Apple launches the PowerMac G5

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
How amazing! The G5 isn't commercially available yet and has been news for precisely one day and yet Asher, a CS undergraduate from Calgary, has miraculously been using one himself.

If you'd given it a couple of weeks for the hype to die down, you might have some credibility.

I've never used one myself, I've just got an idea for real-world performance.

It's an incredibly silly excuse to dismiss performance claims "until you've used it yourself". The texture of the mouse and keyboard doesn't increase the speed.

The Benchmarks given were by IBM themselves, who designed the chip, using their compiler in their optimal lab conditions. As were the Intel and AMD benchmarks.

The simple fact is, the G5 isn't a very fast chip compared to the current PC chips. It's about mid to high end. But the big problem with that, is Prescott is supposed to be much faster than the current Pentium 4, and will come out around the same time...

But go ahead, Agathon, plug your ears and tell me we don't know anything unless we have our hands on a craptastic Apple keyboard and our palm on a hockeypuck.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Asher
So that's at least 4 OSes Mac users had to buy in the time period where Windows XP came out and offered free updates.

Uhm, WinXP is an update. Win2K = NT5. WinXP = NT5.1

You're right though, the case is rather fugly. Makes me think 1980s.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Agathon


Have a look around some Mac forums. I'm not going to do your work for you.



What's laughable is that anyone would take your opinion seriously, given your fanatical support for MS and Intel. In the past you've proved that you'll do anything to support your position - even post evidence from sites without reading them first. All your vaunted computer knowledge is worthless if no-one can take you seriously - and there is good reason not to, since you'll say anything to get your way. So why should this be any different?

It's hardly surprising that Apple would want to put the best spin on its products - but hell, every manufacturer does that.

I have no idea how well the G5 performs and I won't until I sit down and use one. I suggest you wait until you see for yourself.

Good points you got there, Agathon.

By the way, Asher, it's too soon to say that Spec puts the Opteron way faster than the G5; we haven't even seen the results of the G5 benchmarks on the Spec.org site.

You should go to the Apple website and pretend like you're ordering a new PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0Ghz. When you get to the shopping cart screen the ship date says "August."

Oh, and about Prescott being x86-64 compatible: Link please?

By the way, I said it might be too late for Intel in a couple of years. I didn't say it would be.

[Q Classic]

When will Apple have a journalling filesystem like XP?
When will Apple have a database-based filesystem like Longhorn?

i think osx's native filesystem does have journaling.

as for winfs, it's not out yet, so...

[Asher]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Uhm, WinXP is an update. Win2K = NT5. WinXP = NT5.1

Thanks Che, I didn't know that!

Of course WinXP is an update, I was referring to subsequent updates: Service Pack 1, Windows .NET Framework 1.0, Windows .NET Framework 1.1, DirectX 9.0, Windows Media Player 9.0, MSN Messenger 5.x, 6.x, etc.

Stuff like that Apple charges for yearly, while MS offers them as free downloads.

As for the case, it looks like a cheese grater. Hideous. I hate it more the more I see it.

The elevated look is just terrible, too.

[Q Classic]

i have to say, wintel pcs can come in much swoobier and sexier cases. lianli, or xoxide, for instance.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Cloud9
By the way, Asher, it's too soon to say that Spec puts the Opteron way faster than the G5; we haven't even seen the results of the G5 benchmarks on the Spec.org site.

That's because Apple wanted it to be kept secret. You can find the official PowerPC 970 SPEC benchmarks in the IBM.com link I've listed above. Which indeed makes it a fair comparison.

(the 3.2GHz P4s aren't up there yet either, it takes them weeks to update)

You should go to the Apple website and pretend like you're ordering a new PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0Ghz. When you get to the shopping cart screen the ship date says "August."

August 31st. The actual release date is September 1st, if you'd do your research. Who cares if it ships at the very end of August if it arrives in September?

Oh and about Prescott being x86-64 compatible: Link please?

http://www.siliconstrategies.com/story/OEG20020425S0033

http://www.chip-architect.com/news/2003_03_26_Prescott_clues_for_Yamhill.html

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Asher

Thanks Che, I didn't know that!

Of course WinXP is an update, I was referring to subsequent updates: Service Pack 1, Windows .NET Framework 1.0, Windows .NET Framework 1.1, DirectX 9.0, Windows Media Player 9.0, MSN Messenger 5.x, 6.x, etc.

