PowerBook 970s at WWDC?

[mim]

Re: Re: wait for rev. b?

Originally posted by cb911
you don't have to worry about the current TiBooks, or any Macs with G4's not being optimised. sure 10.3 will have certain optimizations for the 970's, but i'm sure that it will also have some speed increases on G4's. after all, even with the 970 a big part of Apple's line will still be G4 & maybe even G3.


and on the subject of anodizing... i recall reading that if you anodize something like a PB case, then contact with the skin will mean that eventually the coating will corrode and wear away. this can't be the case with the current AlBooks, right? i might be getting a bit technical here, but is it only anodizing with dye that makes it corrode with skin contact... or is there a different process that the AlBooks go through?

10.3's bound not to be 'just for ppc970'. There'll be a host of improvements that make the current G4's plenty fast enough for most people (bar gamers... ).

So, Mxpiazza - 10.3 isn't going to make the G4's redundant. It'll proabably make them even better (more altivec optimisations).

The anodising is effectively a layer over the aluminium, but it actually changes the top layers of the material - it's not really a coating. It's an oxidised layer - unless your skin is especially acidic (heh heh, post rude jokes here...) you're not likely to wear it off anytime soon. You can scratch though the anodising, but I'd suspect the Powerbook case is anodised pretty deeply.

 

[nagromme]

I don't think that even with Panther, the first 970s will be the MASSIVE speed boost some would like to see. But they will still be nicely faster than G4s, and more price/performance competitive with Wintel. They will be a great step.

But then the real benefit of the 970 decision will come as 970s keep getting faster--and then the 980 (Power 5 derived) follows. I do think the PowerPC line is likely to be the top-performing desktop CPU in the end.

In other words, the first 970s are only the beginning.

 

[suzerain]

12" already devalued

Originally posted by MovieGuy
why would Apple devalue their just released 12 and 17 inch models. I see an entire line upgrade by x-mas and ibooks becoming iBook G4s.

I just wanted that they already devalued the 12" notebook -- by $200. Apple pretty much never lowers prices just for the hell of it; it's almost always because new products are coming.

So, I will say that there are DEFINITELY new 12" and 15" powerbooks on the way very soon, and WWDC seems as likely a place as any other.

The only puzzling thing is that they didn't lower prices of the 17", and that model has to be the fastest.

My opinion? I'm feeling optimistic today: They didn't lower the price of the 17" because it's a luxury item anyway and they don't maintain a large inventory. Therefore, the entire PowerBook line will be updated at the end of the month with 970s.

iBooks and iMacs will move to 970 in fall/winter.

I think Apple has a very good reason to stop using the G4 ASAP: Motorola wants to sell the CPU division. What guarantee would Apple have that the future owner will want to continue making G4s?

 

[Sun Baked]

Darn, my Magic 8-Ball must be broken...

 

[cb911]

the news item about this on the main page looks like it has been updated and refers to the MacBidouille news from May. MacBidouille said that new 970 PowerBooks would be here around March 2004, but considering that Moto may not be making G4's for much longer... (good point suzerain, i didn't think of the news about Moto selling the semiconductor dept. in that way.)

Since MacBidouille's info is old... way back from May, and considering that Mac Whispers info would be very current, and also considering recent developments like Moto putting the semiconductor dept. up for sale... from looking at all of those things i'm more confident that the 15.4" 970 PowerBooks will be here at WWDC.

and as a bonus, if Moto or anyone else isn't producing G4's then Apple might be forced to move the iBook and iMac lines to the 970 sooner as well.

 

[porovaara]

Again...

Everyone needs to remember nothing is known about the power saving capabilities of the 970.

 

[Chimaera]

true, but we do know that it draws less power... which means less heat and battery battery life off the bat (yes I know there are a lot of other variables).

 

[AppleMatt]

Originally posted by Chimaera
true, but we do know that it draws less power... which means less heat and battery battery life off the bat (yes I know there are a lot of other variables).

So we stick in faster hard-drives! They draw lots of power and give out lots of heat!

