Hmmm, after reading some other posts and taking a closer look at the models offered...
WTF is with the 1.6? Lame apple, just lame...
Also, everyone keeps saying the dual 2 is the best deal. Why? Does 200mhz (especially when its already at 1800) and another proc justify $600? I guess if you must have the best...
Although this doesn't apply to a decent number of people in here, I'd say yes. If you need the dual processors (I surely don't), $600 (really $550 cause you also get the 9600 Pro, $50 upgrade from the 5200 FX) for the second processor that's at the high end is quite reasonable. For reference, Intel's 3.2 GHz P4 is running at around $637 in quantities of 1000 according to a C|Net Article today.
Also, everyone keeps saying the dual 2 is the best deal. Why? Does 200mhz (especially when its already at 1800) and another proc justify $600? I guess if you must have the best...
well, at the risk of sounding ignorant (because, as we all now, it ain't the Hz, it's how you spend 'em), for an extra $600, you go from 1800 MHz t, um, roughly 4000 MHz. let's see, divide, carry the two... looks like a good deal to me.
[B]Absolutely amazing machines. I couldn't be happier. It is interesting that for the first time I can think of, the high-end Powermac is the sweet spot in price/performance. I am also very happy that the Dual 2Ghz didn't break the $3k pricepoint. Very good!
As many of you have already made note, the low-end machine seems really expensive! However, it is great that you can get a Dual 1.25Ghz G4 Powermac for $1,599 on Apple's site now, and a single 1.25Ghz G4 Powermac for $1,299.
________________________________________________
Though the Price reductions are nice - I see a lots of reference to the $1,299 1.25 GHZ -- But get that a little closer to the G5s like boost the RAM to 512MB, and Video Memory to 128 MB and Hardrive to 160 GB and the price is like $1,950 only $450 cheaper than the single 1.8GHz G5. Given the much better specs on the 1.8 - Its the system for me. Now if I and just come up with another $600.
It looks like an understated, "I'm going to rip your ear off" machine, just sitting there. It's simple and low-key and just looks like a squared-away, "ready to do 'bid-ness'" machine if there's ever been one!
Agreed. Nickname: 'The Bastard!'
That's what I'm calling mine when I get it.
Tigerwoods99. Fully agree with your post.
No home run. 3rd base, eh?
Apple. Brilliant. But flawed.
Maybe when Rev B comes along and the fuss and sales (of such pricey machines...) die down...we may see more sane pricing.
Mind you...the top end, ironically, is only a couple of hundred pounds more expensive (inc VAT) than the last top end G4!
THAT is impressive. The other two models look very pricey.
And there is no excuse shipping anything less than an ATI 9800 in a £2,300 Tower. Or less than a gig of DDR.
C'mon. No display either.
Sweet spot? The dual 2 gigger.
Will I buy or crack? I'm cracking already. And I haven't seen one in person...
I was at the Apple Store at the Mall of America. Almost 300-350 people. Amazing keynote - truly a watershed day in Apple history.
I thought the Panther demo was as impressive, if not more so, than the G5.
I don't understand the low end model. It's too crippled to appeal to the "pro's" and too expensive (and too crippled) for the prosumer. It's almost as if Apple doesn't want anyone to buy the 1.6
A minor quibble, though -- it just means that Apple has some work to do filling the prosumer hole in its lineup.
i didnt see the keynote yet but checked out the new g5's at apple.com and all i can say is WOW!
for the last 5 (or 6) years i have been on these boards at appleinsider and just when i thought an upcoming keynote would introduce a new powermac i could buy there would always be something missing (ddr ram, processer, fsb, etc) that would cause me to say "maybe next keynote they'll get it right and i'll buy"
i can honestly say, that now is the time...
they fixed everything i had as a reason not to buy a powermac
and more importantly this is the machine i can now show my pc using friends that may convince them to switch. 1 gig fsb? 8 gigs of ram max? beating a 3 gig p4? what???
what im buying:
the 1.6 gig? riiiight, next...
the 1.8 gig? uhhhh (snorts derisively...)
the duel 2 gig? ahhhhhh..... now thats the one...
think about it,
if you can start at 2k for the 1.6, you can reach a little and get the 1.8, and if you can do THAT, you may as well reach just a little bit more and get the best... the duel 2 gig model.
the diffrence is only 10-one-hundred-dollar-bills...
those of you planning to get the YIKES!, i mean, the 1.6 gig machine...think about this, if you already have the 2k for that, and you save 100 bucks every week until they are ready to ship, you'll have the extra 1k to go for the top of the line!
hey this is going to be my first real mac, and i want it to be the very best!
