Intel: We Will "Blow Away" the PowerPC 970

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Comments

  • Reply 61 of 86
    jrgjrg Posts: 58member
    [quote]Originally posted by atomicham:

    <strong>



    (since Apple is overclocking the desktop machines).



    </strong><hr></blockquote>



    Apple is NOT overclocking the G4. Apple would never run equipment out of spec, it would be technical suicide for them to do that. Apple just do not have the knowledge of the chip to guarantee safe operation outside of Motorola's specifications. Here, read this:



    <a href="http://www.realworldtech.com/forums/index.cfm?action=detail&PostNum=1184&Thread=10&ent ryID=14092&roomID=11" target="_blank">Link to technical discussion on Apple overclocking</a>



    Motorola have actually been improving the current G4 design for some time and are now producing it with very good yeilds after considerable tweaking. This has enabled them to introduce new bin splits (i.e. 1.25GHz & 1.43GHz) The only customer for these bin splits is Apple, becuase not many are produced at the top speed (but apparently more are available at the second speed than before).
  • Reply 62 of 86
    AMD isn't entirely out AFAIK. The Server Opterons will be out as planned. As I understand it the Athlon 64 chips have been delayed not because of production problems but because it doesn't make sense to market the new 32bit Barton core procs at the same time. Better to wait till september although this puts it squarely behind the 970 as IBM will be going to 90nm soon after the Athlon 64 chip is on the market. Another theory I have heard is that the 64bit version of Windows XP isn't ready, however I think the A64 would stil sell well to linux customers.



    [ 02-02-2003: Message edited by: nebcon65 ]</p>
  • Reply 63 of 86
    eugeneeugene Posts: 8,254member
    AMD would have you believe there's no 64-bit Windows, but of course they are lying.



    <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/64bit/default.asp"; target="_blank">http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/64bit/default.asp</a>;



    Tada. Windows XP 64-bit, out and about. There's no 64-bit Windows for Athlon 64, btu that's because Microsoft is playing favorites.
  • Reply 64 of 86
    [quote] The coming 2 years should prove exciting from our point of view. <hr></blockquote>



    Yes! And expensive as our wallets drool over each IBM 970 update!



    People stampede the 970 at .13. .9 follows quickly and we stampede like mhz drunken crazy Apple tower lusting folk. (Probably trampling a few Intel owners in our haste...)



    Agreed with your post, entirely. It kinda sums up the last several years for me...



    The shadow of IBM's foot. That's kinda the way I've been thinking about this. I kinda get the feeling IBM owes Intel something. Looks like IBM is about to wake up.



    Hey, Intel started it with the Itanic...trying to stomp on IBM's turf... Unlike Motorola, IBM is in a position not to take it up the ass...



    Lemon Bon Bon



    [ 02-02-2003: Message edited by: Lemon Bon Bon ]



    [ 02-02-2003: Message edited by: Lemon Bon Bon ]</p>
  • Reply 65 of 86
    [quote] They are still selling ~150k per quarter.



    <hr></blockquote>



    Which is pathetic compared to what where they were last year, the year before, the year before that etc.



    Er...some sales are better than no sales. 150K is better than nothing. Yes. They're still making a profit. It's still worth doing the 'power'Mac range.



    They're going to need more than 150K of sales to get their 'sales engine' back up and running.



    The latest round of bump and not inconsiderable cut to prices on the 'power'Mac line 'may' address this. Or at least halt their decline.



    (...and their latest move proves Apple IS living in the real world and there is a limit to how much people will pay for an out of date, 'barely' bumped, over priced tower in a soft economy. At least Apple finally 'got it'.)



    The 970 should get them moving forwards again.



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 66 of 86
    kurtkurt Posts: 225member
    I would love to hear Moki weigh in on this. He was the one who hinted there might be more beyond the 970 already in the works.
  • Reply 67 of 86
    Understandably, Moki has gone rather quiet on this.



    And perhaps well he should.



    However, in his initial musings he did hint at September being a likely release date.



    Apple just bumped the towers, much to my surprise in January when many thought they wouldn't until March!!! Or even April <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[Laughing]" />



    Apple 'did' us again, eh?



    So, Apple are on six month updates which puts a 970 at around Macworld New York with shipping around Seybold/early September.



    The cynical in me is wondering about the strength of the recent 'power'Mac cuts.



