No 3GHz Soon and No G5 Laptop

[csimmons]

????

We were all hoping that Apple was changing with the G5 series and would get out of the dark ages. Its very disappointing that so little changed with this update even if the processor speed could only be bumped to 2.5 Gig. Its just too much money to throw at a machine when one was expecting more.

A 25% increase in speed in less than a year (if it actually ships in July) for a machine that is already one of the fastest personal computers on the market is nothing to sneeze at, my friend. The Pentium 4 has only seen a 6% increase in speed so far (3.2 to 3.4 GHz), if I may remind you.

Stop being so fixated on the "3GHz" thing.

 

[alexf]

Yep.

For example, Apple's stock price is up today - while all whiny teenagers on this site are decrying Apple's impending demise.

I don't think it's correct to call people complaining about this measly upgrade whiny teenagers

I seriously doubt that anyone familiar with Apple's release history who has been anticipating this upgrade since the beginning of the year could not be surprised - if not disappointed - by this upgrade.

 

[Ensoniq]

It's true that everyone will "do the math" their own way to decide if the new PowerMac lineup is an upgrade or downgrade...but here is how I see it.

Yesterday, $1799 got you a single processor 1.6 GHz/PCI machine.
Today, $1999 gets you a dual processor 1.8 GHz/PCI-X machine.

* $200 more for TWO faster processors, but you give up PCI-X.
* $100 upgrades you to a 160 GB Hard Drive, $75 to 512 MB RAM.
* For $2175, you get what cost $2499 minus PCI-X. ($325 savings.)

Yesterday, $2499 got you a dual processor 1.8 GHz/PCI-X machine.
Today, $2499 gets you a dual processor 2.0 GHz/PCI-X machine.

* $50 upgrades you to 9600XT video, $100 to 160 MB Hard Drive.
* For $2650, you get what cost you $3000 yesterday. ($350 savings.)

Yesterday, $3000 got you a dual processor 2.0 GHz/PCI-X machine.
Today, $3000 gets you a dual processor 2.5 GHz/PCI-X machine.

* Same price as yesterday, with a 25% speed increase per processor.

It looks like an upgrade to me. YES, I completely agree that this upgrade should have come in January/February, with the promised 3 GHz updates at WWDC. But unfortunately, that is not going to happen now. Neither IBM nor Steve "lied", it was simply an "act of god" that prevented the transition to 90nm from going as planned. I bet we see 3 GHz before year end though.

Everyone whining about the 9800 XT not being standard should recognize that the damn card eats up an extra PCI slot. That is not AT ALL something Apple should include standard. Apple could have given the Dual 1.8 512 MB standard. Apple could have made 160 GB on the Dual 1.8 and 250 GB on the Dual 2.0/2.5 standard. Apple could have made the 9600XT standard across the board. BUT they didn't...probably to keep distinction between the 3 models.

Like it or not, it works. Many people will buy the new 2.0 because they feel that the "downgrade" to non-PCI-X and the 4 GB "limit" is a problem. For most people though, buying the low end machine, they'd rather pay $1999 for a great Dual 1.8 machine than the $2500 it cost yesterday. They won't be considering it a "downgrade".

In January/February, these specs would have been perfect. In June, the RAM/HD/Video does come into question. When 3 GHz comes along, let's hope Apple fixes these "limitations". But for today, this is still a solid, if completely overdue, upgrade.

 

[pjkelnhofer]

Well Dude u can get a Dell 8300 fully loaded for $1999

Specs:
Windows XP Professional
Pentium 4 3.4Ghz
512 Dual Channel DDR 3200
160GB SATA at 7200rpm
48x CD-R/RW + DL(Dual Layer)DVD+R/RW at 12X(not 8X that is actually getting old now)
10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet
ATI Radeon 9800Pro 128MB
Sound Blaster Audigity 2
Wireless 802.11 b/g built in
Microsoft Works 2004 and Money
2yr Warranty

and Finally FREE 17in LCD Monitor ... Beat that Steve'O... LOL

Wow, it looks like crap and is in reality probably still slower than the Daul 1.8 GHz G5 for a lot of applications. Oh yeah, does it run OS X? Does it run FCP?
Than it is useless to a lot of video professionals.

P.S. to that Person who said the PC does not have a 64Bit chip they do it's called the Athlon 64/FX by AMD and Clock 4 Clock is better then the G5.

