I just hope the high-end G4 has at least a dual-processor option. It's absurd for Apple to simultaneously talk about how their target market needs two chips and ship their fastest machine with one. Also, unless we see a fairly serious upgrade in the incidentals (HDD, RAM, optical drives, USB/FW) I think the prices on the top two machines should come down a couple hundred bucks.
Same form factor - El Capitan case is 3 years old in MWSF02, how much more can they squeeze out of this thing? But I think they want to wait for MWNY02.
3. Motorola supposedly qualified their HiP 7 fab this past Summer, so a 7460 (Apollo) should be probable. 6 months to move an existing chip onto to a new process seems reasonable to me.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Question: Do you think the MPC7460 in the Powermac will be on 0.13µ die? If so wouldn't it be likely the high end could clock to 1.3 to 1.4GHz???
Question: Do you think the MPC7460 in the Powermac will be on 0.13µ die?</strong>
By definition yes. A MPC7460 is a 7450 fabbed on a 0.13u process. If they stick with 256 KB on-die L2, the 7560 would be ~55 sq mm. If they use 512 KB on-die L2, probably around ~80 sq mm. Straight scaling will give you pretty close estimates for die sizes, voltages and clock rate.
Whether they stick with the same packaging is a different story. Moto could solve the CPU upgrade problems by simply moving to PGA packaging like in the x86 world. But the odds are they will stick with the same old 29x29 mm BGA they've been using.
<strong>If so wouldn't it be likely the high end could clock to 1.3 to 1.4GHz???</strong>
It's a farm. High quality ears of corn (chips) are rarer than average and low quality ears of corn (chips). Here's a demonstrative example, not meant to be accurate. Hopefully I can do the formatting right:
[code]
GHz
1.4 | x
1.3 | x x
1.2 | x x x
1.1 | x x x x
1.0 | x x x x x
0.9 | x x x x x x
0.8 | x x x x x x
0.7 | x x x x x
--- --- --- --- --- --- ---
1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8
Core Voltage
</pre><hr></blockquote>
The "x" marks represent what the chips on wafer can run at. The 1.3 and 1.4 MHz chips would be very few, and would have to run at higher voltage. Like die size, power consumption scales by the square of the ratio of voltage increase or decrease, and as I recall, power consumption increases linearly with clock rate. So, a 1.4 GHz part would be very expensive because there are few of them (only 5 or 10 chips per wafer among hundreds in a wafer), and will run a lot hotter than a chip in the middle of the pack (1.8/1.5^2 = 44% for voltage increase plus another 40% for clock rate increase from a 1.5V 1 GHz chip).
Motorola's job as time goes on is to move the "x" marks to the left and to the top of the chart, just as good farmers will gradually learn how to work their farms to produce the best quality crops (yield). How those axes line up is all up to Motorola. I'd estimate about 60 to 90% clock rate increases for a process reduction of 30%. They are at 867 now, and getting 1.4 GHz is probably something they couldn't do off the bat. Perhaps in 6 months of refinement.
If they advance the process in some significant way, all bets are off.
<strong>Originally posted by DrBoar:
The case styling is a matter of preference, if they could do it "appear" to be slimmer along the the lines of the portable lines.</strong>
I'm hoping more along the lines of the iPOD myself. I don't like the curvy look of the El Capitan case much anymore. One design feature they probably need to improve is thermo control...
And er, shouldn't we have someone act as a referee to keep track of our predictions for us after MWSF02 is completed? We should have some sort rating for predicative ability beneath our names
I guess I'm getting confused after reading all the rumors. Several, and some even quoting Motorola representatives(Macworld article?), have said the Apollo will be on the same 0.18µ die.
[quote]"One of the stated goals for Motorola's Apollo part was to move the desktop G4 to a 0.18-micron SOI manufacturing process (HiP6 .18-micron SOI).........technology that will provide a twenty to thirty percent performance gain.
"<hr></blockquote>
Just changing to SOI according to this "Motorola spokesperson" would take the G4 to 1.0 to 1.1GHz. I threw in the extra 0.3GHz for reduction to the 0.13µ die.
I have been under the impression, apparently miskaken, Apollo would debut manufactured on HiP7. It is notable the MacCentral article did not mention HiP7, only SOI and HiP6.
Comments
FYI: 900 MHz is not a multiple of 133 MHz.
<strong>Here's my prediction:
Power Macintosh G4 - $1699 to $2999
Same form factor - El Capitan case is 3 years old in MWSF02, how much more can they squeeze out of this thing? But I think they want to wait for MWNY02.
