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PPC 970 Powerbooks and Powermacs in Production?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the i'll-take-one dept.

Thadddius_Brinks writes "MacWispers.com is reporting here that apple is currently in production of a redesigned single processor PowerPC 970 Powermac system and a 15.4 inch Powerbook. They (MacWhispers.com) are also standing by their earlier claims about the speed of the new processor." This article consolidates many of the major rumors surrounding WWDC including the rumor of a new case for the Powermacs, but it raises the ultimate question: 17" Powerbook, or PPC 970 Powerbook?

37 of 492 comments (clear)

  1. PPC 970 Powerbook by Krieger · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Egads this would be wonderful. 64-bit laptops. While I suspect we'll get that from the Opteron, I suspect if Apple follows through with the PPC 970, it will be available and useable much sooner.

    Needless to say... drool!

    1. Re:PPC 970 Powerbook by Tumbleweed · · Score: 2, Interesting

      > Forget Opteron notebook, this is much better.

      Don't get too far out, now. The PPC970 isn't expected to be better than an Athlon64 at non-AltiVec tasks. (At least, comparing spec scores would suggest that. Also the Opteron & Athlon64 have an on-die memory controller, which the PPC970 lacks).

      I'll be in line for a dual-proc PPC970 PowerMac later this year, for sure, but it's not because I think it'll be the fastest thing on the block. I think the Athlon64 will have that title, though not by much.

    2. Re:PPC 970 Powerbook by statusbar · · Score: 4, Interesting

      "32 bits ought to be enough for anybody"

      right?

      BTW, a 64 bit processor means more than just the amount of ram you can stuff in it... Think virtual.

      --jeff++

      --
      ipv6 is my vpn
    3. Re:PPC 970 Powerbook by boola-boola · · Score: 2, Interesting
      An on-die memory controller isn't necessarily better, because it'll lock the processor to a certain memory bus, and you can't change the memory bus without changing the processor.

      ...and considering AMD's successive memory bus speed jumping lately, that might not be a good thing... ("266" MHz DDR -> "333" MHz DDR -> "400" MHz DDR, hmmmm.....)

    4. Re:PPC 970 Powerbook by Tumbleweed · · Score: 2, Interesting

      True, but, memory speeds seem to be settling on 400MHz for now, and likely won't go much further in official speeds until DDRII (400 & 533MHz specs already, but 2x the bandwidth per pin per clock as DDR I). I don't see a big move to DDR II happening until next year, at the soonest, so I think we're safe for now. The PPC980 is rumoured to have an on-die memory controller, so you probably better just get used to it. :)

      Also note, with the Athlon64 & Opteron, you're not forced to use the on-die memory controller if your chipset has one, you can use it. The best of both worlds, though I don't know if the PPC980 will be like that or not (hell, the on-die controller on the PPC980 is still just a rumour).

      More importantly for Apple than just DDR 400 is whether they're going to go dual-channel or not, cuz if they're not, they're only going to get 3.2GB/s outta DDR 400, which is half of the FSB of the PPC970. I can see Apple doing that, as they always like to have an FSB bottleneck of some type, for some reason. I hope they do it right with the 970 machines, though.

    5. Re:PPC 970 Powerbook by Trurl's+Machine · · Score: 2, Interesting

      My thinkpad T21 takes it all.

      I once met Matthew Modine (the actor who plays the main character in Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket"). I had with me my graphite iBook. Seeing it, he pulled his tangerine iBook from his bag. It had a HUUUUUUGE hole in the upper casing. Obviously I asked him "where did you get that". He said he was sitting in a restaurant and working on his laptop waiting for dinner. Waiter has lit a candle - and he didn't notice. He felt the smell of burning plastic, but he didn't think it's his own machine, being burned by a candle obscured by the lifted screen. The candle has burned through the whole plastic layer (quite thick, actually - it was my only opportunity to see it through) and reached the inner metal casing of the LCD screen.

      Needless to say, this iBook has survived this ordeal without any problem - with the only exception of a huge hole near the tangerine Apple. Think your Thinkpad could handle THIS? ;-)

  2. Performance claims need clarification by John+Harrison · · Score: 3, Interesting
    It isn't clear from the last paragraph of the article if they are comparing a dual G4 to a single 970. The other option is a single G4 to a single 970. A dual 970 doesn't seem to be an option since they don't seem to be in production currently.

