For those of you interested apple has released the specs of the new G5 PowerMac.

Features 64bit CPU's from IBM at up to Dual 2ghz, 1Ghz FSB - per CPU, PCI-X, 8x AGP Pro, Firewire 800 just to name a few, and most importatnly it beats a 3ghz P4 system in Q3 by 62 FPS (scored 337 fps).

More info on Apple's site.

whoah, that looks pretty damn angry.

Umm..does anyone ever upgrade macs, as such?

Like, how easy/cheap is it to just throw in some extra RAM or phatter HDD?

Holy s***ttt

Edit: V-Expensive 2 upgrade. If u saw that video posted a while ago, ud know the best way to upgrade is get old box, throw it out the window, and get a new one ;)

impressive.

Still wont get one.

u can change ram, hdd's, pci cards, just like u can in a PC

and most importatnly it beats a 3ghz P4 system in Q3 by 62 FPS (scored 337 fps)

Yep, sure it does. Also, considering that maybe 5 games come out a year on macs i really can't see why its even relevant to mention gaming on it.

blame the developers not apple! AMD and Intel dont write games either remember.

it was an example of its performance that gamers understand better, lets not start a mac bashing thread please

f*** me dead that looks HOT!!! I want that case... ohhhh pure horn :D

I'm not bashing macs, i'm sure they are great at what they are good at (video editing, desktop publishing and uh, photoshop). But they aren't game machines.

God they make some sick cases, they should sell the cases, they would probably make more sales than they would with whole Apple Computers.

http://a1568.g.akamai.net/7/1568/51/1ab711c21c324b/www.apple.com/powermac/images/designcooling06232003.jpg

I don't much like the squiggly blue and red lines.

hahahahaha, they're removeable aparrently

If Macs werent so expensive and were easily upgradeable like a PC ( not saying they are not, they just lack that functionality ) and had a bigger variety of games. I would get rid of my PC and get a G5 AND a PowerBook. They are so nice.

the biggest problem is the ack of third party support IMO. You have such a wide choice of perhepials for the PC, along with addon cards etc. With the mac, there arnt nearly as many. This does work in some ways tho, as because its authorised by apple, its bound to work. Dont get the same luxury with PCs.

yeah the aftermarket components simply arent there, but then again power macs are generally used in high end kinda deals.

all the screens for silverchair, santana, stones etc were controlled from 3-4 G4's. mainly because they know they arent going to BSOD mid show :)

Man go here - http://www.apple.com/powermac/specs.html

everything is build in, there ins't any need for anything else!!!

Wish I had the blings, that is uber powerful!

hope this works - http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/71902/wo/Fw54WAqBteCG3xce2iMfJC2SQAa/2.0.7.1.0.5.1

that is a reconfigured dual 2ghz machine - 12k USD :(

Still one uber machine :p

EDIT: reconfigured it to "standard" specs, i.e not 8gb ram not 500gb raid not twin 23" lcds :p

It came in at a tic over 4k - now that is pretty value, well in usd is it, convert it to aud and its like 6k or so

you can overclock Macs.

You can add in PCI cards provided they have Mac OS X support (most good ones do).

You can add in AGP cards.

You can add harddrives, optical drives, etc etc.

You can mod them and watercool them, or whatever else you want to do.

You can run linux, FreeBSD, etc on them.


What you can't do is run that many games, or run Windows.

didnt work :(

i got $13,730.90 when i fully optioned it :D

dual 23" displays, 250gb SATA, 8GB ram :D

They're still expensive, but spec up a Dual 3GHz Xeon system and you'll be looking at WAY more than the PowerMac.

So in some respects it's actually pretty decent value for money! A value for money Mac!!!!

^^ avatar ... BAND!

sig > acceptable

hem i liked teen's b&

hmm they are getting better only about $1000 more than a equivlent pc now. btw they compared them to a dell's running redhat 9 with hyperthreading enabled, so not exactly an optimal test system.

how is that 'not exactly optimal', considering RH9 is better on resources than win32, also so what if its a dell, all they did was assemble it from intel parts, same as ur local pc shop.

i can't quite accept that a dell is running "tip top" for performance.

also, if they can run linux, can't a fair few games run on linux now? and isn't there a linux directX adaption sort of thing happening? i heard something about that

oh and orbitor, why would a dual 3ghz xeon system compare to a dual 2ghz system? would dual 2ghz xeons be more appropriate? (and yes, i realise that comparing ghz speeds is pretty irrelevant)

macs look sweet. they have nicest monitors and interfaces, but u can't run s*** on them :(

actually macs are easier to upgrade them pc's (they had one piece suitcase like mechs on the g3 which ment u pull the tab on the side and the whole side dropped open to allow u to add stuff) u can get just about anything u want for a mac from a mac store, and they are everywhere, now. and u can run windows on a mac, very easily (virtual pc for one) but y would u? games (new games will most likely have mac support, not 100% positive but most likely) and the old games these g5's running virtual windows will run it as well as most mid range pc system, due to the risc tech and memory usuage of the mac.