And currently tops out at 2.4GHz, slower than the new G5.

 

[csimmons]

Interesting observation...

With the rest of the computer industry trying to take the emphasis OFF of clock speed, it's ironic that we Mac users are still deeply stuck in that land.

Funny.

 

[iriejedi]

ATI say no on x800 for mac

ATI Radeon 9800XT/pro/special whatever is the best mac card on market

ATI - replied that there is no x800 for mac 'announced' so it may be a while...

dang it - I guess might as well get the upgrade from apple.

 

[blakespot]

Don't know if someone already said it but...
Alright, I'm just as shocked as all of you are. But here's the deal: OS X Tiger will probably make the G5s twice as fast as they are now in Photoshop and Lightwave type deals.

How would that be achieved in an OS upgrade?



blakespot

 

[dr.Zoidberg]

trade offs...

i understand what Apple has done here, the DP1.8 is cheaper, its better than the SP1.6, but they dropped some stuff, less HD space, Less RAM, BUT we get another PROCESSOR, so instead of 1 we get two...so when you compare it to the old 1.6 it is a good deal better, afterall, Dual Processors is REALLY what is important, is it not? Plus, we can all go and get BETTER HD's and Cheaper RAM elsewhere (at least in theory). The 1.8's and 2.0's dont seem to need the new cooling device, as it isnt in there, so thats interesting....on a complaining note....the BTO's wont let you have 2x160 or 2x80, just 2x250 in the HD section......thats kind of annoying.
Still, the DP 1.8 is a good price, and i dont need, or shouldnt need for a long long time MORE than 4GB of Ram anyway......Maxing out credit card soon.....

 

[dopefiend]

And currently tops out at 2.4GHz, slower than the new G5.

Only until the 4th Quarter of this year, when the AMD Athlon 64 FX-55 is released at 2.6GHz.

 

[Wonder Boy]

First, if you "make a promise and fail" you didn't lie, because you didn't know you were going to fail. Therefore, Steve isn't a liar. Second, Steve wasn't the one who "did't [sic] follow through". IBM didn't. But they didn't lie either. They thought they would have 3Ghz by now, but it turns out that shrinking your chip feature size by over 30% really is as hard as it seems (wow, who would've thought). So, chill out. Before you run your mouth off, stop and think about who is responsible for what.

ok, i admit it, i got a bit excited and some of my anger was pointed at the wrong guy. i should be mad at ibm too, its not all steves/apples fault. but damnit, i think i have the right to be upset. i was promised 3ghz and they didnt come through. if i wasnt lied to, what would you call? im not being a jerk, im just curious.

 

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Should I get. . .

$1,399.00 12-inch G4 Powerbook
12.1-inch TFT Display
1024x768 resolution
1.33GHz PowerPC G4
512K L2 cache
256MB DDR333 SDRAM
60GB Ultra ATA/100
NVIDIA GeForce FX
Go5200 (64MB DDR)
Full size keyboard
10/100BASE-T Ethernet
FireWire 400
AirPort Extreme built-in
Mini-DVI out


$1,469.00 Dual 1.25GHz PowerPC G4
2MB L3 cache/processor
256MB DDR333 SDRAM
80GB Ultra ATA drive
Combo Drive
ATI Radeon 9000 Pro
Mac OS 9 boot supported


or


$1,799.00 1.8GHz PowerPC G5
900MHz frontside bus/processor
512K L2 cache/processor
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
Expandable to 4GB SDRAM
80GB Serial ATA
8x SuperDrive
Three PCI Slots
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
56K internal modem

(these are education price, by the way)

....I want to do video editing, and other normal college student stuff.

 

[jiggie2g]

Well Dude u can get a Dell 8300 fully loaded for $1999

Specs:
Windows XP Professional
Pentium 4 3.4Ghz
512 Dual Channel DDR 3200
160GB SATA at 7200rpm
48x CD-R/RW + DL(Dual Layer)DVD+R/RW at 12X(not 8X that is actually getting old now)
10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet
ATI Radeon 9800Pro 128MB
Sound Blaster Audigity 2
Wireless 802.11 b/g built in
Microsoft Works 2004 and Money
2yr Warranty

and Finally FREE 17in LCD Monitor ... Beat that Steve'O... LOL

P.S. to that Person who said the PC does not have a 64Bit chip they do it's called the Athlon 64/FX by AMD and Clock 4 Clock is better then the G5.[/QUOTE

Except for one minor problem - this isn't comparable to the high end G5s by any stretch of the imagination.

