The future of CPU's in Macs

dferigmu · September 17, 2003 9:45AM

Ok, currently, Apple is using 4 different CPUs with one waiting in the wings. There's the G5 made by IBM, the next G3 by IBM, the old G3, the old G4, and the updated G4 7457; all by Motorola.

We all know Powermacs will use the G5 from now on, but what about the rest?

Which chip will go where? We all know the end is near for the Motorola G3 and G4. Will all Macs eventually be using IBM G3s and G5s? Will the G4 7457 stick around for a while?

not unlike myself · September 17, 2003 9:54AM

As much as everyone hates to admit it the G3 is so solid, low power, and high performace, and low cost (respectivly) that it will remain a power in consumer laptops until such time as the G4s are hacked 30% in price. When will that happen? When the G5s are hacked 10-15%. This means at the 6-9 mon 'bump' that AAPL are gonna do, look for a 'roll around' effect. (This is all IMHO)

outsider · September 17, 2003 11:21AM

Speculating of course, but i also seem to remember hearing about an IBM G3 based CPU with longer pipeline, new bus, and VMX. With IBM's new naming scheme the may call it either an 800 series or something like a 940. The G3 has too many power saving features to be ignored for portable use. Integrating the memory controller would go a long way for performance and power usage and would compete well with centrino. this would essentially make it Uni-Processor centric, but for the imac/iBook/PowerBook, that would be OK.

hmurchison · September 17, 2003 12:04PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Outsider

Speculating of course, but i also seem to remember hearing about an IBM G3 based CPU with longer pipeline, new bus, and VMX. With IBM's new naming scheme the may call it either an 800 series or something like a 940. The G3 has too many power saving features to be ignored for portable use. Integrating the memory controller would go a long way for performance and power usage and would compete well with centrino. this would essentially make it Uni-Processor centric, but for the imac/iBook/PowerBook, that would be OK.

What he said. Very nicely put.

G3 Supadoopa and G5. Nice simple lineup wide coverage.

nofeer · September 17, 2003 1:20PM

Superdooper g3(ibm) how would that compare with the present g3 or g4 for that matter in terms of video, mp3, speed, battery life???

matsu · September 17, 2003 1:34PM

G3's with altivec would effectively make them into G4's for SP applications. Just fine for e/iMac and portables. BUT, they cannot credibly fill that role unless they get altivec, power saving or not, too much real performance depends on it. Photoshop, iPhoto and iMovie only become passable because of it in some cases. So, yeah, we need G4's whether they come from IBM or moto.

outsider · September 17, 2003 1:41PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Matsu

G3's with altivec would effectively make them into G4's for SP applications. Just fine for e/iMac and portables. BUT, they cannot credibly fill that role unless they get altivec, power saving or not, too much real performance depends on it. Photoshop, iPhoto and iMovie only become passable because of it in some cases. So, yeah, we need G4's whether they come from IBM or moto.

Exactly. And for legacy purposes, they could include a memory controller on die and still use the 60x bus, running at say, 200MHz. 200MHz would be plenty fast for the lower I/O like Firewire/Ethernet/USB2/PCI/AGP/ATA leaving memory with its own dedicated bus to the CPU.

snoopy · September 17, 2003 1:53PM

Quote:

Originally posted by NOFEER

Superdooper g3(ibm) how would that compare with the present g3 or g4 for that matter in terms of video, mp3, speed, battery life???

The Superdooper g3 is the IBM 750VX, code name Mojave. It has been discussed for over 6 months, and recently even MacOSRumors mentioned it. It would be good for the iBook and any other low end Mac Apple may come up with for education, general business and the home markets. It will have the Velocity Engine, multiprocessor capability and a fast front side bus according to what I read. It is basically a G4 since it will run software that requires a G4 or better. It should be low power, and is intended for the embedded market too.

brussell · September 17, 2003 2:02PM

Quote:

Originally posted by dferigmu

Ok, currently, Apple is using 4 different CPUs with one waiting in the wings. There's the G5 made by IBM, the next G3 by IBM, the old G3, the old G4, and the updated G4 7457; all by Motorola.

We all know Powermacs will use the G5 from now on, but what about the rest?

Which chip will go where? We all know the end is near for the Motorola G3 and G4. Will all Macs eventually be using IBM G3s and G5s? Will the G4 7457 stick around for a while?

What are they using the old G3 for? You're talking about the 750cxe? Or are you calling the 750fx the "old" G3 and some newer G3 (was it gx?) as the next G3?

I'm surprised that they're not using the 7457 in the iMacs, since they were released just a matter of days before the new PowerBooks.

outsider · September 17, 2003 2:08PM

Quote:

Originally posted by BRussell

I'm surprised that they're not using the 7457 in the iMacs, since they were released just a matter of days before the new PowerBooks.

Maybe it means the iMac 2 is not long for this world

eMac hasn't even been updated to the new specs. It may not be either.

tommybrando · September 17, 2003 2:23PM

Quote:

Originally posted by snoopy

The Superdooper g3 is the IBM 750VX, code name Mojave. It has been discussed for over 6 months, and recently even MacOSRumors mentioned it.

Well if MacOSRumors mentioned it, we can pretty much presume that it WON'T be coming to market.

Someone drag mosr outback and put it out of it's misery already.

rustedborg · September 17, 2003 3:07PM

Motorola REALLY $crewed the pooch with G4 production this year. The Apple execs are so mad at Motorola for disrupting PowerBook production that IBM is now the goldenchild in the eyes of Apple.

IBM will release the new G3 (PowerPC 750GX Microprocessor with 1.1GHz and 1MB of L2 Cache) before Christmas that will go into the new iBooks, and the G5 is getting a lot of attention.