    Does anyone have any clarification on this? With the rumours that the 970 chip is actually less expensive for Apple than the G4 I was hoping for dual 970 boxes at price points similar to the current crop of PowerMacs.

    --
    Lasers Controlled Games!
    1. Re:Performance claims need clarification by Kinniken · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Concerning performances, one thing which struck me out as difficult to believe is the claim of an x2-x2.5 speed increase for Altivec apps... According to ArsTechnica's report, Altivec implemantation in the 970 is supposed to be rather worse than in the G4 ; while Altivec apps will still gain from higher clock speed and faster memory increases, the claimed increase here seems rather unbelievable. Not that I wouldnt like to believe it, but mac rumor websites have been known to post unverified rumors to get hits ;-)

      --
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    2. Re:Performance claims need clarification by azav · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Actually, from what I have heard, the duals "balance the drain". By that I mean that though you don't feel it being a load faster in day to day activities, you feel less of a slowdown when one process would bog the processor. - so overall, the entire system feels smoother - nere I say snappier.

      --
      - Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
  3. My own bets by Dark+Paladin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    1. That the 970's are being produced, but so far, there's still small numbers, so either only folks at the Developer's Conference will first crack, or you'll have to wait for a bit of time before you can actually get your hands on one (kind of like when the 12" and 17" first started shipping).

    2. The major OS Upgrade to 64 bits will happen in a few more months - either way, I expect that OS 10.3 will cost another $50 - $100 (depending on how they do it).

    3. The G3 iBook line will be slowly phased out, and replaced with G4 based systems.

    4. Dual processor systems by Christmas or so.

    5. iTunes for Windows sooner than we thought.

    6. Somewhere in this timeframe, new Xserves will start to appear with the 970 chip and the 64-bit server operating system (which should be interesting for folks running "big ass" database/graphical rendering farms.

    So either way, I'd say we'll "see" the devices, a few "first adopters" will play with them, pass judgement, Ars Techana [SIC] will write a big ass article on them, and "everybody else" will pick them up later.

    Hopefully somebody can convince Valve that Half Life 2 would really run rather nicely on these boxes so I don't have to spend money upgrading my old Wintel Game Box.

    --
    52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
    1. Re:My own bets by Dylan+Zimmerman · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The 970 is already being produced en masse. Because of Apple's contract with IBM, they get a bunch of them pretty early.

      According to ThinkSecret, Panther is going to launch sometime in September. They also say that a special 64-bit version of Jaguar called 'Sméagol' is being built for the new PowerMacs (known internally as Q37). It could be finalized as early as WWDC. Why would they have a special version of Jaguar if they didn't have the 970's rolling off the production lines already? Seriously. If Apple thought that they couldn't get them to people quickly, they wouldn't bother recompiling the entire OS for them. They would just wait a month to release them. They don't want a repeat of the bad publicity they got as a result of the 17" slowness.

      Apple is moving away from Motorola chips entirely. IBM still makes the G3. In all likelihood, Apple is going to keep the G3 in the iBook and just start using IBM chips instead of Motorola ones.

      I sure hope so.

      Again, I really hope so. I've been itching to spend all of my money at the iTunes Music Store, but I don't have a Mac.

      I would imagine that the Xserves would use the real thing. The Power4 uses more power and produces more heat than the 970, but it also has an insane MTBF. Besides, you wouldn't need a dual Power4 since it's already two cores on a single die. Pretty cool design, really.

    2. Re:My own bets by GlassHeart · · Score: 2, Interesting
      The 970 is already being produced en masse. Because of Apple's contract with IBM, they get a bunch of them pretty early.

      If I'm not utterly mistaken, the rumored contract has not been confirmed by Apple or IBM officially.

      In all likelihood, Apple is going to keep the G3 in the iBook and just start using IBM chips instead of Motorola ones.

      That would be silly. First of all, as stable as IBM is, it's always better to have more suppliers than not. Apple's current predicament is precisely because their sole high end CPU provider isn't very interested in them. Secondly, the G3 doesn't have an Altivec unit, and cannot take advantage of the G4 optimizations that this current situation has forced many software vendors to make.

      I find it far more likely that Apple retires the G3 soon, replacing it with low-end G4s on the iBook line. The PowerBooks could then either host high-end G4s, or move to the 970, depending on how quickly they can get it working. Put another way, who'd want to buy a G3 if Apple is retiring the G4?

  4. Mod parent up, please by Dylan+Zimmerman · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Poor MacWhispers doesn't have a single ad on the linked site. Let's not destroy their servers when the article text is here.

  5. Re:I'm wondering... by JudgeFurious · · Score: 2, Interesting

    In another article on MacWhispers site (I believe) they mention information they've come across that appears to indicate a new enclosure will be used for the next PowerMac.

    Long on the tooth the current one is however it's still far more attractive (to me at least) than anything available on the PC side. In my opinion at least the mirrored drive door model was a mistake and the previous Quicksilver was the best looking of the bunch.

    The current one looks like someone gave a Quicksilver to some PC case-mod monkeys and they didn't know what to do with it so they glued a mirror to the front. It's the first one that looks like it's trying to be cool and the first one to (kind of) fail at it.

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  6. Re:MacWhispers and Macrumors etc by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Oh sure. Would that be the Thinksecret that, in 1999, predicted Apple was about to release an Intel version of the iMac that ran Windows?

    Or the one in June 2000 that predicted that Apple was about to drop the entire PowerMac line and just sell laptops and all-in-ones?

    Or the one in August 2001 that predicted Apple and AMD had collaborated on a "secret" CPU design code-named "Twostone", a 48 bit CPU with 16384 registers, that was going to replace the G3 and run it in emulation just as the PPCs had emulated the 68000?

    Or maybe the one that, in September 2002, predicted Apple was about to release a cordless phone, FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER.

    I hardly would describe them as a dependable source of unfounded rumours.

  7. Rumors, Rumors, Rumors by dhovis · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I find it hard to know what to believe here. It seems a lock that Apple will introduce PPC970 based Macs at WWDC, but the question as to when they will be availble for shipment is something that is probably only known to his Steveness.

    As far as a PPC970 based Powerbook goes. I doubt it. The peak energy consumption is low enough, but I don't think it has any powersave features built in. The increased complexity of a whole new chip in a laptop...seems dubious.

    However, There is one thing that makes me think a Powerbook G5 might be released: Apple has not updated the 15" Powerbook since November, not even to bring it up to feature parity with the 12" and 17" models (Bluetooth, FW800, and DDR memory, Aluminum enclosure). It does make me think that maybe Apple has been waiting for the next major uprade to update the 15" models and switching to the PPC970 would certainly qualify.

    --

    --
    The internet is the greatest source of biased information in the history of mankind.

  8. Mac rumor sites vs. Slashdot by Gizzmonic · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Slashdot is not a place for rumors.

    To top it off, the person who runs Macwhispers is completely morally bankrupt, and is most likely fabricating the entire story.

    I'd like to see some real competition for high performance CPUs as much as the next guy, but let's not lose our heads to con artists like this guy...we will know for sure in about 2 weeks ;)

    --
    (-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
  9. New Product Lineup by chia_monkey · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Without knowing exactly how many PPC 970 chips are being produced, it's tough to guess where they would go in Apple's lineup. If there are enough, it's safe to venture a guess that:

    1) PowerBook gets the yummy new PPC 970 chip (it IS the year of the laptop afterall)
    2) iBook then gets the current G4 chip. The last of the lineup using G3s finally gets the upgrade.
    3) iMac, eMac, PowerMac get new 970 chip because hey, we can't leave them out. Or can we? It's the year of the laptop...maybe let the masses go nuts over the laptops as they continue working on the new IBM chips and then blow the doors off when they're ready to be put in the desktop models.

    --

    "He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
    1. Re:New Product Lineup by baka_boy · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I think the iBook, iMac, and eMac will all stay fairly close to their current specs for a while -- they're all selling fine in their intended channels, and the additional revenue to be made from upping them to 970s (or even G4, in the case of the iBook) really doesn't justify major hardware revisions until the excitement (and initial problems/patches/recalls that will inevitably follow the introduction of a new processor and system architecture) dies down.

      Personally, I'd be willing to be that the XServe and desktop lines get the new chip first, with the revised 15" PB still using a (prob. faster) G4 CPU. Until there's some support for processor speed scaling, 64-bit versions of important content production tools (Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, etc.), and a real reason to push the envelope (both in performance and cost), Apple will likely be happy to stay with the formula that has worked so well for the last few years.

      People who think that the Apple desktop line has become obsolete have probably never done much high-end uncompressed video, multitrack audio, or other hardware *and* software-intensive work on a Mac. You need PCI slots, support for fast disks (or RAID arrays), physical access to the machine for cable connects, etc., etc., none of which are really viable on a laptop device. Plus, that product line has definitely seen the least attention from Apple over the last couple of years; aside from minor internal tweaks, the G4 desktop you buy now is just a slightly faster version of the one you could get two full years ago.

  10. I doubt the speed predictions at least. by laertes · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Going from the Ars Technica article a while back, I don't buy the claims about the speed of the new chip.

    Specifically:

    On Altivec optimized tasks, these machines have as much as 2 to 2.5 times the through performance as a similarly clocked G4.

    Unlike the G4, where the AltiVec unit is integrated rather nicely into the issue unit, and can issue several types of vector instructions in parallel, the 970 can only do a permute in parallel with another instruction. Hence, for some tasks, I would expect the G4 to be almost twice as fast as a similarly clocked 970.

    They make a similar claim about the non-AltiVec speed, which I tend to believe. The compiler has to be a little smarter (but Apple did add a bunch of G4 optimizations to gcc anyway), but the 970 can do more per clock the the G4 can, under many circumstances. Not only can it have more instructions in-flight, but it has a much more advanced reordering unit than the G4.

    Oh yeah, and when did /. just copy over Apple rumor stories? </obligatory>

    --

    Yes, I'm still a junky. Are you still a bitch?
    1. Re:I doubt the speed predictions at least. by stripes · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Unlike the G4, where the AltiVec unit is integrated rather nicely into the issue unit, and can issue several types of vector instructions in parallel, the 970 can only do a permute in parallel with another instruction. Hence, for some tasks, I would expect the G4 to be almost twice as fast as a similarly clocked 970.

      The Ars review used the CPU documentation to decide the 970's Altivec was slow. It might have missed something, like maybe the G4's Altivec is always memory starved and thus runs a 25% of it's maximum speed while the 970 has lots of memory bandwidth and thus while in thery is only 50% as fast as the G4's, that manages to be 2x what the G4 really does.

      Of corse it may well be slower (or merely "about the same"), because I'm not able to tell you how fast a CPU is from the pre-release docs either (I thought the TI SuperSPARC would be fast, and the P-II would be slow). Basically I'm saying "who can really tell here".

  11. Re:No question by TheCrazyFinn · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Are you aware that the PPC970 is a more efficient design than the PPC7455?

    It runs cooler and draws slightly less power (19W for a 1.2GHz 970 vs 22W for a 1.25GHz 7455) and is significantly faster. A 1.2GHz 15" Powerbook G5 is quite believable, especially since the 15" is way overdue for an update.

    And 17"'ers have been shipping since April or so. they're just not selling terrible well (It's too damned big.)

    --
    "You've got an invalid haircut" -Warren Zevon - Life'll Kill Ya
  12. Re:Yikes by JudgeFurious · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I haven't looked but do you get an equal number of PC rumour sites if you go Googling for that?

    If not then you've got to ask yourself why is it that so many people care about what may or may not be coming along next from Apple and so few give the proverbial rats ass about the next offering from HP, Dell, or eMachines.

    Apple seems to have perfected getting attention to an art. You can love them or hate them but almost nobody ignores them. That kind of PR is priceless.

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    Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
  13. Re:Shullbit by haunebu · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Apple likes to build up stocks of computers before selling them. Building and shipping computers in the same month would be a ridiculous strain on their resources.

    Er, no. Apple prides itself on having a low inventory (a couple of weeks, at the most) - all personal computer manufacturers do. If they had any more, they'd wind up in the December 2001 "5+ weeks of unsellable inventory" glut problem.

    WWDC isn't exactly a place Steve Jobs likes to announce hardware products, it is really the wrong venue for such announcements. MacWorld Expo is a much better place to do things like that and is only two months away.

    Except that Apple isn't going to be at MWNY this year.

    --

    Blue skies, Barthy Burgers, girls...

  14. Re:this makes sense by switcha · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Where have you been living (apart from Hazard County)? Apple's one of the most cash rich companies around. Tramping all over the SV, feeding rumors of buyouts and actually buying some heavy hitters (Shake, logic, etc.)

    Apple consistent history of rebates, is that it precedes new products.

    --
    You know what? ... A little club soda *did* get that out!
  15. No 64-bit OS for some time - my prediction by gsfprez · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't get why its believed that Mac OS X has to be 64-bit to run on the 970. We've been told in numerous places (Ars, IBM's frickin website) that the 970 runs in 32-bit just fine.

