From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
[quote] Steve Jobs: "The roadmap on the PowerPC actually looks pretty good and there are some advantages to it. As an example, the PowerPC has something in it called AltiVec, we call the Velocity Engine -- it's a vector engine -- it dramatically accelerates media, much better than, as an example, the Intel processors or the AMD processors... so we actually eek out a fair amount of performance from these things when all is said and done. And the roadmap looks pretty good. Now, as you point out, once our transition to Mac OS 10 is complete, which I expect will be around the end of this year or sometime early next year and we get the top 20% of our installed base running 10, and I think the next 20 will come very rapidly after that. Then we'll have options, then we'll have options and we like to have options. But right now, between Motorola and IBM, the roadmap looks pretty decent. "
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
VE (velocity engine a vectorial processing unit) is an add-on of Moto to PowerPC that accelerates a lot media and makes the difference between G4 and P4 less than the MHz let us supposed (the MHz myth campaign). BUT with AMD and Intel > 2GHz, they must have at least 1.5 GHz G4. But, this imply tio developpers to optimize their apps to use Altivec. So better will be a G5 (with or without VE) at 2.0 or 2.5 GHz (with the right bus, graphic card, serial ata 133...).
And, yes Moto and IBM are good options : the G4/5 (consumer macs) for the first and G3/POWER4/5 for the second (high end mac and XServe)
One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps)
3rd parties would need to be on-board to transition their hardware drivers yet again.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Like I've said before, I don't necc think this is a lock or anything, but the idea is very interesting to me. This specific point can make an interesting point with the conspiracy theorists tho....How come so many popular applications haven't ported to OS X yet? Most of the music business hasn't ported it's software yet, altho this is mostly because things weren't working correctly with plugins. What if the other reason were that Apple had already had them starting on the NEXT version of their software, so they will be X compatible under a different proc? Just an extra thought to make people wonder more. I have NO contacts at all
<strong>VE (velocity engine a vectorial processing unit) is an add-on of Moto to PowerPC that accelerates a lot media and makes the difference between G4 and P4 less than the MHz let us supposed (the MHz myth campaign). BUT with AMD and Intel > 2GHz, they must have at least 1.5 GHz G4. But, this imply tio developpers to optimize their apps to use Altivec. So better will be a G5 (with or without VE) at 2.0 or 2.5 GHz (with the right bus, graphic card, serial ata 133...).
And, yes Moto and IBM are good options : the G4/5 (consumer macs) for the first and G3/POWER4/5 for the second (high end mac and XServe)
One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps)
</strong><hr></blockquote>
What matters is not clock rate, it is system performance. If Apple somehow builds systems which kick the crap out of a 4 GHz P4, but do it using a 1 GHz processor, then they are the performance champs. If they get a new 15 GHz PowerPC that is only 10% faster than the current PowerMac, then they aren't. Look at the POWER4 -- it is extremely fast at a mere 1 GHz. There is no magic threshold that they must pass or die. They don't even have to be the absolute performance champs (even if that could be defined) -- they just have to be competitive in terms of price/performance at their price points.
Also, a 64-bit system isn't required and most of its benefits will only be seen by high end server or scientific compution applications. All other things being equal a 64-bit machine will typically be slower than a 32-bit machine for most tasks. Remember that this only refers to the size of the processor's integer registers (and thus memory addresses), and few applications need >4 GB of address space and work with integers outside of that range. In all other ways the G4 is already a 64 or 128-bit machine, and it supports up to 16 GB of physical memory.
Processor <-> memory bandwidth is currently where the G4 is most severely held up (especially in a dual processor machine), and the sooner that a new PowerPC comes along to correct this, the better.
OSx.2 Jaguar is faster than 10.1 because they optimize it for altivec (maybe for the next gen of graphic card too).
<hr></blockquote>
Wrong. Jagwire is faster for many reasons not the least of which is the fact that apps are now compiled with GCC 3.1 which compiles code that runs faster.
[quote] One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps) <hr></blockquote>
Others are better qulaified on this but very very few apps will benefit from a 64bit chip with the apps most people use today.
