A Cube06 might possibly affect sales of the cheapest "PowerMac" (or whatever it's going to be called, I guess), I can see how that might work. Even so, the solution is probably to make the PM replacement significantly more powerful. What they've done already with Twin-Dual Core G5s is a good precedent.
I can forsee a line like this:
Mac mini: $599 (Solo), $799 (Duo + SuperDrive, etc)
They could probably expand the iMac range in a similar range, as it's rather narrowly focussed at the moment. I'm not sure about a "High end iMac", but a low end iMac, one would have thought, is very possible. A $799 "iMac mini" with a Core Solo and 13" Wide Screen. They could even go the opposite way to that of the mid-market iMacs, and put the circuits in the keyboard.
On the other hand, perhaps those would compete with the iBooks (MacBooks.) Wouldn't be hard though to keep the profit margins roughly equal.
There are machines missing from Apple's line-up, and the current controversy over the 3D acceleration (or lack of it) in the Mac minis has highlighted the lack of certain machines in particular. I doubt there'd be this fury if there was a seperate range of mid-priced ($800-1,200 in today's market) headless Macs.
Who would want an iMac mini? A 13.3" screen on a desk? That'd just be werid, other than that I think you designed a pretty good product line but I'd clean it up like this:
Mac mini: $599 (1.5 Solo, combo)
$799 (1.66 Duo + SuperDrive, etc)
Mac cube: $999 (1.66 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 64mb standard)
$1699(20", 2.00 duo , 256mb gfx standard - rest the same)
Mac Pro: $1999 (Dual w/e, 256mb stardard, 4 ram slots),
$3299 (Quad w/e, 256mb standard, 8 ram slots)
I think that varies the lines enough while not killing the imac because a decent screen would put the price above the imac, and the imac gets faster speeds. It also doesn't step on the Mac pro because of the ram limits and hd limits, not to mention the processor.
Then they'd just have to revise their monitor line a bit:
19" widescreen - $599
21" widescreen hd - $899
24" widescreen hd - $1299
30" widescreen hd - $2299
That keeps screen cost out of the way of the imac while still offering better than current pricing. Of course 3rd party exists but that can't be accounted for.
I agree, at this point the only way to get a Macintosh that allows the changing of graphics cards or the use of TV tuner cards is the Power Mac.
TV Tuner cards really don't need to exist. They exist only because PCs have card slots. All the electronics for a TV Tuner card fits in a USB stick the size of a Shuffle and USB is more than capable of transferring the data from the stick. How many people watch TV on their computer instead of their TV?
That leaves just graphics cards and IME that's mostly gamers that change them. The rest of us don't really care.
Maybe i'm wrong, but the Conroes should be competitve with opterons. Looks like woodcrest is for servers.
Opteron is a server chip really in the same way a Xeon is and Woodcrest will be. However if you're building expensive workstation class computers like the higher end PowerMac then that's what you'd use.
Conroe almost certainly won't be competitive with Opteron as you're comparing a desktop chip with a server/workstation class chip. I doubt even Woodcrest will be competitive with the Opteron. Intel have bandwidth limitations that AMD don't and you've got to get slightly moist thinking of a PowerMac based on the recently announced Opteron 885 chips. 16 cores. Sadly Intel has no answer there.
How were the graphics? Everyone has raised a fuss about the choice of no card... in your humble opinion, how did it fare?
Did you feel that it was a good machine for the money?
in light of what the mac mini is supposed to be intel integrated graphics makes some sort of sense. it's like, imagine the people that make iPods make a cool computer.... voila, mac mini -- it's about the iLife, and some iWork, not about the gaming. its *not* about the gaming
i feel the single core is a good machine for the money. the dualcore, well, that's a lot of extra power which i think is more geared for modders/hackers......
edit: although with the dualcore one could argue that's about high-definition video. so the mac mini is really geared towards video not gaming.
I agree... I was sorta asking to see if we could put an end to the endless rant without having seen the thing work. Loads of people ranted about the iPod 5G and its graphics, only to be silenced by how good they really were for the purpose they were designed for.
That isn't what Conroe is for. Conroe will be going into mid-range PCs. Mac workstations better have Woodcrest if Apple want to be taken seriously.
That's exactly what I've been saying all along.
Will it happen?
