Topic: an Apple anyone ?

[gryphon]

ok, just forget that they have a louse software support, or choice in it. Don't forget the hardware has to be compattible with a Mac and not a personall computer. . .just place all those thing asside. Let's see it as the inovative company [ which ideas MS uses  just after they have released a new software version, as WinXP after OsX. ]

Apple has just brought a page online showing the new Apple powermac, using a G5 processor and a new 64-bit architecture. You can even get it as a dual system, just check the box while you are ordering it.

And styled like this




you have just got to like it.

Not much info yet. Just taken it of the Apple site and guess there won't be all that much reviews of it yet. Gon'na look for some. Any one wan'na buy an Apple yet ?

[number6]

The apple computer has always eluded me. When they first came out they were way too expensive (PC's were too much also!) and the amount of available software always seemed lacking. Apples later had a reputation of better graphics than the best PC's out there. Eventually, even though the system had better hardware and was easier to setup they never seemed to really catch on.  I still find Apple computers interesting because I would really like to see why people buy them. I guess they are doing something right to stay in business all these years.  Maybe it's the ease of use thing.  I guess in theory we should never get any visitors to the tech support forums by Apple users.  We could always use that as an excuse for not including a MAC OS forum.  I am joking of course

[gryphon]

Kind of strange that Apple [ who almost went broke a few years back ] as a small company can get credit for the things Microsoft want to inply and get's bashed for. Take the new hardware Windows is suppost to use providing extencive security on a Windows platform. Apple has been using hardware specially designed for Macintosh. Apple centers to sell them and where you can go to for support. And still, people seem to love Mac's for it and hate Microsoft. Weird, but no one ever said the world has to be fair.

For video and audio additing a Macintosh is most likely the preferd machine. And now with the new release of OSX and the G5 based Macintosh hopefully Apple will keep that position. The hardware itself for the G5 has been developed mainly by IBM I think.

Alhough Slashdot run an article yesterday claiming the benchmarks provided by Apple on there site are more deluding than showing the real preformens of the G5.



At this point there arn't a lot of benchmarks from 3th party's of the G5 [ gan'na have a look at IBM if they might have anything as they developed the thing ] So we have to wait and see the result of this. I personally find some truth in something one mentioned, benchmarks are good indication. Although the preformance in real life situations has to deside how well the system really preforms. [ wasn't it the CEO of AMD who mentioned that just after they released the XP series ? ]

However it turn out for Apple and the new G5. I like it no matter what the benchmarks say. At least I have the impression Apple is one of the few companies trying to make an inovating product and go against the main-stream not caring about what any one says. Either case it will be a nice read to see how this turns out.

[number6]

All of the new Apple's use dual processors? I did not see a single processor rating for the G5.

It is amazing how apple has apparently turned things around. I guess the closest system to an Apple computer that I own is a Nintendo Gamecube. They both have power PC's.

[gryphon]

There are 3 basic configurations for the new powermac.

1.6GHz PowerPC G5
800MHz frontside bus
512K L2 cache
256MB DDR333 128-bit SDRAM

1.8GHz PowerPC G5
900MHz frontside bus
512K L2 cache
512MB DDR400 128-bit SDRAM

Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5
1GHz frontside bus
512K L2 cache/processor
512MB DDR400 128-bit SDRAM

Only the last is a dual processor. Havn't seen a rating for a single yet either.

Not shure, the game cube's hardware is IBM's isn't it ?
The previous Apple [ G4 ] was a Motorola processor I thought.

[Doc Nyar]

Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5
1GHz frontside bus
512K L2 cache/processor
512MB DDR400 128-bit SDRAM

1Ghz FSB !

The previous Apple [ G4 ] was a Motorola processor I thought.

Yup...

[number6]

Not shure, the game cube's hardware is IBM's isn't it ?
The previous Apple [ G4 ] was a Motorola processor I thought.

The Gamecube uses a custom IBM Power PC. It should be a similar machine language for the new apples so code written for Gamecube could work theoretically on any of the PPC family. Isn't the motoralla chip based ont he same architecture? You know like an AMD is similar to an Intel chip.

[gryphon]

Intel and AMD are Intel based where the the game Cube and a Apple G4 Motorola are both powerPC based. Think it should be the same comparisson.

[gryphon]

tell me if I'm boring you ok ?

NASA has run benchmarks against the new G5, G4 and an Intell P4 system.

results :

Single CPU Jet3D Scalar Benchmarks - MFLOPS


Single CPU Jet3D Scalar Benchmarks - MFLOPS/MHz


The conclusion they have taken from them :

The primary purpose of this test was to determine how G5 scalar floating point performance compares to G4 performance in CFD applications. As a secondary part of this test, G4 and G5 benchmark results were compared to similar results obtained on Pentium 4 systems. Overall, the scalar floating point performance of G5 systems is much improved over G4 systems due to better per clock cycle efficiency combined with higher clock speeds. Based on preliminary testing with an existing version of Jet3D (not recompiled or optimized for the G5), it appears that the G5 has about 22% better scalar floating point performance per clock cycle than the G4 systems tested and 32% better floating point performance per clock cycle than the P4 systems tested. Based on raw scalar floating point performance in Jet3D, a 2GHz G5 system can match a 2.66GHz P4 system, and this is a dramatic improvement from earlier tests where G4 systems lagged behind higher clock speed P4 systems. Based on an extrapolation of current P4 results, the 2GHz G5 would lag newly announced 3.2GHz P4 systems in Jet3D scalar floating point performance by about 20%, but this kind of comparison is best deferred until G5-aware compiler tools become available (since a 20% performance gain is well within the potential of compiler optimization).

[number6]

Well I would expect a RISC chip to beat out a CISC chip like the Pentium class CPU's. So it is very likely that the G5 will beat a higher clocked P4. The problem with the Apple systems is the same problem that Linux based systems face. Not enough software runs on these platforms. If microsoft would make a version of windows that could run on this hardware I think it would put a hurt on Intel.

[gryphon]

Microsoft did make a version of MS Office for Mac. And you can download Linux for Mac. Although both don't offer you anything like Windows, I think that's a choice Apple made. Only providing an OS that they aproove of [ Linux isn't officially supported by Apple ] so customers won't have to go trough the hassle of sofware errors. And as Apples are mostly made, or used for grafical and designer puproses.. . those software packadges are widley available for Mac's.

Although Apple isn't perfect by itself, mayby even more insecure then Windows. It appears that if you are running with Mac OS X and you put the screensaver on, when you are being asked for authentication, just press a random key for about 5 minutes, then press enter. The screensaver will crash giving you full access to the desktop.

[number6]

I guess my point is it's not as easy as buying the G5 chip and plopping it in a motherboard with the rest of the components available on the market and installing whatever OS you feel like. If it was that easy I think the G5 processor would get more respect. As it stands now it will only be used in Apple computers and some custom setups.  If there is a way to do this I would love to hear about it.