G5 Trinity @ WWDC

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  • Reply 101 of 492
    wizard69wizard69 Posts: 13,377member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by hmurchison

    Well I tend to frequent Audio Production and Video Production boards and I don't really get that they are unhappy with the speed unless we're talking Powerbooks(G5 needed their and quick).



    The PowerBooks do have a big problem!



    Speed is interesting feature. Two things happen, one is software that takes advantage fo that spped and then could use more. The others are users adapting to that speed and then finding they can use more.



    There are also the people that never have fast enough machines. Thankfully I'm not currently in that position, but there are ligitimate examples.

    Quote:



    Frankly I don't think any of us thought it would take almost a year for RevB PMs to hit. The only people buying right now are those in a pinch. Hell Motion alone may get some people to upgrade their computers. What it takes is a new killer feature that is worth opening up the bank again. Apple could sell Powermacs up to 5k easily. There is someone at every level that needs the power.



    5K for a computer, not any of the current towers I can tell you that much for sure. No matter how fast the chip is in them. Now that doesn't mean that Apple wouldn't try it, but it would be a huge mistake from the marketing point of view.



    First is the issue of what to call it. Call it a PowerMac and it will feed the perception that Macs are grossly over priced and have the effect of driving sales downward even more. Apple can't afford fewer sales. Haivng 4 or 5 PowerMac models spread out over a range of frequencies, with basically the same features, is going to be very hard to pull off also.



    Call it a workstation of some sort, then you end up in the same situation that all of the other workstation builders are in. That is declining sales in the face of standard hardware ---- THINK SUN ----



    Even the conventional server market is beginning to reject high priced hardware. The current PowerMacs could not pass as servers anyways and it isn't to clear that the newer machines would address shortcomings here either.



    The last thing Apple needs to do is to jack up the price of the PowerMacs. They are to expensive as it is the market is has been very clear about that. I don't buy the idea that All of Apples customers are sitting back waiting for the next release. That implies a few ugly things, one of which is that the customer base is shrinking. Another is that the whole of the customer base is equal to the number of PowerMacs sold to date. Which if true means that Apple really doesn't have much of a market left.

    Quote:



    I'm disappointed that it's taken this long but I think Apple must have made the decision to skip a small refresh and hit with something big. WWDC has me very excited. I think things are just getting started. I never really expected gonzo PM sales. Creatives are willing to spend the money but the typical consumer is going to be cool with something a little less beefy.



    I certainly agree that Apple has something up its sleeves. At this point they almost have to come out with a PCI-Express machine.



    It is sad that Apple created a situatuion where you didin't expect good PM sales. But you do seem to have the wrong impression about consumers. The problem is that there is little beef there and consumers want that beef for thier dollar. This brings back to memeory the old where the beef commercials of some years back. When one looks at a PM in the store the first thing that comes to mind is where the beef. Or more exactly there is a nice price tag here but one isle over I can double my HD size and 4X my RAM size for less money -- so where the beef?



    You may believe that "creative" are willing to spend the money but more and more shops now have PC hardware in them. Just because people are "creative" does not imply that they are foolish with their money. You will find that people are being much more selective with their PC buying dollar, Macs need a clear advantage to justify their price.

    Quote:



    My guess is that PMs hit 3Ghz by late summer. Apple will have 4 Drive Bays and a beefier audio specification. Another Pro App is coming down the pipe as well. People have the money...you just gotta make them dig deeeeeeep.



    You are very optimistic about getting people to dig deep! Apple needs compelling hardware at reasonable prices to get people to do that. As far as new machines go I'm thinking 3GHz at WWDC. Mostly because Apple needs to address sagging sales of the desktop hardware. This implies a minimal 2GHx imac or replacement and proportionally faster Towers. They also need to correct the joke that the orginal G5 release created when it was claimed to be the fastest PC available. Apple needs to be able to keep that crown for a long time to recoup from that little mistake. Further the machine needs to be marketed at PC prices, not server prices if it is going to compete in the desktop market.
  • Reply 102 of 492
    Quote:

    Originally posted by wizard69

    Hi emig



    Well that is where we may have an issue in communicaitons here. You get the same quality in PC hardware for alot less. There was a time when I honestly believed that Apple had better hardware but that time has passed.



    AS to OS/X, yes it is very nice. One of the reasons I left the Mac world was the state of Apples old OS, which caused me to move briefly to NT. But to be honest with you most of my OS issue went away with the transition to Redhat and now Fedora. I like the idea that OS/X offer similar power but am put off buy the platform needed to run it as well as Linux.



