Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

bigben1024 · Oct 14, 2003, 12:58 PM

Yes, I've finally found a site with some yet limitted info about the processor. http://www.maconline.com/new-powebook-17processor.html
I'm interested in learning more about how to compare performance of Apple's G4 vs Intell comparably priced systems.

I have decided to switch, because I'm tired of 5 blue screans a day where I can't recover. (just one reason) I like what I saw on the website above, however it didn't mention anything about the pipeline.

What I would like to see is a diagram of the steps taken for computation. Although I'm a computer science grad student, I only know the programming side and very little hardware. Even better would be a side by side comparison of the different techniques of moto/ibm/apple processor and intell processor.

Please help me out with links or information.

cambro · Oct 14, 2003, 01:52 PM

Check Apple's Developer Connection site. There is a lot of processor-specific information in there, particuarly with respect to Velocity Engine (vector processing unit) and even some sample code. Motorolla, I believe, also has some technical details posted on their processor lines (white sheets or what have you).

Also, there was a review on ArsTechna recently, but it focused on the G5.

Of course, then there is always Google....

cambro · Oct 14, 2003, 01:53 PM

P.S.

This probably isn't the best forum for this question.

ae86_16v · Oct 14, 2003, 03:32 PM

Yeah, look on Motorola's homepage and do a search for PowerPC 7447/7457. If you are looking at older Powerbooks then it'll be 7455, 7450 and the 7410. All of these are the older Titanium processors.

7410 - 400/500mhz
7450 - 550/667mhz
7455 - 667/800mhz & 867/1ghz
7447 - 1.0/1.25ghz

But definitely I am sure I have found PDFs dealing with more technical aspects of the processor (such as pipelines, etc) on the Motorola site before.

Give me your email address and I'll shoot you over some PDFs that I d/led. (Gotta find them on my HD first though.)

Goodluck and welcome to the boards.

bigben1024 · Oct 14, 2003, 05:03 PM

http://developer.apple.com/documenta...kG4/index.html

here's the link for anyone who is interested.

Thanks for the help... now to read the specs...

ae86_16v · Oct 14, 2003, 05:54 PM

Here is some stuff too. . .

http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps...;nodeId=016246

http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps...;nodeId=018rH3

http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps...;nodeId=018rH3

http://e-www.motorola.com/files/32bi...ote/AN2540.pdf

http://e-www.motorola.com/files/32bi...note/AN2097.pd