[Chuckit]

A 2.3 GHz dualie would be encroaching on the Power Mac's turf. So what we're basically saying here is that if they'd put their best processors in the iMac, they could have competed with their new low-end processors, I guess.

I don't disagree that their numbers are a little unfair if you look at it as a platform-versus-platform comparison, but I'm just trying to further the perspective here.

[MAC-ALEX]

The only one thing stops me to buy new MacTel hardware now is that at the time when the native x86 software will be out then this MacTel hardware will be old already. Intel change CPU speed more frequent that it was with IBM or Motorola's PowerPC. I'm pretty sure that before this summer we'll see new more powerful iMac and MacBook.

[Gee4orce]

but they couldn't have put that dual core G5 in a laptop, which is what the switch to Intel is all about. The iMac is, and always has been, a 'laptop in a desktop' so it's no surprise that it's using the same components as the new MacBook.

...now, this bodes very well for the 'real' desktops - the PowerMacs, erm, I mean, Mac Pros or whatever they will be called.

[Eriamjh]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Apple could have gone with a dual-core 970MP G5 at around 2.3GHz in the iMac. And if they'd have done it before introducing these models, there wouldn't have been any appreciable speed difference.

I agree. At first, it seems that the Intel iMac is twice as fast as the G5 iMac just because Intel is better, but then you have to realize you are comparing a single core G5 to a dual core Intel. In the end, they are about the same.

What's interesting is that the price point is the same as before. So I wonder where Apple's margins are on this product?

More questions: I wonder what it will take to install XP on it? Target disk mode? What exactly is EFI (the BIOS alternative)? What happens if you reboot holding Command-O-F?

I'm sure we will start seeing Intel vs. G5 benchmarks in the coming days/weeks. What will really be interesting will be a Duo 2GHz Intel iMac vs. Dual 2GHz G5 PowerMac benchmarks each running the Universal Binary of iLife (or whatever). And then there will be Windows on an iMac vs. Windows on a "PC" Duo machine. And then OSX on the Intel iMac vs. hacked OSX on a PC. And then...

And then...

And then...

[pliny]

Heh heh, you said it, Eriam.

If they'd come out with a machine with dual 2.3, that may have matched the imac duo, but what about the price? Bet it would have cost more. Any spec scores on the G5 dual cores to compare?

And then the heat issue--don't those 2.3s in the PM's require some interesting cooling?

[ghporter]

I have to agree that a dual core 970MP would have made the iMac scream. But how many could Apple get every month? And what about their thermal characteristics-I bet they are a lot hotter than would work well in an iMac.

For better or worse, my take on the switch to Intel has always been that IBM just didn't want Apple's business and now they don't have it. If IBM wanted to be Apple's supplier, they would have worked at developing the processors Apple wanted for Apple's priorities, not IBM's.

(Frankly it looks like IBM wants completely out of the small computer market and all subsidiary parts of it. Their flagship Thinkpad line was a shining example of how to make a PC laptop-and they sold it, brand name and all. Makes you wonder...)

Now I'm really interested in how these new iMacs run, but mostly I'm waiting to see what people complain about. I'm expecting some "interesting" complaints that equate to "this Mac ain't running a PPC processor," as well as some real issues.

[iStudent 2003]

Apple hit a home run with the new iMacs!

1. Dual-core prossser
2. Extended Desktop (FINALLY)
3. DVI output
4. Great ATI GPU with PCI-Express
5. Back to Two RAM slots

The only thing that I can say bad about the new iMacs, is that Apple didn't add a TV line input; but I understand that Apple can't added everything all at once.

[harrisjamieh]

Originally Posted by Gee4orce

but they couldn't have put that dual core G5 in a laptop, which is what the switch to Intel is all about. The iMac is, and always has been, a 'laptop in a desktop' so it's no surprise that it's using the same components as the new MacBook.

...now, this bodes very well for the 'real' desktops - the PowerMacs, erm, I mean, Mac Pros or whatever they will be called.