It likely depends on price. Woodcrest will cost more than conroe. If Apple can lower their other costs by having Intel design, and build their mobo's (with Apple's input, of course), they might be able to squeak Woodcrest in there.
I sure hope so. I don't see how Conroe can compete against Woodcrest (a Xeon), and the Opteron.
There's a lot of stuff coming from the IDF today. (actually, yesterday now)
Other than the discussion in the last paragraph, one of the most interesting statements was; "The chip-maker is introducing 128 bit SSE in a single cycle."
That is twice as much performance as it will do today. If it works that well, it will leave Altivec in the dust.
There's a lot of stuff coming from the IDF today. (actually, yesterday now)
Other than the discussion in the last paragraph, one of the most interesting statements was; "The chip-maker is introducing 128 bit SSE in a single cycle."
I didnt see it listed anywhere but is that across the whole range inc merom or just conroe upwards?
i suppose when checking out the mac mini core duo and core solo i should have done some preliminary tests on playing back some 720p and 1080p h.264 video. i guess i was dazzled by the four USB ports on the back
Apple made several mistakes with the Cube. One of the biggest ones was placing it as a high mid range machine. The critism was that Apple should have placed the (at the time) much cheaper, but still viable G3 into the machine, instead of the G4.
The second one, is one that Apple has always had. They refuse to explain exactly what their machines are. While everyone who was a techie knew that the machine was highly upgradeable, and had an open slot as well, Apple never made that a widely known fact.
Therefore, I kept on hearing people say, and would read, that the Cube wasn't expandable, or very upgradable.
If Apple had taken the time, and effort, to dispel that rumor, the machine might have sold well enough for it to gather a following. If Apple used the G3 to keep the price down, as well, then it could have become popular.
But, they failed on both fronts.
Apple spent all of their marketing dollars (never enough from Apple to begin with) on how it looked, and the size.
Apple's mistake wasn't selling it as a midrange machine, it was the cube itself. While it looked realy cool, it was also far too expensive and not a very practical design. Consumers couldn't afford and the pros spent the extra money to get the PowerMac. Apple tries to push something completely unconventional when the users in that segment want something very conventional.
Who would want an iMac mini? A 13.3" screen on a desk? That'd just be werid
You're probably right. I'm thinking "Low end iMac", but I'm not sure what it would look like to be honest. I'm pretty sure there's a market for it (the stereotype "Grandma", someone on a low budget who certainly doesn't want to swamped with cables.) The major problem I can think of with the iMac 13" isn't so much that it's small on the desktop, it's more that it competes with the iBook, it'd be something that some potential iBook buyers probably would buy instead. (Not everyone uses laptops as laptops.)
Your proposed line-up is pretty much exactly what I was thinking of.
Apple's mistake wasn't selling it as a midrange machine, it was the cube itself. While it looked realy cool, it was also far too expensive and not a very practical design. Consumers couldn't afford and the pros spent the extra money to get the PowerMac. Apple tries to push something completely unconventional when the users in that segment want something very conventional.
Many of us addressed the expense at the time. That's why I said Apple should have put the much less expensive G3 in. They could have had a machine for $999 then. That would have sold.
actually, now that that's out, instead of integrated graphics something like a nvidia 6600GT would be perfect for the mac mini / mac cube. the nVidia 6-series of GPUs are really quite good bang-for-the-buck
actually, now that that's out, instead of integrated graphics something like a nvidia 6600GT would be perfect for the mac mini / mac cube. the nVidia 6-series of GPUs are really quite good bang-for-the-buck
I didn't read the whole thread, but I doubt this because they are sticking with ATI because of the hardware decoding of H264. I would imagine Nvidia has this by now too, though. So hmmm... I know not what to think
I'm pretty sure there's a market for it (the stereotype "Grandma", someone on a low budget who certainly doesn't want to swamped with cables.)
I'm sure a 13.3" display at default resolution would be uncomfortably unreadable for many "Grandma" stereotypes. I know several people who bought a 14" iBook just because the pixels were larger than on the 12".
$1699(20", 2.00 duo , 256mb gfx standard - rest the same)
Mac Pro: $1999 (Dual w/e, 256mb stardard, 4 ram slots),
$3299 (Quad w/e, 256mb standard, 8 ram slots)
I think that varies the lines enough while not killing the imac because a decent screen would put the price above the imac, and the imac gets faster speeds. It also doesn't step on the Mac pro because of the ram limits and hd limits, not to mention the processor.
