That would make a single PPC 970 processor running at the same MHz as a G4 a bit less than 2x faster for SPECint2000, and a bit over 3x faster for SPECfp.
A single PPC 970 @ 2.5 GHz vs. a single G4 @ 1.4 GHz would result in the PPC 970 being about 3.1x faster for SPECint, and about 5.8x faster.
This is all "on paper" of course, but still, quite interesting.
Hmmm... a couple uneducated guesses on the incorrect conventional wisdoms:
#1) The PPC970 won't be included in consumer boxes until well after its introduction in the PowerMacs
#2) Apple won't introduce PPC970 systems until 2004</strong><hr></blockquote>
Nope, I and many others still content to the fall release, even IBM said the fall. Moto has nothing to rleease so why is it that some can't grasp the fall release?
Moki, know anything different then a fall release?
<strong>Well, I meant two separate fairly surprising items... at least based on current conventional wisdom re: the PPC970's and Apple's new machines.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Multi-GPU configs, where substantial OS-ness is offloaded. FW3200. XGrid. IBM adds 'Mac OS X Server' to list of supported/provided OSes for a wide array of their lineup (which currently includes AIX and Linux, basically).
As far as I can see, Apple's dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's to be useful in the 'workstation' market. I'd rather run FrameMaker under Mac OS X than AIX.
I can't believe I'm replying to one the many Kim's, but:
#1) Apple has said nothing about this yet.
#2) Nobody expects this stuff for a while.
#3) I don't think we'll see it in a PowerMac until MWSF (if there is one)
#4) I don't think these processors are being produced yet, other than prototypes, and I think we'll see a few more proto refinements before they are rolling off the conveyor belts (so to speak)
Buying a Dual 1.42 GHz PowerMac right now is not a bad move. The PowerMac is the most recently updated piece of Apple hardware, and I still say we wont see the 970 til super late 2003, or 2004. IT MAY BE A MERRY X_MAS AFTER ALL </strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah...but there's going to be buyers that'll get screwed...it's inevitable. If (and I say if) Apple chooses the 970 and ships it later this year, the jump in performance will be huge. And there's going to be a lot of people that will have bought a Dual 1.42 GHz a few weeks before the 970. I'm saying this matter of factly. I don't really care if they screwed or not...it's up to them to follow rumors and make decisions based on the rumors...but the fact is, people will buy a 1.42 GHz G4 right before the 970 and will have gotten the worst deal of their lives.
19 years ago Apple wanted IBM dead. Now they need them to survive. Thanks Big Brother!
also...
Why do I have a bad feeling we wont see the 970 for another 12 months. Jobs did say this was the year of the laptop. 2.5ghz 970s in a tower sure would make this the year of the workstation as well.
Yeah...but there's going to be buyers that'll get screwed...it's inevitable. If (and I say if) Apple chooses the 970 and ships it later this year, the jump in performance will be huge. And there's going to be a lot of people that will have bought a Dual 1.42 GHz a few weeks before the 970. I'm saying this matter of factly. I don't really care if they screwed or not...it's up to them to follow rumors and make decisions based on the rumors...but the fact is, people will buy a 1.42 GHz G4 right before the 970 and will have gotten the worst deal of their lives.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Ugh... I don't even know WHERE to begin... <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[oyvey]" />
Gee I just found a cure for old age (okay the G4 isn't that bad... but its getting really close) oh BUT maybe I should keep it to myself cause after all the families of those who have already died might feel bad.
A friend who reads a lot about the tech industry told me that the 970 would immediately be able to begin scaling from 2.5 GHz (which they have RIGHT NOW) to 5.0 GHz, and that it would reach that mark at the same time Intel hits 5 GHz at least. Is this true? That would be awesome, we'd finally have the best of both worlds - the awesome industrial design and wonderful OS of today's Macintosh, combined with the competitive power of years gone by. Looks like we're shaping up for a good next couple of years!
EDIT: People always get screwed. What's Apple going to do, quit selling the PowerMac G4 six weeks before the PowerMac 970 comes out just so no one gets overly pissed? Early adopters of the current generation of G4s will be just as screwed as those who bought a IIvx just weeks before the Quadra 650... the performance difference will probably be very similar. The Q650 was something like 3x faster than the IIvx, and the IIvx was a real piece of crap.
<strong>19 years ago Apple wanted IBM dead. Now they need them to survive. Thanks Big Brother!</strong><hr></blockquote>
Hmmm, given Job's sense of irony, what venue would be good for the release of a remake/tribute of the "1984" commercial? Maybe that's the reason we haven't heard anything from Apple about using this chip. They're waiting for the remake to be finished?