Stuff like that Apple charges for yearly, while MS offers them as free downloads.

As for the case, it looks like a cheese grater. Hideous. I hate it more the more I see it.

The elevated look is just terrible, too.

Just because Apple doesn't go from version 10 to 11 doesn't mean that these are not upgrades. Apple uses a different version upgrading system than Microsoft. I guess because it's whole 'nother culture. If you want updates for Jaguar you can get them. They are 10.2.1, 10.2.2, 10.2.3, 10.2.4, and 10.2.5. These updates are all FREE downloads. They did the same with 10.1 and will do the same 10.3.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Cloud9
Just because Apple doesn't go from version 10 to 11 doesn't mean that these are not upgrades. Apple uses a different version upgrading system than Microsoft. I guess because it's whole 'nother culture. If you want updates for Jaguar you can get them. They are 10.2.1, 10.2.2, 10.2.3, 10.2.4, and 10.2.5. These updates are all FREE downloads.

Hey, no kidding?!

The point is, the updates provided from OS 10.1 to 10.2, and from 10.2 to 10.3 are comparable to what's been given out for free already by MS for Windows.

They did the same with 10.1 and will do the same 10.3.

10.3 is not free. Unless I misread you, and you meant the tiny point releases are free still? Which is hardly something to brag about...

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Asher

That's because Apple wanted it to be kept secret. You can find the official PowerPC 970 SPEC benchmarks in the IBM.com link I've listed above. Which indeed makes it a fair comparison.

(the 3.2GHz P4s aren't up there yet either, it takes them weeks to update)

Oh yes, it will take a few weeks. Guess it's going to be awhile before the G5 specs are up there as well. You assume too much.

August 31st. The actual release date is September 1st, if you'd do your research. Who cares if it ships at the very end of August if it arrives in September?

Link please?

http://www.siliconstrategies.com/story/OEG20020425S0033
http://www.chip-architect.com/news/2...r_Yamhill.html

If you follow the logic in these reports, you will find that they are rumors and should be taken with a grain of salt. And where does it say 5Ghz, by the way?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Cloud9
Link please?

I'm at work on a dialup. I can check it out when I get home because it's in my browser history there.

If you follow the logic in these reports, you will find that they are rumors and should be taken with a grain of salt. And where does it say 5Ghz, by the way?

Don't have the link offhand, but it wouldn't be hard to find.
Intel gives general roadmaps for when they plan to retire cores. They plan to retire Prescott in September 04 or thereabouts, and they also say Prescott scales past 5GHz. So you put two and two together.

Hell, even right now people are getting their hotter, 130nm Northwood cores up to 3.6-3.8GHz with the stock Intel cooler. Prescott is on 90nm with strained silicon and stuff, will run much cooler and scale much higher.

And the Yamhill stuff are more than just rumours. Intel sources confirmed the existence of it, then they denied it, and the official stance right now is "No comment." Not only that, but it makes business sense and fits into Intel's history, not to mention the high-res die photos of Prescott (from Intel themselves!) which show the presence of 64-bit components.

It's simply unofficial because Intel doesn't want to talk about it.

Intel also denied that HyperThreading was present in all P4s, and just recently enabled. But the rumours and same Intel sources said it was so, as did die photos, and it turns out they were absolutely correct.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Asher

Hey, no kidding?!

The point is, the updates provided from OS 10.1 to 10.2, and from 10.2 to 10.3 are comparable to what's been given out for free already by MS for Windows.

You think that 150 new features from 10.1 to 10.2 is comparable to this? Panther will introduce 100 new features when it comes out.

10.3 is not free. Unless I misread you, and you meant the tiny point releases are free still? Which is hardly something to brag about...

What I said was that Apple will likely use the same updating system for 10.3 (ex: 10.3.1, 10.3.2, 10.3.3, 10.3.4, 10.3.5).

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Asher

Well of course not, Agathon, but it's still ridiculous to charge every year for a new OS.

Who's making you buy it? A friend of mine still runs 10.1 - it does everything he wants it to do.

Apple doesn't force anyone to upgrade. Some people find they have to upgrade because developers have written their software to work only with Jaguar or later. Why blame Apple for that?

You also have to upgrade to use some of the free iapps. But no one is making you do it.

