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Cheers, Abstract (et al)...

Regarding Flowbee's post:

Er, yeah...that's what I was saying (?). Clearly I made a hash of saying it, though (no change there...).

Db's are logarithmic,* so 70 decibels is pretty-bleedin' loud. I've never heard a wind-tunnel G4 Working Overtime (in the full XTC sense of that expression), so I have no idea whether it managed to crank out that kind of volume. It just seems unlikely, so I was suggesting that Apple'd used some other way of assessing the noise. Sorry if this wasn't clear.


Oh, and as a final observation...

Now, being British, I'm generally not in favour of creeping to the French...but perhaps we all need to go grovelling to MacBidioulle at the earliest opportunity?

Then maybe they'll tell us how they got that inside track r.e. the product and the stats.

Tsch, and there was me thinking French Intelligence was something of an oxymoron...

Brother Mugga


;)

* Edit: BOLLOCKS...by the time I posted this first time, half the world had got there before me. What's the bleedin' point of doing a physics degree if the one time you get to swank around about it, every other bugger jumps in first, eh? I have so little in life, how *could* you all take even that away from me...
 
Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Originally posted by mustang_dvs

I really could care less about the looks of the G5 (though I question the ergonomics of getting rid of the mobo hinge) -- what bothers me is the apparently cramped confines of the interior, which limits us to 1 optical drive and two hard drives, according to Apple's PowerMac 'Expandability' webpage.

Also, it appears that it may be a bit difficult to run cables from PCI cards (e.g., SCSI or ATA expansion buses) into the small hard drive bay.

Because the G5s use a lot of power, and you need to use that space to pass air through (heatsink). Something has got to give. If you want expandability, you could always run a PCI expansion chassis and get more slots and drives.
 
Re: Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Originally posted by hacurio1
Also, I saw today an external 200Gb FW800 HD, can somebody post info on how fast is this interface compared to an internal ATA.
Speed is very comparable in recent benchmarks. Don't have the numbers in front of me, but its a few percent here or there, nothing you're likely to notice in real-world use.
Overall, the only issue for me is the presence of only 3 PCI-X slots. Oh well, perhaps Rev B.
Maybe you will be willing to answer my question then (since nobody else has). What, on a system like this with Firewire, 802.11g, etc, built in, do you need more than 3 PCI-X slots for? I really am curious.

-Richard
 
A decibel is one-tenth of a bel. An increase of one bel in sound intensity means a doubling of perceived volume.

"decibel" is more commonly seen than "bel" because apparently people don't like decimal points behind each measurement (and common volume measurements need not be more accurate).

DTphonehome is right.
 
Called it! (much to my astonishment)

Yegads! :eek:

The new case design is almost exactly what I had in mind when I posted this last week (the bit about reinterpreting old-tech design, like the outer shell construction of some old Dynaco tube-amps):

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=388258#post388258

Really, this concept of a bent-sheetmetal shell filled by perforated mesh grille inserts front and back is something I've been wanting to custom-fab for myself for... oh, nearly a decade now. Talk about designers plucking an idea out of the zeitgeist ether...!

The only real differences between the G5 and my older visualization is that mine would have had matte-black mesh and no handles (the mesh would have been inset by an inch or so, so the folded-back shell edges themselves would sorta serve as "handles" all the way'round). Anywho, I never had the means to construct it myself, nor the funds to pay someone to do it for me, but now I don't hafta bother custom-fabbing my own, as Apple's gone and done it for me! Thanx Apple!

(...but I still might paint the mesh matte-black, mebbe put some softly orange-glowing drive and power lights behind it to resemble warmed-up vacuum tubes -- how cool would that be? :cool: )
 
If decibels are a logarithmic scale, a 10 decibel increas would mean a 10 fold increase in volume, wouldn't it? Anyway, I'm gonna start saving for my G5 powerbook...
 