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
You beat me to it... thanks for posting the whole comment. There have been many examples of being quoted out of context, but this one is particularly severe! Must have been done by somebody who desperately thinks that switching to x86 would actually do something positive for Apple.
Can we close this thread now? I think it has been beated to death yet again.
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, noticd that. But doesn't seem like anyone else can read. This is the perfect example of how rumours get started, inaccurate representation of the facts. But people continue along with their dreams.
"What matters is not clock rate, it is system performance."
Yes. Though 'mhz' may help in the performance 'perception'...especially in terms of 'mhz' heads for the switch campaign. However...
"If Apple somehow builds systems which kick the crap out of a 4 GHz P4, but do it using a 1 GHz processor, then they are the performance champs."
I'd sooner take a Pentium stuffing PPC at 1 gig than...a paper thin 'mhz' champ... (Power 4...der-rool, der-roooool...)
"If they get a new 15 GHz PowerPC that is only 10% faster than the current PowerMac, then they aren't. Look at the POWER4 -- it is extremely fast at a mere 1 GHz. There is no magic threshold that they must pass or die."
Correct.
"They don't even have to be the absolute performance champs (even if that could be defined) -- they just have to be competitive in terms of price/performance at their price points."
Which, at the moment they're not. Not even close.
As many creative benches from Lightwave to Photoshop show. It's funny. I spent much of my time moaning about this disparity. And criticised for wanting better price/performance ratio. Yet when Apple didn't release improved hardware (eg 'power'Macs...) at the show...people on these boards went nuts!
"Processor <-> memory bandwidth is currently where the G4 is most severely held up (especially in a dual processor machine), and the sooner that a new PowerPC comes along to correct this, the better."
Yes. It is. However, adding a few extra fpu to the G4 would make it more competitive. Afterall, the x86 already has 'bandwidth'. The G4 is only playing catch up on this. My point is that the G4 needs something more to make up for the 18 month 'debacle'. I think we'd call that something a 'G5' on Rio.
As many creative benches from Lightwave to Photoshop show. It's funny. I spent much of my time moaning about this disparity. And criticised for wanting better price/performance ratio. Yet when Apple didn't release improved hardware (eg 'power'Macs...) at the show...people on these boards went nuts!
Steve Jobs: "The roadmap on the PowerPC actually looks pretty good and there are some advantages to it. As an example, the PowerPC has something in it called AltiVec, we call the Velocity Engine -- it's a vector engine -- it dramatically accelerates media, much better than, as an example, the Intel processors or the AMD processors... so we actually eek out a fair amount of performance from these things when all is said and done. And the roadmap looks pretty good. Now, as you point out, once our transition to Mac OS 10 is complete, which I expect will be around the end of this year or sometime early next year and we get the top 20% of our installed base running 10, and I think the next 20 will come very rapidly after that. Then we'll have options, then we'll have options and we like to have options. But right now, between Motorola and IBM, the roadmap looks pretty decent. "
Note that nowhere is he talking about switching to Intel. Check out the bold!
This whole thread was based on a quote which was taken out of context.
Any app written in a high level language (C, C++, etc) for OS X, either Carbon or Cocoa, could be easily recomplied for x86 or the 64 bit extension of x86 used in Opteron. No rewrites necessary. The only sticking point would be PPC assembly... but I'm guessing the vast majority of apps that use PPC assembly are doing so to get at Altivec - so if Altivec units were present, those assembly instructions would still work, no code rewrite necessary. The only instructions that would be left out in the cold would be nonAltivec PPC assembly, and those could be translated - presumably these aren't very common, so most folks wouldn't notice a thing. Alternatively, if this is really an issue, just put a G3 in there to handle nonAltivec PPC assembly. But I really suspect the Opteron architecture could do a nice job with nonAltivec PPC instructions... a modest speed hit maybe, but not enough to really notice in the vast majority of applications. Besides, Opteron's raw speed might make up for the translation hit anyway (as in the 68000->PPC transition).[/QB]<hr></blockquote>
First of all calling C a high level language is an interesting statement. C is one of the most high performing languages above Assembler code becuase it is so LOW level. I mean yeah it's easier to do more complicated stuff than Basic, Fortran, Cobal, or any of the others, but it's not high level.
