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New Mac System Specs
xyankee writes " Think Secret appears to be dishing more of the dirt that Apple loves to hate so much, this time dropping details on updated Power Mac G5, iMac G5, and eMac systems soon to be released. Looks like speed bumps all around: Power Macs get to 2.7GHz, iMacs to 2GHz, and eMacs to 1.42GHz. Video cards and SuperDrives are also upgraded."
Nice to see the iMac getting a more decent video card. (Yes, I know it probably 'sux0rs for gam3z' but honestly, a mediocre gaming card these days will slay practically any other reasonable computing task. It makes me laugh when you see the gamers dis something like, say, a nVidia 5200. That card sucks rocks! but it will also do realtime previews in Motion on uncompressed DV. That used to take some heavy hardware. Just sayin'.)
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I pretty much believe that Think Secret is deservedly screwed, but I also think it would be silly (at this point) to "slow down" as they have assserted from the beginning that they're not doing anything wrong.
Price will drop but not as substantially as you may think, usually there aren't big price drops on Apple's hardware (you can see that even on the second-hand market they retain much of their value).
The real question is when where there be G5 power books. I've heard that it will be several months to a year or so, since they can't really get it working right.
THere's nothing that says they can't publish the information. They only can't refuse to reveal their sources who may have violated NDA contracts.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
And basically admit they're doing something wrong? That seems especially weird to do when, in fact, they weren't doing anything wrong.
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No it wouldn't. There's little to no benefits from 64-bit computing on a portable. The G5 was built for machines that can draw a fair amount of wattage. A G5 PowerBook would be hotter, larger, and more power hungry than a machine based on Freescale's 8641 series, a branch off the G4 family.
The only limiting factor of the G4 today is the memory bus, which Freescale has to keep compatible with the ancient 60x bus because of their other clients (like Cisco). The 8641 is a G4 with a totally rebuilt memory controller onboard and RapidIO, an alternative to HyperTransport.
You'd be happier with an 8641-based PowerBook than a 970-based PowerBook. Trust me.
I do think Apple will _call_ the 8641-based laptops 'G5's though, they'll say it has to do with the 'generation of the technology, not a specific type of CPU'.
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
The judge did not tell them they couldn't publish the information. The judge can't tell them that. They never signed an NDA with Apple, and every once in awhile, the first ammendment actually means something in this country.
Actually, the UTSA does restrict the freedom of speech and has been upheld as constitutional thus far. As have slander, liable, copyright, trademark, military secrets, etc. laws. Apple has just never sought an injunction, although one would almost certainly be awarded. I think it is because Apple does not actually mind rumors sites. It does however, mind employees breaking their NDA's
It's got to be good for Apple's marketing that their MHz ratings are properly competing with modern PCs nowadays. The whole "MHz myth" argument always sounded a bit weak, even though I knew intellectually that it was a fair point.
Too bad there is no speedup for the Mac mini yet, I'd love to see a Mac mini with a base G5. However it does look like they may begin putting dual core processors out in this update.
My guess is that you would not be able to get a G5 into a mini without it sounding like one of those SFF PC's with an Intel Prescott in it. The G5 is just too hot.
A dual core G4 Mini would be interesting though.
Power Mac G5s
Dual-2GHz: 160GB
Dual-2.3GHz, Dual-2.7GHz: 250GB
iMac G5s
1.8GHz: 160GB
2.0 GHz: 160GB or 250GB
eMacs
Combo Drive: 80GB
SuperDrive: 160GB
If I am not mistaken, these are all with one single hard drive.
Imho, it seems like a generally better practice to have, say, two separate 100GB hard drives than one 200GB one - even if it's more expensive.
Granted, I'm a non-Mac person so I'm not very familiar with the ins-and-outs of MacOS file management. But for Windows/Linux I like having actual separate hard drives, not just partitions. One smallish drive for OSes (or 2+, one for each), one massive drive for multimedia (^_^), and another drive for all the other stuff, like work/school/programming or whathaveyou. Or, depending, maybe just partitions on one drive for all that data (only so many slots).
But anyhow, my main point, isn't there a reliability issue with having only one (relatively) massive harddrive? Wouldn't you be better off having multiple, smaller harddrives? Or would you just backup all your data on separate, external mediums anyways?
I'm interested to know what Mac users think.
It also usually requires that the publisher know that the source of information is violating the law by disclosing it, essentially making the publisher a party to a crime.
Has anyone suggested otherwise in this case? Actually I believe the wording is slightly more open, and includes cases where the publisher should know what they are publishing is a trade secret. In any case, a mac rumors site run by a ivy leaguer almost certainly knows that what they are publishing is a trade secret.
The reason we're not seeing a Mac mini G5 or a PowerBook G5 is because the G5 chip has some severe thermal issues. You could have either, but in both cases you'd need a massive fan to keep the chip cool. The iMac is about the limit of how tightly you can cram a G5 into a case without worrying about the thing overheating and turning your machine into a desktop hibachi.