Re: Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Also, it appears that it may be a bit difficult to run cables from PCI cards (e.g., SCSI or ATA expansion buses) into the small hard drive bay.
Actually, the new hard drives (and you can get half a terabyte inside) just slide on in, like in a Sparc bay (or a PCI card for that matter) -- no cables to mess with. At least, that's what the website makes it sound like. I could be way off, and there's no real way to tell until we get to tear one of these down in person.

-Richard

edit: By the way, each drive position comes with its own SATA bus, so there's really no need for an expansion card just to prevent congestion.
 
Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Originally posted by mustang_dvs
Okay, I posted this in the Keynote thread, but as no one has thus far said anything to this effect and I feel it is an important point for discussion, I am posting it in this thread, as well.

I really could care less about the looks of the G5 (though I question the ergonomics of getting rid of the mobo hinge) -- what bothers me is the apparently cramped confines of the interior, which limits us to 1 optical drive and two hard drives, according to Apple's PowerMac 'Expandability' webpage.

Also, it appears that it may be a bit difficult to run cables from PCI cards (e.g., SCSI or ATA expansion buses) into the small hard drive bay.

I just don't understand why Apple decided to take a significant step backwards, especially since PowerMacs have been designed to easily handle more than 2 hard drives since the revision B Blue & White's.

TRUE... I'm using 2 ATA drives and a SCSI drive right now... They cerainly packed as much tech as they could into that new package, though... I think we'll see more expandability in future revisions! I would also like to see an option for industrial grade graphics cards, such as those from 3d labs... This would be another big step for making Apple a real alternative (and an inexpensive one also!) to high end Unix workstations by IBM, etc..
 
Re: Nice. Very Nice.

Originally posted by rjstanford
Let's see. What doesn't this have? The Airport antenna is external, although not a big deal (and sticks out about as far as you'd have to have the machine off the wall for the cables anyway). Same with the Bluetooth one (no picture that I can see, but I assume it matches Airport).

Kinda hard to get electromagnetic signals out of an all-aluminum metal chassis. Maybe they could drill a couple of holes at the top of the G5, and put rabbit ears on it instead. :p
 
Re: Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Originally posted by VIREBEL661
I would also like to see an option for industrial grade graphics cards, such as those from 3d labs... This would be another big step for making Apple a real alternative (and an inexpensive one also!) to high end Unix workstations by IBM, etc..
IIRC from the keynote, Jobs specifically mentioned this as a reason for the PCI-X Pro slots. Fast, and highly powered.

-Richard
 
Originally posted by idkew
yeah- i'm wondering about the g6.

this g5 really doesn't impress me very much.

only 1,000mhz system bus? that is only a ~60% jump from my 166mhz bus. only 8gb ram? sheesh. apple really isn't working too hard anymore.

I HOPE you're joking!;)
 
Originally posted by tjwett
New PowerMacs are lacking an L3 Cache. I just noticed this. Does this matter, or is this new system not in need of it?

I think this is an issue only on G4s because they lack a wide enough bus. I'm not sure, can someone post a technical link that answers this?
 
Re: Re: Re: A Step Backwards in Expandability

Originally posted by rjstanford
IIRC from the keynote, Jobs specifically mentioned this as a reason for the PCI-X Pro slots. Fast, and highly powered.

-Richard

MOST EXCELLENT! I missed that, I haven't actually WATCHED the keynote yet, just was on MacObserver getting minute by minute info earlier (couldn't get on MacRumors:()... Thanks!
 
Typo on Apple's Page & Grievances...

Well, I've finally read up on all the features, etc. of the new G5s, and here's what I have to say:

1) The speed is great, even on the single proc machines

2) I wish more expansion was available; in my G4 w/ Gigabit & AGP, I have four 120GB hard drives installed now (can't do that in a new G5... :mad: ? also the one optical drive - this is something that peecee lovers always grill us Mac users on (come on Apple!)