Now secondly. It is not just a simple recompile that is needed to move from one processor to another. Yeah people always say that, but once you try you start realizing that Big-Endianess versus Little-Endianess makes a huge difference when casting from int to char. In one case you loose the high order bits, while in the other you loose the low order bits. Yeah most people don't think about that when they are programming, but once you hit bugs like that you realize how difficult your port is going to be.
Other things that crop up are stupid designs in the Intel architecture versus good ones in other Processor families. For one thing Intel does not have an atomic increment method for use with multi-processor machines. That will cause you so much trouble it's unbelievable. And on top of that Intel's architecture for multi-processor systems in general is piss poor.
Porting from one architecture to another is never just as simple as a recompile. Just take a look at some GNU code and take a look at all the #DEFINE statements which change how a program runs on different platforms!
All of those problems can be avoided if programmers stick to the conventions set forth in Cocoa, and more generically C standards, but just ask one and you will find out many don't do this.
Now the advantage of the Mach kernel is that it has great Hardware abstraction, and as long as Apple Engineers have been coding properly, it shouldn't take the OS much time to be ported over to Intel, or any other platform.
The applications are a completely different issue. It will take all the people who engineered those a while to get them ported, since most likely they weren't using any abstraction tools.
Hmm... Steve talkng about moving to X86, huh? I wonder if they'll blacklist him from the next Macworld for spreading rumors. heh
The truth is, though, he was quoted out of context. All of the speculation is not only a waste of time, but also a bit pointless. There's something coming down the line, and it'll happen for Macworld SF or before, and it's NOT an x86 chip, I gaurantee it.
A shame, X86 Macs would have been cheaper to make. But ultimately the PowerMac is the way to go for the Mac's future. I can't wait to see the G5 chips. Apple is just recently started to use dual processor Macs and is using SMP. The Amiga will have SMP when AmigaOS 5.0 is finished, if you ask me Amiga should have done SMP way back in 1992.
The Apple speed argument is a futile discussion. Higher clocking chips are not always faster. X86 (Intel) is concerned with high clock rates as to sell and market their chips. The Pentium 4 was designed with this in mind. Porting OS X to x86 would ensure they could market their machines using clock speed as a comparison to wintel. Remember back to 96/97. Apple had the highest clocking chips with the 603e (first to 300mhz) as well as the 604e. Though these chips clocked as fast and were in fact faster than x86 chips, this did not help Apple sell machines. In addition when the g3s were introduced, they originally clocked lower than the 6043, but were in fact better performers. What does this prove:
High clock speed does not mean better performance or increased sales.
If Apple switched to X86 they would loose all the advantages of PPC such as cooler operation and the use of lower wattage. The transition would be more difficult than 68k to PPC because X86 is not so much faster that it could emulate PPC at the same speed as the machines today. Developers are just catching up with porting to OSX, do they want to re-write their apps again?
What should Apple do?
Design efficient computer with performance in mind. The G4 is a fast chip, but in its current incarnation it is limited. Apple needs to improve bus and ram speed. Multiple processors/cores are another way to increase performance.
Future providers: I'd say they will stick with Motorola for another 6 to 9months with the G4. Next year sometime the will bring out a fifth generation PPC chip. I don't know who will provide it (IBM most likely) but I still have confidence in PPC and Apple ability to design fast computers.
<strong>A shame, X86 Macs would have been cheaper to make. </strong><hr></blockquote>
From what information I have, Apple makes most of their profits from hardware sales. So, just wondering if you think Apple would be able to sell an X86 mac box for $1000.00 more than a dell box given that the dell box was almost identical to the mac box?
