Apple’s new Power Mac G5 achieves all these personal computer firsts, reports Greg Thom for The Herald Sun:
– World’s fastest desktop computer.
– First desktop to include a 64-bit processor.
– Industry’s first 1GHz front-side bus.
– Highest bandwidth system controller.
– Fastest PCI interface on a desktop (133MHz).
“‘The 64-bit revolution has begun and the personal computer will never be the same again,’ Apple CEO Steve Jobs says. So Intel, the world’s largest computer chip manufacturer, is quaking in its boots, right? Not so, according to computer trends analyst Andy Woo, of research company Gartner Australasia. Though most people will drool over a machine such as the G5, the extra power is simply not needed by the average user. There’s more than enough grunt in an Intel P4 machine to do most tasks,” Thom reports.
“‘It is really interesting, from an Apple perspective, that they have beaten others in getting 64-bit computing in a desktop,’ Woo says. ‘The question is, what do users, both in business area and at home, need with that sort of power?’ Woo says what the Apple announcement does do is reinforce its image as a ground-breaking outfit at the leading edge of innovation. ‘It plays to their strengths, like marketing, design and user-interface. They have always had a leading-edge image,’ Woo says. ‘But is Intel rattled by this announcement? Absolutely not,'” Thom writes.
Thom reports, “Woo feels the G5 will reinforce Apple’s strength in its core customer areas such as graphic design and video editing. ‘But few users need that power and speed. This will not worry Intel at all in the desktop space.'”
Full article here.
It used to be that Apple Power Macs didn’t have enough power to compete with Intell. Now they are saying they are more powerful than people need. Funny how the press works.
Intel’s assessment is flawed in that it doesn’t take into account the sector of the consumer market that makes the highest demands on computers and computer manufacturers – gamers. You can also bet that Intel will increasingly begin to market to this group. Also, I can remember a time when Mircosoft Word ran on a Mac Classic with 1MB or RAM. Suffice to say increasing demands of even the most mainstream (and mundane) software titles and OS’s will continue to drive enhancements in hardware. Finally, people are using computers for different reasons, and as always, Apple is leading the industry here. As an obvious example, we’re going to see an exponential increase in home video editing in years to come.
That’s it. Computers have now become too fast. Hey all computer makers, stop all development! Do not, I repeat, do not make them any faster than now. Any faster is unnecessary!
Last month on the other hand new Macs were “too slow”. Now they are “too fast”. Guideline to PC makers: aim for something in between.
The Herald Sun must be out of their minds to publish such rubbish.
Apple is coming back into the game, and is at least equal on the playing field if not surpassing the competition. People can now stop using benchmarks as an excuse not to buy Apple. Surely the competition will bring up other things (such as BuyMusic.com to compete with iTunes, or Micrsoft killing off more of their software for Apple) but at least we’re gaining headway.
The G5 will only be “too fast” until Intel ships something that is faster. Until then, the P4 is fast enough.
“An undeniably beautiful and powerful machine, the G5 comes with a price tag to match — $5599 for the top Dual 2GHz processor model. It will also ship in 1.6GHz ($3599) and 1.8GHz ($4499) single-chip versions.”
He should get his prices straight, the top of the line is 2999.00, 3500.00 with 19″ flat sony .
I know, I ordered one. It isn’t chickenfeed by a long shot but being off by over 2500.00 is another computer (or 4 if you build wintels, not a shot, just a fact).
It looked like the reporter was trying to be fair to the Apple he just needed to not scare the potentials by the crazy price error.
Be well all
I can say the same for the power in a P4. Do the consumers really need all that “grunt” from a P4 in a home? Answer: NO! BUT PEOPLE WANT IT!!! THE MORE POWER THE BETTER!! I GOT TO HAVE IT!!! Fact is the G4 speed is adequate for the general consumer. And people think it’s slow copmpared to P4’s. People are finicky, the consumer market is finicky. Just wait…Intel will announce a 64-bit for the home consumer and tell them they need it at home. Why wouldn’t they? We all have to keep that cash flow going they can’t stop increasing chip speeds. Gives them more reason to tell people they need to buy new computers.