How was the iMac always a laptop inside a desktop? It had a desktop processor, desktop hard drive, desktop RAM (G5's), desktop speakers - what laptop components were in the iMac?

[Crusoe]

Any word on how soon they'll hit retail stores or are they already there?

[typoon]

Originally Posted by Crusoe

Any word on how soon they'll hit retail stores or are they already there?

If Jobs says it's released "today" then it's usually going to take til the end of the week for them to have them. Some might even have them in already.

[Chuckit]

My local Apple store has a recorded message saying the iMacs will be available starting Jan. 17.

[P]

Originally Posted by jamil5454

Sigh, why this and not the iBook?

Because the cheaper singlecore Yonahs aren't available yet (at least not in volume), and even those are fairly expensive. Also, I think the iMac and the Macbook share the same motherboard, possibly with an extra PCIe connection for that new slot and a regular Radeon X1600 instead of the Mobility one (although it might turn out the iMac also has the Mobility version). Expect a Mac mini/iBook fairly soon though (with another shared motherboard?).

[awarenessengine]

Disappointed they didn't release a 23" iMac. Macworld UK put a mock-up of one on their recent cover and it looked amazing in black.

If you have a G5 anything then there's little point in upgrading to these models.

[chrisutley]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

My local Apple store has a recorded message saying the iMacs will be available starting Jan. 17.

Cincinnati Apple Store told me Feb, I think the guy made it up though.

[ciparis]

Looking at the iMac ordering information at the Apple store, it looks like the ATI X1600 256MB part has its own sku. I wonder how hard it would be to upgrade the 128 MB stock version to that, and further I wonder if they're using a standard type of laptop-style socket that will eventually see faster GPUs being shipped without changing the motherboard (allowing intrepid iMac owners to upgrade their graphics much like Dell XPS Gen2 notebook owners have been doing recently, unsupported by Dell though it is).

[jamil5454]

If that's the case, I wonder if regular PC video cards will finally work unmodified in an Intel Mac.

[shabbasuraj]

i wanna see benchmarks vs current G5 dualies....

[V]

Any chances old games, like Starcraft, warcraft 3, COD, Lucas Art's games etc, will be updated with universal binaries?

[Brad5689]

can anyone tell me why the ram in the intel macs is so much cheaper where as it is a lot more expensive in the PPC models. Also in all honest which is a better built machine and which would last longer. I dont really care about the intel part to be honest i don't do anything crazy with my computers so I don't really need the Intel chip. Also, another question do you think that the Imacs(PPC of course) will go down in price and why can't you upgrade the video card in them. Sorry I'm still new to Mac i don't have one yet but it will be my next computer.....

Thanks Brad

[Brad5689]

hey i have another question why aren't there any firewire 800 ports on the IMAC G5 or the Intel Imac? does anyone else think that firewire is going to kick the bucket?

[ghporter]

Brad, welcome to the MacNN forums! I have to ask what you're talking about with the RAM price-the RAM prices at the Apple Store are identical for both the G5 and Intel iMacs.

[Brad5689]

I'm looking at the site now and without an educational discount the ram for 2GB on the intel model is only a $300 upgrade and for the PPC model it is $1200 for 2.5 GB. This confuses me especially when the fsb is faster on the Intel iMac than on the PPC iMac.

Also as far as the video card goes i'm guessing you just can't upgrade it on the PPC model because of the actual model of video card?

On the intel model you upgrade to 256mb for only $75.

I guess there are alot of changes i'm just not sure what to think of them.

[Brad5689]

Also any answer to my other question as to which machine is better quality as far as total package? which processor would last longer? how long do you think they will have the universal software (another 5 years? or so?). Just things to consider since I'm planning on buying an iMac within the next 2 or 3 weeks. Thanks.


And by the way I've never owned a Mac but IMHO it just doesn't seem "right" that Apple now has Intel chips. It almost seems as though they may stray to the "Microsoft" side of things and try to market to the masses which is cool. I just hope that the quality of their machines (from what little experience I have with them) doesn't change for the worse.