Comments
[quote] Steve Jobs: "The roadmap on the PowerPC actually looks pretty good and there are some advantages to it. As an example, the PowerPC has something in it called AltiVec, we call the Velocity Engine -- it's a vector engine -- it dramatically accelerates media, much better than, as an example, the Intel processors or the AMD processors... so we actually eek out a fair amount of performance from these things when all is said and done. And the roadmap looks pretty good. Now, as you point out, once our transition to Mac OS 10 is complete, which I expect will be around the end of this year or sometime early next year and we get the top 20% of our installed base running 10, and I think the next 20 will come very rapidly after that. Then we'll have options, then we'll have options and we like to have options. But right now, between Motorola and IBM, the roadmap looks pretty decent. "
<hr></blockquote>
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
VE (velocity engine a vectorial processing unit) is an add-on of Moto to PowerPC that accelerates a lot media and makes the difference between G4 and P4 less than the MHz let us supposed (the MHz myth campaign). BUT with AMD and Intel > 2GHz, they must have at least 1.5 GHz G4. But, this imply tio developpers to optimize their apps to use Altivec. So better will be a G5 (with or without VE) at 2.0 or 2.5 GHz (with the right bus, graphic card, serial ata 133...).
And, yes Moto and IBM are good options : the G4/5 (consumer macs) for the first and G3/POWER4/5 for the second (high end mac and XServe)
One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps)
MWNY02 : <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
[ 07-19-2002: Message edited by: Appleworm ]
[ 07-19-2002: Message edited by: Appleworm ]</p>
OSx.2 Jaguar is faster than 10.1 because they optimize it for altivec (maybe for the next gen of graphic card too).
MWNY02 : <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
<strong>
3rd parties would need to be on-board to transition their hardware drivers yet again.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Like I've said before, I don't necc think this is a lock or anything, but the idea is very interesting to me. This specific point can make an interesting point with the conspiracy theorists tho....How come so many popular applications haven't ported to OS X yet? Most of the music business hasn't ported it's software yet, altho this is mostly because things weren't working correctly with plugins. What if the other reason were that Apple had already had them starting on the NEXT version of their software, so they will be X compatible under a different proc? Just an extra thought to make people wonder more. I have NO contacts at all
<strong>VE (velocity engine a vectorial processing unit) is an add-on of Moto to PowerPC that accelerates a lot media and makes the difference between G4 and P4 less than the MHz let us supposed (the MHz myth campaign). BUT with AMD and Intel > 2GHz, they must have at least 1.5 GHz G4. But, this imply tio developpers to optimize their apps to use Altivec. So better will be a G5 (with or without VE) at 2.0 or 2.5 GHz (with the right bus, graphic card, serial ata 133...).
And, yes Moto and IBM are good options : the G4/5 (consumer macs) for the first and G3/POWER4/5 for the second (high end mac and XServe)
One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps)
</strong><hr></blockquote>
What matters is not clock rate, it is system performance. If Apple somehow builds systems which kick the crap out of a 4 GHz P4, but do it using a 1 GHz processor, then they are the performance champs. If they get a new 15 GHz PowerPC that is only 10% faster than the current PowerMac, then they aren't. Look at the POWER4 -- it is extremely fast at a mere 1 GHz. There is no magic threshold that they must pass or die. They don't even have to be the absolute performance champs (even if that could be defined) -- they just have to be competitive in terms of price/performance at their price points.
Also, a 64-bit system isn't required and most of its benefits will only be seen by high end server or scientific compution applications. All other things being equal a 64-bit machine will typically be slower than a 32-bit machine for most tasks. Remember that this only refers to the size of the processor's integer registers (and thus memory addresses), and few applications need >4 GB of address space and work with integers outside of that range. In all other ways the G4 is already a 64 or 128-bit machine, and it supports up to 16 GB of physical memory.
Processor <-> memory bandwidth is currently where the G4 is most severely held up (especially in a dual processor machine), and the sooner that a new PowerPC comes along to correct this, the better.
OSx.2 Jaguar is faster than 10.1 because they optimize it for altivec (maybe for the next gen of graphic card too).
<hr></blockquote>
Wrong. Jagwire is faster for many reasons not the least of which is the fact that apps are now compiled with GCC 3.1 which compiles code that runs faster.
[quote] One more thing, Mac are under 32 bit system and CPU, they need a 64 bit one (especially for media apps) <hr></blockquote>
Others are better qulaified on this but very very few apps will benefit from a 64bit chip with the apps most people use today.