sick of ppl putting down macs, based on what they heard a friend of a friends said or a school exp 5 years ago (when the IT guys didnt have any knowledge or exp of macs)
use a new mac and use it for what its built for, mostly high end graphics and tell me ur still a pc fan boy
/end rant

http://www.speedis.org/images/272126.jpg

also, if they can run linux, can't a fair few games run on linux now? and isn't there a linux directX adaption sort of thing happening? i heard something about that

no, entirely different potatos, when you got from win32 to linux in most situations your are still on x86 hardware (intel/amd) hence only OS specific stuff needs to change, when you goto the Mac though you are changing to an entirely different platform (whether it runs linux or not) you're now on PPC and hence there is a lot more work involved in porting it, for companies like id that use open standards like SDL and openGL this is rarely a problem (and hence you see Mac ports pretty quickly) for anyone dumb enough to code for directX then the likely hood of seeing a port is very low.

Macs are getting NWN soon. They even finished the linux port before it.

Yes, the good ol' G5. Get it from Computron, the best filing cabinet, prostitutes in the business.

its still a mac

go display your awesome ignorence somewhere else.

This was just posted on slashdot.

Personally i'd take both of them with a grain of salt.

Back when the 500mhz G4 was released, apple claimed in advertising that it was 2 times faster than a dual 1gig p3. How? It could do a series of filters in photoshop faster (in fact twice as fast). Is that really comparing the processors or the optimisations done to photoshop?

I'd love to use OSX, a stable and consistant GUI with the power of a decent command line sounds awesome. But $5k to get a system thats ~equal in CPU power to my PC just for a nice OS...

interesting about that slashdot link, they are all single processor chips, apple is clearly talking about its flagship dual processor model!

but hey, i'm sure once they are out in the workplace we will soon see how well they do where it matters.

They are multiprocessor, just the first few tests he mentions are tests of single processor capabilities.

He has the multiprocessor rate tests as well.

ineffable - No, it doesn't mention processor capabilities, it states that it's two times faster, which it is in applying photoshop filters.

Heh, I still remember when the original Q3 tech demo was released for MACs before PCs.

All the reviewers were trying to use the 'hockey-puck' mice with one button

Gold... :)

hmm they are getting better only about $1000 more than a equivlent pc now.

-and-

oh and orbitor, why would a dual 3ghz xeon system compare to a dual 2ghz system?

A dual 3ghz Xeon compares (badly) to the dual 2ghz 970's because the 970's soundly whip their asses. That's comparing 32bit to 64bit, also - I'm sure tests against Athlon64's and Itaniums would show an even bigger margin, since they're not up to the same clock speed as the 32bit x86 stuff.

Basically, Apple have a huge head start here. Athlon64's aren't coming out until early next year, and when they do come out you'll be lucky if they match the highest 32bit Athlons in raw clock speed. Intel have sworn off 64bit on the desktop for some obscure reason, so it's up in the air what happens to them.

As for the "500mhz G4 = 1ghz P3" comment, I actually swapped my 1ghz P3 Inspiron for a 500mhz G4 Powerbook, and I can testify that performance is at least on par with my old laptop (mainly due to Altivec stuff, and a much less bloated OS)

Edit: Oh yeah, the price thing. The Dual 2ghz G5 costs $2999 US. The Dual 3ghz Xeon that it spanks costs $4500 US from Dell.

Athlon64's aren't coming out until early next year, and when they do come out you'll be lucky if they match the highest 32bit Athlons in raw clock speed.

I thought you could by these now? Opteron CPUs are listed on Computer Alliance's website for sale now, but I don't know if this means you can get 64 bit performance yet (I'm a nooby).

Opteron CPUs

Aren't Opterons totally different to Athlon64s??

Aren't Opterons totally different to Athlon64s??

I don't know, it says they have 64 bit support on the CA page?

http://www.top500.org/list/2003/06/

Alpha's rule. NUF said by this Tru64 fan boy.

.. Yeah the Specs look impressive but it's still a MAC... remember that..

Apple have rigged those bench scores.

Read: http://www.amdzone.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1296&page=2

64 bit is pretty irrelevant unless you use software that has been written for it. This is not hard for development companies to do though: in most cases they only have to re-compile using the 64bit libraries supplied by the OS companies and the compiler needs to know that it is compiling to 64 bit and not 32 bit.