You're really not gaining much with 64-bit quite yet. Even with Tiger, the Cocoa and Carbon libraries are still 32-bit, meaning that unless you have someone writing a 64-bit backend that interfaces with the 32-bit UI, most apps won't take advantage of the extra address space. In fact, for some applications, 64-bit addressing actually slows things down - why allocate a pointer that's 64-bits wide unless you need to do so?
If such a device could be made, I am sure it would have huge sales.
Well, that's kind of the thing, isn't it? On the one hand, we have people like yourself saying "I'm sure it will sell!" On the other hand, we have extremely highly paid experts in market research telling us that a product like that will never sell.
The fact that you want it doesn't mean it'll be a successful product.
A G5 Mac Mini doesn't make any sense. Apple is still loosely applying themselves to the Good/Better/Best lineup. The Mac Mini is good. Putting a G5 in it would make it better, but then there would be no good. It would only serve to confuse customers -- a confusion that a lot of people simple accept on the Wintel side of things. I am saddened when I see a non-technical couple shopping for a laptop at Best Buy as they are presented with dozens of choices that -- in their eyes -- are only seperated by price.
People have traditionally held that Apple hardware is expensive, and it was hard to argue against that for a while, but it is also well built and carries a unique (if not pleasurable) user experience. Don't under-estimate the soothing nature of walking into an Apple store and being presented only with Good/Better/Best. To that end, there always has to be a "good" option. Hence no Mac Mini G5.
get an Athlon64, FX, Xeon, or Opteron inside a Cappuccino PC and have all the components (video, sound, firewire, usb, superdrive, bluetooth, wireless, memory, hard drive) to fit and work nicely, in an under-$1000 price range, and with no heat issues, and then we'll talk.
otherwise, buy a powermac G5 for $1499 or an older G5 on ebay for about $1000.
I mean, i've got the 3 slots, and I consider myself a power user, but they remain empty because all the ports I need are already on the computer, or it's cheaper/easier for me to simply buy an external device. I've got 2 FW enclosures and an external nice soundcard on FW.
I know it's not just me, either, since the last Windows computer I put together only used PCI slots for a FW card and a fancy soundcard. If anything, the video push going on will get FW on PC mainboards more steadily, and, well, most people don't need fancy soundcards either. I know shopping around there was always the "I need 6 PCI slots" crowd, but I would've been perfectly happy with just 2.
It's almost like, the sooner PCI is sidelined, the sooner mainboards will come with better equipment installed and the sooner external devices with essentially more functionality will become common. But now I'm dreaming...
Have you not been following the case? Ciarelli actively solicits Apple employees to break their confidentiality agreements by offering them a promise of anonymity. He then publishes the information they leak to him.
He's breaking the law six ways from Sunday. This has never been in dispute.
The new Freescale chips aren't out yet, and except for thermal issues they're going to take as much of a redesign as G5s would. Probably more because they don't have any chipsets for them. I seriously doubt Apple is prepared to put that much work into redesigning PowerBooks when IBM will probably have a low-power G5 within the same timeframe. Particularly since much of the power saving work with a laptop chip would be shared with the dual-core chip we know they're going to release.
The question in my mind is whether or not they're going to put the new G4 chips in the other lines. And the answer to that is probably 'no' as well, IMO. Once they have a G5 suitable for laptops, Apple will be able to fit it into all the other lines, and they'll have a PowerPC 980/G6 by that time (end of 2006 or so) to maintain the separation between the lines.
Another consideration is that Apple is going to want to move to an all 64-bit lineup as soon as possible, so they can start EOLing the 32-bit stuff. The new Freescale chips will not be 64-bit (at first).
I rarely criticize things I don't care about.
Knowingly revealing (and soliciting, no less) trade secrets is in fact illegal and not protected as 1st amendment speech.
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Also, the amount of heat generated by an ATI 9600 would be considerably higher than that of the GPU that ships with the Mac Mini at the moment.
/speculation
I don't know the exact thermals involved, but I'm not sure an appropriately-clocked 9600 would necessarily put out too much heat. I have a fanless 9600 in my Shuttle that produces very little heat.
Going from a 9200 to an equivalently-clocked 9600 (or a higher clocked 9600 on a smaller die process?) would give you more performance in the form of a wider data path and more advanced GPU programmability.
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the best thing about this has to be the default amount of RAM. currently the iMac's only come with 256. And Apple is damn'd expensive with upgrading this (yes, I know you can buy 3rd party and install it yourself). Think Secret is reporting that the entire iMac line will start with 512... i can only hope it is one dimm
The judge actualy specifically said the rumor sites could continue to speculate and publish rumors, but that they had to turn over their sources in the cases in question. Apple still has to plug the leaks on their own, the sites just can't protect the leak.