[mqualben]

I'm drooling over these new Macs, but have to admit that I'm a little disappointed that Apple didn't add an external SATA port, which would cost next to nothing and provide much better external hard drive performance than FireWire 400 or USB 2.0. Granted, external SATA hard drives aren't popular *yet* (hey, 3.5" floppies and USB weren't popular when introduced in Macs, either), but it would have enabled users to install Windows on an external hard drive and run it as fast as if installed on the internal hard drive. Maybe it's possible to have the internal hard drive partitioned into HFS and NTFS, but it would be less painful to just plug in a fast SATA drive loaded with whatever OS you want in its native disk format. Apple has some recent patents which imply they might be gearing up the Macs to run multiple OSes slickly (maybe not until Leopard?). An external SATA port would have made that cooler and given Apple another feather in its cap for popularizing another cool standard ahead of the rest of the industry. Anyway, other than that, kudos to Apple!

[mduell]

Originally Posted by ::maroma::

Well based on what Steve said in the demo, the Rosetta apps won't be running as fast as they would on PPC chips. He said (while using Photoshop under Rosetta) something like "...its not running fast enough for Pro users, but for those of us who use it here and there it runs just fine."

Pro users are mostly on PowerMacs, not iMacs.

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Apple could have gone with a dual-core 970MP G5 at around 2.3GHz in the iMac. And if they'd have done it before introducing these models, there wouldn't have been any appreciable speed difference.

Heh, what's the power budget on those again? Much higher than the current ~50W.

[Simon]

MacFixIt has some interesting information on the new Intel Macs here and here.

• EFI confirmed
• OF is gone
• FW target disk mode still works
• c or option on boot still work
• no mentioning of how to reset PMU, PRAM or NVRAM yet

[harrisjamieh]

Originally Posted by Brad5689

Also any answer to my other question as to which machine is better quality as far as total package? which processor would last longer? how long do you think they will have the universal software (another 5 years? or so?). Just things to consider since I'm planning on buying an iMac within the next 2 or 3 weeks. Thanks.


And by the way I've never owned a Mac but IMHO it just doesn't seem "right" that Apple now has Intel chips. It almost seems as though they may stray to the "Microsoft" side of things and try to market to the masses which is cool. I just hope that the quality of their machines (from what little experience I have with them) doesn't change for the worse.

Hey Brad, right,

1) the new intel iMacs have TWO RAM slots, meaning you can have two sticks of RAM in each slot. The previous iMac had only one. Because it had only one, to max out the RAM to 2.5GB, you had to buy a 2GB stick of RAM, which are very expensive (around about $400, though of course more from apple - $1200). Because the new iMac has two RAM slots, to max out the RAM at 2GB, you only have to buy 2x 1 GB sticks, which are much much cheaper.

2) The 'quality' of the machines can mean a few different things. The build quality will be to the same high standard the PPC iMac was built to, as the casing and design is all exactly the same on the intel one. If your asking which iMac will last longer, then the Intel one will - it being twice as fast (aparently) as the old iMac, it will not be outdated by faster processors nearly as quickly.

3) The whole universal software thing im not to sure about. I mean when Steve announced the whole intel thing, he said how easy it was for new app writers to make apps for PPC and intel, because all they had to do was tick a box that said 'compile for PPC and intel'. If this is true, there is no technical limitation that would stop the production of universal binaries, for at least 10 years or so. That said, I'm sure Apple will cease production of PPC software much earlier than that (3-4 years), as they dont want to lose out on people buying new hardware because they can still use their old stuff.

Verdict: I bought a PPC iMac 9 days ago, and have just arranged for John Lewis to take it back and refund me the money. Once I do this on sunday, then I am going straight online to the Apple store and buying an Intel iMac. I'd say deff go with the intel, i'm pretty sure it will last you longer.


Edit: I missed out some of your other points:

1) I dont think PPC iMacs will go down in price so long as people keep buying them, which I think they will for a time.
2) The video card in the iMac G5 is not technically a card, it is in the motherboard (i think), so you cant just pull out a card and put a new one in
3) Firewire 800 has never been on the iMac. They left that for the professional machines as Apple thought that consumers didnt need it. Saying this, the new Macbook Pro is a professional machine and also lacks firewire 800, so I still doubt it is, but maybe it is on its way out...