…Though most people will drool over a machine such as the G5, the extra power is simply not needed by the average user. There’s more than enough grunt in an Intel P4 machine to do most tasks,” Thom reports…
Mac users have been saying that all along! It’s those Wintelites that run their mouth about performance prowess! For most users these days, the average Mac/PC is good enough for most tasks. Only the Super Pwer Users need such powerful computer solutions. Helk I’m typing this on a BeBox Dual 66 MHz PowerPC machine, works just fine if you ask me
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I don’t think Apple thinks that their computers are too powerful. I suspect they will be the platform for some new apps that will need that power and take personal computing to a new level. Apple computer has consistently shown that it has a vision way beyond that of other companies. Technologies like the new iChat AV are probably just the tip of the iceberg. Sure they have more power than most of us need right now. But just wait… something is coming. It always is with Apple. Those using Windows and the Intel platforms will be playing catch up with half baked imitation technologies
“He should get his prices straight…”
Dude, *hellOOOO* AusTRALIA? At least look at the link address before you type. Them thar’s down under dollars.
I hate Intel. They have such a grip on everyone on the planet, save us lucky few free thinkers. The press used to point out how bloody behind our iron was and NOW they’re saying, too much, too much. F you mother Fers. Don’t you get that the computing world NEEDS Apple? Do you think Micro$oft is gonna innovate for you the way Apple does? NO WAY FOOLS. Die, Wintel users, in shame. We’re never going to be as good as you and thats just fine. EAT ME.
“…the extra power is simply not needed by the average user.”
Heeeellllooooo…it’s a PRO machine…as in for professionals who need all the power they can get. If that extra power scares you, get an iMac. It might not be as fast as a P4, but who needs all that extra power? Besides, both the G5 and iMac have a significant advantage over any P4 box: they run OS X! But then, who needs all that extra elegance, power, and efficiency?
Comments like these will bring joy to hardcore Mac users everywhere. G5s are not “at least equal” to Pentium 4s, they surpass them in almost every way. Intel should be quaking in its boots because unlike AMD and IBM they do not have a 64 bit processor to satisfy the power-hungry computer user. It seems like the best Intel can do for now is give their desktop processor a higher GHz rating. Give me a lower clocked 970 any day.
i think slamming ‘the press’ as a whole for the comments of one writer is foolish.
‘the press’ by and large give Macs great coverage—much more ink than a niche player in any other market would get.
Ok Maggots.
The G5 hasnt shipped yet. So all these “firsts” they havent happened – got it? HAVENT FUCKING HAPPENED. So which will SHIP first, AMD’s 64bit desktop processor? Or IBM’s (note its IBMs chip not apples). AMD’s is due any day now.
If it hasnt shipped first.. then its NOT FIRST.
And, you make such a deal about how Intel isnt “quaking in its boots” about the G5, but I dont ever recall you mentioning Apple quaking in their boots when their systems were roughly 1/3 the speed of Intel systems. Oh wait! in fact RIGHT NOW TODAY, Apple’s systems are lucky to be a third as fast as Intel systems – did I mention that the G5 isnt even shipping? Or are you still under the delusion that a G4 can hold a candle to a P4?
Sad one minded unable to think for themselves maggots. Has macdailynews decided to pick up the Apple fan-boy flag where macnetv2 dropped it?
Just last week they were saying that the benchmarks were biased towards Apple and Intel was still faster? What happened? Did they realize that they were comparing servers to apple desktops?