It'll be a little hard for me to buy one anytime soon knowing that 3ghz is only a year away. My G4 can hold out until then.................. or can it?
With Quark 6 and a fall rise in Design/Publishing budgets...I can see Apple, along with pent up demand...make a killing in the next two quarters...
A fall rise!? WTF is that? Do you mean "Autumn" perchance?
I don't think there's much chance of that, budgets are constrained from where I'm sitting, and I think they're going to stay that way into next year (don't forget we're only three months into the financial year over here, and the US usually starts in Jan - I don't think you're going to see much change until new budgets get assigned).
It'll be a little hard for me to buy one anytime soon knowing that 3ghz is only a year away. My G4 can hold out until then.................. or can it?
Hey, hold onto your money, 10 GHz is just five years away!
I can't believe people are bitching about PCI slots. Not only are there 2 PCI buses but PCI-X maxes out at 2 devices per bus. One has 2 slots and the other is split between a slot and the peripheral controller. The info is all there, you just have to put 2 and 2 together. With so many other things to bitch about. The only thing I would bitch about is price on the low end.
As a side note: look at the internal shots of the G5. Where is the power supply???
Actually under further examination it appears to be enclosed away from the rest of the machine ALL THE WAY at the bottom! See the power connector sneaking its way up?
I'm gonna bet that Apple didn't put a 2nd Optical drive bay on the G5 towers because after people begged and bitched for one and they added it with the Mirrored Drive Doors, NO ONE EVER BOUGHT TWO OPTICAL DRIVES. More than likely, they sold so very few that it wasn't worth designing this case around that big empty void which one out of 30,000 customers would actually fill. I really don't know the numbers, but I bet it's really, really low.
I was ticked about the 2 internal drive limit too, until I realized you can buy 300GB drives now, and we'd have to buy Serial ATA drives for the new cases anyway
As for the one less PCI slot, I dunno about that. Although there are probably very, very few people who actually use four PCI slots, I think this is one area Apple should have tried a little harder on, because it's not an issue that has a cheap alternative.
But if you really need 4 PCI slots, take advantage of the situation and order a Dual 1.25Ghz G4 for $1,599 while they're still available
I'm gonna bet that Apple didn't put a 2nd Optical drive bay on the G5 towers because after people begged and bitched for one and they added it with the Mirrored Drive Doors, NO ONE EVER BOUGHT TWO OPTICAL DRIVES.
No, they dropped wicked-fast CD-R drives into them for cheap. I did.
I agree re: iSight...$99 is that "sweet" spot (you break that psychological 3-digit barrier too) and I could really imagine people buying the crap out of them for that price!
Yes, here's hoping that by the holidays Apple goes "okay, we really need to scoot that one down, guys..." and price it at that.
Although, as someone said, it does seem to be a lot nicer than the others out there. It is FireWire based (once cable too), mounts on any Mac, seems to have better display, clarity and color, etc.
I don't know. If more of my friends and family were on Macs and all AND if I have $149 burning a hold in my wallet, sure.
Until then, I'd rather keep saving for my PowerBook.
We are now seeing that a wealth of my predictions are actually right on, though I have wavered in the excitement.
"What?" you say, "how so?"
What I've been saying in the days leading up to this show: IN BOLD Commentary following each.
1299 low end PM NEEDS to be 1299.
With the G4 model that nobody mentioned in the iChat buzz-a-thon, there it is, and it isn't so bad!
Apple typically welches, or makes a half assed effort on the low end machine
The 1299 model is there, but it's a single G4, albeit with L3. I would have prefered stripping out a G5 and selling that, but it at least shows the intention to get a 1299 PM is there. Good. I'll wait for the real one. Which leads me to point three.
There will NOT be G5 PowerBooks for about 12 months after the intro of the G5
In my optimism I had ammended my thoughts to say perhaps a 17 by the end of the year, but the prices of these G5's show it clearly, Apple is excercising an inadvertent form of demand control. Demand will still be huge, from workstation customers, but it's pretty clear that the costs of putting this puppy in a PB are not in the range for a laptop yet. New CPU, new architecture, miniturization, etc etc... The volume will be there, but not this year. We might be waiting for .09u, might not, but some costs need to be absorbed first. It appears that the G5 is not as cheap as we believed IBM would make it. It will be, but later.
So, there you have it, a not total vindication of my statements, but not that far off actually.
ANd, generally positive news for "PRO" customers.
I believe prices will come down, NEXT YEAR, for now, there are enough people who will pay for G5's.
It appears to me, that a PM G4 is nearly the cube we had been spec'cing out in our many discussions.
What remains now, is to see whether Apple merely intends to clear them out and be rid of them, or whether they will gradually move g5's down into that range.
Comments
Originally posted by JohnHenry
Hmmm, after reading some other posts and taking a closer look at the models offered...
WTF is with the 1.6? Lame apple, just lame...
Also, everyone keeps saying the dual 2 is the best deal. Why? Does 200mhz (especially when its already at 1800) and another proc justify $600? I guess if you must have the best...
Although this doesn't apply to a decent number of people in here, I'd say yes. If you need the dual processors (I surely don't), $600 (really $550 cause you also get the 9600 Pro, $50 upgrade from the 5200 FX) for the second processor that's at the high end is quite reasonable. For reference, Intel's 3.2 GHz P4 is running at around $637 in quantities of 1000 according to a C|Net Article today.
Originally posted by JohnHenry
Also, everyone keeps saying the dual 2 is the best deal. Why? Does 200mhz (especially when its already at 1800) and another proc justify $600? I guess if you must have the best...
well, at the risk of sounding ignorant (because, as we all now, it ain't the Hz, it's how you spend 'em), for an extra $600, you go from 1800 MHz t, um, roughly 4000 MHz. let's see, divide, carry the two... looks like a good deal to me.
I just didn't see it as the BEST deal
Mmmmm 4000mhz
[B]Absolutely amazing machines. I couldn't be happier. It is interesting that for the first time I can think of, the high-end Powermac is the sweet spot in price/performance. I am also very happy that the Dual 2Ghz didn't break the $3k pricepoint. Very good!
As many of you have already made note, the low-end machine seems really expensive! However, it is great that you can get a Dual 1.25Ghz G4 Powermac for $1,599 on Apple's site now, and a single 1.25Ghz G4 Powermac for $1,299.
________________________________________________
Though the Price reductions are nice - I see a lots of reference to the $1,299 1.25 GHZ -- But get that a little closer to the G5s like boost the RAM to 512MB, and Video Memory to 128 MB and Hardrive to 160 GB and the price is like $1,950 only $450 cheaper than the single 1.8GHz G5. Given the much better specs on the 1.8 - Its the system for me. Now if I and just come up with another $600.
It looks like an understated, "I'm going to rip your ear off" machine, just sitting there. It's simple and low-key and just looks like a squared-away, "ready to do 'bid-ness'" machine if there's ever been one!
Agreed. Nickname: 'The Bastard!'
That's what I'm calling mine when I get it.
Tigerwoods99. Fully agree with your post.
No home run. 3rd base, eh?
Apple. Brilliant. But flawed.
Maybe when Rev B comes along and the fuss and sales (of such pricey machines...) die down...we may see more sane pricing.
Mind you...the top end, ironically, is only a couple of hundred pounds more expensive (inc VAT) than the last top end G4!
THAT is impressive. The other two models look very pricey.
And there is no excuse shipping anything less than an ATI 9800 in a £2,300 Tower. Or less than a gig of DDR.
C'mon. No display either.
Sweet spot? The dual 2 gigger.
Will I buy or crack? I'm cracking already. And I haven't seen one in person...
Lemon Bon Bon
And there's 6 months of 2003 to go. Intriguing.
Maybe I'll let my Apple stock fund this purchase...
Lemon Bon Bon
I thought the Panther demo was as impressive, if not more so, than the G5.
I don't understand the low end model. It's too crippled to appeal to the "pro's" and too expensive (and too crippled) for the prosumer. It's almost as if Apple doesn't want anyone to buy the 1.6
A minor quibble, though -- it just means that Apple has some work to do filling the prosumer hole in its lineup.
i didnt see the keynote yet but checked out the new g5's at apple.com and all i can say is WOW!
for the last 5 (or 6) years i have been on these boards at appleinsider and just when i thought an upcoming keynote would introduce a new powermac i could buy there would always be something missing (ddr ram, processer, fsb, etc) that would cause me to say "maybe next keynote they'll get it right and i'll buy"
i can honestly say, that now is the time...
they fixed everything i had as a reason not to buy a powermac
and more importantly this is the machine i can now show my pc using friends that may convince them to switch. 1 gig fsb? 8 gigs of ram max? beating a 3 gig p4? what???
what im buying:
the 1.6 gig? riiiight, next...
the 1.8 gig? uhhhh (snorts derisively...)
the duel 2 gig? ahhhhhh.....
think about it,
if you can start at 2k for the 1.6, you can reach a little and get the 1.8, and if you can do THAT, you may as well reach just a little bit more and get the best... the duel 2 gig model.
the diffrence is only 10-one-hundred-dollar-bills...
those of you planning to get the YIKES!, i mean, the 1.6 gig machine...think about this, if you already have the 2k for that, and you save 100 bucks every week until they are ready to ship, you'll have the extra 1k to go for the top of the line!
hey this is going to be my first real mac, and i want it to be the very best!