[quote] MWNY02 : <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" /> <hr></blockquote>
What were you expecting? A G5? Don't believe the rumor sites and maybe you won't be dispointed.
Wanted new g4 towers? wait a month.
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
You beat me to it... thanks for posting the whole comment. There have been many examples of being quoted out of context, but this one is particularly severe! Must have been done by somebody who desperately thinks that switching to x86 would actually do something positive for Apple.
Can we close this thread now? I think it has been beated to death yet again.
<strong>From MacRumors today, it seems Job's comment was taken out of context.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, noticd that. But doesn't seem like anyone else can read. This is the perfect example of how rumours get started, inaccurate representation of the facts. But people continue along with their dreams.
Yes. Though 'mhz' may help in the performance 'perception'...especially in terms of 'mhz' heads for the switch campaign. However...
"If Apple somehow builds systems which kick the crap out of a 4 GHz P4, but do it using a 1 GHz processor, then they are the performance champs."
I'd sooner take a Pentium stuffing PPC at 1 gig than...a paper thin 'mhz' champ... (Power 4...der-rool, der-roooool...)
"If they get a new 15 GHz PowerPC that is only 10% faster than the current PowerMac, then they aren't. Look at the POWER4 -- it is extremely fast at a mere 1 GHz. There is no magic threshold that they must pass or die."
Correct.
"They don't even have to be the absolute performance champs (even if that could be defined) -- they just have to be competitive in terms of price/performance at their price points."
Which, at the moment they're not. Not even close.
As many creative benches from Lightwave to Photoshop show. It's funny. I spent much of my time moaning about this disparity. And criticised for wanting better price/performance ratio. Yet when Apple didn't release improved hardware (eg 'power'Macs...) at the show...people on these boards went nuts!
"Processor <-> memory bandwidth is currently where the G4 is most severely held up (especially in a dual processor machine), and the sooner that a new PowerPC comes along to correct this, the better."
Yes. It is. However, adding a few extra fpu to the G4 would make it more competitive. Afterall, the x86 already has 'bandwidth'. The G4 is only playing catch up on this. My point is that the G4 needs something more to make up for the 18 month 'debacle'. I think we'd call that something a 'G5' on Rio.
As always, Programmer, a handsome post.
Lemon Bon Bon
[ 07-19-2002: Message edited by: Lemon Bon Bon ]</p>
<strong>
As many creative benches from Lightwave to Photoshop show. It's funny. I spent much of my time moaning about this disparity. And criticised for wanting better price/performance ratio. Yet when Apple didn't release improved hardware (eg 'power'Macs...) at the show...people on these boards went nuts!
Lemon Bon Bon
[ 07-19-2002: Message edited by: Lemon Bon Bon ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
What people went nuts? I'm still waiting til August to determine what they have to offer. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt til then.
Steve Jobs: "The roadmap on the PowerPC actually looks pretty good and there are some advantages to it. As an example, the PowerPC has something in it called AltiVec, we call the Velocity Engine -- it's a vector engine -- it dramatically accelerates media, much better than, as an example, the Intel processors or the AMD processors... so we actually eek out a fair amount of performance from these things when all is said and done. And the roadmap looks pretty good. Now, as you point out, once our transition to Mac OS 10 is complete, which I expect will be around the end of this year or sometime early next year and we get the top 20% of our installed base running 10, and I think the next 20 will come very rapidly after that. Then we'll have options, then we'll have options and we like to have options. But right now, between Motorola and IBM, the roadmap looks pretty decent. "
Note that nowhere is he talking about switching to Intel. Check out the bold!
This whole thread was based on a quote which was taken out of context.
<strong>Here is the actual quote:
Steve Jobs: "..... But right now, between Motorola and IBM, the roadmap looks pretty decent. "
.</strong><hr></blockquote>
decent... decent?.. From the man who coined the phrase "Insanely Great", decent sounds like "poor".
