PowerMac G5, iMac G5, eMac Specs

[tgilbey]

Hattig, I think you speak a lot of sense, and I think that most people long ago accepted that a love for macs is a very expensive love, but people who are self-employed or part of small organisations will always look for price-performance. At the moment, I think that mac are "getting hammered on hardware" a bit as, whilst AMD are at a similar place with chip performance, you can put together an AMD machine at a much cheaper price point. I know that international pricing differences are another argument altogether, but fully loading a powermac with all the features I would want here in the uk would cost over 3150 GBP, or just under 6000USD. I would bet a lot of money that I could put together an AMD machine with the same, if not better, componentry, for about 2000 GBP.

The 2000USD difference is far too much for most users to pay just to run OSX.

 

[aljawad]

Apple Event?

I was at the London Apple store yesterday– where I purchased an iPod Photo with all the trimmings, including the camera connector!

(BTW, that store is HEAVEN for Mac-Heads from around the world!)

Anyhow, one of the presenters mentioned an upcoming Apple event “soon”– he didn’t know what was it gonna cover, but he had the impression it was something related to the iTunes store???

 

[MrKahuna]

Who cares about the price? I have waited to get a mini with tiger and this core image thing bugs me. It seems to me that any computer sold should at least be able to run the apps that came with it...

Except that core image is not an app. It is a component of the OS that can provide better performance on certain things. I think it's entirely reasonable that a low end computer might not be able to take advantage of all the components of the OS. You'll be able to run all the apps in Tiger, just not as fast as a higher end Mac. It's no different in the PC world, a $500 PC doesn't use all the potential components of WinXP (e.g. Hyper-Threading).

 

[iGary]

OK...

EVERYONE NEEDS TO TAKE A CHILL ON THIS FREAKING CORE IMAGE THING.

If your GPU is not supported, you CPU will handle the graphic task.

CHILL.

Ugh.

 

[maddav]

Yay finally, I've saved up best part of £1700 for a new desktop and it's been burning a hole in my bank account, time for a lovely new 20" iMac 2GHz!

So I suppose they'll anounce it next tuesday with the Powerbook G5s

 

[tex210]

an experience in reality

I took a friend to compusa the other day I wanted to see if they had the mini in. Bear with me, There is a point. He's a regular joe type. He fell in love with the AIO Imac. His priorities are 1. Itunes 2. Porn 3. Web 4. The way the machine looked (he loved the screen) & 5. Mac os X(he's done windows and was bored by it). He's waiting for the next revision for Apple to work out any kinks, and for Tiger to be included. The specs are not on his radar. If Apple lowered specs on the next release it wouldn't matter to him. I could gigahertz this and gigabyte that, but all he wants to know is will it do what he wants to do.
My priorities are not too far from his, not necessarily in the same order add video/photo editing, simple web design and dvd burning. An lcd panel is great, but price is a priority for me, so I am looking forward to a new emac, or the next revision of the mini. I did drool all over that iMac though..
edit: Core image... who cares! My current computer doesn't have altivec either, but will still run Tiger. With Altivec and a much faster processor than my current, I think I'll be very pleased.

 

[nagromme]

A great update if those are "dual duals"... if not, then OK, but don't stay with 2.7 for too long!

Pricing is a question mark too.... I know a lot of people want an iMac to be a top-of-the-line hard-core gaming machine, which I doubt it ever will be. But will the new improved specs cost the same (or less than) the old, despite adding BT standard etc.? That would be great--and after all, LCD prices are dropping they say...

 

[robotnick2000]

OK...
EVERYONE NEEDS TO TAKE A CHILL ON THIS FREAKING CORE IMAGE THING.
If your GPU is not supported, you CPU will handle the graphic task.
CHILL.
Ugh.

A CPU should have better things to do than handle GPU's work. My 0.02 €.

Please all go and visit Tom's Hardware and find what a piece of sh** the Radeon 9600 (yes, even the XT actually in OpenGL is!!!!

For your convenience: you'll find the 9600 easier if you start from the bottom line...

It exaclty as weak as the 5200 Ultra currently in iMacs and bottom-line G5's! I find that unbelievable!!!

I really hope this is some sort of "bad joke vengeance" from TS to show Apple how much pressure they can get from TS...

R2K

 

[devman]

OK...

EVERYONE NEEDS TO TAKE A CHILL ON THIS FREAKING CORE IMAGE THING.

If your GPU is not supported, you CPU will handle the graphic task.

CHILL.

Ugh.

Hey, I totally agree with you that people need to chill out. The core image thing is being way overblown by most.

But, it's not as simple as your CPU doing what an unsupported GPU can't. Some things are just not done on an unsupported system. e.g. the dashboard widget ripple is not there at all on an iBook. (now, if you say who cares, then I agree with that too - but the blanket statement that your CPU will handle it if your GPU is not supported is not correct).

 

[cgc]

When will they hit three

Doesn't really matter. You're saying that 3.0GHz is the magic number, but that's only .3GHz faster than the current projections. When will they go 970MP is the big question.

 

[iGary]

Hey, I totally agree with you that people need to chill out. The core image thing is being way overblown by most.

But, it's not as simple as your CPU doing what an unsupported GPU can't. Some things are just not done on an unsupported system. e.g. the dashboard widget ripple is not there at all on an iBook. (now, if you say who cares, then I agree with that too - but the blanket statement that your CPU will handle it if your GPU is not supported is not correct).

Understood, but it's not like this is an earth shattering thing. I can understand the frustration (I have two unsupported machines, though I may buy a card for the G4), but it's been expolained over and over again in multiple threads.