<strong>A friend who reads a lot about the tech industry told me that the 970 would immediately be able to begin scaling from 2.5 GHz (which they have RIGHT NOW) to 5.0 GHz, and that it would reach that mark at the same time Intel hits 5 GHz at least. Is this true?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not necessarily. The P4 was designed to run at high clock speeds. In fact Intel made some engineering tradeoffs that resulted in its performance actually being worse than the PIII's at the same clock speed. But they made up for this by pushing the clock speed much faster than they could get the PIII up to.
So the P4 has plenty of headroom. And its performance bottlenecks are well mapped. That means that fairly minor tweaks (that are already known) to the process used to fabricate them will improve clock speeds.
With the PPC970, IBM probably has some headroom, (and bumping 1.8 Ghz from the "high-end" clock speed to the "entry level" speed is a good sign) but how much and how easy it will be to tweak the design probably isn't well understood at this point. So yes, they will probably be able to improve on things without major revisions to the design as time goes on, but how much and how fast is anybody's guess.
The 601 CPU was the top of the line from Mar 94 to Aug 95 when the 604 came. Then the G3 came in Nov 97 to be replaced by the G4 two years later. They all have been relegated from the top of the line CPUs in two years or less apart from the G4 that have been in the front line for more than 3 years. So who should be surpriced?
I am eagerly awaiting a dual 1.25 at work, and I will not be upset if the midrange is replaced by a dual 2 GHz 970 later this year. For it intended use the 1.25 will last me several years.
If Apple was to lessen the blow to the G4 owners they could use 970 in the 1.4 to 1.8 GHz and avoid those that are to fast <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[oyvey]" /> and perhaps go to all single configuration to not risk beating the Pentium IV.
My hope that after four failing years with the G4 that Apple will be eager to get all ther performence they can get and are willing and eager to beat up the competition IRL not in some few selected PS filters.
I have tried to calculate how many time higher SPEC scores a dual 970 gets than my current G4/400 at home but I am running out out of fingers <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> Is a manyfold a bigger entity than a several fold?
Sorry for the pun, I am giddy <img src="graemlins/cancer.gif" border="0" alt="[cancer]" />
<strong>EDIT: People always get screwed. What's Apple going to do, quit selling the PowerMac G4 six weeks before the PowerMac 970 comes out just so no one gets overly pissed? Early adopters of the current generation of G4s will be just as screwed as those who bought a IIvx just weeks before the Quadra 650... the performance difference will probably be very similar. The Q650 was something like 3x faster than the IIvx, and the IIvx was a real piece of crap.
Yes, the Quadra 650 was faster than the IIVX, but it certainly wasn't twice as fast or three times. We're talking about a 33MHz (I believe) 68030 vs. a 40MHz 68040. In any case, I've been livid once or twice concerning purchasing right before the next generation. I smartly purchased my Quarda 650 (which is still a good machine), but was infuriated over the fact my 8600/300 wasn't going to be fully supported by OS X, especially when the low end G3 that came out soon after was slower than my machine. But that anger soon dissipated when I learned years later OS X ran poorly on the beige G3. I wouldn't have been any better off.
Now, concerning the leap from G4 to 970, it's a different story. This is most likely the most significant watershed in Mac history. It's only real parallel one could cite would be from the 68040 to the first generation Power Macs. Yet, this is more significant because of the performance spike promised.
One positive thing is, for the Mac users under rocks with fingers stuck in their ears, Apple has set a precedent for protecting them. If you recall, there was a tradeup program post-MWSF 2003 for hardware bought something like a month or so before an upgrade. (Can't remember exact terms, but those details are close.) I think there's a good chance Apple will provide the same opportunity when the 970 Mac appears.
Comments
SPECint2000
? 937 @ 1.8 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 1051 @ 1.8 GHz
Dhrystone MIPS
? 5220 @ 1.8 GHz
....
So let's extrapolate this to 2.5ghz...
SPECint2000
? 1301 @ 2.5 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 1459 @ 2.5 GHz
Dhrystone MIPS
? 7250 @ 2.5 GHz
.....
Here's what the current MOT G4 does:
SPECint2000
? 418 @ 1.4 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 248 @ 1.4 GHz
.....
That would make a single PPC 970 processor running at the same MHz as a G4 a bit less than 2x faster for SPECint2000, and a bit over 3x faster for SPECfp.
A single PPC 970 @ 2.5 GHz vs. a single G4 @ 1.4 GHz would result in the PPC 970 being about 3.1x faster for SPECint, and about 5.8x faster.
This is all "on paper" of course, but still, quite interesting.
.....
Oh, and here's a Pentium IV @ 3.06 GHz:
SPECint2000
? 1032 @ 3.06 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 1092 @ 3.06 GHz
.....
Looks like an interesting future indeed...
