Freescale Debuts Faster, Cooler G4

acsinc writes "The Register reports that Freescale (Motorola's chip division) has launched the 90nm G4, and is planning a dual core version for next year. The chip is faster -- over 1.5GHz -- and cooler than the old chip, but it is also pin compatible. This ought to help provide a speed bump for PowerBooks, which still don't have G5s."

Comments

Re:Huh?

[jhoffoss]

Read it again. The one just released is compatible; the planned dual-core CPU probably will not be (my assumption).

Re:Huh?

[Chucker23N]

"unless it requires new hardware, but then its not exactily a G4 anymore, at least in my mind."

What? G4 merely defines the PowerPC generation 4, which means existance of AltiVec, multi-processing capability, etc. It doesn't have to be on the same hardware at all. The G4 exists for everything from embedded devices over laptops to servers.

Re:Huh?

[adamjaskie]

It is NOT dual core. The article is talking about a 90nm G4 processor, and they are planning a dual core for later. The single core is what is pin-compatible.

The new chip is Freescale's first 90nm G4 and is based on the company's e600 core, the foundation for Freescale's upcoming line of dual-core chips. The 7448, however, contains just one core, clocked to beyond 1.5GHz. It contains 32KB of L1 cache and 1MB of L2, double the 512KB of L2 found in the MPC7447A currently driving Apple's PowerBook G4 and iBook G4 notebooks.

Re:G4's last gasp?

[Ster]

That's not going to happen.

Apple would be nothing short of certifiably insane if they stopped supporting 32-bit machines before probably five years after they stopped shipping them.

Let's say the entire lineup goes 64-bit tomorrow. They're wouldn't require 64-bit machines for OS upgrades until 2009 or so. Individual *features* might require 64-bits, but none of the core functionality.

For example, Panther still supports original iMacs, which are from '98 ('97? I really should know that...). Features like Quartz Extreme won't work, but the OS itself installs and runs fine. Panther updates install and work just fine.

-Ster

Re:Cunningly...?

[Guy Harris]

Cunningly, the 8641D can not only appear to the host OS as two processors, but is capable of running a separate operating systems on each core.

So when the dual core G4s do come out I could run 2 separate operating systems simultaneously?

Not necessarily. Freescale's Web site speaks of them as a vendor of embedded microprocessors; perhaps that feature is intended for use in embedded systems, where the OS can be tweaked as necessary to handle two processors sharing an I/O bus and peripherals, so that doesn't necessarily imply that the dual-core processor magically turns any system into which it's plugged into two separate systems that can boot separately and communicate separately with peripherals on the system.

(BTW, when I tried Googling for "8641D freescale" and "MPC8641D freescale" to see if I could find anything giving details about that feature - nothing turned up - Google asked whether I wanted "firesale" instead of "freescale". Is Google expressing its opinion of Motorola's spinning off Freescale?)

(No, don't bother explaining to me how that Google feature works; I'm already aware of it. "It's a joke, son....")

Re:New G4 - can it replace old ones?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope... well not easily at least.

The CPU in the iBook is integrated to the main logic board.

Re:Huh?

[obirt]

Not all, but most of the G4 lineup is. I have an AGP graphics G4 that was a 400 MHz G4 and can be upgraded to a dual cpu daughtercard from GigaDesign, sonnet, or a similar company.

The dual cpu G4's can have two cpu's on a single daughtercard even though there are two separate daughtercard sockets. You just leave one of them empty. As long as you have a UniNorth rev 7 or later you can run multiprocessor. I do believe that two cpu's is the limit for some reason. I don't think you can have two dual cpu daughtercards, I'm not sure I remember why.