<strong>So Moto can roll off tons of G4 800, 933, 1.0ghz and 3 G5's at the same time? </strong><hr></blockquote>
That would only be two production lines -- one for the G4s, and one for the G5s. All speeds of a given chip design on a given process come from the same wafers. The fab makes a wafer with a bunch of processors, it then tests each of the chips starting at a high speed and then dropping the speed until the chip passes the test. The chips are then cut out of the wafer and divided according to the speed they passed the tests at. Since many more chips pass the tests at lower speeds they are more common and thus cheaper, whereas the very fast ones are rare and command a higher price. The "yield" of a fab is the number of chips of each speed that it gets out of a wafer, and the rate at which it can produce wafers.
As a result Moto no doubt has a fab (or several) cranking out Apollo G4s, and the speeds available to Apple will depend on how well these chips test in quantity. There is not a fab "per speed". Whether or not there is a G5 fab operating depends on how far along they really are. The existance of prototype machines only says that the chip is "sampling", not in mass production. The more optimistic among us naturally believe that mass production is in full swing. The pessimists... well... they don't even seem to think the design is sampling. At this stage I think we just have to wait for Apple to play their hand...
If Apple is releasing a minor speed bump next week, then dont look for new Mother Boards, they will keep the UMA 1.5 specs.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, I think they will too. By all means this bump looks like it's just to hold people off until the real thing. Just like the last update to the CRT iMacs last MWNY.
[quote] So, an open question to any Apple employee AI posters... are you still keeping secrets? <hr></blockquote>
I think the closest thing we've got to that is MrNSX, who works for ATi, used to post here, now just hangs around Ars. A few months ago he said that he's optimistic about upcoming chips from both Motorola and IBM, IIRC.
Don't panic, folks. The reason why Apple have downplayed this speedbump is precisely because of the hysteria that some of the posters in this thread have shown.
My guess -- and it's just a guess -- is that we'll be much happier about our CPUs by summertime (Northern Hemisphere). I don't care whether the source of that happiness is branded a G4 or G5.
Actually, I just changed my mind after writing that. If we see a substantial speedboost from G4s in a few months time, then that can only bode very well indeed for the G5. So bring on faster G4s, I say.
My question is if all this is supposed to happen, where is the "Temporarily Unavailable" on Power Macs? As you'll recall, there was a "Temporarily Unavailable" on the CD-RW feature of the PowerBook...
<strong>My question is if all this is supposed to happen, where is the "Temporarily Unavailable" on Power Macs? As you'll recall, there was a "Temporarily Unavailable" on the CD-RW feature of the PowerBook...</strong><hr></blockquote>
There were no Temporary Unavailable on the iMacs either.
Perhaps Apple didn't have any more CD-RWs and didn't want to buy more since they were about to release Combo drives.
I f they can have an 800Mhz imac at 100 Mhz FSB then they alreaqdy have the ability to make a 1.1 Ghz processor at 133 Mhz FSB so what's the big deal!. Therefore, there si no need for a big hype by Apple.
Wel.. I was going to post that my friend at Ingram Micro updated his SKU list. Apparently he did mean this monday... but if you look at the Apple store.. you'll see why this is already old news...
BTW, He was right about the non-event/ quiet update. Megahertz doesn't really matter after all.
Comments
<strong>So Moto can roll off tons of G4 800, 933, 1.0ghz and 3 G5's at the same time? </strong><hr></blockquote>
That would only be two production lines -- one for the G4s, and one for the G5s. All speeds of a given chip design on a given process come from the same wafers. The fab makes a wafer with a bunch of processors, it then tests each of the chips starting at a high speed and then dropping the speed until the chip passes the test. The chips are then cut out of the wafer and divided according to the speed they passed the tests at. Since many more chips pass the tests at lower speeds they are more common and thus cheaper, whereas the very fast ones are rare and command a higher price. The "yield" of a fab is the number of chips of each speed that it gets out of a wafer, and the rate at which it can produce wafers.
As a result Moto no doubt has a fab (or several) cranking out Apollo G4s, and the speeds available to Apple will depend on how well these chips test in quantity. There is not a fab "per speed". Whether or not there is a G5 fab operating depends on how far along they really are. The existance of prototype machines only says that the chip is "sampling", not in mass production. The more optimistic among us naturally believe that mass production is in full swing. The pessimists... well... they don't even seem to think the design is sampling. At this stage I think we just have to wait for Apple to play their hand...
<strong>
If Apple is releasing a minor speed bump next week, then dont look for new Mother Boards, they will keep the UMA 1.5 specs.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, I think they will too. By all means this bump looks like it's just to hold people off until the real thing. Just like the last update to the CRT iMacs last MWNY.
Expect hypertransport in the G5.
I think the closest thing we've got to that is MrNSX, who works for ATi, used to post here, now just hangs around Ars. A few months ago he said that he's optimistic about upcoming chips from both Motorola and IBM, IIRC.
Don't panic, folks. The reason why Apple have downplayed this speedbump is precisely because of the hysteria that some of the posters in this thread have shown.
My guess -- and it's just a guess -- is that we'll be much happier about our CPUs by summertime (Northern Hemisphere). I don't care whether the source of that happiness is branded a G4 or G5.
Actually, I just changed my mind after writing that. If we see a substantial speedboost from G4s in a few months time, then that can only bode very well indeed for the G5. So bring on faster G4s, I say.
Apple could do this...but I think it's stupid.
<strong>Yeah, offer Superdrives on all prebuilts so first time buyers who don't want one will have to configure theirs online...
Apple could do this...but I think it's stupid.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I think that SuperDrives will be standard before long, and we will look back at CD-RW and Combo drives and think they were lame.
<strong>My question is if all this is supposed to happen, where is the "Temporarily Unavailable" on Power Macs? As you'll recall, there was a "Temporarily Unavailable" on the CD-RW feature of the PowerBook...</strong><hr></blockquote>
There were no Temporary Unavailable on the iMacs either.
Perhaps Apple didn't have any more CD-RWs and didn't want to buy more since they were about to release Combo drives.
<strong>Yeah, offer Superdrives on all prebuilts so first time buyers who don't want one will have to configure theirs online...
Apple could do this...but I think it's stupid.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I don't see why it's stupid. Maybe one day down the road they'll wanna use it.
BTW, He was right about the non-event/ quiet update. Megahertz doesn't really matter after all.
A dual Ghz for 2999... hmmmmm
MSKR