<strong>
Hmmm... a couple uneducated guesses on the incorrect conventional wisdoms:
#1) The PPC970 won't be included in consumer boxes until well after its introduction in the PowerMacs
#2) Apple won't introduce PPC970 systems until 2004</strong><hr></blockquote>
Nope, I and many others still content to the fall release, even IBM said the fall. Moto has nothing to rleease so why is it that some can't grasp the fall release?
Moki, know anything different then a fall release?
<strong>Well, I meant two separate fairly surprising items... at least based on current conventional wisdom re: the PPC970's and Apple's new machines.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Multi-GPU configs, where substantial OS-ness is offloaded. FW3200. XGrid. IBM adds 'Mac OS X Server' to list of supported/provided OSes for a wide array of their lineup (which currently includes AIX and Linux, basically).
As far as I can see, Apple's dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's to be useful in the 'workstation' market. I'd rather run FrameMaker under Mac OS X than AIX.
<strong>
I can't believe I'm replying to one the many Kim's, but:
#1) Apple has said nothing about this yet.
#2) Nobody expects this stuff for a while.
#3) I don't think we'll see it in a PowerMac until MWSF (if there is one)
#4) I don't think these processors are being produced yet, other than prototypes, and I think we'll see a few more proto refinements before they are rolling off the conveyor belts (so to speak)
#5) forget #5
Buying a Dual 1.42 GHz PowerMac right now is not a bad move. The PowerMac is the most recently updated piece of Apple hardware, and I still say we wont see the 970 til super late 2003, or 2004. IT MAY BE A MERRY X_MAS AFTER ALL
Yeah...but there's going to be buyers that'll get screwed...it's inevitable. If (and I say if) Apple chooses the 970 and ships it later this year, the jump in performance will be huge. And there's going to be a lot of people that will have bought a Dual 1.42 GHz a few weeks before the 970. I'm saying this matter of factly. I don't really care if they screwed or not...it's up to them to follow rumors and make decisions based on the rumors...but the fact is, people will buy a 1.42 GHz G4 right before the 970 and will have gotten the worst deal of their lives.
This is really great news. I just can't wait for next fall. Anyone else want to get knocked out for a few months to help them wait?
YAAAAHOOOOOO!
also...
Why do I have a bad feeling we wont see the 970 for another 12 months. Jobs did say this was the year of the laptop. 2.5ghz 970s in a tower sure would make this the year of the workstation as well.
That would allow Apple to ship the iBook with a 7457. Whee.
<strong>
Yeah...but there's going to be buyers that'll get screwed...it's inevitable. If (and I say if) Apple chooses the 970 and ships it later this year, the jump in performance will be huge. And there's going to be a lot of people that will have bought a Dual 1.42 GHz a few weeks before the 970. I'm saying this matter of factly. I don't really care if they screwed or not...it's up to them to follow rumors and make decisions based on the rumors...but the fact is, people will buy a 1.42 GHz G4 right before the 970 and will have gotten the worst deal of their lives.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Ugh... I don't even know WHERE to begin... <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[oyvey]" />
Gee I just found a cure for old age (okay the G4 isn't that bad... but its getting really close) oh BUT maybe I should keep it to myself cause after all the families of those who have already died might feel bad.
<img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" />
Dave
I think I just heard the sound of PowerMac G4 sales hitting rock bottom....
EDIT: People always get screwed. What's Apple going to do, quit selling the PowerMac G4 six weeks before the PowerMac 970 comes out just so no one gets overly pissed? Early adopters of the current generation of G4s will be just as screwed as those who bought a IIvx just weeks before the Quadra 650... the performance difference will probably be very similar. The Q650 was something like 3x faster than the IIvx, and the IIvx was a real piece of crap.
[ 02-27-2003: Message edited by: Luca Rescigno ]</p>
<strong>19 years ago Apple wanted IBM dead. Now they need them to survive. Thanks Big Brother!</strong><hr></blockquote>
Hmmm, given Job's sense of irony, what venue would be good for the release of a remake/tribute of the "1984" commercial? Maybe that's the reason we haven't heard anything from Apple about using this chip. They're waiting for the remake to be finished?
/rampant speculation
what's that I smell?
*sniff sniff*
Is it?
*sniff*
could it be?
*sniff sniff sniff*
I think it is!
I smelll a bakeoff!
<strong>A friend who reads a lot about the tech industry told me that the 970 would immediately be able to begin scaling from 2.5 GHz (which they have RIGHT NOW) to 5.0 GHz, and that it would reach that mark at the same time Intel hits 5 GHz at least. Is this true?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not necessarily. The P4 was designed to run at high clock speeds. In fact Intel made some engineering tradeoffs that resulted in its performance actually being worse than the PIII's at the same clock speed. But they made up for this by pushing the clock speed much faster than they could get the PIII up to.