Then everyone feels at home.

AppleMatt

 

[wwworry]

ok this is stupid but

overall performance approximately 1.25 to 1.5 times that of a similarly clocked G4 on non-Altivec optimized applications

1.8 GHz 970 x 1.5 = 2.7 speed
1.4 Ghz dual G4 = 2.8 speed

so why no dual processor configurations?

what's stupid is my processor math (full of holes) but still it would be nice to have dual 970s.

 

[SuzanneA]

Originally posted by cb911
that's interesting that they say that. i thought that the current AlBooks were raw (not anodized) aluminium.
[/B]

The AlBooks are 'Aircraft Aluminum' (at least, thats what was said at release, the apple site just refers to it as Aluminum Alloy now) which is actually an alloy of a variety of things, not just 'raw aluminum', I believe it (often [1]) even includes some titanium to lend it some strength.

Either way, it would have to be clear/natural anodized, beacuse even in an alloy, aluminum oxidizes fast. Your nice 'shiny' AlBook would be dull and blotchy within a few days

[1] 'Aircraft Aluminum' is a very generic term, there are a few thousand different alloys of aluminum used in aircraft manufacture, and apple's choice, like any other 'Aircraft Aluminum' could be any of them.

 

[The Shadow]

What do we know?

Here's a summary of the major "informant" type rumors and facts I can remember over the past 3 months:
_A tender for new PM motherboards was put out in March
_IBM has been producing PPC 970 chips since April
_Suppliers are producing new PM cases
_The mainstay Powerbook, the 15" has strangely not been updated yet. The new look is anticipated any time with a 15.4" screen, possibly with a PPC970?
_The WWDC was put back a month ostensibly to give a better demo of Panther - which we all expect to be optimised for the PPC970.

The rhetorical question on everybody's lips "How better to demo the 970 optimised Panther than on a 970 powered PowerMac?"

Whether the new hardware is actually available (which I doubt) or release dates announced as in the past, one could be forgiven for thinking that it's all starting to come together.

 

[zac4mac]

To my limited experience, there are two basic types of anodizing Aluminum, hard and soft. Soft would be used for corrosion resistance, but not contact durability. I've seen hard anodized Al chip and rip teeth off a carbide saw blade - it's really tough, on the surface. Once you break thru the top layer, it cuts very easy. The process is kinda similar to case hardening steel, giving an extremely hard surface. I would expect Apple chose the hard process and the AlBooks should be much more durable than their Ti cousins. Like having a built in Halliburton case.

Hope Jack's right here, he sounds pretty sure of this info...

Z

 

[gezzas525]

970's in powerbooks you must be joking? In order for that to happen IBM will have to move to 90nm production and even then we will have to wait a few months after that for apple to prepare the machines. 90nm for Intel will be in mass production nov-dec iam guessing IBM will also be at a similar timeframe with 970's based powerbooks ariving feb-april 2004. This is assuming no delays and with the extra complexities in the 64-bit architechture, it may also take longer. One more thing THERE IS NO PORTABLE DDR400 MEMORY CHIPS !!!! WITH REGISTERED/ECC DDR400 IS CURRENTLY PENDING APPROVAL BY JEDEC.

THERE IS NOT ENOUGH 970's TO GO ROUND, HENCE THEY WILL ONLY BE FOUND IN THE HIGHEND POWERMAC DESKTOPS PERIOD!! THEY WONT BE CHEAP EITHER MY GUESS THE SINGLE 1.8 WILL BE NO LESS THEN $3000-$4000 AND WILL PROBABLY COME WITH 2-4GB OF RAM AS STANDARD, SCSI, FX5900/9800.

KLEOS

 

[gezzas525]

DUAL 1.8 will be very expensive and so will most likely be not available until there is a good yield/supply of 970's my guess >$5000 when comapring a DUAL 1.8 OPTERON with a DUAL SUN 1.2Ghz USPARQ 3 machine coming in at $14000 !!! WOHA

KLEOS

 

[arn]

Originally posted by cb911
the news item about this on the main page looks like it has been updated and refers to the MacBidouille news from May. MacBidouille said that new 970 PowerBooks would be here around March 2004, but considering that Moto may not be making G4's for much longer... (good point suzerain, i didn't think of the news about Moto selling the semiconductor dept. in that way.)