IBM has already announced that they will release the PowerPC 750VX Microprocessor (1.4GHz with Altivec) in 2004. On that same note, rumors are that Apple will start calling the PowerPC 750VX a "G4" instead of a G3 since it uses Altivec.

I suspect that Motorola is about to get the cold shoulder ... unless they can show Apple they still have something to offer. There are plenty of rumors from PC users that Apple will go Intel ... but that's a load of BS. Apple didn't invest all this money into G5 development and making Panther super G5 friendly just so it could drop the G5 and go the way of Intel.

I suspect we'll be seeing IBM PowerPC chips in Macs for quite a while ... Motorola is a different story.

amorph · September 17, 2003 3:21PM

Quote:

Originally posted by rustedborg

IBM has already announced that they will release the PowerPC 750VX Microprocessor (1.4GHz with Altivec) in 2004. On that same note, rumors are that Apple will start calling the PowerPC 750VX a "G4" instead of a G3 since it uses Altivec.

Not to rain on all the IBM love, but that puts IBM at least 1 year behind Mot - who, lest we forget, shipped a 1.4GHz G3 with a longer pipeline and AltiVec 9 months ago.

One can hope that the IBM part will at least run a lot cooler than the XPC7455 did at the same clock speed. That would make it an excellent candidate for the iBook.

snoopy · September 17, 2003 3:46PM

Quote:

Originally posted by rustedborg

. . . IBM has already announced that they will release the PowerPC 750VX Microprocessor (1.4GHz with Altivec) in 2004. . .

Do you have a link? I did not find it with a search of the IBM website, and I am interested in the bus and some other details, if available. It's nice to see it finally confirmed.

anand · September 17, 2003 4:00PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Amorph

Not to rain on all the IBM love, but that puts IBM at least 1 year behind Mot - who, lest we forget, shipped a 1.4GHz G3 with a longer pipeline and AltiVec 9 months ago.

One can hope that the IBM part will at least run a lot cooler than the XPC7455 did at the same clock speed. That would make it an excellent candidate for the iBook.

Yes, but it will be a chip that can use at least a 200 MHZ bus and still be used in a MP situation.

rustedborg · September 17, 2003 4:01PM

Quote:

Originally posted by snoopy

Do you have a link? I did not find it with a search of the IBM website, and I am interested in the bus and some other details, if available. It's nice to see it finally confirmed.

I haven't actually seen the announcement myself, but someone in another Mac news forum said that IBM let the news leak about the PowerPC 750VX in a PDF they made about the 750 line.

The specs I gave may have come from that PDF or may be speculation based on what little info IBM has released about the PowerPC 750VX.

I'd do a google.com search for PowerPC 750VX and see what you find.

ryaxnb · September 17, 2003 4:04PM

IMHO The G3 (750GX) will stay in iBooks for some time. Just keep it going. It will probably do that until the 750VX comes out; i.e. a long time. The G3 has been around in Apple's lineup (in various forms) for a long time (6 years), but it's still practical. The main thing I want to see the iBooks do is get a higher res on the 14 incher (at least 1152x768 or 1152x810.) Also a mini-DVI port would be nice. In PB's they'll stick around until it least March '04. The eMac will have a fair chance of having them for even longer, as they need to be cheap. The iMacs may be able to go with slow G5's (i.e. 1.5-1.7Ghz at WWDC '04,) but at least one more G4 revision is likely.

amorph · September 17, 2003 4:48PM

Quote:

Originally posted by anand

Yes, but it will be a chip that can use at least a 200 MHZ bus and still be used in a MP situation.

If the bus is the aged 60x bus (the bus that all G3s use to date) then it's not going to be much better than a 167MHz MaxBus (the G4's).

If it has an onboard memory controller, and communicates with the rest of the board via RapidIO, then we're talking about a real improvement. Otherwise... enh. Same old same old.

drboar · September 18, 2003 2:45AM

With the 970 production ramping up it do put a squeeze on the G4. We have yet to see how the G5 compare to the G4 with optimized OS and application and what the time frame for this is.

Assuming

1. G5 will be faster.

2 The optimization will be done in 2003.

3. There will be plenty of G5 around first at 130 then at 90 nm .

4. The G5 will migrate to 90nm for faster or cooler CPUs pretty soon

Outcome

With 1-2 in place the G4 can be replaced in the servers by G5s

(the low number of servers really does not stress the G5 supply)

With 1-3 in place the G5 can be put into the iMac and even eMac (if they do it in the low end eMac is an other thing)

With 1-4 in place migration also in the portable is possible. Those Centrino laptops seem to be pretty good so Apple really can not hold back just to be kind to Motorola...

If we at the end of this year have, as I expect, 10.3 and G5 tweaks out and the low end 1.6 stomping on the dual 1.42 G4 and the 2 GHz DDR G4 is still "delayed" I can see no other outcome than G5. Dual low power G4 in the iMac is possible but is a good idea

cubist · September 18, 2003 8:59AM

My guess is that the iBook will eventually be discontinued. As G5s get faster and cheaper, the 12" Powerbook will be Apple's economy solution; the plastic computers and AIOs will disappear from the lineup, both the eMac and the iMac LCD. The iMac LCD will be replaced by a headless model in a small metal case.

As for the CPUs: G3s will be used in iBooks as long as it looks like people will still buy them, but the performance gap between the G3 and the G5 is huge and will get huger. The G3 is popular in embedded systems and may get used in a small tablet computer.

The G4 is about to become history. The models you see today are the last ones.

not unlike myself · September 18, 2003 9:45AM

Quote:

Originally posted by cubist

The G4 is about to become history. The models you see today are the last ones.

But they *Just* introduced the 15 inch laptop. They won't history that for MONTHS....

The future of CPU's in Macs

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