Dual 64 bit 2.5 GHz processors destroy a single P4 3.4.
Dual 1.25 GHz memory bus is way faster than the Dell
Maximum memory capacity of 8 GB vs something like 2 GB
Mac OS X vs Windows XP? No comparison.

If you want a cheap machine, go ahead and buy one. But don't delude yourself into thinking that your Yugo is the same as a BMW just because it has 4 doors and 4 wheels.

Well Dude i wasn't trying to compare that Dell to a High End G5 it was towards the low end G5 and being a better Value , Now if I wanted to Destroy Your Precious G5 2.5 and Spend 3K on a Comp(which is nuts 4 most people ) i'd just get a Spankin new

AMD 64 +3800/FX-53 939pin water cooled OC it to a +4200 how's about that (the 939pin use a 1600mhz Hyper-transport Bus so much for that)
ATI Radeon X800XT 256MB
twin 74GB 10,000rpm WD Raptors running RAID 0
Dual Channel DDR 400 (533mhz)
and a bunch of other Goodies for about or just over the 3K mark ..
GOTTA LOVE ....NEWEGG.COM

but thats if i wanted to Blow a Car Down Payment on a freakin machine that will be Old in less than a year.

 

[fpnc]

It's true that everyone will "do the math" their own way to decide if the new PowerMac lineup is an upgrade or downgrade...but here is how I see it.

Yesterday, $1799 got you a single processor 1.6 GHz/PCI machine.
Today, $1999 gets you a dual processor 1.8 GHz/PCI-X machine.
...

Actually, this is incorrect. The "new," dual 1.8 GHz model only has PCI, NOT PCI-X. So, you get the faster, dual processors, but you still are limited to PCI (64-bit, 33 MHz).

In any case, I think you are getting a faster SuperDrive (8x).

 

[badapple]

aaaa

I HATE STEVE JOBS !!!!! WHAT A LIER !!!! HE PROMISED 3GHZ !!! HE PROMISED !!!!! THIS IS NO UPGRADE ! IT'S A JOKE !

sheesh, half the posts here looks like that. I thought this is a rumors site with knowledgable people, not a bitching site with cry babies.
if you dont like the new upgrade, dont buy a new G5. we understand that you are upset but bitching and moaning all over the board wont help.

 

[pjkelnhofer]

Only until the 4th Quarter of this year, when the AMD Athlon 64 FX-55 is released at 2.6GHz.

And, we don't know yet what IBM will be release in six months time. I doubt it will be a year again between updates.

 

[dopefiend]

And, we don't know yet what IBM will be release in six months time. I doubt it will be a year again between updates.

They said a while.

I'm willing to bet its going to be more than half a year since it took them a year to get +500mhz

 

[pjkelnhofer]

Well Dude i wasn't trying to compare that Dell to a High End G5 it was towards the low end G5 and being a better Value , Now if I wanted to Destroy Your Precious G5 2.5 and Spend 3K on a Comp(which is nuts 4 most people ) i'd just get a Spankin new

AMD 64 +3800/FX-53 939pin water cooled OC it to a +4200 how's about that (the 939pin use a 1600mhz Hyper-transport Bus so much for that)
ATI Radeon X800XT 256MB
twin 74GB 10,000rpm WD Raptors running RAID 0
Dual Channel DDR 400 (533mhz)
and a bunch of other Goodies for about or just over the 3K mark ..
GOTTA LOVE ....NEWEGG.COM

but thats if i wanted to Blow a Car Down Payment on a freakin machine that will be Old in less than a year.

And you would end up with a computer that is the same speed in the real world as the Dual 2.5GHz G5 that you could have spent the same money on, and it will still be running Windows!

 

[charlesc]

A couple observations.

When you remove the superdrive in the apple store it now only deducts $80, versus removing $180 on the Rev. A PM's.

In the G5 white paper it says '90nm', but I've yet to see any material stating specifically that the new 1.8 and 2.0 machines have the 90nm chip.