[harrisjamieh]

So have I got this right: the new iMac is faster than the dual core powermac 2.0?

Steve said that one of the 2.0 ghz cores in the new intel is faster than the 2.1ghz G5 that is in the G5 iMac. So i theory, one of the 2.0 ghz intel cores is faster than one of the 2.0 ghz cores in the PM, making the intel faster, meaning the *only* reason to buy a 2.0 PowerMac would be to get expandibilty, extra HD space, Extra RAM, bigger monitor (although the imac now does spanning).

Seems like a lot of price difference in the two JUST to get those few extras in the PM

[Eriamjh]

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

So have I got this right: the new iMac is faster than the dual core powermac 2.0?

There is no evidence to support that. Not yet. Have you seen any real-world tests?

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

Steve said that one of the 2.0 ghz cores in the new intel is faster than the 2.1ghz G5 that is in the G5 iMac. So i theory, one of the 2.0 ghz intel cores is faster than one of the 2.0 ghz cores in the PM, making the intel faster, meaning the *only* reason to buy a 2.0 PowerMac would be to get expandibilty, extra HD space, Extra RAM, bigger monitor (although the imac now does spanning).

He said it was about twice as fast as the old single core iMac. With two cores, this would put an intel iMac on par with a dual core G5, but without direct comparisons of native iLife software (currently the only thing that could give us real-world comparisons) we shouldn't jump to conclusions.[/quote]

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

Seems like a lot of price difference in the two JUST to get those few extras in the PM

Yup. But one is PPC and the other is Intel.

My postulating has come to this: If Apple can drop a dual-core Intel in an iMac and sell it for the same price as before, then maybe they can drop two duals into a G5 PowerMac and sell a quad for the same price. How about a quad Intel PowerMac for $1999 that is twice as fast as the old Dual core G5? Makes the iMac look slow, doesn't it?

[Simon]

Does Yonah do SMP? I mean of course two Yonah cores can live on the same Yonah die and work together, but can two separate Yonahs sit on the same board? If if so, would they have to share the 667MHz bus? Bus limitation?

[Fdanna]

FYI: I ordered a CTO 20" iMac on the day of the announcement. Ship date is Jan 18. Somewhere else in this thread someone mentioned that iMacs would be in stores by Jan 17th.

I thought I didn't have any applications that I had to worry about running under Rosetta until I remembered that my company just recently allowed us to VPN with the Cisco client on Mac OS X. I'm almost positive that this won't work under Rosetta, but we'll see!

Two things on the new iMac that I'm excited about: The graphics card has H.264 hardware decoding (this should make a huge difference in HD playback performance) and that there is now a gigabit ethernet port.

I'll report back if someone else doesn't report back first!

[palane]

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

How is that fair?! I bought an imac 9 days ago! Thats it, its going back to John Lewis....

I don't want to seem too unsympathetic, but you bought an iMac 9 days ago? If you spend any time up on the rumor sites (such as, umm, MacNN), you'd know that they keynote would be featuring the first Intellimacs. Granted, the rumor was that the Intel processors would be going into Mac Minis and iBooks. I still think that anyone interested in getting a new Mac would wait and see.

That much having been said, it will be quite some time before a lot of popular software is ported. So, your G5 iMac will probably be more useful than its Intel counterpart for awhile. As for me, I'm waiting for my software packages to go native. For me, I work on a lot of data generated in a scientific lab. Nothing fancy. I tend to use Excel to play with data, Kaleidagraph for plotting, and Canvas to make my figures for papers and talks. [I hate all-in-one solutions such as Origin, far less flexible to my taste.] Kaleidagraph and Canvas are already Windows native and both companeis have been good about keeping their programs up to date. I'll probably wait until this fall to finally turn in my faithful Cube.

So, enjoy. If returning the iMac is best for you, it's a short, sharp lesson in patience. If not, your G5 will give you many years of good service.