800, 933, 1067, 933x2 PowerPC 7460 w/2MB backside cache
256 to 512 MByte of PC2100 DDR SDRAM
GeForce 3 w/64 MB
60, 80, 100 GByte drives
Combo, Superdrive opticals
2 USB + 2 Firewire (800 Mbit/s)
Gigabit Ethernet
Airport optional
3. Motorola supposedly qualified their HiP 7 fab this past Summer, so a 7460 (Apollo) should be probable. 6 months to move an existing chip onto to a new process seems reasonable to me.
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Question: Do you think the MPC7460 in the Powermac will be on 0.13µ die? If so wouldn't it be likely the high end could clock to 1.3 to 1.4GHz???
If they add one more front bay and also front USB/Firewire sockets like the Sony Vaio
The case styling is amtter of preference, if they could do it "appear" to be slimmer along the the lines of the portable lines.
- Faster G4s, no G5
- Nothing to TiBook or iBook
- 800GB iPod with millions of colors and Gigawire
(I wish I wish I wish they would increase the resolution in the TiBook!!)
- Pook
Question: Do you think the MPC7460 in the Powermac will be on 0.13µ die?</strong>
By definition yes. A MPC7460 is a 7450 fabbed on a 0.13u process. If they stick with 256 KB on-die L2, the 7560 would be ~55 sq mm. If they use 512 KB on-die L2, probably around ~80 sq mm. Straight scaling will give you pretty close estimates for die sizes, voltages and clock rate.
Whether they stick with the same packaging is a different story. Moto could solve the CPU upgrade problems by simply moving to PGA packaging like in the x86 world. But the odds are they will stick with the same old 29x29 mm BGA they've been using.
<strong>If so wouldn't it be likely the high end could clock to 1.3 to 1.4GHz???</strong>
It's a farm. High quality ears of corn (chips) are rarer than average and low quality ears of corn (chips). Here's a demonstrative example, not meant to be accurate. Hopefully I can do the formatting right:
[code]
GHz
1.4 | x
1.3 | x x
1.2 | x x x
1.1 | x x x x
1.0 | x x x x x
0.9 | x x x x x x
0.8 | x x x x x x
0.7 | x x x x x
--- --- --- --- --- --- ---
1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8
Core Voltage
</pre><hr></blockquote>
The "x" marks represent what the chips on wafer can run at. The 1.3 and 1.4 MHz chips would be very few, and would have to run at higher voltage. Like die size, power consumption scales by the square of the ratio of voltage increase or decrease, and as I recall, power consumption increases linearly with clock rate. So, a 1.4 GHz part would be very expensive because there are few of them (only 5 or 10 chips per wafer among hundreds in a wafer), and will run a lot hotter than a chip in the middle of the pack (1.8/1.5^2 = 44% for voltage increase plus another 40% for clock rate increase from a 1.5V 1 GHz chip).
Motorola's job as time goes on is to move the "x" marks to the left and to the top of the chart, just as good farmers will gradually learn how to work their farms to produce the best quality crops (yield). How those axes line up is all up to Motorola. I'd estimate about 60 to 90% clock rate increases for a process reduction of 30%. They are at 867 now, and getting 1.4 GHz is probably something they couldn't do off the bat. Perhaps in 6 months of refinement.
If they advance the process in some significant way, all bets are off.
<strong>Originally posted by DrBoar:
The case styling is a matter of preference, if they could do it "appear" to be slimmer along the the lines of the portable lines.</strong>
I'm hoping more along the lines of the iPOD myself. I don't like the curvy look of the El Capitan case much anymore. One design feature they probably need to improve is thermo control...
And er, shouldn't we have someone act as a referee to keep track of our predictions for us after MWSF02 is completed? We should have some sort rating for predicative ability beneath our names
[ 12-06-2001: Message edited by: THT ]</p>
I guess I'm getting confused after reading all the rumors. Several, and some even quoting Motorola representatives(Macworld article?), have said the Apollo will be on the same 0.18µ die.
<a href="http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0112/04.motorola.php"; target="_blank">http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0112/04.motorola.php</a>;
[quote]"One of the stated goals for Motorola's Apollo part was to move the desktop G4 to a 0.18-micron SOI manufacturing process (HiP6 .18-micron SOI).........technology that will provide a twenty to thirty percent performance gain.
"<hr></blockquote>
Just changing to SOI according to this "Motorola spokesperson" would take the G4 to 1.0 to 1.1GHz. I threw in the extra 0.3GHz for reduction to the 0.13µ die.
I have been under the impression, apparently miskaken, Apollo would debut manufactured on HiP7. It is notable the MacCentral article did not mention HiP7, only SOI and HiP6.
Conclusion: rumors cause confusion,
<strong>During the DV Expo, Schiller will announce Final Cut Pro for Mac OS X and taht it will be ready to ship at the time </strong><hr></blockquote>
i think you predicted this bout a day before it came out, fcp 3 is here! for os x! real time effects on a g4! no rendering! (for some things)
:eek: