BusinessWeek Article on G5 consumer machines
See:
Taking It Slow with a Superfast Chip
By delaying the lava-hot G5's use in iMacs and laptops, Apple is wisely awaiting the improvements that will make a good thing even better
The reasons why he says it is a good idea not to put the 970 in laptops and iMacs right away is:
I don't doubt that design specs for a G5 that would work well in laptops, and iMacs are already sitting on the hard drives of Big Blue's chip designers. But they would have to be slower versions of the G5 due to the current physical limitations of the new chips. ... The power is not an issue when you can plug your machine into a wall. But to cool down the G5 box, Apple resorted to an anodized aluminum chassis and space-age cooling system using nine -- count 'em, nine -- different fans to keep the machine copacetic.
...
Both these problems could be solved another way, though: Use slower versions of the G5 chips that consume less power and produce less heat. A G5 running at 1.2 gigahertz will consume less than half the power of a top-speed chip in the lineup. Most users wouldn't even notice the speed difference.
And that's the second rationale behind Jobs's strategy. Not only would the average user not notice the difference between a 1.2 vs. 1.8 gigahertz G5, they probably wouldn't notice the difference between their top-speed G4 machine and even the fastest G5. ...
Arghh.
This mad even even more disappointed:
The exotic cooling system [of the Power Mac G5] is clearly not an option in laptops or iMacs, where space is at a premium.
Argh. Nothing like the lack of imagination to bring out the disdain in me. Why not have an exotic 9+ fan cooling system in a notebook computer? Like the Power Mac G5, it may even be quieter than its predecessor.
And I have no idea what he is talking about users not noticing speed differences, especially speed differences between a 1.2 to 1.8 GHz system. In any case, as long as there is a performance improvement, the onus is on Apple to sell a more marketable system. It seems absurd that Apple has our best interests at heart...
Taking It Slow with a Superfast Chip
By delaying the lava-hot G5's use in iMacs and laptops, Apple is wisely awaiting the improvements that will make a good thing even better
The reasons why he says it is a good idea not to put the 970 in laptops and iMacs right away is:
I don't doubt that design specs for a G5 that would work well in laptops, and iMacs are already sitting on the hard drives of Big Blue's chip designers. But they would have to be slower versions of the G5 due to the current physical limitations of the new chips. ... The power is not an issue when you can plug your machine into a wall. But to cool down the G5 box, Apple resorted to an anodized aluminum chassis and space-age cooling system using nine -- count 'em, nine -- different fans to keep the machine copacetic.
...
Both these problems could be solved another way, though: Use slower versions of the G5 chips that consume less power and produce less heat. A G5 running at 1.2 gigahertz will consume less than half the power of a top-speed chip in the lineup. Most users wouldn't even notice the speed difference.
And that's the second rationale behind Jobs's strategy. Not only would the average user not notice the difference between a 1.2 vs. 1.8 gigahertz G5, they probably wouldn't notice the difference between their top-speed G4 machine and even the fastest G5. ...
Arghh.
This mad even even more disappointed:The exotic cooling system [of the Power Mac G5] is clearly not an option in laptops or iMacs, where space is at a premium.
Argh. Nothing like the lack of imagination to bring out the disdain in me. Why not have an exotic 9+ fan cooling system in a notebook computer? Like the Power Mac G5, it may even be quieter than its predecessor.
And I have no idea what he is talking about users not noticing speed differences, especially speed differences between a 1.2 to 1.8 GHz system. In any case, as long as there is a performance improvement, the onus is on Apple to sell a more marketable system. It seems absurd that Apple has our best interests at heart...
Comments
I've always found it funny that people still say things like "you'll never use all that power". There is always something out there that will bring your computer to it's knees begging for mercy. From Top Notch MPEG2 Encoding to number crunching effects like Audioease's Altiverb. There is a definite market for speed. Even purchasing an eMac today only gets you just abover the recommended spec for DVD Studio Pro and Soundtrack.
We're not out the woods yet Toto. The low end is where Apple needs to be shipping computers like a Mad Company. They have .mac and iTMS now to make up on the small margin.
