[robre]

Apple should build its own supercomputer using the new G5 and design it to be #1 in the world. Cost of the computer would be small compared to the current #1 and in my opinion would be better advertising that money spent on commercials (not that they would give those up). What do you think?

[einmakom]

The thing about being number 1 is that it never really lasts for very long. Not a reason to not try, but there are better things to shoot for- like selling xServe machines.

[Turias]

I think that the costs (in both hardware and man-hours) would far outweigh the benefits. Apple already has the #3 spot and has gotten a ton of publicity because of it. I don't think that they would gain much by putting a huge cluster together.

Plus, by not going for the number 1 spot, someone else might. And if someone else does attempt to gain the number 1 position by using G5s, Apple would get a ton of money.

[SSharon]

yea I don't think apple making the cluster would be as impressive as someone else (like VT), but they could make some incentive for someone else to do it. like build #1 and we max out your ram for free, or knowing apple they may give you a bluetooth mouse instead.

Originally posted by robre:
Apple should build its own supercomputer using the new G5 and design it to be #1 in the world. Cost of the computer would be small compared to the current #1 and in my opinion would be better advertising that money spent on commercials (not that they would give those up). What do you think?

Nah - there's no reason to. Now if Apple helped a school do it, that'd be a different story. Apple doesn't have a reason to own one other than a pi**ing contest. Besides, Dell, would just throw a bunch of machines together and do the same thing. Remeber, they were #4. Sure it took them more money and machines, but Dell has lots of both.