    As to Apples hardware being competitive that simply is not the case. Every platoform they have you imemdiately have to go out and upgrade to make best use of the machine. Oftne that means buying RAM and harddisk just to bring the machine up to the same values avaliable form the mainline PC vendors. Is a machine that comes with far to little RAM to run its own OS a good bargin?



    As to the OS - its mostly BSD with a different graphical environment. While Apple has done a nice job with it, it certainly isn't light years ahead of any other BSD distribution. Let me tell you though, Linux is moving along at a rather impressive clip. Sure it is not perfect, no OS is, but it is far more stable than some of the old MS OS'es.



    So agian where is the money going, into quality -nope-, into nice hardware -nope-, into the highest margins in the industry -yep-.



    Your argument comes down to the idea that the OS is worth $2000. Well I do know that some could easly justify spending $2000 on an OS but the vast majority of the people out there see it as an expense. An expense that can be reduced or eliminated by choosing a different path. That path may not involve MS, Linux offers an environment that is very similar to OS/X in capabilities at a greatly reduced cost and on hardware that is far cheaper.



    So I'm sitting here and I see OS/X as it is now. It is not bad but it is not pulling me off the hardware I'm on now. When it coems right down to it that is Apples problem, there are a lot of us that have no interest in MS OS'es but on the other hand are not willing to pay Apples tax. When it comes right down to it that is really what is happening, your being taxed for a name, because that extra money you are spending isn't going into either hardware or software. Sometimes I have to laugh when I hear about the RDF, but apparently it still works on people. The thing is they would even need the RDF if they just would attempt to meet customer needs on the simplest things.



    Thanks

    Dave






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  • Reply 103 of 492
    ensign pulverensign pulver Posts: 1,193member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by hmurchison

    Hell Motion alone may get some people to upgrade their computers.



    If you had seen the live demo as I did then you wouldn't say "maybe". This app will absolutely blow you away when you get get your hands on it. I guarantee it. People won't just upgrade because of it, they'll switch their whole workflows to the Mac platform because of it. It's that good.



    In fact Motion's system requirements (2x2 G5 with 2GB RAM and a Radeon 9800 Pro is the recommended system ) is what gives me confidence in the upcoming G5 revs. Apple is crazy serious about the video and post production markets and apps like Motion mean Apple must have some very serious hardware in store.



    I really believe Steve is going to give us Dual 3GHz 975 Power Macs with PCIe native ATi x800 graphics at WWDC. He never would have made that promise last year if we wasn't DAMN sure.
  • Reply 104 of 492
    smirclesmircle Posts: 1,035member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by wizard69



    As to Apples hardware being competitive that simply is not the case. Every platoform they have you imemdiately have to go out and upgrade to make best use of the machine.




    I think you have crossed the line to pointles whining here. Almost anyone I know is able to push a RAM stick or two in the slots and most people are quite happy to go and buy RAM at spot market prices.



    Go and look at Dell or IBM or Sony for a comparison, not some one-man show around the corner. Their RAM and HD offerings are frequently quite modest, whereas their prices are not.

    Quote:



    As to the OS - its mostly BSD with a different graphical environment. While Apple has done a nice job with it, it certainly isn't light years ahead of any other BSD distribution. Let me tell you though, Linux is moving along at a rather impressive clip. Sure it is not perfect, no OS is, but it is far more stable than some of the old MS OS'es.




    Another bitch-fest.

    Linux is moving along rather impressively? I'd love to see the day when their UI has turned from ridiculous to "something akin to Win2K".

    The important part of an OS today are no longer the IP stack, the RAM subsystem, but the higher level APIs. Linux is so far behind here, it's not even funny any longer. MS's .NET/C# is currently the gold standard (which is why the Linux guys were scrambling to copy it) with Apple's Cocoa/obj-C and Sun's J2*/Java following suit.



    Linux? QT - based on C++. Technically sound, but totally lackluster - in the days of Ghz-CPUs, C++ is no longer interesting for a lot of developers.



    Even lower level structures like the graphics layer (XWindows haha) and audio architecture are more modern on OS X - and if MS ever comes out with Longhorn, they might even leapfrog Apple here.



    Heck, it took Linux until Kernel revision 2.6 to get a well performing and elegant threading architecture...
  • Reply 105 of 492
    jasenj1jasenj1 Posts: 923member
    Errrmm... Sorry, didn't mean to send this thread off into a price war, Wintel vs Mac flame fest. The original rumor at the start was very encouraging, and the "confirmations" along the way made it more so. Here's to killer new machines at WWDC. (And prices staying out of the stratosphere.)