I can agree that the Mac pro is safe. The iMac and top end Mini I dunno. The $999 cube is only $100 more than the $799 mini when you make both 1GB RAM.
With the Dell 2005FPW 20.1 wide aspect running $396.75 on sale you're still looking at 1.66Ghz + 20" vs 1.83Ghz + 17" for $100 more or 1.66Ghz + 19" (4:3) for the same price. Hopefully a lot of folks would just buy the monitor from Apple but maybe not.
Granted you're short a $160 X1600 card but on the plus side you get a little more longevity. As a mid-tier gamer I can go longer not replacing my CPU than my vid-card.
If the core duo is socketed it makes the scenario a little worse I think. If the expected price drops for the 2.0Ghz then for $300 (and a busted warranty) there is no processor speed difference. Only a tweaker would do this but still.
Maybe when the iMac goes merom. Or perhaps an iMacCube with a $1400 starting price with Conroe and Mac Pros running woodcrest starting at $2K. $1400 with Conroe sounds like having the same issue as the original Cube though. Too pricey for a mid-range machine.
Comments
Originally posted by Mr. H
That isn't what Conroe is for. Conroe will be going into mid-range PCs. Mac workstations better have Woodcrest if Apple want to be taken seriously.
Maybe i'm wrong, but the Conroes should be competitve with opterons. Looks like woodcrest is for servers.
Originally posted by peharri
A Cube06 might possibly affect sales of the cheapest "PowerMac" (or whatever it's going to be called, I guess), I can see how that might work. Even so, the solution is probably to make the PM replacement significantly more powerful. What they've done already with Twin-Dual Core G5s is a good precedent.
I can forsee a line like this:
Mac mini: $599 (Solo), $799 (Duo + SuperDrive, etc)
Mac cube: $999 (Duo, 1gig, gfx), $1499 (Faster Duo, SD, etc)
Mac Pro: $1999 (Twin Duo), $2999 (Faster Duos)
They could probably expand the iMac range in a similar range, as it's rather narrowly focussed at the moment. I'm not sure about a "High end iMac", but a low end iMac, one would have thought, is very possible. A $799 "iMac mini" with a Core Solo and 13" Wide Screen. They could even go the opposite way to that of the mid-market iMacs, and put the circuits in the keyboard.
On the other hand, perhaps those would compete with the iBooks (MacBooks.) Wouldn't be hard though to keep the profit margins roughly equal.
There are machines missing from Apple's line-up, and the current controversy over the 3D acceleration (or lack of it) in the Mac minis has highlighted the lack of certain machines in particular. I doubt there'd be this fury if there was a seperate range of mid-priced ($800-1,200 in today's market) headless Macs.
Who would want an iMac mini? A 13.3" screen on a desk? That'd just be werid, other than that I think you designed a pretty good product line but I'd clean it up like this:
Mac mini: $599 (1.5 Solo, combo)
$799 (1.66 Duo + SuperDrive, etc)
Mac cube: $999 (1.66 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 64mb standard)
$1399 (1.83 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 128mb standard)
iMac: $1299(17", 1.83 duo - rest as it is)
$1699(20", 2.00 duo , 256mb gfx standard - rest the same)
Mac Pro: $1999 (Dual w/e, 256mb stardard, 4 ram slots),
$3299 (Quad w/e, 256mb standard, 8 ram slots)
I think that varies the lines enough while not killing the imac because a decent screen would put the price above the imac, and the imac gets faster speeds. It also doesn't step on the Mac pro because of the ram limits and hd limits, not to mention the processor.
Then they'd just have to revise their monitor line a bit:
19" widescreen - $599
21" widescreen hd - $899
24" widescreen hd - $1299
30" widescreen hd - $2299
That keeps screen cost out of the way of the imac while still offering better than current pricing. Of course 3rd party exists but that can't be accounted for.
Damn come to think of it I wished they'd do that.
Originally posted by TenoBell
I agree, at this point the only way to get a Macintosh that allows the changing of graphics cards or the use of TV tuner cards is the Power Mac.
TV Tuner cards really don't need to exist. They exist only because PCs have card slots. All the electronics for a TV Tuner card fits in a USB stick the size of a Shuffle and USB is more than capable of transferring the data from the stick. How many people watch TV on their computer instead of their TV?