[harrisjamieh]

Originally Posted by palane

I don't want to seem too unsympathetic, but you bought an iMac 9 days ago? If you spend any time up on the rumor sites (such as, umm, MacNN), you'd know that they keynote would be featuring the first Intellimacs. Granted, the rumor was that the Intel processors would be going into Mac Minis and iBooks. I still think that anyone interested in getting a new Mac would wait and see.

That much having been said, it will be quite some time before a lot of popular software is ported. So, your G5 iMac will probably be more useful than its Intel counterpart for awhile. As for me, I'm waiting for my software packages to go native. For me, I work on a lot of data generated in a scientific lab. Nothing fancy. I tend to use Excel to play with data, Kaleidagraph for plotting, and Canvas to make my figures for papers and talks. [I hate all-in-one solutions such as Origin, far less flexible to my taste.] Kaleidagraph and Canvas are already Windows native and both companeis have been good about keeping their programs up to date. I'll probably wait until this fall to finally turn in my faithful Cube.

So, enjoy. If returning the iMac is best for you, it's a short, sharp lesson in patience. If not, your G5 will give you many years of good service.

So my impateince got the better of me, and i also figured the iMac was updated 2 months ago, so it wouldnt be first to intel. But i have arranged it and John Lewis are willing to take it back, even though it has been used, '...but we dont usually do this kinda thing...'.

So ill be ordering my intel iMac on sunday

[palane]

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

So my impateince got the better of me, and i also figured the iMac was updated 2 months ago, so it wouldnt be first to intel. But i have arranged it and John Lewis are willing to take it back, even though it has been used, '...but we dont usually do this kinda thing...'.

Sounds like you found a really good retailer. I'll have to look into them when ordering my own.

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

So ill be ordering my intel iMac on sunday

Enjoy!

Paul

[Michael Jolly]

harrisjamieh John Lewis is really good with stuff like that,

well i decided that i am going to wait at least a month before i decide weather i get an iMac G5 or the new DUO, i can wait for a few months my iBook will guide me through

[Naediel]

I'm so tempted to get one of these things. It would be my first desktop mac. I had an iBook before. I only have a desktop PC and laptop PC now.

I'm not quite sure if I'm willing to spend all this money when I'm not sure if I want to switch completely.

[harrisjamieh]

Ye, the main reason i bought it from John Lewis is because they give a free 2 year warrenty on all their PC's, vs the 1 year apple give

[harrisjamieh]

Naediel, then keep the PC laptop and get rid of your desktop, replacing it with the new iMac. That way if you decide you like OSX but aren't quiet sure if you can live without windows, then you have the best of both. Thats what I did - i bought an iBook 3 months ago, and kept my sony PC, but now I have sold that on eBay and am on a new iMac (which as you can see from the above posts, will soon be an intel iMac)

[Naediel]

Yeah, I'm not sure what I am going to do yet at this point.

[Brad5689]

i really wouldn't use any other apps outside of iLife for what i need to do the only thing I'm concerned about is when office will be released as universal I'll probably go with Intel. i don't think any of the other programs i use will be affected at least i hope not. either way it won't be long until new versions are released to work on intel macs.


The one big question i have is how can I install my own ram?

i hear a lot of talk about crucial ram is it good and once again how would i install it into my new intel iMac? i want at least 2g of ram.

thanks

[rhashem]

I've got a 970MP 2.3 GHz. The 2.0 GHz Yonah will be a step up from that processor running integer and mixed integer-floating-point code. Using GCC, my personal benchmarks show the integer performance of the 970MP to be comaprable to a 1.6 - 1.8 GHz Opteron. Floating point performance is comparable to a 2.0 - 2.2 GHz Opteron (GCC isn't good enough to get the full floating-point performance of the G5, and XLC 8.x doesn't run on Macs). Meanwhile, benchmarks are showing Yonah to be comparable to an Opteron (Athlon X2, same thing) of the same clock-speed. In all, depending on what you do, the new 20" iMac will give the 2.0 GHz G5 dual-core or the 2.3 GHz G5 dual-core a run for its money. Heck, in single-threaded integer tasks, it'll beat the Quad too

[rhashem]

Originally Posted by pliny

Heh heh, you said it, Eriam.

