Apple to use 970, confirmed by IBM
Hi,
I work in IT for a large corporation and IBM gave us a presentation about the future of their pSeries and other systems today. Part of the presentation was about the Power processors. They talked about the Power 4, 4+, 5 and 5+. They also briefly discussed the blade servers running what they had listed as the Power 970. They mentioned the Vector unit but said it would not be used in their blade servers, it was for something else. I later asked the rep if the 970 was going to be sold to Apple and he said yes. He was sure of this, and seemed surprised that I knew anything about it. He said they (Apple) have them in their labs now, and that they plan to release them. He said the Vector unit (altivec) was for Apple and that IBM has been told to caution their customers that they have no plans to implement it in their Linux or AIX versions of the blade servers. I told him I heard that Linux may support it in the future, but he wasn't sure about that. He said the Blades would be available Q3 but didn't know when Apple would release them. I later asked if the Blades would be out before Macs and he didn't know. So it's possible we could see a 970 Mac at least as soon as the Blades come out, which would fit in with the timelines we've been hearing elsewhere.
Another interesting thing he talked about was the work they were doing on the Playstation 3. He said it was going to be a dual core chip, but one core would be for graphics. He also said they were implementing something with a company called (or a technology called) Blossom that was a grid computing system for the PS3. It had something to do with multiplayer gaming, but allowed the processing power to be shared, at least part of it, on the grid. Then I remembered Apple's XGrid trademark. I would say it's a safe bet that Apple intends to incorporate that sort of technology into future XServes.
They also listed the speed on the Blades as 1.7Ghz+. I suspect that was for marketing though, as the fastest Power 4+ they had on the roadmap for this year was 1.7GHz. So they probably will have 1.8's as reported elsewhere but didn't want to make it in any way seem faster than the POWER based boxes. They also listed a Blade+ but he never showed that slide and like an idiot I forgot to ask him. Although I'm sure it would be just info about the 980 and other things we've already heard.
Anyhow, I hope that's helpful. I'd consider this to be absolute confirmation that the 970 is going to be in Macs soon. The question now is when.
Cheers,
John
I work in IT for a large corporation and IBM gave us a presentation about the future of their pSeries and other systems today. Part of the presentation was about the Power processors. They talked about the Power 4, 4+, 5 and 5+. They also briefly discussed the blade servers running what they had listed as the Power 970. They mentioned the Vector unit but said it would not be used in their blade servers, it was for something else. I later asked the rep if the 970 was going to be sold to Apple and he said yes. He was sure of this, and seemed surprised that I knew anything about it. He said they (Apple) have them in their labs now, and that they plan to release them. He said the Vector unit (altivec) was for Apple and that IBM has been told to caution their customers that they have no plans to implement it in their Linux or AIX versions of the blade servers. I told him I heard that Linux may support it in the future, but he wasn't sure about that. He said the Blades would be available Q3 but didn't know when Apple would release them. I later asked if the Blades would be out before Macs and he didn't know. So it's possible we could see a 970 Mac at least as soon as the Blades come out, which would fit in with the timelines we've been hearing elsewhere.
Another interesting thing he talked about was the work they were doing on the Playstation 3. He said it was going to be a dual core chip, but one core would be for graphics. He also said they were implementing something with a company called (or a technology called) Blossom that was a grid computing system for the PS3. It had something to do with multiplayer gaming, but allowed the processing power to be shared, at least part of it, on the grid. Then I remembered Apple's XGrid trademark. I would say it's a safe bet that Apple intends to incorporate that sort of technology into future XServes.
They also listed the speed on the Blades as 1.7Ghz+. I suspect that was for marketing though, as the fastest Power 4+ they had on the roadmap for this year was 1.7GHz. So they probably will have 1.8's as reported elsewhere but didn't want to make it in any way seem faster than the POWER based boxes. They also listed a Blade+ but he never showed that slide and like an idiot I forgot to ask him. Although I'm sure it would be just info about the 980 and other things we've already heard.
Anyhow, I hope that's helpful. I'd consider this to be absolute confirmation that the 970 is going to be in Macs soon. The question now is when.
Cheers,
John
Comments
I've heard that 2.5Ghz was the top, but 1.7 seems reasonable for actual retail production. 2.5 is the number for future implementation I'm asserting.
It will be great to see the IBM chip back at Apple. I was one of the proud owners of a G3/350 IBM Chip in a B/W tower, that thing is a work horse and still goes head to head with my Dual G4/867 everyonce in a while; somethings I can't tell the difference in everyday use between the two.
IBM has the better mind for Chip making in personal/server computers. Where as my thoughts are that Moto perfers the embedded/portable chip markets.
Your statement seems highly likely because what I see usually happening with rumors is that a guy will predict 1Ghz, and then the chip actually ship @ 933Mhz. I've seen that happen about 3 times now which leads me to believe that the manufacturer's max clock estimate is different from Apple's standards.
Did they say anything about a 9800 PowerPC Power5? There has been some buzz about this, and if they didn't talk about it at the presentation, it's likely it's non-existant: for now.