That leaves just graphics cards and IME that's mostly gamers that change them. The rest of us don't really care.
Originally posted by backtomac
Maybe i'm wrong, but the Conroes should be competitve with opterons. Looks like woodcrest is for servers.
Opteron is a server chip really in the same way a Xeon is and Woodcrest will be. However if you're building expensive workstation class computers like the higher end PowerMac then that's what you'd use.
Conroe almost certainly won't be competitive with Opteron as you're comparing a desktop chip with a server/workstation class chip. I doubt even Woodcrest will be competitive with the Opteron. Intel have bandwidth limitations that AMD don't and you've got to get slightly moist thinking of a PowerMac based on the recently announced Opteron 885 chips. 16 cores. Sadly Intel has no answer there.
How were the graphics? Everyone has raised a fuss about the choice of no card... in your humble opinion, how did it fare?
Did you feel that it was a good machine for the money?
in light of what the mac mini is supposed to be intel integrated graphics makes some sort of sense. it's like, imagine the people that make iPods make a cool computer.... voila, mac mini -- it's about the iLife, and some iWork, not about the gaming. its *not* about the gaming
i feel the single core is a good machine for the money. the dualcore, well, that's a lot of extra power which i think is more geared for modders/hackers......
edit: although with the dualcore one could argue that's about high-definition video. so the mac mini is really geared towards video not gaming.
Originally posted by Mr. H
That isn't what Conroe is for. Conroe will be going into mid-range PCs. Mac workstations better have Woodcrest if Apple want to be taken seriously.
That's exactly what I've been saying all along.
Will it happen?
It likely depends on price. Woodcrest will cost more than conroe. If Apple can lower their other costs by having Intel design, and build their mobo's (with Apple's input, of course), they might be able to squeak Woodcrest in there.
I sure hope so. I don't see how Conroe can compete against Woodcrest (a Xeon), and the Opteron.
Originally posted by backtomac
Maybe i'm wrong, but the Conroes should be competitve with opterons. Looks like woodcrest is for servers.
The Opteron has the on die memory controller. It has two paths to memory for its dual core chips. Neither IBM or Intel's chips can do that yet.
Therefore, the 1.333GHz memory bus speed of the Woodcrest is a better match than the 1.066GHz bus the Conroe has.
There are other advantages as well. Woodcrest has better floats than Conroe, though Conroe is ever so slightly better in integer.
Interesting short article on the AOpen.
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1935125,00.asp
Other than the discussion in the last paragraph, one of the most interesting statements was; "The chip-maker is introducing 128 bit SSE in a single cycle."
That is twice as much performance as it will do today. If it works that well, it will leave Altivec in the dust.
Ha! It's late, I forgot to put the link in!
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=30111
Here's a good one about Conroe.
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=1149
Remember that the Conroe is matched against the Athlon here.
Whatever happens, things are looking up.
Originally posted by melgross
There's a lot of stuff coming from the IDF today. (actually, yesterday now)
Other than the discussion in the last paragraph, one of the most interesting statements was; "The chip-maker is introducing 128 bit SSE in a single cycle."
I didnt see it listed anywhere but is that across the whole range inc merom or just conroe upwards?
Originally posted by gsxrboy
I didnt see it listed anywhere but is that across the whole range inc merom or just conroe upwards?
Supposedly across the range.
Originally posted by melgross
Apple made several mistakes with the Cube. One of the biggest ones was placing it as a high mid range machine. The critism was that Apple should have placed the (at the time) much cheaper, but still viable G3 into the machine, instead of the G4.
The second one, is one that Apple has always had. They refuse to explain exactly what their machines are. While everyone who was a techie knew that the machine was highly upgradeable, and had an open slot as well, Apple never made that a widely known fact.
Therefore, I kept on hearing people say, and would read, that the Cube wasn't expandable, or very upgradable.
If Apple had taken the time, and effort, to dispel that rumor, the machine might have sold well enough for it to gather a following. If Apple used the G3 to keep the price down, as well, then it could have become popular.
But, they failed on both fronts.
Apple spent all of their marketing dollars (never enough from Apple to begin with) on how it looked, and the size.