    SO... that being said... my WWDC announcment predictions along with what Apple has already stated

    - New Macs with PPC 970
    - New PowerBook 15 with PPC 970 (the 15" PowerBook is the workhorse of the line, always will be, sorry)
    - Preview of Panther
    - Macintosh Roadmap Roadmap showing the future... and this is the big-ass news that everyone's been talking about.

    Roadmap steps will look something like this...

    July 2003:
    10.2.7 running on new 970-based Macs practically unmodified because the 970 handles 32-bit operation just totally fine. x.x.+1 updates between WWDC and October 2003. Developer-only release of 64-bit SDK which will not be ready for prime time, but will allow developers to make the swtich, if necessary (similar to Mac OS 9 -> Carbon transition)

    October 2003:
    10.3 release - all those cool updates in iApps, updates in performance and operation of Mac OS X UI that were shown at WWDC. Panther Will NOT BE a 64-Bit OS!! - why not? Does not need to be because there are no 64-bit apps! Where are the apps? They are still being worked on with the 64-bit SDK, see you at Mac World San Fran with first 64-bit apps.

    Jan 2004 (MWSF):
    10.3.5 release. Mac OS X will run 64-bit applications. Only apps that NEED to be recomplied 64-bit clean will be recompiled 64-bit clean (iChat, for example, does NOT need to be 64-bit). Finder will be first app to be 64-bit clean because it needs to be.

    beyond that, its non-speculateable.

    But i think that the real news at this WWDC is going to be the first major Macintosh Roadmap since we saw the Rhapsody one in 1997(8?). You will see where the Mac is going hardware-wise and software wise.

    Apple is going to push into the small-medium server market in a hard way.... 64-bit XServes which can run horkin Oracle databases, huge fileservers, and be the backbone of big-ass renderfarms... all with Mac OS X moron-simple UI and none of the pain of cost with Windows servers or admin headache of Linus servers? Puhlease... Apple is going to kick ass and move in where Intel and AMD are just simply lagging behind.

    (yes, half the guys in my wedding party have apple.com email addresses.. no, none of this information was gleaned from them.)

    --
    guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
  16. My predictions by Phroggy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The PowerMac G5 will be announced at WWDC, based on the IBM PowerPC 970. The name of the machine will be "PowerMac G5" or "Power Macintosh G5", but Apple will also advertise the processor as the "IBM PowerPC 970 processor with Velocity Engine". It's 64-bit, and they'll hype that up as much as they can.

    The low-end (1.4GHz?) model will be available immediately, or within two weeks and Apple will be taking pre-orders. The mid-range and high-end (dual 1.6 and dual 1.8?) models will be shipping within a month after that. Photoshop comparisons with the latest Compaq PC will be mind-blowing, for the types of people who get excited about Photoshop performance. USB2, Bluetooth, FireWire 800 and 400 and Gigabit Ethernet will be standard features, with a slot for an Airport Extreme card.

    The Aluminum 15" PowerBook will be released. We will not see a PowerBook G5 before January '04 and maybe not until March '04.

    The PowerMac G5 will ship with a hacked version of Mac OS X 10.2, which will not be fully optimized to take advantage of the new processor. However, the PPC970 is designed to run 32-bit code just as well as 64-bit code, so it will still be amazingly fast. Anyone who buys a G5 will be entitled to a "free" ($29 S&H) upgrade to Mac OS X 10.3, which will ship in September for $129.

    The new OS will be 64-bit native, optimized for the PPC970, and compiled with gcc 3.3. Large chunks of the Finder will be rewritten for performance and better UI, and there will be a ton of little system-wide UI improvements (adding up to a significantly better experience). One convenient new feature will be support for multiple users being logged in locally at the same time, like Windows XP (go to a login screen without quitting all your apps, second person logs in, first person's apps stay running hidden in the background, can switch back and forth between users).

    Mac OS X 10.3 will include WebCore, Apple's Aquafied version of KHTML, available for any application to use. Safari will be the default browser. I suspect Internet Explorer will not be included, although of course you can download it from Microsoft. Help Viewer will be replaced (thank god) with a version that uses WebCore. Now that WebCore is available, it'll be possible for Apple to support PAC and WPAD for automatic proxy server discovery, although I don't know whether these features will make it into 10.3.