<sniffle> the worst thing is that with Rendezvous...networking Macs is so easy but affording 2 or more decent machines is hard to do. Fix this Apple. We want a Chicken in every pot and Mac in every room!!
Originally posted by hmurchison
We're not out the woods yet Toto. The low end is where Apple needs to be shipping computers like a Mad Company. They have .mac and iTMS now to make up on the small margin.
And the iPod, just think for the price of many a bargain box emachine you can get an iPod...who needs a $<499 computer if you can sell a music player for $499
Originally posted by Wrong Robust
And the iPod, just think for the price of many a bargain box emachine you can get an iPod...who needs a $<499 computer if you can sell a music player for $499
Yep, and it only comes with a 30GB HD.
Originally posted by hmurchison
Apple Apologists Unite!
I've always found it funny that people still say things like "you'll never use all that power". There is always something out there that will bring your computer to it's knees begging for mercy. From Top Notch MPEG2 Encoding to number crunching effects like Audioease's Altiverb. There is a definite market for speed. Even purchasing an eMac today only gets you just abover the recommended spec for DVD Studio Pro and Soundtrack.
Ummm, yeah.
But the non-Apple apologists veer wildly between demanding that Apple ship a low end machine for people who don't care about iMovie or iDVD, and demanding that they ship a low end machine for people who will encode two-pass VBR high quality MPEG-2 while tightening up the soundtrack in Logic and rendering the cover art in Maya. I'm afraid that the "broke power user" is just going to be perennially frustrated. The grass is not necessarily greener on the other side, although you can get by sometimes if you're willing to become a gearhead.
Pick one. Low end PCs are almost invariably incapable of running pro applications at all, so asking an eMac to do so is silly; and if the market is people who "just want a machine to do light word processing, surfing and email" then DVD Studio Pro isn't in the picture. Right?
There's a market for speed, and Apple offers a product that owns that market. It's not the eMac.
The stripped-down box isn't going to happen anyway. You can't pursue a whole-widget strategy by shipping half the widget and hoping that the customer stuffs the other half into the available PCI slots. Apple's bad enough about migrating their technology across their lines as it is. They don't need encouragement.
We're not out the woods yet Toto. The low end is where Apple needs to be shipping computers like a Mad Company. They have .mac and iTMS now to make up on the small margin.
I think you are greatly overestimating the ability of those services to make up the margins. Besides, If you're going to ship low end machines, you have to ship like a mad company or you don't get the economies of scale to get the prices down or the volume to make up for the poor margins (and that's how you make up for poor margins, not by hoping that something else will subsidize them - unless you're selling large quantities to enterprise, in which case the service contract makes up for the lack of profit on the hardware).
So, before Apple can ship machines like a mad company, they have to be assured that they'll sell like mad, or they'll just end up with warehouses full of Lisas again. Do you think that a cheap Mac is all that's needed to open the floodgates? That it will overcome all the fears of incompatibility, all the logic about buying what you use at work (or school) so that you don't have to learn two systems? All the myths that are still altogether too prevalent? I don't.
<sniffle> the worst thing is that with Rendezvous...networking Macs is so easy but affording 2 or more decent machines is hard to do. Fix this Apple. We want a Chicken in every pot and Mac in every room!!
Well, if your qualification is that the machines be able to quickly render high definition MPEG-2, I can certainly understand your frustration. If you don't, the eMac's a decent value and the iBook's a steal.
Originally posted by CubeDude
BuisnessWeek seems to be covering Apple a lot lately.
Is that a good thing? If this means good publicity, yes. But if Businessweek reports in a dull manner akin to the way that they report on PC news, no.
Originally posted by Eugene
9 fans in a laptop? ???
They'll be very small fans.
Originally posted by Placebo
They'll be very small fans.
Yeah, but they are trying to get the heat out of the machine, insulation will trap the heat in the machine.
Originally posted by Bigc
Yeah, but they are trying to get the heat out of the machine, insulation will trap the heat in the machine.
