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jay999 · Mar 13, 2005, 11:55 PM

2.2 Single
2.2 Dual
2.5 Dual
2.8 dual

No Dual Core until the following update.

Available in early April.

MagnusDredd · Mar 14, 2005, 05:47 PM

The Cell processor, while a marvel of engineering is not a good general purpose CPU. This has been covered many times on multiple forums including this one.

Cell, is more of an architecture, as opposed to being represented by a single chip. The current chip that will be used in the PS3 is just one implementation of the cell architecture. Basically the PS3 chip is to cell, what the IBM 970 is to PowerPC.

The PS3 cell chip contains 1 general purpose CPU (PPE). The general purpose CPU is a heavily modified IBM PPC 970 core. The 970 core, of course has a VMX (Altivec/Velocity) unit. It has 8 SPEs, which are vector processing units that are not compatible with VMX (Altivec/Velocity). The SPEs use some of the instructions from VMX, some new ones, and don't use quite a few that VMX does. Also due to the way they are engineered to be "nodes" to the PPU's "job dispatcher" role means that even the way instructions are sent to the SPEs is different than VMX.

The SPEs don't do anything unless the programming of the application schedules things to be done by the SPEs. This means that for ALL of the current software, you'd have a modified G5 with 8 units sitting there doing nothing! Using the SPEs requires some major differences to exist not only within the compiler but also the code being written. This means that people who are going to develop for this thing have MANY new things to learn.

Developers don't like to have to rethink the way they write programs all the time. It's less bad when it is an embedded platform (routers, cars, game consoles, microwaves) since all of the units using the new setup will be the same. For companies like Adobe, you're not going to see them rewrite Photoshop in order to take advantage of this no matter how fast it would run. This is because they would likely have to rewrite major portions of their code. This would take thousands of man hours.

For more information, check out this article at Real World Tech.

Eug Wanker · Mar 14, 2005, 06:28 PM

The PS3 cell chip contains 1 general purpose CPU (PPE). The general purpose CPU is a heavily modified IBM PPC 970 core.

PowerPC yes, but not based on PowerPC 970. It's a new core (based on a revamped older core design which has apparently not been previously released).

hedgehogfrenzy · Mar 14, 2005, 08:07 PM

Originally posted by alands:
1 processor / dual core @ 2.0GHz Fan Cooling
1 processor / dual core @ 2.4GHz Fan Cooling
2 processor / dual core @ 2.6GHz Liquid Cooling
2 processor / single core @ 3.0GHZ Liquid Cooling.

There is no way that they will drop liquid cooling. All of the current line is liquid cooled. You would have to be looking at an entirely different processor to get rid of liquid cooling.

Originally posted by commodus:
Most people probably won't see any gain from having 4 physical CPU cores chugging away at once - unless they're doing editing in Final Cut Pro while Photoshop runs a Gaussian Blur in the background.

I don't think that you would need to be doing all of that to see an improvement from 4 processors. Anyting that involved video would see an improvement. Same with digital images. Final Cut is entirely software based, so the faster the processors, the faster the preformance. I'm a video editor, so I'll take all the power that they offer.

- David

Catfish_Man · Mar 14, 2005, 08:35 PM

Originally posted by hedgehogfrenzy:
All of the current line is liquid cooled.

- David

You are incorrect.

osxisfun · Mar 14, 2005, 09:02 PM

only the 2.5 is...

jamil5454 · Mar 14, 2005, 10:43 PM

Originally posted by hedgehogfrenzy:

I don't think that you would need to be doing all of that to see an improvement from 4 processors. Anyting that involved video would see an improvement. Same with digital images. Final Cut is entirely software based, so the faster the processors, the faster the preformance. I'm a video editor, so I'll take all the power that they offer.

- David

It depends on how many threads the program can be split into. If your video editing application uses four threads, then all four processors will work together. If it uses only one (aka not "SMP aware"), then you won't hardly notice a performance increase.

Also, as previously posted, only the DP2.5 G5 is liquid cooled.

JB72 · Mar 15, 2005, 02:41 AM

1-2-3 what are we waiting four?
Believe me, I give a damn.
Pack it with eight gigs of RAM.

To be continued...

Commodus · Mar 15, 2005, 11:20 AM

Originally posted by JB72:
1-2-3 what are we waiting four?
Believe me, I give a damn.
Pack it with eight gigs of RAM.

To be continued...

I do not need 8 GB of RAM.
I do not need it, Sam I Am.

hedgehogfrenzy · Mar 15, 2005, 11:23 AM

Everyone is right, only the 2.5 ghz G5s are liquid cooled. Apparently I can't read. lol.

But when it comes to this:

Originally posted by Jamll5454:

It depends on how many threads the program can be split into. If your video editing application uses four threads, then all four processors will work together. If it uses only one (aka not "SMP aware"), then you won't hardly notice a performance increase.