    Did I miss anything? We'll see how accurate my predictions are next month...

    --
    $x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
    $x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
    1. Re:My predictions by glowurm · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Losing my moderator status for this story and breaking my tradition of not posting inflammatory comments, I post reply because it's important for others to know that these are not YOUR predictions but the predictions of a number of rumor sites.

      My predictions: you will, next time you post something written by another party you'll give them credit. That, or you'll post an obstinate reply about how you're justified in posting these as your own thoughts. For some reason the bar scene in "Good Will Hunting" comes to mind - the one where Will confronts an ivy-league student for "cock-blocking" his buddy.

      Of course you could ignore this, or post a reply citing those sites you've plagiarized.

      I hope you do the right thing.

  17. Re:If they want to get our attention.... by Nexum · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Mac had better come up with a dual processor Notebook.

    'Mac' would do bloody well to come up with *anything* considering it's a product name and not a company... have a lot of experience with Apple products do you?

    I am demoing a shoebox AVID field editor that has 2 P-4 processors

    I think you mean 2 P4 Xeon processors seeing as vanilla P4's are not SMP capable, and you are probably paying through the nose for this privilege, and it's likely not gonna be anywhere NEAR as portable as a notebook so you're not really comparing like for like are you?

    Current Apple notebooks compare rather well in both price and performance (and ALWAYS in functionality) to modern PC notebooks. Show me a PC notebook with dual processors? The performance delta is negligable on the notebook front, unless you're thinking about the companies who put desktop chips into their PC notebooks, and then you had BETTER be able to do your work a lot faster because you've got 15 mins of battery life on the thing. Show me a comparable machine with a 17 inch screen, 4.5 hour batt life, gigabit ethernet, superdrive, in an enclosure as portable as the Mac at a price not far from the Mac.

    MAC's used to be the thing for Video....

    Hmm, strange, I never knew that Media Access Control was so capable it could entirely take the diverse strains of Video PP. The abbreviation for the Macintosh platform is Mac, not MAC, this error really pisses off a lit of people and shows the poster as ignorant, someone in the industry would have known that I would have thought.

    it looks like they are starting to lose with the big companies moving away from them...

    What a gem of wisdom... you've wonderfully neglected to mention any of these companies you refer to... unless you mean your own, which judging from your post has never/rarely touched the Macintosh platform seriously.

    Go find somewhere else to post your FUD, Troll.

    -Nex

    --

    This sig has been deprecated.
  18. So is this The End of 32-bit Apple OS by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Does this portend the end of the 32-bit OS-X? Unlike Windows systems, Apple can force the migration to the PPC 970 simply by not selling anything else. They can continue a G4 PowerBook but not offer OS updates except for bugfixes. As long as there are both PPC 970 based desktops and notebooks, why spend double the money maintaining two parallel operating systems?

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
  19. Re:Everyone seems to misunderstand MacWhispers by Elwood+P+Dowd · · Score: 2, Interesting

    No, they are both providing valuable information (the machines are in production) and they are providing verifiable information (they have a metalicized plastic enclosure and different handles).

    Predicting something that everyone knows will happen eventually is not so significant as correctly predicting *when* it will happen.

    Obviously. That is why everyone seems to be denying these nonexistant predictions. That doesn't change the fact that they are not making those predictions.

    Also, I'll point out that until recently, not everyone knew that these things were happening. For a long time, the only people saying that Apple was within a year of release was MacBidouille, a Portuguese (!) mac rumor website. MacWhispers clearly has a totally separate source, and this is valuable corroboration.

    All I'm saying is that MacWhispers is a fantastic addition to the Macintosh Rumors scene, and if people would only pay attention, they'd see the virtues. Every Mac rumors website begins in fan mode, and some of them improve. MacWhispers has improved a *lot*.

    Some of them get worse, and worse, and worse, and worse.

    --

    There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
  20. What we can expect by customjake · · Score: 4, Interesting
    There are doubts in my mind that Apple will use the WWDC as a launching pad for the new 970s. I do belive that Apple is currently in production of 970 machines, and plans to release them alongside Panther, whenever it releases...probably August. After all, why release an OS that's 64 bit if you don't have hardware to run 64 bit. The rest of the computer world is waiting for a viable 64 bit desktop system....there are other 64 bit processors out there.....

    I do belive that Apple will have some sort of 970 based machine for the developers to look at, as well as some benchmarks for us all to drool over.