NO 3ghz soon for sure. Everyone that wants the 3ghz G5 needs to realize that the 970/970fx will not make it to 3ghz. It is going to take a new
cpu we have yet to see or hear anything about to make it up to 3ghz.

I'm guessing MWSF in Jan for 3ghz with a new cpu and architecture improvements.

 

[jiggie2g]

Wow, it looks like crap and is in reality probably still slower than the Daul 1.8 GHz G5 for a lot of applications. Oh yeah, does it run OS X? Does it run FCP?
Than it is useless to a lot of video professionals.

And currently tops out at 2.4GHz, slower than the new G5.

G5 Clock 4 Clock is slower than the Athlon 64/FX just look at the old benchmarks of FX-51's vs. 2.0 G5's not the rigged apple benchmarks.
Place like Mac World and Toms Hardware.

 

[macenforcer]

Quad 3ghz macs

The only thing I can think of that would save face for Jobs, keep his promise, look cool, be worth waiting for, and make good use of the liquid cooling technology is a quad processor mac. That is something that I could see him anouncing. It would blow my mind. Ofcourse it will be $4000 also so it would put it right after the new 2.5ghz.

Lets wait and see.

 

[Sun Baked]

Actually, this is incorrect. The "new," dual 1.8 GHz model only has PCI, NOT PCI-X. So, you get the faster, dual processors, but you still are limited to PCI (64-bit, 33 MHz).

In any case, I think you are getting a faster SuperDrive (8x).

The PCI vs. PCI-X debate is basically moot -- because BOTH machines require 3.3V cards.

And that matters if you have some old 5V PCI cards you were going to use. If you do there's a good chance you be buying new SCSI and audio cards along with your new G5 -- even if you get a PCI model.

The "major" difference is the 2 "pairs" of DIMMs -- so upgrade memory once and the start debating over which pairs of DIMMs you'll be putting in a box come the next memory upgrade.

---

Our venerable PowerMac G4 is the one that made use of the 5V PCI cards, and it's on closeout (soon to be gone as stock runs low.)

 

[Lanbrown]

With that said, the WWDC is coming. iMac G5s? Maybe. Tiger yea, perhaps it will blow us away. New Screens maybe. Wireless Firewire to surpass blue tooth? Maybe. We can speculate about many things.

A new iMac has to be there, sales are down. Speed bumps are doing nothing for sales. Tiger, they'll show it but won't be here until October, unless the core is the same, as Panther was a big jump. New screens are almost a must. Wireless FW will not surpass BT. Take some of the new phones coming out with a lot of storage, 512MB, 1GB and soon 2GB. Sire FW would transfer it extremely fast, but the battery life will be killed by it. BT was never designed for high BW applications; even the new version is only about three times faster.

Speculate we shall.

 

[titaniumducky]

They said a while.

I'm willing to bet its going to be more than half a year since it took them a year to get +500mhz

Don't you see? They've got the 90nm process working! Now that they've done the hard part climbing up the hill, it's really easy to continue on the path when going downhill.

I bet in 6 months we see 2.2, 2.5, 2.8 (or 3).

 

[machinehead]

The only thing I can think of that would save face for Jobs, keep his promise, look cool, be worth waiting for, and make good use of the liquid cooling technology is a quad processor mac. That is something that I could see him anouncing. It would blow my mind. Ofcourse it will be $4000 also so it would put it right after the new 2.5ghz.

Lets wait and see.

Currently the new 90-nm 2.5 GHz chip needs water cooling, whereas the old 130-nm 2.0 GHz chip doesn't.

So if Apple wanted to whip up a quad machine in a hurry, presumably it would be an air-cooled 4 x 2.0 Ghz. That's if there's room inside the existing G5 case, which I'm not so sure.

But as you say, it would cost at least $4,000. Let's say $4,495, just to be conservative. This is not a prediction.

 

[nmk]

Here is what I think will happen during the rest of the year.

1)PB's will remain at 1.5 Ghz till about Nov/Dec. At this point they will hopefully get a upgrade to the new dual core 2Ghz G4 (if it actually gets manufactured on time)

2) PM's will get an upgrade to 2.8Ghz in Macworld Jan

3) iMacs will get the 1.5 Ghz G4 and say there till about Jan/Feb

4) iBooks and eBooks will get upgraded to 1.5 G4 once PB gets new processor (I know, it goes without saying)