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Yes!

Yet another reason to wait for a new PowerBook. I think this is great, all these many months of waiting will hopefully soon pay off...:D YAY!
 
dr_lha said:
Exactly. Clearly Altivec is going to be no speed demon emulated on x86, but it will increase the compatibility with PPC software.
Support the Altivec calls, and make sure that Classic Support is still working.

Without the G4, Classic is dead -- seems Apple may have had a call to keep it around a little longer from the education and corporate crowd.

People who might have software, that cannot afford another round of both new SW and HW at the same time.

Should be interesting to see if it is true, and what happens with Classic.
 
PPC970FX said:
Dudes the SSE3 is the closest we will ever et to Altivec on a x86 chip EVER. Emulating hardware is like dressing up a man as a women, he may look like a girl but if you shag him you will fast understand and feel that it is not a girl.
This also helps in explaining why some emulators perform much better than the originals, too, right? :)
 
aegisdesign said:
That's quite an assumption bearing in mind Intel native vector code is way slower than AltiVec already.

I will look for a link but it was my understanding that a lot of the calls made to altivec could be remapped so to speak to SSE3, in other words while it may not be fast it would be plenty usable. I wouldn't be suprised if we ended up with Intel Powerbooks using Rosetta that were running Altivec PPC apps just as fast as the current G4.
 
Sun Baked said:
Without the G4, Classic is dead

And this is a bad thing because... ? People can still buy used machines to run Classic just fine, I say Apple cut lose the Classic crowd to move forward, that's a lot of coding wasted, move forward, not backwards. Let those who still cherish Classic find older machines, that's what those who still covet Amiga, BeOS, and other fringe OSes do and if you do your Googling those people aren't complaining.
 
Sun Baked said:
Support the Altivec calls, and make sure that Classic Support is still working.

Without the G4, Classic is dead -- seems Apple may have had a call to keep it around a little longer from the education and corporate crowd.

People who might have software, that cannot afford another round of both new SW and HW at the same time.

Should be interesting to see if it is true, and what happens with Classic.
I believe that Apple have already stated that Classic support is ended with the introduction of Intel Macs.
 
This is a good thing, but the fact that Intel x86 chips will be in Macs STINKS, and always will. I would love it if only the portables went to x86 while PowerMacs and iMacs could stay PPC. As long as all software is written in Univeral Binaries, this could be possible.

x86 stinks, it always has, and always will. I'll never fully accept x86 chips in a Mac. x86 needs to die, right along with Windows. I also find it quite funny that suddenly so many in the Mac community are suddenly embracing x86 or claiming they "never had a problem with x86". Bullcrap. I guess these people feel they have no choice. I may someday have to have a Mac with a crapp-ass x86 processor in it, with no open firmware and no Altivec, but I won't like it; I'll always hate it. Always.
 
NickCharles said:
This is a good thing, but the fact that Intel x86 chips will be in Macs STINKS, and always will.

Hating x86 won't change the fact that PowerBook is seriously lagging behind Intel-based notebooks. As long as MacTel works, runs fast and smooth, I really don't care what's underneath and neither should you.
 
PPC970FX said:
Dudes the SSE3 is the closest we will ever et to Altivec on a x86 chip EVER. Emulating hardware is like dressing up a man as a women, he may look like a girl but if you shag him you will fast understand and feel that it is not a girl.


That explains a lot to me (in my computer life & in my general life)
 
nutmac said:
Hating x86 won't change the fact that PowerBook is seriously lagging behind Intel-based notebooks. As long as MacTel works, runs fast and smooth, I really don't care what's underneath and neither should you.

Yes I DO care. It's a crappy architecture, no Open Firmware, and no Altivec. I don't care about x86 substitutes for the above either. I would like to think that Apple going "intel" would kick IBM in the ass and make them get their ^&%$ together and make the G5 and beyond PPC chip that is possible to run in a laptop.

I also doubt you would have made the "I don't care what's underneath" comment two years ago.
 
I guess all those rumors that the pro line will transit last due to lack of x86 binaries for pro applications can finally die now.

Intel Powerbooks next Tuesday! :p
 
If it's true, this quite sudden AltiVec compatible-Rosetta must mean that Intel Macs are coming quite soon. It suddenly makes the ab-sol-lute need for waiting for the universal binary-verision of an AltiVec-required app, far less necessary.
Suddenly you can get, say, an x86 PowerBook, and all the apps run fine. Not at full speed, but presumably fast enough....
 
generik said:
I guess all those rumors that the pro line will transit last due to lack of x86 binaries for pro applications can finally die now.

Intel Powerbooks next Tuesday! :p
Only took 39 posts, but it was coming, as the new PowerBooks hopefully will be, but January, not next Tuesday.

I think this is truly wonderful news for the likes of me, still undecided whether to get the last PPC PBs or hold out for the first Macintels. If they get released in January, they coincide about the same time as my planned purchase. I am more than happy to be a x86 guinea pig, I just hope it won't be a simple processor switch and we can get some other goodies included too. Blu-ray is still in my dreams.
 
I really hope you stop using macs and switch to windows, really i do. One less moron..

Let me state a couple things for the record.

1. I recently purchased a quad g5
2. I own about 4 different models of dual processo g5, maxed out
3. I have an official developer (intel) transition kit.
4. I have a dual processor amd athlon dual core 64bit 2.4ghz
5. I have a single amd processor
6. I have single intel 3.73ghz
7. I have a dual core "test kit" (yes that's right) on loan from Intel

All of them except the first 2 on my list have one thing in common. Do you know what that is? They are fast. VERY fast. I've test os x on them (yes i'm not supposed to...), and OS X without proper drivers and it runs faster on all the x86 systems than it does on any motorola ibm chip.