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If you look at it statistically, you have better MTBF on a single drive, than you do on two...
for example, 1 drive = 500,000 hrs mtbf
1/500,000 + 1/500,000 = 2/500,000 or 1/250,000
so two drives give your a MTBF or 250,000 hrs for your drive subsystem.
Also given, MTBF is more useful for calculating the amount of failures that you will see over a large population of drives as opposed to your single machine experience.
Using things such as RAID does not put a dent in your drive MTBF, but it does make a huge difference in your data preservation!
My advice, if you can afford the iMac, would be to go for the Mac Mini (with at least 512MB of RAM) and a 20" Cinema Display (we've got a 20" and a 23" one here. The screens are both stunning, but the 23" one's enclosure looks quite fat and ugly to my eyes), and see how you like OS X. If you like it, and decide the Mini isn't powerful enough (it's almost as fast as the top-of-the-line PowerBooks, so you might be surprised), then consider replacing it with a PowerMac G5 some time down the road (or a dual-core Mac Mini, if such a thing appears). If you decide you don't like OS X, then the Mini is small and quiet enough to be an always-on server somewhere, and you've got yourself a nice monitor for the Dell.
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"... I hope Apple releases a product for heterosexual men...."
Do you have a issues with your own sexual orientation? Apple's products are for hetersexual men. The only ones that take issue with it as being "gay" are the closet cases who don't want to be reminded of what they are.
(DISCLAIMER: I am an Apple user at home and would love an Apple 'treo-type' device for myself)
Apple recognizes that their three audiences are:
(1) Video/graphics pros,
(2) education,
(3) and home users.
(Yeah there are others and all those segments are growing with the exception of gamers but lets focus on the main ones.)
Apple only has so many R&D dollars, even with $7B in the bank. They have to focus on what their audience wants and will pay for.
So what does the demand look like?
(1) Video/graphics pros are using PowerBooks in the field. They need access to a large 17" screen for editing so a sub-notebook really doesn't appeal.
(2) Education has no need for this. My highschool made headlines back when they piloted a program to equip all incoming freshmen with Palm Pilots. The program was not a success, more of a distraction.
(3) Home users just don't need this type of device any more than they need a Treo today.
The real market for sub-notebooks is the business world where the Blackberry and Treo dominate the market. Apple would have a major hurdle to get corporate IT to support a third (and this time "Apple" - tisk tisk) device.
All that said, I return to my disclaimer that I would personally really love an Apple sub-notebook with celular and Wi-fi that I could use as an iPod for music, share photos, and use Ink Well to interface to PDA functions with. But 'iDoubt' the market is full of folks like me.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Or.. for the time being, use this:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/xgrid/
Just when you make it idiotproof, some idiot builds a better idiot.
3% might sound small. Indeed, it would be small if the market for computers was a few dozen a year. But it's not. 3% of a colossal market is still an enormous amount of revenue. Witness how Apple's market cap has now overtaken Sun's.
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Your probability is a little off, even though your overall point remains valid as far as I know (but I'm not too familiar with MTBF ratings or how they're calculated).
:)
You calculated the probability using the incorrect assumption that event A (drive 1 failing) and event B (drive 2 failing) are mutually exclusive, i.e. that it's impossible for both drives to fail, only one or the other. You forgot to subtract the intersection of the 2 events (the probability that both events occur). A Venn diagram would help here, but I'm not very good at ASCII art. The proper way to calculate the union of 2 events is:
p(A U B) = p(A) + p(B) - p(A intersect B)
since the events are independent (we'll assume that one of the drives failing or not doesn't affect the probability that the other drive will fail):
p(A intersect B)= p(A)p(B)
so p(A U B) = p(A) + p(B) - p(A)p(B)
so you're off by (1/500000)^2
As I said, it's a slight quibble, but I hate to see such a reckless disregard for the statistical method
This is a warmed over RUMOUR. It's not NEWS. For fuck's sake, let's not let Slashdot become just another Mac rumours site - god knows there's enough of them already. This isn't even original, I read this a couple of days ago elsewhere. These are not specs, they're speculations.
Look, I'm a Mac guy, I occasionally look at the rumour sites like everyone else, but I come to Slashdot because it's not full of one-sided Mac fanboyism. Sure, there's a hell of a lot of ignorance spouted, but at least there are different perspectives on things, and I like that. If I want to read rumours, I'll go to the rumour sites. If I want to read actual released specs of newly announced Macs, I'll go to Apple.com when they are officially released. Neither of these are Slashdot's role. This is a bad article, pointlessly posted, and it just a waste of space. Please, let's restrain ourselves - stop posting every damn tidbit about Macs just because they are flavour of the month at the moment. Keep focused, dammit! The worthwhile articles ar srtaing to get drowned in teh noise, and that doesn't serve anyone's interests.