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I had an IBM rep come from the (northern U.S.) to our college in Kansas and I talked to him for about half an hour about their processors centering the conversation around the 970, and the Power4. What he said is that it did have some Apple-specific features in it and that it was highly likely that Apple was going to pursue it as it's main high-end chip. That was in the Fall of 2002. So with your statement, it looks like things are look'n up.
-walloo.
[ 03-12-2003: Message edited by: willywalloo ]</p>
Lemon Bon Bon <img src="graemlins/surprised.gif" border="0" alt="[surprised]" />
I'm inclined to believe that this is definitely plausible. After all I though Workerbee was wrong and we know how that turned out.
Cheers,
John
[ 03-12-2003: Message edited by: johnpg ]</p>
==the message for everyone
I think I'm going to dump the idea of the 9800. I am aware of the 980, but that seems some what far down the road in the Apple timeline. (as well as the theoretical 9800 was I'm sure, heh)
So IBM and Sony will be working together on the PS3, I haven't even looked at this. It makes a huge amount of sense. IBM does RISC processors. Sony uses RISC processors. Man, I can't even imagine using one of those proc. in a 'wrig dedicated with hardware and software only dedicated to gaming.
The PS2 is awesome, but the PS3 will be huge. UT2003 or UT3 -like. Did he/she say anything more on the PS3?
whoa,
-walloo
[ 03-12-2003: Message edited by: willywalloo ]</p>
I guess that's part of why I'm so baffled every time people say, "You know, we still don't even know if Apple will use the 970."
Believe it people. Tis good news.
I'll watching the whisper traces of Sony/Apple co-operation with great interest...
Lemon Bon Bon <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
<strong>The only thing that doesn't smell right is the idea that the 970s in the blade servers won't be using Altivec. That doesn't make any sense.</strong><hr></blockquote>Well Linux and AIX don't support Altivec, so I think that's what they mean. They don't want their customers to think it's going to make their software faster just because it has a vector unit. I think that there is support in gcc for Altivec though, so it's possible that Linux on the 970 might have some support for it. But he didn't know anything about that.
As for Apple and Sony, he did NOT suggest that Apple and Sony were in any way connected. I'm not saying it isn't true, but there was no suggestion of Sony and Apple working together on the PS3, 970 or anything else with IBM.
John
<strong>
I'll watching the whisper traces of Sony/Apple co-operation with great interest...</strong><hr></blockquote>
You mean
<a href="http://www.alwayson-network.com/comments.php?id=258_0_2_0_C"; target="_blank">like this</a>? It's been out for a while but it's an interview with Nobuyuki Idei, Chairman and CEO of Sony, about meeting with Steve Jobs:
[quote] Idei: We actually met several times with Steve last year, in January, March, and June to try to work out a mutual strategy. But you know Steve, he has his own agenda. [Laughs.] Although he is a genius, he doesn't share everything with you. This is a difficult person to work with if you are a big company. We started working with them, but it is a nightmare. We have the exact type of guy like Steve within Sony. His name is Ken Kutaragi. They respect each other. So maybe if we can get them both together then they could figure out how the PlayStation and the Mac can work together. <hr></blockquote>
Ken Kutagari of course being the head of Sony Computer Entertainment.
<strong>The only thing that doesn't smell right is the idea that the 970s in the blade servers won't be using Altivec. That doesn't make any sense.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I am just guessing but maybe because Apple had a hand in making the technology that they get the rights to use it? Seems like a logical reason but I am not to sure myself.
I know that some Linux distros (Yellow Dog comes to mind for some reason) are in fact rolling in AltiVec optimizations. I don't know whether to count the distro(s) that IBM is adopting.
<strong>The only thing that doesn't smell right is the idea that the 970s in the blade servers won't be using Altivec. That doesn't make any sense.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Think about it though. What does a blade server really need vector processing for? I think it's more for the graphically challenged desktop/workstation user.
<strong>If Apple can piggy back the Sony PS 3 in any way and there are an exchange of 'minds' 'tween Sony/Apple...then it will have serious implications for us transcending the minority tag.
I'll watching the whisper traces of Sony/Apple co-operation with great interest...
Lemon Bon Bon <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" /> </strong><hr></blockquote>
who said they were cooperating?
Sounds like what this guy got from ibm guy is real but frankly i could have made this up and no ones bs meter would go up.
Anyway 1.8 for top speed powermac with the bus speed and other specs we're hereig about is still very damn impressive.
<strong>In regards to IBM and Linux, I think IBM is heavily involved in "Redhat", but I'm not sure if there are any Altivec optimizations in that version. Anyone know?</strong><hr></blockquote>
This came out about a <a href="http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0203/11.redhat.php"; target="_blank">year ago</a>. Note that Red Hat has <a href="http://sources.redhat.com/binutils/docs-2.12/as.info/PowerPC-Opts.html"; target="_blank">supported Altivec</a> for quite some time.