New PowerMacs at NAB

alexandr

alexandr

kosmonaut
funny this one hasn't been picked up yet, guess it drowned in the Tiger-frenzy around April 1st. anyway - macrumors.com are reporting of rumors of an update to the PowerMac-line at the NAB-conference, which is to be held in Las Vegas 16th-21th of April.

the machines is said to sport new processors, PCI-Express, blu-ray-drives(high-end-model only) and may be able to max out at 32MB(!) RAM..

sounds ok ;)

http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2005/03/20050330102917.shtml

alex.
 
you mean 32 GB right? ^^

and i didn't think that blue-ray was ready yet... but if it is then great!
 
I'm pretty certain blu-ray isn't even a ratified spec yet.


But I'll take any rumour I can get at the moment.
 
32 MB of Ram? Wow, that's almost as much as my Performa 6400/200!

Now I can finally edit video... ON MY COMPUTER!

lol. Sorry. It's just too fun.
 
yeah, yeah - keep it coming. i can take it.. ;)

alex - who by no means is gonna edit his first post.
 
We're still in the midst of settling on DVD-R or DVD+R, so it wouldn't surprise me if Apple decided to "take a side" before a standard was settled on concerning Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD (if a standard is ever settled on).
 
As ususal, I think the rumored specs are a bit too ambitious. Here' smy prediction:

Definitely new G5s at NAB
Top out at 2.8 GHZ
Same 8GB RAM max
PCI-Xpress
Support for new higher end 3D cards
No Blu-Ray, instead just higher speed DVD burners (16x)
 
well.. but we have been waiting for the PM's to reach 3.0 for quite some time now, and considering the massive delay compared with the average PM update-cycle i think we are in for something big. but thats thinking/hoping without too much technical insight..

i would very much see the line top out at 3.0(or more), and hopefully the bigger/better models get a slight bump aswell, meaning the 2nd model at 2.8 and the 3rd at 2.5. a whole step(2 to 3) seems a bit too much considering that would indeed signify a massive difference in CPU-speed. too massive if you ask me..

another thing, if the iMacs 2.0 will be released i hope that the "slowest" PM gets a higher clock-speed. yeah, i know the PM sport double processors, but i like the way it is with the high-end iMac as a "weaker" machine than the lowest PM. i would like to avoid cross-over clock-speeds, if you get me.. for marketing strategy aswell, i think that would be wise. keep the PM a .1 or .2(or even .3 or .4) over the iMacs and it is easier to see what you get..

alex.
 
They will definatly release new machines.. They are already starting to dry up the supply of PM's here in sydney. I was going to wait but figured that if I do wait I will end up waiting another 4 months..

Hopefully they boost up the standard ram with these machines.. 256mb is a joke. Ram prices have dropped again (im thinking of getting another 1gb for my g5.. cos I can)
 
um. saying PCI-Xpress is VERY misleading. Currently, they have PCI (low "crippled" ones) or PCI-X.

The rumors are about PCI-Express, aka PCI-E.

please do not confuse the issue by writing PCI-Xpress.
 
I was just thinking....my DP 1.8GHz G5 is lightning fast... if they introduced DP 3.0Ghz G5's... those machines would be a minimum of 60% faster then mine.. and they probably have better cache and all that other goodies.. I would be so tempted to buy one. :eek: :eek:
 
Dont forget that the bottleneck is and always will be I/O. HDDs and Networks are still way slower than CPUs in most cases. I'd prefer things like 10Gb-Ethernet.. SATA2 HDDs, onboard RAID (or even the cabling to use something like an XServe RAID card without cables going everywhere), PCI-Express video cards, DDR2 memory, more HDD spaces (even 3 would be good, for 74G RAPTOR boot, and 2x500Gb Hitachi for 1Tb storage), Bluetooth 2.0 (as in PowerBooks)..
 
This article also stated that the PB would recieve a screen resolution update..... I don't personally see this happening, as the PB screen is already technically high-definition.
 
It's also a "Page 2" rumour at MacRumors. (Just to answer the original poster's question about why this wasn't covered here.) ;)

The PB screen was rumoured before. More than rumoured even: There was a reference to a higher-res screen in some Apple manual of the 17" PowerBook. And with this being the "year of HD" for Apple, it would make some sense. It would also make sense to make such an announcement at NAB, I guess.
 
the screens res on the pbooks is terrible IMO. the 12" only goes up to 1024x768! which, in terms of pro apps, is useless. its a jumped up portfolio at the moment. sony have a laptop with a 10" screen (2" smaller than the 12" pB) with a screen res similar to that of the 15" pb. thats progress. the HD model should be the 15". the 17" pB is only just borderline portable - the physical size of the unit is actually quite bulky - it wont fit in a briefcase, for example, or any normal sized bag for that matter
 
I have the PowerBook 1.67GHz 17" model (which I love...it makes the 15" I used to have feel like a toy!) and the manual does include specs for a higher resolution display.

I don't have much trouble commuting with my 17" at all. Between my WWDC bag and my Zero briefcase, its well protected and very mobile. Yeah, its a little bigger than the 15", but I hardly even notice it now, after a little bit of use. Besides, you can't beat the 17" screen in this form factor!

As for PowerMacs. Obviously a dual 2.5 is still faster than most of us could use. I don't blame people for waiting, they're expensive machines and if your cash can get you a bit more for your money (like more RAM, newer GPU, extra speed, etc), unless your in dire need, I'd wait too! (and am) :)
 
There are different needs and other aspects Apple has to take into consideration when choosing resolutions for their PowerBooks. I'm no fan of the 12" model's XGA resolution, either. I personally wish they'd finally make it a widescreen model at least. A tad smaller still and maybe 1152*768. (11 or 12 inch widescreen display.)

And considering higher resolutions: I can clearly see why Apple doesn't choose 'em. The system (even Tiger) is still basically set up for 72 dpi. And until there's at least a 150 or 300 dpi screen available at prices that make sense for 'normal' notebook customers AND Apple has a totally scalable UI for Mac OS X, it doesn't make sense to make the PowerBooks adopt higher res screens. UI elements would simply be too small for the majority of people - and it's the majority of people that defines market chances after all. Graphics artists still make up a great part of Apple's PowerBook customers. And they have to cater for them.

(I know that Tiger implements technology for scaling UI, but there's simply no such setting in system preferences. If you even _had_ a 150 or higher dpi screen, you simply _couldn't_ tell the OS that. So all its UI elements would simply be very, very small. I know it's theoretically possible that Apple would go high-res with displays and the OS. And I wish they would rather sooner than later. But right now, such screens ain't available - certainly not at the right prices - and the OS isn't prepared for it.)
 
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