1) The Windows UI now offers decent graphics, it's your problem if you don't want to change them to something else

The whole thing looks like crap.

2) Windows has offered hardware-accelerated transparency since Windows 2000 (since "day 1"), something it took until OS 10.1 to get.

Wow, I had a transparent terminal in 10.0

3) Quartz is analogous to the Windows GDI+, Windows has had that since before OS X has had it. Apple branded it a fancy name and acted like it's some radical innovation, it's not.

It's better.

4) Look into the Longhorn UI, and you'll see just how incredibly radical it is from OS X's.

I wish I could, but it won't be out for TWO YEARS!!!!

5) Look into Longhorn's filesystem, and you'll see just how incredibly radical it is from OS X's.

I wish I could try it for myself, but it won't be out for TWO YEARS!!!!

6) Look at DirectX 10, and see how incredibly radical it is from anything available on OS X.

Is this out yet, or do I have to wait TWO YEARS!!!!!

Apple's little additions to OS X have been laughable.

Bizarre. The speed has improved notably, even on my machine which is now a bit long in the tooth (new one in late 2004 I think). And all the other improvements count for nothing. You don't even use OS X as was demonstrated by your ignorance of the way the Dock works, even though various Apolyton Mac users were telling you so.

Ohhh, we skinned the finder to look worse.

No - it's a whole new Finder.

We now bundle X11 with it.

X11 is free from Apple's site if you want to run it on your current system. Bundling it just makes it easier. You probably don't have to install it if you don't want to anyway.

We've released a new version of iChat that finally is comparable with MSN Messenger, only we're going to charge you $30 instead of offering it for free.

This is laughable. Windows XP costs more than OS X, but you will get ichat AV free with 10.3. Only a skinflint would pay the $30 upgrade - it's better value to get the whole thing.

We've finally implemented threadable views in our mail client. We've provided a new update to a free, open source browser...

One could ask where the decent junk mail filter is in Outlook Express.

And Safari is a good browser. In fact it seems to me to be faster than IE for XP (based on yesterday's horrible experience). It isn't bloated and it has tabbed browsing and pop-up blocking (which MS doesn't want you to have).

And the only reason they developed it is that MS made such a poor job of IE on the Mac. Face it, nobody who knows anything has used IE as their default browser on OS X. There were always better competitors available (Omniweb, Chimera and now Safari).

Like shipping a first party webbrowser for the OS?

Which they had to do since IE performed so poorly. Apple gave developers two years to come up with a worthy browser for OS X and they weren't happy with the results. So they decided to use their own. That's a whole lot better than MS's reason for trashing Netscape.

Like how the new iChat ripped out features blatantly from MSN Messenger?

So sue them/

Like how Panther has Fast User Switching (something XP has had since day one)?

Which Jobs admitted in his keynote. Who cares anyway? Panther's fast user switching is way cooler than XP's.

And when will Apple have a customizable user interface like XP?

It does - you just use a freeware haxie to enable it. You can get plenty of free themes on the web and enough UI addons to keep anyone happy. Apple doesn't want to be seen supporting this since they think that the Aqua interface is a recognisable selling point and they want it to be seen.

When will Apple have a journalling filesystem like XP?

Had it since 10.2.2

When will Apple have a database-based filesystem like Longhorn?

Probably before it comes out.

When will Apple completely runs the interface off graphics cards like Longhorn?

No idea, but they have plenty of time to implement it.

There's plenty more stuff for Apple to steal. The thing is, they'll do it with expensive yearly updates while MS will offer in one upgrade in 4-5 years from the XP launch.

Which you'll probably have to rent.

Apple robs you, and you don't even care.

Microsoft wants to own our lives and you don't care.

Anyway, this is all bull****. You are comparing a version of OS X which will probably ship in November 2003 (perhaps earlier) with an OS that won't ship until at least 2005 and probably 2006.

Of course I don't know what Apple's developers have in store for 2005, but if you want to make a fair comparison you should know.

[Asher]

Oh yes, it will take a few weeks. Guess it's going to be awhile before the G5 specs are up there as well. You assume too much.

I've no idea what you're talking about -- did you not see the IBM PDF I linked to?

Not only does it give very detailed G5 specs, it gives the official SPEC benchmarks.

What am I assuming?

[Mr. Nice Guy]

oops. triple post.