    The commonality that I've seen in this thread (and the many others just like it):

    1. You can build a much cheaper Windows box than Apple can build a Mac. That's an apple to oranges comparison. You can't compare self-serve to full-serve. Apple is full-serve. Compare their prices to other full-serve vendors and Apple does better. If you believe all full-serve vendors are overpriced, that's fine; but Apple holds no special place in that comparison.



    2. If you make $$$ with a Mac, and more specifically with the very fine apps Apple makes, the price for the hardware doesn't matter very much. Their Pro apps are great and very reasonably priced. The "premium" for Apple hardware disappears into the cost of doing business and is paid for by added productivity.



    I just hope Apple doesn't put too much focus on that segment of the market. I think there are plenty of "prosumers" and general business users who aren't married to Apple's apps but prefer the PMac line to iMacs for many reasons. Pushing the PMac price into the "workstation" space will drive some (many?) of those sales to the Wintel camp. Apple might not care if they are making enough money, but as a part of that "don't really need a PMac but want one anyway" market, I do.



    - Jasen.
  • Reply 106 of 492
    mccrabmccrab Posts: 201member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by jasenj1

    I just hope Apple doesn't put too much focus on that segment of the market. I think there are plenty of "prosumers" and general business users who aren't married to Apple's apps but prefer the PMac line to iMacs for many reasons. Pushing the PMac price into the "workstation" space will drive some (many?) of those sales to the Wintel camp. Apple might not care if they are making enough money, but as a part of that "don't really need a PMac but want one anyway" market, I do.



    - Jasen.




    Interesting point you make. When Steve-O returned back in the 90's, he simplified Apple's offering into the famous quadrants (iMac, PMac, iBook, PBook) to get Apple's house back in order.



    Now that the OSX migration has occured and that a buch of good apps are in place, perhaps now is the time for Apple to consider materially expanding its offering: eMac, AIO iMac, headless Mac (G5 SP), and top end (DP, QP G5) workstations; and in the laptop line 2 or 3 G4 iBook configurations, PowerBook (ultra portable 10" no CD drive, 12/13", 15" and 17" widescreen). Better for Apple to cannabalise its own share than for it to lose share elsewhere.
  • Reply 107 of 492
    wizard69wizard69 Posts: 13,377member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by jasenj1

    Errrmm... Sorry, didn't mean to send this thread off into a price war, Wintel vs Mac flame fest. The original rumor at the start was very encouraging, and the "confirmations" along the way made it more so. Here's to killer new machines at WWDC. (And prices staying out of the stratosphere.)







    It wasn't my intent to throw this into a price war discussion, rather an attempt to address the thought that Apples raising prices would be OK. Apple needs to lower prices not raise them. $5000 for a base machine is just to much considering Apples market performance.

    Quote:



    The commonality that I've seen in this thread (and the many others just like it):

    1. You can build a much cheaper Windows box than Apple can build a Mac. That's an apple to oranges comparison. You can't compare self-serve to full-serve. Apple is full-serve. Compare their prices to other full-serve vendors and Apple does better. If you believe all full-serve vendors are overpriced, that's fine; but Apple holds no special place in that comparison.



    It goes well beyond what you can build yourself. Lets face it building yourself is not exactly an economical approach when buy componenets retail. The problem is the other vendors, of complete systems, do offer more for the money. They especially offer more where the consumer needs it.

    Quote:



    2. If you make $$$ with a Mac, and more specifically with the very fine apps Apple makes, the price for the hardware doesn't matter very much. Their Pro apps are great and very reasonably priced. The "premium" for Apple hardware disappears into the cost of doing business and is paid for by added productivity.



    This is one thing I disagree on. In a tight economy the price differrential can make a differrence in a buy decision. Beyond that you have the flexibility of a PC competeing against a Mac. There are many ways to measure productivity, sometimes the Mac wins sometimes not.

    Quote:



    I just hope Apple doesn't put too much focus on that segment of the market. I think there are plenty of "prosumers" and general business users who aren't married to Apple's apps but prefer the PMac line to iMacs for many reasons. Pushing the PMac price into the "workstation" space will drive some (many?) of those sales to the Wintel camp. Apple might not care if they are making enough money, but as a part of that "don't really need a PMac but want one anyway" market, I do.



    This is exactly what I'm talking about. Simply having a need for internal HD expansion or a PCI slot puts you into expensive Mac hardware.



    The point is Apple has already push customers away with their pricing. If they think that having their top performing CPU priced at $5000 dollars is going to help then they need to be reeducated a bit. Or at the very least have their noises rubbed into the current sales figures.