Since MacBidouille's info is old... way back from May, and considering that Mac Whispers info would be very current, and also considering recent developments like Moto putting the semiconductor dept. up for sale... from looking at all of those things i'm more confident that the 15.4" 970 PowerBooks will be here at WWDC.

I added MacBid's info for contrast to this rumor. You have to remember that MacWhispers has been very wrong in the past. They were confident about iPod revisions, as well as previous Powerbook revisions. Those did not come to pass.

They do appear very confident about this information - and it is "unique" info... no other sites believe this to be true - 15" 970 PowerBooks. These are reasons it's been posted.... but we'll have to see how it turns out....

arn

 

[JBracy]

Originally posted by gezzas525
970's in powerbooks you must be joking? In order for that to happen IBM will have to move to 90nm production and even then we will have to wait a few months after that for apple to prepare the machines. 90nm for Intel will be in mass production nov-dec iam guessing IBM will also be at a similar timeframe with 970's based powerbooks ariving feb-april 2004. This is assuming no delays and with the extra complexities in the 64-bit architechture, it may also take longer. One more thing THERE IS NO PORTABLE DDR400 MEMORY CHIPS !!!! WITH REGISTERED/ECC DDR400 IS CURRENTLY PENDING APPROVAL BY JEDEC.

THERE IS NOT ENOUGH 970's TO GO ROUND, HENCE THEY WILL ONLY BE FOUND IN THE HIGHEND POWERMAC DESKTOPS PERIOD!! THEY WONT BE CHEAP EITHER MY GUESS THE SINGLE 1.8 WILL BE NO LESS THEN $3000-$4000 AND WILL PROBABLY COME WITH 2-4GB OF RAM AS STANDARD, SCSI, FX5900/9800.

KLEOS

Originally posted by gezzas525
DUAL 1.8 will be very expensive and so will most likely be not available until there is a good yield/supply of 970's my guess >$5000 when comapring a DUAL 1.8 OPTERON with a DUAL SUN 1.2Ghz USPARQ 3 machine coming in at $14000 !!! WOHA

KLEOS

1) Actually the 970 is cheaper than the G4.
2) According to IBM there are plenty of 970's to go around
3) Ram speed is set by the BUS not the processor. There is no reason that Apple couldn't use slower RAM in their PowerBooks - as they already do due to heat issues - the 17" is the only PB with a 167mHz bus.
4) Why 90nm? The chip is already only very slightly larger than a G4 and runs cooler at the same mHz.
5) Apple are not in the same market as Sun Workstations. They could get there, but why? It's an even smaller market than they are alrady in.
6) SCSI?

Jason

 

[gezzas525]

Cheaper err I dont think so? Its a 64-bit chip, much higher transister count definetly not cheaper. And wheres the other 512Kb of cache? I want the FULL 1Mb!! its suppose to be a workstation chip for gods sake !!

Enough to go round thats what IBM says, maybe but not enough fot the chips to be used in both the desktops and powerbooks?

Why use slower memory? You want to create bottlenecks DUH!!
It has 6.4Gb/s bandwidth YOU HAVE TO USE DDR 400 AND IN PAIRS FOR DUAL CHANNEL OPERATION!!!

90nm need for lower power and feasible use in a portable platform.

Sun was an example!!

SCSI would be likely, why would you want to use IDE in a 64-bit workstation? Again your creating bottlenecks.

 

[utilizer]

Phil Schiller said it...

Phill Schiller stuck his foot in his mouth with what he said in that MWSF intro video showcasing the PowerBook, by saying something along these lines:
"With the largest and smallest full-featured notebooks ever made, you'll have a hard time remembering why you ever needed a desktop."