MSKR
Apple has [and will continue to have] more than 1 OS;
there is the FAT CLIENT = OSX
there is the THIN CLIENT= iPod OS
there is the SERVER ..........= OSX SERVER
now that we're *nix, 64 bit processor is right around the corner.
to complete a true coup d'etat
at least the THIN CLIENT OS must (i)Sync with all x86 in existence.
at some point Apple must release at least an "LE" version of their OS to re-Hijack every desktop computer on every desk in the world.
Any app written in a high level language (C, C++, etc) for OS X, either Carbon or Cocoa, could be easily recomplied for x86 or the 64 bit extension of x86 used in Opteron. No rewrites necessary. The only sticking point would be PPC assembly... but I'm guessing the vast majority of apps that use PPC assembly are doing so to get at Altivec - so if Altivec units were present, those assembly instructions would still work, no code rewrite necessary. The only instructions that would be left out in the cold would be nonAltivec PPC assembly, and those could be translated - presumably these aren't very common, so most folks wouldn't notice a thing. Alternatively, if this is really an issue, just put a G3 in there to handle nonAltivec PPC assembly. But I really suspect the Opteron architecture could do a nice job with nonAltivec PPC instructions... a modest speed hit maybe, but not enough to really notice in the vast majority of applications. Besides, Opteron's raw speed might make up for the translation hit anyway (as in the 68000->PPC transition).[/QB]<hr></blockquote>
First of all calling C a high level language is an interesting statement. C is one of the most high performing languages above Assembler code becuase it is so LOW level. I mean yeah it's easier to do more complicated stuff than Basic, Fortran, Cobal, or any of the others, but it's not high level.
Now secondly. It is not just a simple recompile that is needed to move from one processor to another. Yeah people always say that, but once you try you start realizing that Big-Endianess versus Little-Endianess makes a huge difference when casting from int to char. In one case you loose the high order bits, while in the other you loose the low order bits. Yeah most people don't think about that when they are programming, but once you hit bugs like that you realize how difficult your port is going to be.
Other things that crop up are stupid designs in the Intel architecture versus good ones in other Processor families. For one thing Intel does not have an atomic increment method for use with multi-processor machines. That will cause you so much trouble it's unbelievable. And on top of that Intel's architecture for multi-processor systems in general is piss poor.
Porting from one architecture to another is never just as simple as a recompile. Just take a look at some GNU code and take a look at all the #DEFINE statements which change how a program runs on different platforms!
All of those problems can be avoided if programmers stick to the conventions set forth in Cocoa, and more generically C standards, but just ask one and you will find out many don't do this.
Now the advantage of the Mach kernel is that it has great Hardware abstraction, and as long as Apple Engineers have been coding properly, it shouldn't take the OS much time to be ported over to Intel, or any other platform.
The applications are a completely different issue. It will take all the people who engineered those a while to get them ported, since most likely they weren't using any abstraction tools.
Sorry for ranting.
The truth is, though, he was quoted out of context. All of the speculation is not only a waste of time, but also a bit pointless. There's something coming down the line, and it'll happen for Macworld SF or before, and it's NOT an x86 chip, I gaurantee it.
High clock speed does not mean better performance or increased sales.
If Apple switched to X86 they would loose all the advantages of PPC such as cooler operation and the use of lower wattage. The transition would be more difficult than 68k to PPC because X86 is not so much faster that it could emulate PPC at the same speed as the machines today. Developers are just catching up with porting to OSX, do they want to re-write their apps again?
What should Apple do?
Design efficient computer with performance in mind. The G4 is a fast chip, but in its current incarnation it is limited. Apple needs to improve bus and ram speed. Multiple processors/cores are another way to increase performance.
Future providers: I'd say they will stick with Motorola for another 6 to 9months with the G4. Next year sometime the will bring out a fifth generation PPC chip. I don't know who will provide it (IBM most likely) but I still have confidence in PPC and Apple ability to design fast computers.
<strong>A shame, X86 Macs would have been cheaper to make. </strong><hr></blockquote>
From what information I have, Apple makes most of their profits from hardware sales. So, just wondering if you think Apple would be able to sell an X86 mac box for $1000.00 more than a dell box given that the dell box was almost identical to the mac box?