    Their top end is now only £2K ish.



    That leaves room for a range of uber workstations to be placed above the current range and launched after the developer conference? Could a surprise 'workstation ala Uber' be on the cards?



    I hope not. I want a 970, but I still think Apple's towers should be 2k and below...



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 68 of 86
    I know this article is a bit old (from april 2002) but has many interesting bits...



    "Where Power4 was intended for high-end Unix servers, Power5 has a broader mandate, Arimilli said. IBM plans to use it in " blade" servers as well, super-thin servers stacked densely like books in a bookshelf. "



    Xserve potential? imagine the Ultralite version of this? Sound like that version would have even better notebook potentional then the 970 since it will be a scaled down version of a chip that uses much less power than the Power4...lots of other interesting info in this article...how wonder how much OS X could make use of the "application specific accelleration" of Power5 based chips...imagime if IBM was working with Apple on the ultraliteversion to have special acceleration for OS X and its apps built into the processor...also the 2*power increase from hyperthreading sounds nice too



    more here:



    <a href="http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-892836.html"; target="_blank">Power 5 and 6 info</a>



    [ 02-02-2003: Message edited by: Producer ]</p>
  • Reply 69 of 86
    mokimoki Posts: 551member
    [quote]Originally posted by Kurt:

    <strong>I would love to hear Moki weigh in on this. He was the one who hinted there might be more beyond the 970 already in the works.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Compared to the G4, the PPC 970 at the same clockspeed is orders of magnitude faster. We're not talking about slightly better benchmarks as we're used to seeing in 200mhz or so speedbumps. Especially in the floating point arena, the 970's are quite a boost compared to the G4... couple that with a very progressive bus, and you have the makings for a very nice desktop CPU indeed.



    This is not enough for you?
  • Reply 70 of 86
    An interesting read.



    Certainly, it gives me the kinda background for Apple to cancel the Motorola G5 and go with a streaming Power CPU road map for X-serve and 'power'Macs.



    Apple get a permanent CPU road map. A powerful inheritance. They'll sell loads more 'power'Macs and IBM will get their R&D payed for by Linux and Macos X.



    IBM is in a win win situation. IBM will need to go something to halt Intel's Itannic advances and it looks like an all Linux/'X' alliance to break the M$ stranglehold on the domestic and encroachment in server markets?



    Apple may or may not be the main customer in mind for the 970 and on series of CPUs.



    But they will be a strong beneficary.



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 71 of 86
    [quote]Originally posted by moki:

    <strong>

    Compared to the G4, the PPC 970 at the same clockspeed is orders of magnitude faster. We're not talking about slightly better benchmarks as we're used to seeing in 200mhz or so speedbumps. Especially in the floating point arena, the 970's are quite a boost compared to the G4... couple that with a very progressive bus, and you have the makings for a very nice desktop CPU indeed.



    This is not enough for you? </strong><hr></blockquote>



    Binary orders of magnitude, mind you. Given even performance even better than published so far I'd "only" expect about a 2-4 times speed improvement which is a far cry from 10x.



    Not that I'm complaining at all!
  • Reply 72 of 86
    mokimoki Posts: 551member
    [quote]Originally posted by Programmer:

    <strong>



    Binary orders of magnitude, mind you. Given even performance even better than published so far I'd "only" expect about a 2-4 times speed improvement which is a far cry from 10x.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Yeah, 3-4x is about right in theory... we'll see what it ends up being in the real world.
  • Reply 73 of 86
    rickagrickag Posts: 1,626member
    [quote]Originally posted by jante99:

    <strong>Basically this will never happen. Maybe with a 5 gzh 970 but at that time Intel will have a faster chip also.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    You probably are right, but I think you didn't read all the information. The comments concerned IA32 bit software on the IA64 bit Itamium.



    The Itanium, I believe, handles 32 bit software in emulation, and apparantly very very slowly. (Initially, I thought I read in the realm of 486 speeds.) Unless there has been improvements in both the Itanium and in Microsoft's operating systems, well you get the point.



    Last I checked, Intel was quoted as saying there were only 100+ applications written for Itanium. Let's see, all application developers for Windows are going to immediately update all of their software to the 64 bit Itamium for questionable speed gains for an extremely expensive cpu. mmmm



    Then again I could be all wet, and most likely am.