Now, the delay in the 15 in. PowerBooks and with this being the year of the notebook, not to mention on-going updates to the PowerBook 17/12 in models, we are going to see some movement here with Motorola being totally out of the picture. What better way to distribute reciprocity: Kick them while they're down, right in the gut, just like they did Apple!

970s will be in the Powerbooks before the year is out. In the words of Justin Wilson: "I guar-ran-tee!"

 

[Ensoniq]

Everyone's entitled to an opinion, but an informed opinion is what's best.

Multiple sources over the last few months have indicated the following without being contradicted by any reliable source:

1 - IBM has been in full scale production of the PPC 970 for a number of months.

2 - IBM's yields have been far greater than expected...both in higher speeds, and quantity of chips.

3 - A PPC 970 @ 1.2 GHz is cooler and draws less power than the 1 GHz G4 being used in PowerBooks today.

4 - IBM is able to sell the PPC 970 to Apple at a cost below what Apple pays Motorola for the G4 chips.

If someone has a source that absolutely contradicts the above, feel free to share it with us. Otherwise, no matter how much you pound the table claiming the above details are false, you're doing no more than "guessing" and have no weight to your argument.

Regarding the 15" PowerBook speculation:

Apple introduced the 12" and 17" PowerBooks in January...the 15" should have been updated shortly thereafter. All 3 Aluminum PowerBooks would have been designed simultaneously. Apple probably planned to put the 15" into production last so that they could get rid of Titanium stock first. But there's no doubt that the DESIGN of the 15" Aluminum PowerBook was done BEFORE the 12"/17" were announced.

Now 5 months later, nothing. What can explain that? Why would Apple leave the middle child stuck looking different with lesser features than it's siblings for so long? The ONLY thing that makes any sense is that just as Apple was getting ready to put the 15" into production, IBM informed them that PPC 970 production was far exceeding expectations. And that caused a dilemna (albeit a good one) for Apple.

They'd just released new PowerBooks they expected to last for a year. Now they find out that if they want, the PPC 970s will be available much sooner. So do they spend all the money to begin production on the planned 15" G4 upgrade, or do they retool and spend the money redesigning the 15" to take the PPC 970? Yes...it will cause a delay that won't make sense...UNTIL the 15" with PPC 970 is released to an unsuspecting crowd.

But wait...if the PPC 970 is way ahead of schedule, and Panther is not (because Apple thought they had a whole year) then their programmers need to kick some serious butt to push Panther along. So what does Apple do? Out of the blue, they push back WWDC for TWO months, stunning everyone who had already made plans to go.

If Apple found out in January that IBM could let them release PPC 970 machines 6 months ahead of schedule, they would have needed to scramble to do hardware redesigns and software upgrades they thought they had until January of 2004 to complete. Previous rumors line up with that...Panther and new machines not until 2004. But IBM changed all that by being successful in production. So Apple changed plans, and that is why the 15" update that MacWhispers said was coming didn't happen. NOT because MacWhispers was wrong, but because IBM made Apple change their own plans.

There are too many things happening at once...the "planets are aligning", as they would say. Even if the majority of you reading this don't believe a single word, at least I have explained in detail my position, and there is a flow of logic to it whether you agree with the end result or not.

I'd like to see others who insist on discounting the simultanous release of new PowerMacs and PowerBooks at least attempt to be as logical and thorough as I have.

-- Ensoniq

 

[pyrotoaster]

Originally posted by AppleMatt
So we stick in faster hard-drives! They draw lots of power and give out lots of heat!

Then everyone feels at home.

AppleMatt

Exactly! We've gotta burn our palms on something...

Seriously, I've heard that the lower-speed (i.e. 1.2, 1.4 GHz) 970s use less power than the existing G4s. They'd be perfect for laptops.

BTW, if anyone cares... MacUnderground is predicting Powerbook 970s, and has been for over a month now.

 

[StuPid QPid]

Originally posted by gezzas525
Cheaper err I dont think so? Its a 64-bit chip, much higher transister count definetly not cheaper. And wheres the other 512Kb of cache? I want the FULL 1Mb!! its suppose to be a workstation chip for gods sake !!

