PowerPC 750GX Begins Sampling Next Month

Trollaxor writes "The June issue of IBM's PowerPC Processor News features an article on the latest G3, Big Blue's PowerPC 750GX. The chip, which begins sampling next month, runs at 1.1 GHz and has 1 megabyte of on-chip L2 cache. Could this be Apple's next speedbump to the iBook?" Or, maybe, they will kill the iBook altogether in favor of the 12" AlBook.

Comments

goodbye to G3

[boomerny]

with G5's announced, why would they still produce any G3 machines? G5 for pro, G4 for consumer seems the path to go. An iBook with a G4 and Altivec should run Jaguar and Panther much better than the G3 versions. They could use features and clock speed to differentiate between iBook G4 and Powerbook G4 until the G5 Powerbooks are ready.

Re:goodbye to G3

[Elwood P Dowd]

G5 Powerbooks may be a long time in the making. The G5 produces a lot more heat than the 970 Powerbook fanatics expected. Apple's chief of hardware design said that the G5s wouldn't be seeing the inside of a portable for a long time. I can't imagine why he'd lie.

Plus, the G3 uses much less power and heat than the G4, it's a lot cheaper, and with Quartz Extreme, Apple's UI isn't dependent on altivec for reasonable performance. I've got the last model of iBook with a non Quartz Extreme compatible graphics card, and I don't lust after a G4. I lust after QuartzGL.

Gobi is family. Never disrespect him again in my presence.

Re:goodbye to G3

[Alan Partridge]

I don't really know what happened there, but to finish the comment (and have it make sense):-

G4 @ 1Ghz = >20W
G3 "Gobi" @ 1Ghz = 8W

which would YOU prefer in a laptop?

Re:goodbye to G3

[Anonymous Coward]

"Apple's chief of hardware design said that the G5s wouldn't be seeing the inside of a portable for a long time. I can't imagine why he'd lie."

First off the comments you refer to were made by Greg Joswiak, head of hardware MARKETING, not design, and he said not "anytime soon", which is pretty darn vague and not the same thing as not for a long time. Furthermore, a marketing chief has to be worried about inventory on the shelf, not the stuff on the drawing board ... and that's as good a reason as any to mislead buyers about future product intro dates.

g3s are cool

[zojas]

literally! much less heat than a g4, which is great for a laptop.

also, a g3 is faster than a g4 for non-altivec operations. I even have toy benchmarks to prove it!

maybe not for new macs; upgrades would be nice

[alien666]

I'm not going to shell out $600 bucks for a 1 gigahertz G4 upgrade for my trusty 400mhz G3 server, but I might consider a 1 gigahertz G3 if the price was under $300.

This is hardly an Apple story. The G3 (aka PPC 750) has many applications other than Macs.

P.S. It's only a G3, G4, or G5 when it is used in a Mac, otherwise it's just a plain old PowerPC.

Eliminating the iBook

[HebrewToYou]

"Or, maybe, they will kill the iBook altogether in favor of the 12" AlBook." Apple still needs a sub $1000 laptop for college students that provides e-mail, web browsing, instant messaging and small ventures into the graphical arts. There is no way a PowerBook would ever breach the $1000 barrier... The G3 processor still has legs. My iMac DV Special Edition (purchased in 1999) runs Jaguar quite well with only 256MB of RAM at a 400Mhz clock speed. Throw a 1.1Ghz G3 with 512MB RAM and that would be one kickass machine. It would run quietly, have a more compact design and offer speeds that would, if not by benchmark than by real-world usage, equal that of a much-higher clocked Pentium 3.

No Altivec

[am46n]

Until the G3 has an AltiVec unit, Apple will not be ditching Motorola completely.

The next PB will probably use moto's G4+. Apple's reluctance to put the same chip in both its "consumer" and "pro" laptops will mean that the iBook wont get Altivec for a while.

Re:Pixlet and Quartz Extreme

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Pixlet is designed for HD quality video with good compression. How many FinalCut Pro users are working on iBooks?

QuartzExtreme is not dependent on the CPU but on the GPU. There is no reason why Apple couldn't continue to use G3 processors and upgrade the video hardware to support QuartzExtreme.

Rumor has it that the next generation of G3 processors will also have AltiVec. This will extend the lifespan of teh G3 line of processors.

The G3 has 2 major factors going for it low cost and low power. The G3 will continue to find a niche in Apple's product line. Perhaps we will see it in future iPads or other consumer lifestyle devices.

G3 won't be around long

[dafz1]

With Apple's announcing that beige G3s won't be supported for Panther, that's probably an indication of Apple moving away from the six year old processor.

As for Apple not using the same processor in pro v. consumer notebooks, the same was true in Power Macs and iMacs until the iMac G4(and then eMac). There will probably be a short time in which Apple will put the G4 into an iBook replacement to co-exist with the Powerbooks.

My guess is they will put a new name on the 12" AlBook and maybe even a "new" 14" version. The 17" with a better processor(MPC7457 G4)/motherboard(DDR333 RAM) combo will be the main selling feature until they can get heat to a manageable level on the G5.

Re:G3s can't go on

[sean23007]

If IBM can continue to improve the G3 like this, why not drop Motorola's dead-in-the-water G4 and sell the G5 as the high end chip and continue to sell the G3 as the low end chip? If IBM can keep this up, the G3 will surpass the G4, performance-wise, fairly soon. Especially if the rumors about AltiVec support and 1.5 GHz are true.

Ibook may need a little more than the 1.1 ghz g3

[Enrique1218]

If apple keeps the G3 in the iBook for another year, it may not be able to compete against other sub 1000 notebooks with desktop 2.2 Ghz P4, 15 inch displays, and combo drives. You can argue small size and battery life (I would agree), but that would still be a tough sell to those on a slim budget and don't look that far down the spec sheet. Unless Apple leverages the low power capabilities of the G3 and built a sub 5 pound notebook with a 14 inch display to replace 12 inch, I wont be able to recommend it.