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PowerBook and iBook Confirmation?
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zepkin said:
The new Motos are meant to increase battery life by lowering the chips cycles when not in use or low usage, saving power. We should hopefully at least see that in the new specs.
64 bit OS
Firstly i would like to say that i dont know much about this whole 32 bit OS running on a 64 bit chip thing.
But if a 64 bit OS will run slower on 64 bit chips (G5) than a 32 bit OS, what advantages are there to a 64 bit OS, surely apple wouldnt bother releasing it unless there was some advantages.
Im sure someone will be able to easily tell me why
cheers
Reuven said:
Firstly i would like to say that i dont know much about this whole 32 bit OS running on a 64 bit chip thing.
But if a 64 bit OS will run slower on 64 bit chips (G5) than a 32 bit OS, what advantages are there to a 64 bit OS, surely apple wouldnt bother releasing it unless there was some advantages.
Im sure someone will be able to easily tell me why
cheers
Reuven said:
I think you have this backwards.
The G5 64bit should allow more instructions/information each cycle thus increasing the speed by some substantial percentage. Less cycles to do the same work means its faster.
Dippo said:
The Hertz rating is an excellent measure of performance within a single processor line. The myth isn't that Hertz matters, it's that Hertz comparison between processors has any point.
Thank you, please play the troll game again.
~J
If we assume that there will be updates to laptops next week, considering that emacs were updated last week what do u think the chances are of another update(PM or iMac) is next week, have we entered an "update season"?
elgruga said:
well, i possibly would... I don't really need all the power at the moment (sure fast will be slow in meantime, but still). Also I checked out some powermac stuff at apple store and found out I would get a dual 1.42 G4 for a better price than the single 1.6G5. the dual must be faster. The only actual bad thing about the dualg4 I can think of it's a lot louder than the G5.
So what I'm trying to say here is that the G5 isn't really the word of God, eventhough it might be revolutionary. The "when we do it we want to get it right" applies here too. It's microsoft that sells products that need further tweaking all the time -- let's not hope the same from Apple.
Why is the speed bump so important now? what if they just added more stuff to the same price? The laptops now have a ridiculous RAM size (256, 512 on the supermegamacs) and there is need for bigger hds too. I'd love to see this:
PB 12" SuperDrive
$1,599.00
12.1-inch TFT Display
1024x768 resolution
1GHz PowerPC G4
512K L2 cache
512MB DDR266 SDRAM x
60GB Ultra ATA/100 x
ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 (64MB DDR) x (this doesn't have to be upgraded, but it would be good for external displays.. also if playing games and such -- where an external displays comes in too)
Full size keyboard
10/100BASE-T Ethernet
FireWire 400
AirPort Extreme Ready
Mini-DVI out
But I guess it's not gonna happen. the 1GHz will be bumped a bit and they add a bigger HD. I still would have to buy more ram. The superdrive has to be there. a cd is much too small for the data sizes these days.
PB 12" SuperDrive
$1,599.00
12.1-inch TFT Display
1024x768 resolution
1GHz PowerPC G4
512K L2 cache
512MB DDR266 SDRAM x
60GB Ultra ATA/100 x
ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 (64MB DDR) x (this doesn't have to be upgraded, but it would be good for external displays.. also if playing games and such -- where an external displays comes in too)
Full size keyboard
10/100BASE-T Ethernet
FireWire 400
AirPort Extreme Ready
Mini-DVI out
But I guess it's not gonna happen. the 1GHz will be bumped a bit and they add a bigger HD. I still would have to buy more ram. The superdrive has to be there. a cd is much too small for the data sizes these days.
What I don't understand is why they can't simply put "slower" G5 chips in upcoming updated hardware? Even a bottom of the line G5, say a 1.5 GHz, is faster than top of the line G4. The 1.5 GHz G5 runs cooler than the 1.4 GHz G4. There shouldn't be a deficit of slow first generation G5s. At least using these lowered speed G5s would be a positive step.
QCassidy352 said:hey, it's my old friend, the voice of reason!
So yes, the G5 is better clock for clock, but the difference is hardly night and day, as some people here seem to think. IMHO, a lot of people are being lured by the "cutting edge" technology and not stopping to think about either how much better that technology really is, or what they would actually do with it.
.
Well, the G5 is not only better clock for clock, it also much better at sound in your ear - a 1.42 Ghz G4 is completely unberable in the old PM casing. even a single 1.2Ghz G4 is a pain in my ear - that's a very good reason to get a G5 in the first place. Now, let's look at performance - well, G5 is faster, but it's not the G5 alone - the complete bus was redone, beeing able to push something like what? I can't remember the factor of more data per second. AH, AN EXAMPLE: The G4 AGP bandwidth maxes out at about 600MB/s
In the G5 you get AGP 8x for a mere 2.1GB/s.
Now memory management was completely redone, allowing up to 16GB/s Bandwidth.
Now, what it comes down to is - G4 is hosted by a sorryly outdated system architecture with a lot of bottlenecks und unergonomic (noisy) casing.
The last part is a real turn off for me, and in turn for the computer. So no matter what you do with the PMG5 - even if it's just idling - as long as you are in the same room with it, it's always the better choice.
Kagetenshi said:
I don't think I would be disparaging towards him for "playing the troll game."
It is normally trolls or PC folk who compare only proc speeds. Yes, you have a point about comparisons being accurate within a single processor line (all other things being equal). However, his point was to question your apprarent pooh poohing of a mere 20% increase in speed (or whatever it was), without taking into account possible upgrades of other components. Also it came across that you felt a) it wouldn't be worth Apple's efforts, or b) it wouldn't be worth anyone waiting for.
I think most people's feeling is that it will be other updates to other parts of the PB that when taken in combination will make this a worthwhile upgrade. That consensus is what dispels the "megahertz myth", while you seemed to be looking at MHz alone. You may disagree with people that are not trolls; in fact I am sure you will.
Obviously, I feel it's worth waiting two or three days, but perhaps no longer if you are ready to buy a PB now.
Rip
I'd like to see Airport Extreme standard across all books (or at least the PowerBooks). And similar price adjustments in the UK as we saw with the eMacs.
Wireless is picking up momentum. Apple should be leading this like they have done with numerous other technologies - but an Airport card costing £70 on top of the notebook starts to hurt even when you're on a reasonable budget.
Wireless is picking up momentum. Apple should be leading this like they have done with numerous other technologies - but an Airport card costing £70 on top of the notebook starts to hurt even when you're on a reasonable budget.
QCassidy352 said:hey, it's my old friend, the voice of reason!
The dual 2.0 Ghz G5 is clocked ~41% faster than the dual 1.42 Ghz G4. So if the two chips (G4 and G5) were equal, the dual 2.0 G5 should outperform the top-end G4 by 41% per test.
How did you get those 41% btw? Looking from the G5 perspective, G4 is only 29% slower...
Check it out: (1420/2000)*100 =71(%) so G4 is running at 71% frequency of the G5, which is 29% percent slower...
Supposedly all the external components used with the chip (as currently assembled in the G5 PowerMac) also require too much power and need to dissipate more heat, especially the memory controller. Some of these will probably eventually be integrated into the CPU, but that takes time and engineering effort to achieve both by Apple and IBM. Also, even though the G5 (970fx) can generate less heat overall than a G4, the heat is more concentrated (smaller die size for the chip) and so can be harder to move away from the chip to dissipate it evenly, especially in the G5's ultra-thin enclosure.Sedulous said:
visor said:
If you have tried out 2000/1420 * 100 then it comes out to be about 40.8% which means that the G5 2ghz is about 41% faster than the G4 1.42.
Therefore, G5 2ghz is 41% faster, but the G4 1.42ghz is only 29% slower.
It all depends on which perspective u are looking from.
and if you don't believe in the mhz myth, then you would know that you can't really say this is wut percent faster just by comparing the mhz. You have to consider the IPC as well as many other factors.
aswitcher: do it!
Well, I just switched last weekend. I replaced My 1.6GHz P4m Thinkpad A31 with a Powerbook 17". I did some comparisons between a 1.6GHz Pm Thinkapd T40p and a Powerbook 15" 1GHz (both with 768MB RAM) and in my opinion the Powerbook is the equal of my T40p. So my partner will be very happy with the PB17 replacment for her A31. G4 is more than good enough for most things. You need video or render performance: get a G5 or Opteron desktop, if you're a heavy gamer: get na AMD box with a good display card. (of course these should be in addition to a Powerbook! )
Never mind that I'm waiting until june/july for my T40p replacement!
Have fun!
aswitcher said:
Its going to be a tough call. If they do good things like drop the price, bump up the screen resolution, better ram or anything else, then I am going to be torn...
G5PB is 5 months off I guess...can I wait...?
Well, I just switched last weekend. I replaced My 1.6GHz P4m Thinkpad A31 with a Powerbook 17". I did some comparisons between a 1.6GHz Pm Thinkapd T40p and a Powerbook 15" 1GHz (both with 768MB RAM) and in my opinion the Powerbook is the equal of my T40p. So my partner will be very happy with the PB17 replacment for her A31. G4 is more than good enough for most things. You need video or render performance: get a G5 or Opteron desktop, if you're a heavy gamer: get na AMD box with a good display card. (of course these should be in addition to a Powerbook!
)Never mind that I'm waiting until june/july for my T40p replacement!
Have fun!
Rev a 12"
I'm a 12" Rev A owner too, and I know that I'll be happy with it for years to come. Too bad for Apple though, they won't see me upgrading the nest 2-3 years. Good for me, because WHEN I do, I'll see major advances. How cool is G4 867 to G5 2,8 rather than G4 867 to G4 1,42 today?
paulie said:
I'm a 12" Rev A owner too, and I know that I'll be happy with it for years to come. Too bad for Apple though, they won't see me upgrading the nest 2-3 years. Good for me, because WHEN I do, I'll see major advances. How cool is G4 867 to G5 2,8 rather than G4 867 to G4 1,42 today?
bleachthru said:
My guess still is MacWorld SF in January '05. Given the usual update cycle of the PBs, this would nicely fit in.
G5 or bust
I want a new laptop in September and i'm not paying for another G4, i bought a powerbook last year (1.25Ghz) and it was pants, i sold it two months later and bought an eMac. I'll buy another eMac in September if a G5 doesn't come out, i'm not even interested in a G4 iBook, i'd be paying for a laptop that has less speed than last year! I would keep the eMac but i promised to sell it on after the Paris Expo.
Also I believe that as Apple updates its product lines it will drop the prices in the UK to be more inline with the dollar which is nice and *might* change my mind if everything is cheaper. I only want 12 inches of G5 goodness. It isn't even the power i'm after, its the fact that the G5 WILL be cheaper than the G4 as like what happened with the G5 Powermac.
Btw, Apple have been working on a G5 laptop for more than a year, before the release of the PM, how long does it take?
I want a new laptop in September and i'm not paying for another G4, i bought a powerbook last year (1.25Ghz) and it was pants, i sold it two months later and bought an eMac. I'll buy another eMac in September if a G5 doesn't come out, i'm not even interested in a G4 iBook, i'd be paying for a laptop that has less speed than last year! I would keep the eMac but i promised to sell it on after the Paris Expo.
Also I believe that as Apple updates its product lines it will drop the prices in the UK to be more inline with the dollar which is nice and *might* change my mind if everything is cheaper. I only want 12 inches of G5 goodness. It isn't even the power i'm after, its the fact that the G5 WILL be cheaper than the G4 as like what happened with the G5 Powermac.
Btw, Apple have been working on a G5 laptop for more than a year, before the release of the PM, how long does it take?