Originally posted by Lemon Bon Bon
With Quark 6 and a fall rise in Design/Publishing budgets...I can see Apple, along with pent up demand...make a killing in the next two quarters...
A fall rise!? WTF is that? Do you mean "Autumn" perchance?
I don't think there's much chance of that, budgets are constrained from where I'm sitting, and I think they're going to stay that way into next year (don't forget we're only three months into the financial year over here, and the US usually starts in Jan - I don't think you're going to see much change until new budgets get assigned).
Moving to General Discussion so it doesn't become an innocent victim of the Temporary Insanity napalm dump.
Originally posted by Akumulator
It'll be a little hard for me to buy one anytime soon knowing that 3ghz is only a year away. My G4 can hold out until then.................. or can it?
Hey, hold onto your money, 10 GHz is just five years away!
As a side note: look at the internal shots of the G5. Where is the power supply???
I was ticked about the 2 internal drive limit too, until I realized you can buy 300GB drives now, and we'd have to buy Serial ATA drives for the new cases anyway
As for the one less PCI slot, I dunno about that. Although there are probably very, very few people who actually use four PCI slots, I think this is one area Apple should have tried a little harder on, because it's not an issue that has a cheap alternative.
But if you really need 4 PCI slots, take advantage of the situation and order a Dual 1.25Ghz G4 for $1,599 while they're still available
Some of u would complain at a funeral.
Originally posted by Cory Bauer
I'm gonna bet that Apple didn't put a 2nd Optical drive bay on the G5 towers because after people begged and bitched for one and they added it with the Mirrored Drive Doors, NO ONE EVER BOUGHT TWO OPTICAL DRIVES.
No, they dropped wicked-fast CD-R drives into them for cheap. I did.
Yes, here's hoping that by the holidays Apple goes "okay, we really need to scoot that one down, guys..." and price it at that.
Although, as someone said, it does seem to be a lot nicer than the others out there. It is FireWire based (once cable too), mounts on any Mac, seems to have better display, clarity and color, etc.
I don't know. If more of my friends and family were on Macs and all AND if I have $149 burning a hold in my wallet, sure.
Until then, I'd rather keep saving for my PowerBook.
Getting there...
We are now seeing that a wealth of my predictions are actually right on, though I have wavered in the excitement.
"What?" you say, "how so?"
What I've been saying in the days leading up to this show: IN BOLD Commentary following each.
1299 low end PM NEEDS to be 1299.
With the G4 model that nobody mentioned in the iChat buzz-a-thon, there it is, and it isn't so bad!
Apple typically welches, or makes a half assed effort on the low end machine
The 1299 model is there, but it's a single G4, albeit with L3. I would have prefered stripping out a G5 and selling that, but it at least shows the intention to get a 1299 PM is there. Good. I'll wait for the real one. Which leads me to point three.
There will NOT be G5 PowerBooks for about 12 months after the intro of the G5
In my optimism I had ammended my thoughts to say perhaps a 17 by the end of the year, but the prices of these G5's show it clearly, Apple is excercising an inadvertent form of demand control. Demand will still be huge, from workstation customers, but it's pretty clear that the costs of putting this puppy in a PB are not in the range for a laptop yet. New CPU, new architecture, miniturization, etc etc... The volume will be there, but not this year. We might be waiting for .09u, might not, but some costs need to be absorbed first. It appears that the G5 is not as cheap as we believed IBM would make it. It will be, but later.
So, there you have it, a not total vindication of my statements, but not that far off actually.
ANd, generally positive news for "PRO" customers.
I believe prices will come down, NEXT YEAR, for now, there are enough people who will pay for G5's.
It appears to me, that a PM G4 is nearly the cube we had been spec'cing out in our many discussions.
What remains now, is to see whether Apple merely intends to clear them out and be rid of them, or whether they will gradually move g5's down into that range.