Also, as previously posted, only the DP2.5 G5 is liquid cooled

As far as I'm aware from my reading on dual core processors, the operating system only sees them as one unit. So though there would be 4 cores, it would only be like having 2 CPUs.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

- David

osxisfun · Mar 15, 2005, 12:19 PM

Originally posted by hedgehogfrenzy:
Everyone is right, only the 2.5 ghz G5s are liquid cooled. Apparently I can't read. lol.

But when it comes to this:

As far as I'm aware from my reading on dual core processors, the operating system only sees them as one unit. So though there would be 4 cores, it would only be like having 2 CPUs.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

- David

and there has been chatter that 10.4 changes all of this.

Eug Wanker · Mar 15, 2005, 01:26 PM

Originally posted by hedgehogfrenzy:
As far as I'm aware from my reading on dual core processors, the operating system only sees them as one unit. So though there would be 4 cores, it would only be like having 2 CPUs.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

No, it would be like having 4 CPUs. Also note the changes to the latest CHUD tools:

borgobello · Mar 16, 2005, 05:15 PM

http://www.macitynet.it/macity/aA20871/index.shtml
http://www-306.ibm.com/chips/techlib...256FC30083B0A9

IBM confirms PPC 970MP dual core processor, and has posted information on its integrated thermal diodes giving evidence to it's high frequency (IMHO 3Ghz ore more). It's not the Power5 derivation that I guessed, but I'm more sure that next PowerMac upgrade will not be a simple speed bump. I think the other spec I posted can be true.
Another thing I'm guessing is that the new PowerMac's will be announced with iMac upgrede, to partially cover this slightly important upgrade (2Ghz for top iMac, faster drive and the new two button mouse and slightly more) and will come with Tiger (no Panther support in new HW's). And I think they will come soon because Steve will go to NAB with it.
Price will be very aggressive, so I suggest an entry level machine at 1199$ (not MP) growing up to 3999 for heigh end dual-dual, this one with 2Gb ram, 250Gb HD or even more, and X800 graphic card.

Eug Wanker · Mar 16, 2005, 05:20 PM

Originally posted by borgobello:
http://www.macitynet.it/macity/aA20871/index.shtml
http://www-306.ibm.com/chips/techlib...256FC30083B0A9

IBM confirms PPC 970MP dual core processor, and has posted information on its integrated thermal diodes giving evidence to it's high frequency (IMHO 3Ghz ore more). It's not the Power5 derivation that I guessed, but I'm more sure that next PowerMac upgrade will not be a simple speed bump. I think the other spec I posted can be true.
Another thing I'm guessing is that the new PowerMac's will be announced with iMac upgrede, to partially cover this slightly important upgrade (2Ghz for top iMac, faster drive and the new two button mouse and slightly more) and will come with Tiger (no Panther support in new HW's). And I think they will come soon because Steve will go to NAB with it.
Price will be very aggressive, so I suggest an entry level machine at 1199$ (not MP) growing up to 3999 for heigh end dual-dual, this one with 2Gb ram, 250Gb HD or even more, and X800 graphic card.

Heheh, better late than never, but...

The document has already been pulled.

borgobello · Mar 16, 2005, 05:43 PM

Originally posted by Eug Wanker:
Heheh, better late than never, but...

The document has already been pulled.

I've downloaded the pdf with information on its integrated thermal diodes

but i have it on my office computer

osxisfun · Mar 16, 2005, 05:47 PM

all this thermal diode talk is scaring me...

the heat... the heat...

my fans... my fans...

Will they include some next gen cooling unit as rumored?

Eriamjh · Mar 17, 2005, 09:08 AM

Originally posted by Commodus:
I do not need 8 GB of RAM.
I do not need it, Sam I Am.

Yes you need 8 Gigs of RAM
Yes you need it Sam I am.

Yes you need it in your house
We all want a 2-button mouse!

hedgehogfrenzy · Mar 17, 2005, 09:32 AM

We've digressed to Dr. Seuss? Oh well.....

It will be pre-loaded with Tiger,
It will be more powerful than a liger.

All Windows users will yell in vain,
They'll realize that windows is a pain.

- David

Catfish_Man · Mar 17, 2005, 06:54 PM

Originally posted by hedgehogfrenzy:

As far as I'm aware from my reading on dual core processors, the operating system only sees them as one unit. So though there would be 4 cores, it would only be like having 2 CPUs.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

- David

A dual core chip is (from the operating system's POV) a dual processor. However, it might be advantageous to schedule tasks in such a way that related threads were on one chip so that they could talk to each other quickly (if there is an on-chip intercore connection), and the OS doesn't do this currently. Hyperthreading/SMT has even more issues like this, since threads on a processor can use resources that other threads could need.