Yes, I believe they use the machine as a large heatsink
Originally posted by Placebo
They'll be very small fans.
Uh, what? Help what problem? That would help keep your thighs cool but it wouldn't cool down the PowerBook one bit.
Originally posted by Amorph
Ummm, yeah.
But the non-Apple apologists veer wildly between demanding that Apple ship a low end machine for people who don't care about iMovie or iDVD, and demanding that they ship a low end machine for people who will encode two-pass VBR high quality MPEG-2 while tightening up the soundtrack in Logic and rendering the cover art in Maya. I'm afraid that the "broke power user" is just going to be perennially frustrated. The grass is not necessarily greener on the other side, although you can get by sometimes if you're willing to become a gearhead.
Pick one. Low end PCs are almost invariably incapable of running pro applications at all, so asking an eMac to do so is silly; and if the market is people who "just want a machine to do light word processing, surfing and email" then DVD Studio Pro isn't in the picture. Right?
There's a market for speed, and Apple offers a product that owns that market. It's not the eMac.
---snip---
Well, if your qualification is that the machines be able to quickly render high definition MPEG-2, I can certainly understand your frustration. If you don't, the eMac's a decent value and the iBook's a steal.
The problem is that nowadays the low end PCs can run the 'pro apps' just fine (and you don't need to be running expensive programs like FCP -- there are plenty of shareware encoders and other products that can use as much horsepowers as you can get your hands on).
For the price of an eMac you can get a 2.4 to 3.2 GHz P4. The current The eMac's and iMacse are just terribly underpowered -- they choke on games and other programs that the low end PCs handle just fine. (The problem with the low end PC is that it is running annoying windows OS.)
You cannot blame people for wanting apple to move the consumer lines to the G5. My family will most likely pick up three of them once that happens.
Originally posted by Eugene
9 fans in a laptop? ???
These are my comments from the Apple notebook lineup thread:
Actually, I'm envisioning a 1.5 inch thick Powerbook G5 as having an aluminum structure, 3 thermal zones, 10+ 0.75" fans, aerogel insulation, 4 SO-DIMMs, 2 Cardbus slots, easily removable bottom for hard drive, optical and memory upgrades, and a 120+ Watt-hour battery for 6+ hour operation time. All using a Power Mac G5 inspired design theme.
------
Well, maybe 7.5 to 8 lbs. I put it at 1.5 inches because it would allow for a 0.5" to 0.75" thick "heat sink" that covers 75% of the motherboard. Namely it would be designed such that its surface can be thermal pasted to the CPU, system ASIC, graphics chip, and system I/O chip. Fans would be an integral part of the heat sink and are situated at the ends of the heat sink with flow going south to north (front to back). The flow would be separated into 3 zones: 1 for the system I/O chip, 1 for the CPU and system ASIC, and 1 for the graphics chip. (Maybe it should have 4 zones?) Since it will be less than 0.75" thick, it means each zone would have lots of small fans, with the CPU zone probably having 6+.
The insulation would insulate the top and bottom while the fans blow air from the front to the back. It's cartoon engineering, but that's usually the best kind! The details can be worked out later.
Between that other guy's goofy polls and people putting EVERYTHING into Future Hardware, this place is getting completely silly lately.
And don't stretch the definition of "future hardware" by saying "the dual G5 isn't shipping yet..." because that's just lame.
Originally posted by pscates
Between that other guy's goofy polls and people putting EVERYTHING into Future Hardware, this place is getting completely silly lately.
Everything goes into Future Hardware because:
(A) It's the first forum in the list of forums, so it's the easiest choice to click on.
(B) All the coolest people hang out in Future Hardware, so loser wannabes keep following us into here, hoping to bask in our coolness.
PS: The Business Week article talks about the future of the G5 beyond the Power Macs, so, oddly enough, this topic might actually belong here!
Originally posted by Wrong Robust
And the iPod, just think for the price of many a bargain box emachine you can get an iPod...who needs a $<499 computer if you can sell a music player for $499
Very good point, and Apple is able to sell iPods to Wintel users without forcing them into a traumatic switch to the Mac.