Since when has the 970 been a workstation chip?
The IBM Power 4 and soon to be Power 5 chips are workstation chips, and cost about the prices you're suggesting. The 970 is a 'lite' version, specifically made for lower end desktop machines and servers, if you can call an Apple powered 970 machine 'low end'...
Check your facts before you post!

 

[Postal]

gezzas525:

Whoa, cool down, please!

One thing to remember is that the actual speed of the system bus is 1/4 the speed of the processor itself, at least from what I've seen about the PPC 970 online. You only have (and need) that 6.4 GB/sec bandwidth on the 1.8 GHz chip.

So if the raw speed of the system bus on a 1.8 GHz PPC 970 is 450 MHz (450x2 is where we get the 900 MHz DDR bus), then the raw speed of the 1.2 GHz system's bus would be about 300 (effectively 600, since it would be DDR).

At that clock speed, you could easily get away with using DDR333 memory.

While I'm personally diminishing the likelihood of PPC 970 PowerBooks at WWDC or even this year, we don't actually know the power management features of the 970 - or whether Apple even cares that those features exist.

Oh, and as for the SCSI thing: if you go to the Apple Store online, notice how Apple doesn't actually offer any PowerMacs with SCSI hard disks at the moment; you just have the option of a SCSI card, and this is even true on the Xserve (which is supposed to be the server-class system). Apple is most likely going to choose ATA133 or Serial ATA for storage.

 

[MetallicPenguin]

Originally posted by Ensoniq
Everyone's entitled to an opinion, but an informed opinion is what's best.

Multiple sources over the last few months have indicated the following without being contradicted by any reliable source:

1 - IBM has been in full scale production of the PPC 970 for a number of months.

2 - IBM's yields have been far greater than expected...both in higher speeds, and quantity of chips.

3 - A PPC 970 @ 1.2 GHz is cooler and draws less power than the 1 GHz G4 being used in PowerBooks today.

4 - IBM is able to sell the PPC 970 to Apple at a cost below what Apple pays Motorola for the G4 chips.

If someone has a source that absolutely contradicts the above, feel free to share it with us. Otherwise, no matter how much you pound the table claiming the above details are false, you're doing no more than "guessing" and have no weight to your argument.

Regarding the 15" PowerBook speculation:

Apple introduced the 12" and 17" PowerBooks in January...the 15" should have been updated shortly thereafter. All 3 Aluminum PowerBooks would have been designed simultaneously. Apple probably planned to put the 15" into production last so that they could get rid of Titanium stock first. But there's no doubt that the DESIGN of the 15" Aluminum PowerBook was done BEFORE the 12"/17" were announced.

Now 5 months later, nothing. What can explain that? Why would Apple leave the middle child stuck looking different with lesser features than it's siblings for so long? The ONLY thing that makes any sense is that just as Apple was getting ready to put the 15" into production, IBM informed them that PPC 970 production was far exceeding expectations. And that caused a dilemna (albeit a good one) for Apple.

They'd just released new PowerBooks they expected to last for a year. Now they find out that if they want, the PPC 970s will be available much sooner. So do they spend all the money to begin production on the planned 15" G4 upgrade, or do they retool and spend the money redesigning the 15" to take the PPC 970? Yes...it will cause a delay that won't make sense...UNTIL the 15" with PPC 970 is released to an unsuspecting crowd.

But wait...if the PPC 970 is way ahead of schedule, and Panther is not (because Apple thought they had a whole year) then their programmers need to kick some serious butt to push Panther along. So what does Apple do? Out of the blue, they push back WWDC for TWO months, stunning everyone who had already made plans to go.

If Apple found out in January that IBM could let them release PPC 970 machines 6 months ahead of schedule, they would have needed to scramble to do hardware redesigns and software upgrades they thought they had until January of 2004 to complete. Previous rumors line up with that...Panther and new machines not until 2004. But IBM changed all that by being successful in production. So Apple changed plans, and that is why the 15" update that MacWhispers said was coming didn't happen. NOT because MacWhispers was wrong, but because IBM made Apple change their own plans.