“Sad one minded unable to think for themselves maggots.”… Awwww, is someone a wittle upset dey aren’t in da lead anymore? It’s ok, wittle baby, you can be happy on your inferior OS and slower computer, there’s really nothing to get so upset about. Now just tuck in tight, and don’t let the bed bugs bite…
At the professionals software level; graphic design, CAD, 3D visualization, movie editing, etc., there is no question that we are not even close to having enough processing power. I do 3D Modeling and Rendering, and Architectural CAD Design, etc. using computers and if I had a computer that was 25 times faster than what I use now I would still want and need a faster computer to work at peek efficiency.
To me the debate of how much processing power is enough is a tough one at the consumer level because most consumer software is written based on the power available to the end user. Imagine ten years ago you thought you have all the power you will ever need to run a word processor on a Power PC 8100. Since then new features have been added to word processors like real time spell checking and grammar checking, and the real time helper that demand more power. Microsoft Office for OSX is so poorly written and optimized at the core level that I think it runs really slow on a 1.25 GHz G4.
As more power becomes available more software developers find ways to use that added power. Then their are games which are getting to be the biggest power hogs in the consumer market. And there are programs like Konfabulator that add a bunch of cool widgets to the desktop but eats up some processing power. I imagine one day in the future you will be able to talk to and interact with your computer in plain language and it will recognize the users expressions using video sight. People are working a technologies for this now but their is not the available power in implement this technology as yet.
Based on the fact that there are technological advancements in software contiguously how can you set a cutoff point for how much power is enough? By doing that you would effectively eliminate all innovation which requires more power.
It’s all about options buddy. Apple is giving you the G5 PowerMacs if you need that kind of power and if you don’t, you can go with the G4 iMac or eMac for considerably less, so I don’t see any problem here. And who cares if AMD or IBM/Apple is first with the 64 bit processor “Maggot boy Gates”? If I can’t run OS X on the AMD then I couldn’t care less about it anyway. Buying a computer system strictly for what CPU it has in it or what clock speed it runs at is something that you “Wintel maggots” love to do, the rest of us buy computers for the software/OS since that’s what actually gets the work done.
>>> There’s more than enough grunt in an
>>> Intel P4 machine to do most tasks
And there is more than enough grunt in an economy car to get around town. I guess that’s why SUV sales are up.
” An undeniably beautiful and powerful machine, the G5 comes with a price tag to match — $5599 for the top Dual 2GHz processor model. It will also ship in 1.6GHz ($3599) and 1.8GHz ($4499) single-chip versions………”
Where did this guy come up with his prices. They are definately not from the Apple Store web site. what a moron!!
http://store.apple.com
The thing to remember here is that Apple ships when they say they will. Not like certain other vapor-hard & software providers, who shall remain nameless. And it is Apple’s chip, just as much as the G3 was. IBM, Motorola and Apple combined some time ago to jointly develop the Power PC chip, and have been happily working together for some time now, thank you, you clueless troll.
The real point of this article is the hypocrisy imposed by advertising. I suspect that when Intel produces a 5GHZ chip, little mention will be made of the fact that Woo said, “The question is, what do users, both in business area and at home, need with that sort of power?”
—And Apple will derided for being too slow, and PeeCees are God’s gift to the world, etc., etc., etc.
dear MasonMcD
Fair enough, it is Down Under dollars, my mistake. but a simple one. The dollar sign is a lot easier to see than the .au in the link. don’t be condiscending, I wasn’t. And when I read your post I went oops..my bad pointing out the link oversight was all you had to do. It isn’t like I didn’t read the story.
And fellow thinker “eaxit” I recommend not being seriously nasty (calling the guy a moron) about a writer whos only mistake would have been price if we hadn’t missed the link cue as the location of the currency spoken of.
We have enough things to debate without trolling the crap out of each other. You can learn a lot from these posts when people aren’t being jerks to each other.
Be Well
Most people don’t need a 3 Ghz HT double-pumped fsb blah blah blah. If they could they would but they can’t since Winblows doesn’t exsist for a 64/32 bit processor (and NO that crap they have now is not for CONSUMER USE!) so they grunt along at 32 bit 3 Ghz (over clocked) false front system bus system.