So the P4 has plenty of headroom. And its performance bottlenecks are well mapped. That means that fairly minor tweaks (that are already known) to the process used to fabricate them will improve clock speeds.
With the PPC970, IBM probably has some headroom, (and bumping 1.8 Ghz from the "high-end" clock speed to the "entry level" speed is a good sign) but how much and how easy it will be to tweak the design probably isn't well understood at this point. So yes, they will probably be able to improve on things without major revisions to the design as time goes on, but how much and how fast is anybody's guess.
<strong>BOOOM!!!!!
I think I just heard the sound of PowerMac G4 sales hitting rock bottom....</strong><hr></blockquote>
<cheap shot>
Wouln't that be more like *plink*?
</cheap shot>
<strong>IBM PPC 970:
SPECint2000
? 937 @ 1.8 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 1051 @ 1.8 GHz
Dhrystone MIPS
? 5220 @ 1.8 GHz
....
So let's extrapolate this to 2.5ghz...
SPECint2000
? 1301 @ 2.5 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 1459 @ 2.5 GHz
Dhrystone MIPS
? 7250 @ 2.5 GHz
.....
Here's what the current MOT G4 does:
SPECint2000
? 418 @ 1.4 GHz
SPECfp2000
? 248 @ 1.4 GHz</strong><hr></blockquote>
:eek: :eek: :eek:
[ 02-27-2003: Message edited by: Leonis ]</p>
IBM can give you a reaming, and will give you a reaming!
Barto
PS I'm aware of the bitter humor of being on 886 posts (I've just bought an Athlon).
[ 02-28-2003: Message edited by: Barto ]</p>
there may be more than one bag of sand, too... two more that I can think of actually <hr></blockquote>
Ah. The iBook will finally get it's 1 GHz G3!
<strong>
<cheap shot>
Wouln't that be more like *plink*?
</cheap shot></strong><hr></blockquote>
<img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> that was pretty cheap.
As far as the ppc970...it looks like Apple has a bright future ahead, but what will become of Motorola?
The 601 CPU was the top of the line from Mar 94 to Aug 95 when the 604 came. Then the G3 came in Nov 97 to be replaced by the G4 two years later. They all have been relegated from the top of the line CPUs in two years or less apart from the G4 that have been in the front line for more than 3 years. So who should be surpriced?
I am eagerly awaiting a dual 1.25 at work, and I will not be upset if the midrange is replaced by a dual 2 GHz 970 later this year. For it intended use the 1.25 will last me several years.
If Apple was to lessen the blow to the G4 owners they could use 970 in the 1.4 to 1.8 GHz and avoid those that are to fast <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[oyvey]" /> and perhaps go to all single configuration to not risk beating the Pentium IV.
My hope that after four failing years with the G4 that Apple will be eager to get all ther performence they can get and are willing and eager to beat up the competition IRL not in some few selected PS filters.
I have tried to calculate how many time higher SPEC scores a dual 970 gets than my current G4/400 at home but I am running out out of fingers <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" /> Is a manyfold a bigger entity than a several fold?
Sorry for the pun, I am giddy <img src="graemlins/cancer.gif" border="0" alt="[cancer]" />
<strong>EDIT: People always get screwed. What's Apple going to do, quit selling the PowerMac G4 six weeks before the PowerMac 970 comes out just so no one gets overly pissed? Early adopters of the current generation of G4s will be just as screwed as those who bought a IIvx just weeks before the Quadra 650... the performance difference will probably be very similar. The Q650 was something like 3x faster than the IIvx, and the IIvx was a real piece of crap.
[ 02-27-2003: Message edited by: Luca Rescigno ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes, the Quadra 650 was faster than the IIVX, but it certainly wasn't twice as fast or three times. We're talking about a 33MHz (I believe) 68030 vs. a 40MHz 68040. In any case, I've been livid once or twice concerning purchasing right before the next generation. I smartly purchased my Quarda 650 (which is still a good machine), but was infuriated over the fact my 8600/300 wasn't going to be fully supported by OS X, especially when the low end G3 that came out soon after was slower than my machine. But that anger soon dissipated when I learned years later OS X ran poorly on the beige G3. I wouldn't have been any better off.
Now, concerning the leap from G4 to 970, it's a different story. This is most likely the most significant watershed in Mac history. It's only real parallel one could cite would be from the 68040 to the first generation Power Macs. Yet, this is more significant because of the performance spike promised.
One positive thing is, for the Mac users under rocks with fingers stuck in their ears, Apple has set a precedent for protecting them. If you recall, there was a tradeup program post-MWSF 2003 for hardware bought something like a month or so before an upgrade. (Can't remember exact terms, but those details are close.) I think there's a good chance Apple will provide the same opportunity when the 970 Mac appears.
[ 02-28-2003: Message edited by: Big Mac ]</p>