There are too many things happening at once...the "planets are aligning", as they would say. Even if the majority of you reading this don't believe a single word, at least I have explained in detail my position, and there is a flow of logic to it whether you agree with the end result or not.

I'd like to see others who insist on discounting the simultanous release of new PowerMacs and PowerBooks at least attempt to be as logical and thorough as I have.

-- Ensoniq

Very nice...but do you think we will see 970's in 12" PowerBooks? And do you think the prices will go up back to their normal place or stay down? This whole thing is getting interesting....

 

[Sun Baked]

Originally posted by Ensoniq
Regarding the 15" PowerBook speculation:

Apple introduced the 12" and 17" PowerBooks in January...the 15" should have been updated shortly thereafter. All 3 Aluminum PowerBooks would have been designed simultaneously. Apple probably planned to put the 15" into production last so that they could get rid of Titanium stock first. But there's no doubt that the DESIGN of the 15" Aluminum PowerBook was done BEFORE the 12"/17" were announced.

Now 5 months later, nothing. What can explain that? Why would Apple leave the middle child stuck looking different with lesser features than it's siblings for so long? The ONLY thing that makes any sense is that just as Apple was getting ready to put the 15" into production, IBM informed them that PPC 970 production was far exceeding expectations. And that caused a dilemna (albeit a good one) for Apple.

-- Ensoniq

Everybody is reading WAY too much into a marketing decision by Apple, if it was a production decision they would not have left a legacy OS 9 bootable PowerBook, PowerMac, and iMac in the lineup -- and announce at the last major keynote that OS 9s death would now be moved June 2003, because of that darn application everybody was waiting for.

Everybody was trying to fit Apple's schedule to a juicy rumor of their choice, and there have been a lot.

Then there is the decision to speed bump the iBook and eMac instead of updating them to DDR and eliminating OS 9 bootability.

Too many data points point to reasons other than -- hey let's stuff a 970 into these beasties for the heck of it, and not introduce the 15" Powerbooks for this reason.

 

[pyrotoaster]

Originally posted by gezzas525
970's in powerbooks you must be joking? In order for that to happen IBM will have to move to 90nm production and even then we will have to wait a few months after that for apple to prepare the machines. 90nm for Intel will be in mass production nov-dec iam guessing IBM will also be at a similar timeframe with 970's based powerbooks ariving feb-april 2004. This is assuming no delays and with the extra complexities in the 64-bit architechture, it may also take longer. One more thing THERE IS NO PORTABLE DDR400 MEMORY CHIPS !!!! WITH REGISTERED/ECC DDR400 IS CURRENTLY PENDING APPROVAL BY JEDEC.

THERE IS NOT ENOUGH 970's TO GO ROUND, HENCE THEY WILL ONLY BE FOUND IN THE HIGHEND POWERMAC DESKTOPS PERIOD!! THEY WONT BE CHEAP EITHER MY GUESS THE SINGLE 1.8 WILL BE NO LESS THEN $3000-$4000 AND WILL PROBABLY COME WITH 2-4GB OF RAM AS STANDARD, SCSI, FX5900/9800.

KLEOS

No, no, no... The 970 is cheaper for Apple to produce. The new Powermacs will probably cost no more than the existing models.

And there are plenty of 970s to go around. IBM has been producing them for at least a month now, and possibly longer.

And I seriously doubt that Apple's going to start shipping machines with 2-4 Gigs of RAM. Most people aren't willing to pay Apple's outrageous RAM prices.

Powerbook 970s aren't unreasonable. I don't think MacBidouille has any info regarding them (perhaps their source is only close to the Powermac or Xserve production). And since they've got no info, they just made some assumptions and pushed the released date into next year.

Apple's laptops might be superior now, but in eight months, they won't be. Apple needs to push the Powerbook (and the iBook) ahead now, so they're still ahead later.