    So what can we expect? Previewing Panther on a 970 based system, probably an update to the developer software (64 bit Project Builder), benchmarks of the 970, overview of 970 based hardware. Probably annouce a PPC 970 based Powerbook in the near future...END OF YEAR? Possibly a Naming change to hardware lineup, and Adjustable Displays

    What is less likely? Windows verison of iTunes, PPC 970s shipping, PPC 970 Powerbooks shipping, iCam,

    What is NOT going to happen? Apple PDA, Apple Cell phone,

    As for the whole product line being revamped, i don't think we'll see a whole new product line at WWDC, but i think that Apple is going to be moving all it's lines away from the G4/G3 based systems. I don't even see the iBooks being converted to G4 systems, as IBM's chip lineup is known to be 20-30% cheaper than Motorola's line...

    Instead of seeing G4s as the low end chips, i'd probably wager that IBMs will develop a PPC off of the 750 chip and this will probably replace the G3 systems. But i wouldn't expect to see a PPC 750 until you see a 980 in a powermac.... I think if Apple is going to IBM processors, it would be prudent that they went to an all IBM chip lineup.

  21. Old Macs don't die, they just get non-Apple Unix by Radix42 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...at least at our house. The old Performa is very happy with Debian, and the Umax dualie is good with NetBSD. And the iBook SE we used to have was mucho smooth under OpenBSD.
    Which flavor is best for your aged box that's not up to snuff for OS X depends on it's architecture and your needs/experience.
    Somebody posting about moving their older mac to YDL made me grin.

    We'll prolly wait on the 970 before buying another Mac. In the meantime our new cheap Intel mobo tower runs XP and Knoppix on the HD (reiser FS) just fine, on the metal or under VMware.

    But we won't be in the market for a new box (prolly laptop for Her Highness :-) until later this year, so we'll see what ends up being out there!

  22. Re:If they want to get our attention.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    "Cripes the guys can completely edit a spot in the field before they even return to the office! something that is currently impossible with any MAC based NLE system."

    Rubbish! More and more news gatheres are using miniDV ,DVCAM, type bits of equipment for collecting video footage. Plug one of those into any current Apple laptop and fire up Final Cut Pro and there you have one field based NLE that "lets you edit in the field before they return to the office". In someplaces with severe tfaffic congestion they do the edits on the way back to the office.

    Avid is just pissed 'cos their $100 000 turnkey edit systems are being outclassed by Apples $3000 bog std computer and Final Cut Pro solution.

    Quote I heard the other day from a video editor . "My Macintosh, Final Cut Pro and SDI Board give better results than this other place are getting on their $300 000 dollar system"

  23. Re:Next from Apple... by phillymjs · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Chill out, rabid fanboy!

    I was not slamming/mocking Apple for only shipping a single-button mouse. I'm typing this post on my G4. All I was saying is, based on their nomenclature changes they might be about to ship one with their new towers.

    ~Philly

  24. irony of IBM inside Apple by code4fude · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Interesting that lost in this all, without comment, is the irony that IBM, which once represented all that was opposite to Apple and was its big nemesis, will now be the heart of the latest, greatest, user-friendly Apple computers, and that's viewed by the Apple community not just with anticipation and excitement, but with a sense of impeding vengeance, even, against ... what? Still, the IBM-compatible PC!

  25. Re:If they want to get our attention.... by jo_ham · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I can do that with a Firewire-equipped camera and a PowerBook with Final Cut Pro on it.

    This is dependent on your production environment using DVCAM or (for low importance work) DV or MiniDV since all the pro DVCAM and consumer cameras have firewire ports. If the camera has an I/O firewire port (some have out only due to a silly tax law defining it as a VCR if it has external video inputs), then you can master back to DVCAM and have the tape ready before you even get back to the office.

    Nothing Apple makes at present has component inputs, for that you need Media 100i, which has a breakout box with assorted inputs including component, SDI, AES/EBU etc depending on how much you want to spend.

    We have a Media 100 system and a Final Cut Pro system. Both have strengths and weknesses, but for a program I can pick up for under £1000 and install and use on a Dual 450 G4 (our current FCP system), Final Cut Pro compares very favourably to Media 100.

    If you're using Betacam then you're limited to expensive NLE's anyway - either Media 100 or Avid, and I've found that I prefer using Media 100, even if it is a bit slow in the render department. The PPC970 should help there.