If they'd come out with a machine with dual 2.3, that may have matched the imac duo, but what about the price? Bet it would have cost more. Any spec scores on the G5 dual cores to compare?

And then the heat issue--don't those 2.3s in the PM's require some interesting cooling?

The SPEC scores on the 970MP are effectively useless. They're quite reasonable: ~1450 for integer and ~2100 for FP on the 2.5 GHz 970MP, but they're taken with XLC 8.x, which isn't available on the Mac. The GCC numbers will be a lot worse, much closer to the publically available 2.2 GHz 970FX numbers (1040 int 1241 fp).

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Simon

Does Yonah do SMP? I mean of course two Yonah cores can live on the same Yonah die and work together, but can two separate Yonahs sit on the same board? If if so, would they have to share the 667MHz bus? Bus limitation?

From what I've read, Intel is developing another chip called Sossaman that is like Yonah but allows higher-end capabilities like SMP.

[microsoftee]

I have iMac Power PC G4, 700 Mhz, 128 MB RAM, CDRW and OS X 10.3 (Panther) running.

It boots up successfully from CD1 but after few minutes of activity it just hangs up and only blue screen appears, there is no mouse pointer and nothing else, I waited for long time.

Someone suggested to upgrade firmware. I tried searching firmware upgrade on apple site, but didn't find any for my machine.

I also tried the trick by directly running file "OSInstall.mpkg" in "System\Installation\Packages" in CD1, it starts setup but after few seconds it gives the error "BaseSystem cannot be installed on this computer." "This software cannot be installed on this computer"

Please help me to get out of this problem.

I am very thankful to u.

[ciparis]

There should be an Intel iMac sightings thread. There is plenty of interest in finding out when these are arriving.

Moderators?

[d0ubled0wn]

Any iMac 2.1 owners planning on upgrading already? I'm thinking about it. But I will wait for the following:

• A solution to run Win apps. I have a couple of apps that I need to be able to run, one is for work.
• Benchmark results of single threaded apps.
• Stability... seems like there are always some annoying problem with 1st gen machines.

[Lateralus]

Originally Posted by mduell

Pro users are mostly on PowerMacs, not iMacs.



Heh, what's the power budget on those again? Much higher than the current ~50W.

Actually... It would have been pretty close to the Core Duo if it were running at the same clock speed.

970MP @ 2.5GHz - 100w max
970MP @ 1.2GHz - 25w max
970MP @ 1.8GHz - Approximately 60w given the power consumption ratings above.

[Lateralus]

Oh, and for those of you eating up the '3x faster' BS up based on the SPEC scores Apple showed during the keynote, convinced that IBM couldn't have done better;

970MP @ 2.5GHz

SPECint - 32.3
SPECfp - 42.8

Core Duo @ 2GHz

SPECint - 32.6
SPECfp - 27.1

[mduell]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Oh, and for those of you eating up the '3x faster' BS up based on the SPEC scores Apple showed during the keynote, convinced that IBM couldn't have done better;

970MP @ 2.5GHz

SPECint - 32.3
SPECfp - 42.8

Core Duo @ 2GHz

SPECint - 32.6
SPECfp - 27.1

Too bad they couldn't put 970MP in the iMac at that clockrate.
970MP at 2.5Ghz is what, a 100W CPU? Core Duo at 2.16 Ghz is a 31W CPU.

Also, those scores aren't in the SPEC database (IIRC, they're from an IBM exec's comment at a show). Were they achieved while complying with the SPEC CPU2000 Run Rules?

[Lateralus]

So you want to call into question the results I quoted above because they happen to favor IBM? Even when it's a known fact that the G5 has always done exceptionally well at floating point?

...But you're willing to chow down on the Intel scores even though there is more controversey surrounding the validity of Intel SPEC scores than there is any other architecture?