better, would that be possible?

 

[AvSRoCkCO1067]

Or something new...

Apple could always just come out with an entirely new line of computers (possibly a desktop or a laptop) with Intel, keeping its other computers under PPC Architecture for a bit. You know, just to work out the bugs.

I think that, although the Mac Mini certainly isn't a speed demon, that it is not the area in which Apple would want to focus on the most. Look at Apple's current offerings (especially considering bang for the buck.)

The PowerMac is amazing - its recent update will certainly carry it along a while (until Intel comes out with something actually worthwhile for desktops...)

The iMac is pretty darn awesome too...

The Mini is slow, but for 500 bucks, I'm very happy with my purchase

The iBook is also a bit slow, but again, for a 1000, much better than its PC counterparts (it never slows down, unlike my other PC laptop and desktop)

The POWERBOOK - ah, therein lies the lagger. Although its screens are undoubtedly beautiful, its in need of a facelift. Bang for the buck considerations; iBook is better. Apple needs to update the PowerBook's processer (re: FBS) as soon as possible - it will probably be one of the earlier updates!

 

[Multimedia]

PowerMacs will be LAST to get intel inside.

Wait for them to actually come out before you say that too emphatically

Why? The new PowerMac G5 Quad is more than competitive with its x86 counterparts, and people who buy PowerMacs generally have hefty software that they need, and it wouldn't be wise to release an Intel PowerMac before all of those developers have their software ready.

PowerMacs will be LAST to get intel inside. The software is ready. Apple said they have all their software parallel Intel ready. That's not the issue. The issue is that PPC dual core will still outperform intel dual core until 2007 when the switch will be implemented when PPC can no longer keep a performance lead.

 

[Multimedia]

All Apple MacIntels Will Smoke Previous Models' Performance Specs

My concern with a Pentium M mac mini is that it will underwhelm the press and negatively influence consumers' perceptions of the first Intel-based mac.

Just imagine, a low-end Pentium M based Mac mini is going to be compared against faster celeron or P4 desktops in similar price ranges. The Mac mini is going to look like it has a slow processor for the price. The Pentium M they choose might not be a much faster chip than the current G4 is. Then we have Rosetta slowing it down as well. So it might not be much faster than a previous generation Mac, or it might even be slower

Can you imagine the press reaction when Apple releases its first intel-based computer and things are SLOWER than the previous generation? People would pile on to say how overpriced Apple is compared to other PC makers that use similar chips.

The only hope I see is that the Mac mini performs at par with the current G4 machine on common tasks and is less expensive. A price drop would help difuse any negative press about the lack of performance gains.

Right. Apple is going to begin the switch with an underperformer and no smokin' demos.

And what business plan have you been smoking?