Apple's mistake wasn't selling it as a midrange machine, it was the cube itself. While it looked realy cool, it was also far too expensive and not a very practical design. Consumers couldn't afford and the pros spent the extra money to get the PowerMac. Apple tries to push something completely unconventional when the users in that segment want something very conventional.
Originally posted by ecking
Who would want an iMac mini? A 13.3" screen on a desk? That'd just be werid
You're probably right. I'm thinking "Low end iMac", but I'm not sure what it would look like to be honest. I'm pretty sure there's a market for it (the stereotype "Grandma", someone on a low budget who certainly doesn't want to swamped with cables.) The major problem I can think of with the iMac 13" isn't so much that it's small on the desktop, it's more that it competes with the iBook, it'd be something that some potential iBook buyers probably would buy instead. (Not everyone uses laptops as laptops.)
Your proposed line-up is pretty much exactly what I was thinking of.
Originally posted by BenRoethig
Apple's mistake wasn't selling it as a midrange machine, it was the cube itself. While it looked realy cool, it was also far too expensive and not a very practical design. Consumers couldn't afford and the pros spent the extra money to get the PowerMac. Apple tries to push something completely unconventional when the users in that segment want something very conventional.
Many of us addressed the expense at the time. That's why I said Apple should have put the much less expensive G3 in. They could have had a machine for $999 then. That would have sold.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=30141
edit:
actually, now that that's out, instead of integrated graphics something like a nvidia 6600GT would be perfect for the mac mini / mac cube. the nVidia 6-series of GPUs are really quite good bang-for-the-buck
Originally posted by sunilraman
Whatever Apple cube-like thing will have to be able to handle something like the soon-to-be-revealed nVidia 7600GT
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=30141
edit:
actually, now that that's out, instead of integrated graphics something like a nvidia 6600GT would be perfect for the mac mini / mac cube. the nVidia 6-series of GPUs are really quite good bang-for-the-buck
I didn't read the whole thread, but I doubt this because they are sticking with ATI because of the hardware decoding of H264. I would imagine Nvidia has this by now too, though. So hmmm... I know not what to think
Originally posted by peharri
I'm pretty sure there's a market for it (the stereotype "Grandma", someone on a low budget who certainly doesn't want to swamped with cables.)
I'm sure a 13.3" display at default resolution would be uncomfortably unreadable for many "Grandma" stereotypes. I know several people who bought a 14" iBook just because the pixels were larger than on the 12".
Originally posted by ecking
[B]I think you designed a pretty good product line but I'd clean it up like this:
Mac mini: $599 (1.5 Solo, combo)
$799 (1.66 Duo + SuperDrive, etc)
Mac cube: $999 (1.66 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 64mb standard)
$1399 (1.83 Duo, one 3.5" hd, upto 2gb ram. replacable gfx, 128mb standard)
iMac: $1299(17", 1.83 duo - rest as it is)
$1699(20", 2.00 duo , 256mb gfx standard - rest the same)
Mac Pro: $1999 (Dual w/e, 256mb stardard, 4 ram slots),
$3299 (Quad w/e, 256mb standard, 8 ram slots)
I think that varies the lines enough while not killing the imac because a decent screen would put the price above the imac, and the imac gets faster speeds. It also doesn't step on the Mac pro because of the ram limits and hd limits, not to mention the processor.
I can agree that the Mac pro is safe. The iMac and top end Mini I dunno. The $999 cube is only $100 more than the $799 mini when you make both 1GB RAM.
With the Dell 2005FPW 20.1 wide aspect running $396.75 on sale you're still looking at 1.66Ghz + 20" vs 1.83Ghz + 17" for $100 more or 1.66Ghz + 19" (4:3) for the same price. Hopefully a lot of folks would just buy the monitor from Apple but maybe not.
Granted you're short a $160 X1600 card but on the plus side you get a little more longevity. As a mid-tier gamer I can go longer not replacing my CPU than my vid-card.
If the core duo is socketed it makes the scenario a little worse I think. If the expected price drops for the 2.0Ghz then for $300 (and a busted warranty) there is no processor speed difference. Only a tweaker would do this but still.
Maybe when the iMac goes merom. Or perhaps an iMacCube with a $1400 starting price with Conroe and Mac Pros running woodcrest starting at $2K. $1400 with Conroe sounds like having the same issue as the original Cube though. Too pricey for a mid-range machine.
Vinea