OK I'm done bitchin.

 

[appleface]

iMac remote control

"All models will also feature Bluetooth 2.0" according to thinksecret. that means they are ready for remote controllers. come on asteroid!

 

[nagromme]

the blanket statement that your CPU will handle it if your GPU is not supported is not correct).

But are people suggesting that Apple shouldn't make use of the power of higher-end boards? Should they take things away from people with higher boards, to make people with low-end Macs feel better? That's silly.

That's like saying Apple shouldn't support DVD burning, because it's optional hardware. Or that Apple shouldn't support printing, because not everyone has a printer.

Meanwhile, ripple effect or no, you have Dashboard functionality in Tiger even on a G3!

 

[devman]

But are people suggesting that Apple shouldn't make use of the power of higher-end boards? Should they take things away from people with higher boards, to make people with low-end Macs feel better? That's silly.

That's like saying Apple shouldn't support DVD burning, because it's optional hardware. Or that Apple shouldn't support printing, because not everyone has a printer.

Meanwhile, ripple effect or no, you have Dashboard functionality in Tiger even on a G3!

Terrific. But, I never said any of the things you are rebutting

 

[sigamy]

Quotes from 2002:
"Man, Moto sucks! 200mhz in one year?! Is that all they can do with the G4? Apple better dump Moto and wake up because x86 is killing us!"


Quotes from 2005:
"Man, IBM sucks! 200mhz in one year?! Is that all they can do with the G5? Apple better dump IBM and wake up becasue x86 is killing us!"


It's deja vu all over again.

 

[BornAgainMac]

2.7 Ghz?! It's time to get the paint out. Powermacs in 5 lickable colors.

 

[sw1tcher]

speed bumps

Wow. Speed bumps.... the kind that prevent you from going too fast.

 

[Hiroshige]

but great on the low end

If this rumor is true and you might be able to get a dual 2 Ghz with 512 MB RAM and an ATI 9600 for $1999 (what the dual 1.8 costs now with only 256 and the FX 5200)- then that is a significant price drop from $2499 and it would be golden.

So while the high end is not good, the low end is outstanding.

They should put PCI-E on the high end, at least.

 

[dicklacara]

His priorities are 1. Itunes 2. Porn 3. Web 4. The way the machine looked (he loved the screen) & 5. Mac os X(he's done windows and was bored by it).

... now, if you could combine iTunes with porn... wouldn't that be something?

 

[crpchristian]

If apple announces some killer new PM's at NAB then, wonderful, if not, then WTF? IBM has to be getting a ton of money to be putting into R&D right now, all three next gen consoles are going with IBM, on top of apple and pre existing buisness. WIth the wait going this long i see only 2 possibilities. Either Apple/IBM has held off speed bumps for and entire year because they are, as planned, realeasing some hot new technology OR, they planned to and aren't able to come up with what htey hoped for...which would be a super shame. It seems so hard to believe a 200mhz speed bump, if thats more or less all it is, wouldn't have come out months ago.

And so true with the apple proline tappering off...WHY buy a power mac when you can get an imac that includes that killer screen...all that extra money just for expansion possibilities....not justified.

Its all rumors until the show....I really hope i won't regreat waiting an entire year on getting a PM....ugh.. "year of HD"... how can he say that and it not mean killer new hardware......COME ON NAB..GET HERE ALREADY

 

[itsa]

... now, if you could combine iTunes with porn... wouldn't that be something?

a lot of the music on there is no better than porn.

 

[tex210]

... now, if you could combine iTunes with porn... wouldn't that be something?

LOL! That's actually why I don't think Apple wants to be in the movie distribution business. We all know what will be hot sellers/rentals.

edit: Bornagainmac, please no to the colors... that was the whole retail Imac problem... kinda like gold iPods.

 

[Yvan256]

OK...

EVERYONE NEEDS TO TAKE A CHILL ON THIS FREAKING CORE IMAGE THING.

If your GPU is not supported, you CPU will handle the graphic task.

CHILL.

Ugh.

Indeed. The way I understand it, CoreImage will try to use the hardware in such manner:

- Use the GPU
- if the GPU can't do the task, ask the CPU
- Does the CPU has Altivec? Yes, use that
- No Altivec? Use generic G3 code then

In short, use what works best given a certain task.

 

[alfismoney]

ok, so the powermac updates may or may not be worth buying.

what do we know about fcp 5 and the other software? what do people hear about support for cluster rendering? how about mpeg/imx? an improved render engine? better audio support? some form of audio editing (most likely logic as it's in house) integration which we are GRAVELY lacking now?

 

[HiRez]

If it's true I'm very disappointed. After all that time, 3ghz is the bare minimum. We also need more RAM than 512 MB, faster RAM than the PC3200 and the possibility to have more than 8 Gigs.

I don't have a problem with 512 MB of RAM, that is an adequate baseline for OS X right now, plenty to load the OS and do basic tasks without thrashing the HD. You can always add your own later, it's inexpensive if you don't buy it from Apple, easy to install, and with 8 RAM slots you have a lot of options. More than 8 GB of RAM? Meh. The percentage of people who could actually use that has to be miniscule, I would bet far less than 1%. Once apps are able to address more than 4 GB, we'll see. I think an 11" x 14", 32-bit image at 2,000 dpi takes up about 2 GB, so it's possible people will need more than 8, but does everyone who doesn't need it want to pay for the added expense of adding those RAM slots, controllers for them, etc? I doubt it. Personally I'd like to see space utilized for more internal drive bays before RAM slots.