Someone said something about people coding in DirectX are dumb...
You're dumb! :P
OpenGL is great, for graphics... it doesn't do anything else.
OpenAL has recently been released and now you can do OS independent audio as well, so things are moving ever but slowly. With DirectX you can do graphics, audio, network etc... Shame it will never be ported to any other OS cause then it would be very easy to play games on Linux and Mac.

That MAC looks sweet though. If MAC creates a .NET environment for their OS then we will see some nice things happening. I might be buying MAC if that happens.

Cheers

I think it's very appropriate to add this to the current apple/pc discussion here...

http://webdev.o1.com/rvb/movies/switch/RvB_switch.mov

:)

Apple has replied to the rigging allegations at slashdot

More testing is going to need to be done to see who is faster. Apple will also have to get a compiler that optimises for the G5 so they can get a decent comparison with Intel's compiler instead of having to use gcc to give a [i]fairer[/i] test.

Ok someone help me out with a question here.

What are the advantages of 64bit over 32bit?

Logically we are talking about a greater bus width, but surely if you are transferring 32bit data (which i'd assume most program data would be), then the rest of the bandwidth would be pointless. I've got no idea, just trying to work out why 64bit is so hyped, yet doesn't seem to be much better.

So besides greater addressing space, which will probably be an issue in what, 5 years for desktop users, and more registers, its pretty pointless.

In certain situations 64bit is slower because you have to move around more data because of the larger address size. If you are using integers > 2^32 then it will give you an enourmous power boost. You only have to look at the assembly code generated for the long long datatype to see the difference it would make.

One of the main advantages that the G5 has over the G4 is a much faster Bus. This was one of the main flaws of the G4 which kept the CPU from running at its full potential.

who gives a f*** about macs or x86 pcs?
i want my f***ing flying car and my fuel efficient safe and powerful jetpack NOW

what are those scientist fagets doing :(

this is the most informative thread ive ever read.

gg

Yep, sure it does. Also, considering that maybe 5 games come out a year on macs i really can't see why its even relevant to mention gaming on it.

I think you'll find that increasingly developers are porting their games over to the macintosh system.

In tokyo, most netcafes are Mac systems. Most university administration centers are also mac powered. They're cheaper, and more reliable.

I've got a G4 and a 19" Powerbook(?) here, they both rock.

more reliable, i could accept, since mac hardware is standardized, but cheaper????

Opteron CPUs are listed on Computer Alliance's website for sale now

Opterons are to Xeons as the Athlon is to the P4.

more reliable, i could accept, since mac hardware is standardized, but cheaper????

Price it yourself if you don't believe me. Their other prices are almost as competitive now - I can buy an iBook for $1,850 AUD.

Opterons are to Xeons as the Athlon is to the P4.

So, they're cheap, overheating practically useless CPUs? (teehee) I don't understand this analogy, because all my experiences with AMD CPUs have been negative so this analogy to me means that Xeons are better than Opterons, which I don't think is your point at all?

One more benifit of 64bit over 32bit is this:

If you have some data in a program that is say 128bits long and you need to move it or work with it, then with a 32bit processor you will need 4 registers to do it, or if you can't get 4, you will need to do the same operation 4 times with some added moves to save the data to another register. On a 64bit machine this is halved, so double the speed. Now this would only work properly if the programmer optimised his code for 64bit machines.

There are still a fair amount of people programming more like 16bit style than 32bit, but having the ability to do more is always better. :)

Cheers

I think you'll find that increasingly developers are porting their games over to the macintosh system.

In tokyo, most netcafes are Mac systems. Most university administration centers are also mac powered. They're cheaper, and more reliable.

I've got a G4 and a 19" Powerbook(?) here, they both rock.

I dunno what kind of universities you visit, but all the ones I've been to have been very against any game playing whatsoever, indeed, they tend to discourage anything that isn't directly associated with university work (ie researching, typing out documents, using various academic programs, like various databases or image creation/ manipulation programs).

And as for netcafes, I somehow doubt the netcafes you are talking about have anything to do with games- they're places people visit to read their news webpages/write updates for their own sites, check their hotmail and other such trivial matters. Of course, you could do all the basic stuff most people do at netcafes on a 486, so either I've misunderstood your point (please clarify if this is so) or your discourse has very little real bearing on this discussion.

PS: I doubt developers are going to start porting all their games to the apple platform. I just can't see enough benefit in porting games to machines targeted primarily at academic and professional use.

From what I can tell there was Firewire 400 which is half the Speed of this new Firewire 800.. Runs about 1/3 faster than USB2.0.. Knowing MAC they invented this new standard as they like to use Firewire on the old MACS hence why MAC's are only realy good for video editing.. Not gaming as such.

macs aren't just good for video! they're good for audio as well!

...

wait, was i just sticking up for a macintosh?? ;)

links are broken for me.

i find that everyone fudges their benchmarks however apple get dumped on more simply because people think its cool to hate them.