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Freescale Debuts Faster, Cooler G4

Posted by pudge on from the i-think-i-need-a-new-powerbook dept.

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."

3 of 37 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Huh? by adamjaskie · · Score: 5, Informative

    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.
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  2. Cunningly...? by funkdid · · Score: 5, Interesting
    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.

    My that is rather cunning...!?

    So when the dual core G4s do come out I could run 2 separate operating systems simultaneously? That's odd, how (and which ones) is that pulled off. Getting a dual boot mac is enough of a pain in the ass, to have it multi boot is, yeah I don't see that happening.

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    I boycott signatures

  3. new powerbook cpu by boomerny · · Score: 5, Insightful

    this cpu will probably be in the last generation of G4 Powerbooks before they move to G5. Personally I think I'd rather have a nice, cool running, fast, energy efficient, 3rd or 4th gen G4 than a 1st gen G5.