    [ 02-02-2003: Message edited by: rickag ]</p>
  • Reply 74 of 86
    stoostoo Posts: 1,490member
    So the 970 is like going from 603 to G3 in terms of per clock performance?
  • Reply 75 of 86
    [quote]Originally posted by Tom West:

    <strong>The part I find scary is







    What does this say to me? These chips



    <ol type="1">[*]Won't be cheap. They'll be priced like Xeon's (I *hope* not Itaniums) and workstattions based on them will be priced accordingly.[*]It will be another processor that Apple uses (if it does) in which Apple is not really part of the target market.[/list=a]



    In other words, if Apple can manage the memory controller design (no sure thing), they may have the next $6,000 XServe.



    I have dreams of a nice 970, but I strongly suggest people start to manage their expectations. Most of what IBM has stated about the chip indicate that this will not be an ideal chip for Apple to use. The Power4 is a nice chip too, but it doesn't mean that Apple can use it.



    The only bright spot is they did add Altivec, which means that they hope Apple will use it *somewhere*.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Tom,



    Just a quick question - you're not *the* Tom West of "Soul of a New Machine" fame, are you??
  • Reply 76 of 86
    rickagrickag Posts: 1,626member
    [quote]Originally posted by Mark- Card Carrying FanaticRealist:

    <strong>



    Tom,



    Just a quick question - you're not *the* Tom West of "Soul of a New Machine" fame, are you??</strong><hr></blockquote>



    You have a long memory, I read that book a looonnggg time ago. The best incident was the engineer that left a note about the shortest period of time he wanted to deal with was a season. Even a technological dummy like me belly laughed out loud over that.
  • Reply 77 of 86
    [quote]Originally posted by rickag:

    <strong>



    You have a long memory, I read that book a looonnggg time ago. The best incident was the engineer that left a note about the shortest period of time he wanted to deal with was a season. Even a technological dummy like me belly laughed out loud over that.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Not only do I have a long memory, but I am also horrendously old; the first computer of my career was a Data General Nova 4/X and my first serious programming efforts were on one of Mr. West's progeny, namely a MV/2000 DC. Ah, Business BASIC - all those memories!



    Still have a copy of the book in question, and I recall the passage that you mention: my memory says it was one of the Microkids (i.e. the kids who worked on microcode), but I'd have to retrieve the book from my self-storage unit to be sure. I apologise to anyone who hasn't read this book for this diversion, but wholly recommend it as a compelling tale of the industry's "golden age" (i.e. when it was still possible to consistently make a profit from hardware) if you can get hold of a copy - I know it's been out of print for years here in the UK.
  • Reply 78 of 86
    [quote]Originally posted by moki:

    <strong>



    Yeah, 3-4x is about right in theory... we'll see what it ends up being in the real world.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    If PowerMac 970 was 4x faster than a Power Mac G4 for 10% more money, I would call that close to theft from a consumer's point of view. Even if it was 3x faster for 20% more money, you'd have to seriously consider flashing some cash.
  • Reply 79 of 86
    rickagrickag Posts: 1,626member
    [quote]Originally posted by Mark- Card Carrying FanaticRealist:

    <strong>.....my memory says it was one of the Microkids (i.e. the kids who worked on microcode), ...</strong><hr></blockquote>



    derailing the thread again momentarily.

    by the way the book won a Pulitzer prize, excellent reading.



    Yes, I believe so, it was one of the engineers debugging the system, looking @ snapshots of transactions in billionths of a second. Every one else had left for the night, the teams had been putting in tremedous hours trying to beat competitors and other teams from the same company at a different location. In the morning, there was only a note left, saying he had quit and moved to Canada and would only consider time in seasons.
  • Reply 80 of 86
    kurtkurt Posts: 225member
    [quote]Originally posted by moki:

    <strong>



    Compared to the G4, the PPC 970 at the same clockspeed is orders of magnitude faster. We're not talking about slightly better benchmarks as we're used to seeing in 200mhz or so speedbumps. Especially in the floating point arena, the 970's are quite a boost compared to the G4... couple that with a very progressive bus, and you have the makings for a very nice desktop CPU indeed.



    This is not enough for you? </strong><hr></blockquote>



    Nah. I am curious how you think it will compare to whatever Intel is offering at the time. I.E. will they "blow away" the 970?
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