    Quote:



    - Jasen.



  • Reply 108 of 492
    nerudaneruda Posts: 439member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by cubist

    Hold on... we knew plenty about the 970 by January '03, but the Apple G5 machines weren't released until June '03. We had photos of the chip (with feathers!), data sheets, all kinds of information on the chip from IBM, altho nothing from Apple....



    Semantics. What makes something vaporware is not that there is available information on the product but that the product itself is not available. Following your logic Longhorn isn't vaporware, then, since there are demos, screenshots...



    a_greer: Redheads are the best I shure loves my redhead



    975 at WWDC
  • Reply 109 of 492
    Quote:

    Originally posted by concentricity

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    Isn't this a little rude.
  • Reply 110 of 492
    Quote:

    Originally posted by lloyddean

    U



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    Isn't this a little rude.




    Sorry, I guess I forgot to add a smiley. And it's just too darn frustrating to try to explain why this whole arguement is retarded for the 100th time. Hope nobody was terribly offended.
  • Reply 111 of 492
    onlookeronlooker Posts: 5,252member
    hmurchison,

    I don't think Apple will create a 3D app from the ground up, and they didn't buy Alias, but I do think they could be a formidable player in CG.

    I just keep thinking about renderman, and renderman artist tools (which is not available for Mac OS yet), and all of Apples other pro applications. They have products that need to be on the cutting edge of power, and graphics.



    Apple could have a first class 3D workstation if they had the good 3D video card support like PC's do. That alone is holding them back big time. Plus the fact that they are still one step behind in processing power AFAIAC. If they hit 3GHz a lot of people will take another look at the G5 because it will be seriously competitive, and a leader in performance speed wise in many more areas, but the graphics card is still their biggest hurdle.



    If Apple gets 3D video card support they seriously need an NVIDIA card manufacturer's help. ATI has been a big supporter of the Mac in the past, and I have great respect for them for that. I would love to support them just for this reason, but I keep hearing to stay away from ATI 3D cards because their OpenGL support is very poor, and that NVIDIA is the only true choice for a workstation class computer in 3D.



    Who ever said a $5,000.00 is too expensive for the configuration I came up with is off their rocker. The Graphics card I listed alone is worth like $2,500.00.



    But when I put that card in there I didn't mean it as a base configuration. I was suggesting offering a more professional card as a BTO option.
  • Reply 112 of 492
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Quote:

    Sorry, I guess I forgot to add a smiley. And it's just too darn frustrating to try to explain why this whole arguement is retarded for the 100th time. Hope nobody was terribly offended.



    Nah I wasn't offended. I agree this arguement happens all the time. Typically when Apple is in the 11th hour of a product cycle and the vultures swoop in to compare a 9 month old Mac with a new PC that was just released. It's pointless and stale.



    What bothers me the most is people that cannot "shift their center". Is it so hard to realize that a consumer and a profesional have two different ways of looking at something?



    How many times do we have to hear someone complain that the Xserve doesn't have the fastest processor because Servers value stability over overall speed.



    How many to do we have to hear about Apples insane ram costs when www.crucial.com or www.corsair.com is a freakin website away.



    The norm on the net seems to be hyperbole and FUD. I get Mac and PC users alike trying to pull the wool over my eyes. It's the politics of computing nowadays.



    The truth is we're all right. There is someone out there that feels exactly like we're describing. Just some of us have more allies than others.
  • Reply 113 of 492
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Onlooker



    Yeah I see your point. Apple does have the inside track to Pixar tech tsk tsk tsk. They most definitely do need to get the Quadro FX series on the Mac.



    Let's be honest. store.apple.com is quite boring. There needs to be a section showing hotrodded Macs.



    Like



    Powermac G5 DCC

    2.6 Dual G5s

    2GB RAM

    500GB of SATA HD

    DVD Burner

    Quadro FX 2000

    $5999



    Offer other configurations with preinstalled software. Apples goal should be to hit 15 Billion in revenue within the next 2-3 yrs. That means hitting on all cylinders everywhere and making themselves indespensable.
  • Reply 114 of 492
    kim kap solkim kap sol Posts: 2,987member
    People who are expecting 999 for the low end and less than 2000 for the top end are being unrealistic.



    Apple is a company that innovates new software, hardware, and high quality enclosure cases. The R&D costs need to be covered. Then a reasonable profit margin needs to be established to ensure future R&D. Money has to be saved up to ensure that the company can cover the unexpected.