Sorry but it's time for powerpc to die. it's a great chip, especially for that home broadband router, or my wireless acess point. but for a computer? sorry. it's time.

Apple recognizes something you can not, that the powerpc is beginning to suck. I've never been impressed with my mac, beachball city. for the first time os x feels really fast, and this is on a hacked up x86...

I can't wait for the transition to happen so we get some good speeds and chips finally. If you were to use an intel box you wouldn't even know, except for the fact that you'd be like "wow this powerpc is really fast, .. blah blah" then i'd politely let you know it's an intel dev kit.

Don't be an idiot.



NickCharles said:
This is a good thing, but the fact that Intel x86 chips will be in Macs STINKS, and always will. I would love it if only the portables went to x86 while PowerMacs and iMacs could stay PPC. As long as all software is written in Univeral Binaries, this could be possible.

x86 stinks, it always has, and always will. I'll never fully accept x86 chips in a Mac. x86 needs to die, right along with Windows. I also find it quite funny that suddenly so many in the Mac community are suddenly embracing x86 or claiming they "never had a problem with x86". Bullcrap. I guess these people feel they have no choice. I may someday have to have a Mac with a crapp-ass x86 processor in it, with no open firmware and no Altivec, but I won't like it; I'll always hate it. Always.
 
Benjamin said:

Slightly off topic but...

After reading the Wikipedia article on Altivec and then reading their article on Power PC, it dawned on me that there may no longer be a Power Mac and a Power Book once Apple switches to Intel...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC
The first single-chip implementation of the design was the MPC601, a hybrid of the POWER1 and PowerPC specifications released in 1992. This allowed the chip to be used by IBM in their existing POWER1 based platforms, although it also meant some slight pain when switching to the 2nd generation "pure" PowerPC designs. Apple continued work on a new line of Macintosh computers based on the chip, and eventually released them as the 601-based Power Macintosh on March 14, 1994.

What is the replacement going to be, the Pentium Mac?
 
aegisdesign said:
With DDR sitting on a 167Mhz bus that gives you 2.6GB/s. Apple's Intrepid2 system controller supports DDR2 memory and talks to it on a 64bit 333Mhz bus. ie. 5.2GB/s theoretically - I'm not sure if the RAM they ship does that. I think that's actually faster than most of the Dothan based laptops which max out around 4.3GB/s.
The Intrepid 2 controllers in the 15" and 17" PowerBooks run the RAM at 167 MHz DDR = "333 MHz", the same speed as in the current 12" and previous 15" and 17" PowerBooks. So you're still maxing out at 2.5 GB/sec. DDR2 doesn't somehow mean "twice as fast as DDR"; it's just the next generation of DDR SDRAM.

The RAM is capable of running at 267 MHz DDR = "533 MHz", and the RAM in the new Power Macs does run at that speed, but not the RAM in the PowerBooks.
 
Fiveos22 said:
Slightly off topic but...

After reading the Wikipedia article on Altivec and then reading their article on Power PC, it dawned on me that there may no longer be a Power Mac and a Power Book once Apple switches to Intel...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC


What is the replacement going to be, the Pentium Mac?
This is probably the most asked question, transition-wise, at the moment. The best suggestion I heard was Express Mac and Express Book for consumer products and ProMac and ProBook for pro lines, (keeping with the current naming from apple for software). They may sound hideous, but they are probably the most likely if they were to ditch i and Power for the switch.
 
Sun Baked said:
Should be interesting to see if it is true, and what happens with Classic.

I hope they extend support for Classic. There are a lot of legacy programs many businesses and individuals are still using and need. There are no upgrade paths for most of these programs. Apple's already done the hard work of supporting Classic, extending it to MacIntel is easy and it will gain them continued customer loyalty. This is a long term issue.
 
Photorun said:
And this is a bad thing because... ? People can still buy used machines to run Classic just fine, I say Apple cut lose the Classic crowd to move forward, that's a lot of coding wasted, move forward, not backwards. Let those who still cherish Classic find older machines, that's what those who still covet Amiga, BeOS, and other fringe OSes do and if you do your Googling those people aren't complaining.

Wow, you're such a young'un or you have a really bad memory.
 
Fiveos22 said:
Slightly off topic but...

What is the replacement going to be, the Pentium Mac?

That's pretty much OT....

So much so, and such an anticipated topic.... better to start a new thread on that! (maybe a Poll...?)

To get going:

MacTel?
IntelMac?
G6?
 
Fiveos22 said:
Slightly off topic but...

After reading the Wikipedia article on Altivec and then reading their article on Power PC, it dawned on me that there may no longer be a Power Mac and a Power Book once Apple switches to Intel...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC

The first single-chip implementation of the design was the MPC601, a hybrid of the POWER1 and PowerPC specifications released in 1992. This allowed the chip to be used by IBM in their existing POWER1 based platforms, although it also meant some slight pain when switching to the 2nd generation "pure" PowerPC designs. Apple continued work on a new line of Macintosh computers based on the chip, and eventually released them as the 601-based Power Macintosh on March 14, 1994.

What is the replacement going to be, the Pentium Mac?
It's impossible to know for sure, but the Intel switch may not mean the death of the Power* products. Keep in mind that, while the Power Mac was indeed born with the PowerPC transition, the PowerBook had existed for several years before then (since 1991, I believe), and in fact every one of Apple's laptops besides the Portable was named PowerBook (or PowerBook Duo) until the release of the iBook in 1999.

Pulling some numbers mostly out of the air, I'd say there's an 85% chance of "PowerBook" surviving the Intel transition, and a 75% chance for "Power Mac". :)
 
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