    On top of that, Apple uses high quality hardware that you'd never find in a $999 box.



    And some of you expect the high end professional PowerMac to go under 1k? Get real. You're in the wrong forum too...SpyMac and other kiddie forums are thaddaway .
  • Reply 115 of 492
    macroninmacronin Posts: 1,174member
    Quote:

    onlooker said:

    Anyway. I think Apple would charge $5000 for that setup, but If that setup had Dual 3GHz G5's with 1,5 GHz FSB, 2GB RAM, 16x PCI-Express, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000, and an 8x DVD-R/DVD+R Superdrive I'd buy it in a second.



    Quote:

    hmurchison said:

    Powermac G5 DCC

    2.6 Dual G5s

    2GB RAM

    500GB of SATA HD

    DVD Burner

    Quadro FX 2000

    $5999




    I say the rig onlooker specs out is more realistic, price-wise...



    I would like to have dual PCI-Express slots on the motherboard at the least, and the ability to run two seperate OpenGL/display cards...



    Of course, PCI-Express for all expansion slots would be nice..!
  • Reply 116 of 492
    fat freddyfat freddy Posts: 150member
    What's about Architosh
  • Reply 117 of 492
    nerudaneruda Posts: 439member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by hmurchison

    Onlooker



    Powermac G5 DCC

    2.6 Dual G5s

    2GB RAM

    500GB of SATA HD

    DVD Burner

    Quadro FX 2000

    $5999





    Let's hope the days of $6,000 Macs are gone and will never return
  • Reply 118 of 492
    Quote:

    Originally posted by hmurchison

    Onlooker



    [snip]



    Let's be honest. store.apple.com is quite boring. There needs to be a section showing hotrodded Macs.



    [snip]



    Offer other configurations with preinstalled software. Apples goal should be to hit 15 Billion in revenue within the next 2-3 yrs. That means hitting on all cylinders everywhere and making themselves indespensable.




    this is a great point, and I think you're on to something bigger...



    think about what apple has done to build support in the open source community. they (mostly) opened their code, have put money and resources into the darwin camp, and have embraced an entirely new and open attitude in OS development. And it worked.



    why not do the same type of thing with the hardware platform, in the sense of providing a welcoming environment, officially, like with darwin, for the DIY / HW hack people, third party hardware developers, etc. Maybe it's a seperate section of the web site, and has a page off of the regular store. bundle third party hardware and gadgets, etc. maybe even a forum, seperate from the lame @ss support forums, for DIYers and highlight cool mods/upgrades. If they were feeling really ballsy, they could offer stripped down towers for cheap, with a purchasing contract similar to developers that says you can only buy for yourself, and are not permitted to resell. I'd love to be able to buy a stripped down G5 with just the enclosure, MB, processors, etc, but NO ram, HD, GFX, optical... it would still cost more than a _partly_ equivalent beige-box, but I'm not going to get sucked in to that BS.
  • Reply 119 of 492
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Quote:

    I say the rig onlooker specs out is more realistic, price-wise.



    Dual 2.6 PM- $3000 (Base config w/dvd brnr, 1GB RAM, 9800 gpu 250GB HD

    500GB Sata- $300 extra

    Quadro 2000- $1300 extra

    2GB of RAM- $ $500 extra



    Yeah 6k would be too much. 5K is more likely for a hyped up version.





    Quote:

    Let's hope the days of $6,000 Macs are gone and will never return



    Indeed. I'd love to see an $8000 turnkey Mac someday with



    The fastest PM Apple could ship with Dual Procs

    4GB of RAM at least

    Terabyte of HD space min

    FCP Suite(FCP/Motion Pro/DVDSP/3D App/Apple DAW/Xsan preloaded and ready to roll.



    It's human nature to look at the unobtainable and lust for it. I just don't have lust for the Dual 2Gh anymore. It's become somewhat passe. It's time to change that.



    Concentricity



    Great point! I wish Apple would eventually do something like this with Darwin. There is a huge desire in many of us to "Roll our own". The question is how can we reach a happy medium with Apple? Wouldn't it be great to have motherboards from Apple and the ability to purchase PPC processor from them. The computers wouldn't need to run OSX but maybe an advanced Darwin. Many computer fans love to build their own computers. It fosters a nice "can do" mentality. Well one can dream right?
  • Reply 120 of 492
    placeboplacebo Posts: 5,767member
    Wow...we had AGP 8X in a single product update...and now PCI Express is going to be in the next one...



    I've stopped caring about the obsolescence of my own machine...as long as Apple can deliver, they're free to do so.
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