3) The case is neat; I LOVE the front ports (right now I always have to reach around to the back of my computer to connect my FireWire hard drive and video camera)

4) Pricing could be better; the computers are faster and better than PCs, but not enough to warrant an extra thousand bucks for the system (most PC users don't use the SPDIF optical audio or Gigabit ethernet, anyway)

Also, I've found a typo on Apple's PowerMac page: go to http://www.apple.com/powermac/graphics.html and look down at the "Connect with S-video and RCA (composite) connectors" section at the bottom right; it allows you to preview your "wok"
-is this some sort of new Chinese translation device? ;)
 
L3 cache

>New PowerMacs are lacking an L3 Cache. I just noticed this. Does this matter, or is this new system not in need of it?<

They have on-chip L1 instruction (64K) and data caches (32K), plus 512K L2 cache for each processor.

L3 cache is most useful when accessing main memory is slow (either the memory itself, the bus, or with the processor interaction). With DDR, and very fast buses, L3 cache shouldn't make any difference in performance. And the DDR memory uses a 128-bit interface to access two banks of SDRAM at once. *PLUS* it uses a 64-bit bidirectional DDR frontside bus which again helps. And the 64-bit bus will access the cache in other processors (on the duals) when needed. (All this is from the G5 tech specs at Apple.com).

Hence, lack of L3 cache should not be a factor.

Here are some useful links:
1. This is the G5 tech overview (from which some of the info above came):
http://a352.g.akamai.net/7/352/51/e93ca6b90038b4/www.apple.com/powermac/pdf/PowerMacG5_TO_062303.pdf

2. This is on the G5/970 processor:
http://a1264.g.akamai.net/7/1264/51/d297fb89c825b9/www.apple.com/g5/pdf/G5_Processor_WP_062303.pdf

3. This is on the performance:
http://a192.g.akamai.net/7/192/51/e...om/powermac/pdf/PowerMacG5_Perf_WP_062303.pdf
 
Re: Typo on Apple's Page & Grievances...

Originally posted by geerlingguy
2) I wish more expansion was available; in my G4 w/ Gigabit & AGP, I have four 120GB hard drives installed now (can't do that in a new G5... :mad:
Just for the record, while you can't get quad 120gb drives (480gb total) you can order one from Apple with dual 250gb drives (500gb total).

-Richard
 
Workstation Pricing

I just want to add my voice to those talking about Sun / HP workstations being the true targets of the new PowerMac line. And its about time. When you figure that for under $7000 you can pick up a fully loaded dual G5 with 4gb (alright, so I used Crucial pricing here), APP, iSight, a 23" flatscreen, and oh what the heck the 5.1 speaker set, that's some mighty fierce competition.

I figure that what we really need to watch for are some of the more serious graphics boards creating OS X drivers. That should tell us when the 3D folk are truly on board (not that the 9800 is a bad card, but ...). And as for more serious scientific work... this truly is wonderful. No more pretty boxes (mac/windows) tied to a backend UNIX machine (unless you're doing truly hardcore work).

-Richard

ps: Now, if they'd just get autoCad for OS X, and some of the other apps like it .. whoo!

pps: Hmm. I wonder if the new IBM relationship is good enough that we'll see Websphere for the Mac too? That would rock.
 
Originally posted by tpjunkie
If decibels are a logarithmic scale, a 10 decibel increas would mean a 10 fold increase in volume, wouldn't it? Anyway, I'm gonna start saving for my G5 powerbook...

See iMook's post...indeed, a 10 BEL increase would be a tenfold increase in power, but a 10 decibel (which is just 1 bel) is a doubling of power.

--DT
 
2 G 5 questions that I don't see answered on apple's site?

1. Do buyers of a G5 get Panther when it releases or do we have to buy it.

2. I don't see any pictures of the back of the machine anywhere that show the details?
 
Re: Cheers, Abstract (et al)...

Originally posted by Brother Mugga


* Edit: BOLLOCKS...by the time I posted this first time, half the world had got there before me. What's the bleedin' point of doing a physics degree if the one time you get to swank around about it, every other bugger jumps in first, eh? I have so little in life, how *could* you all take even that away from me...

LOL...I couldn't understand a word of that, but its bloody hilarious. I'm thinking Brad Pitt in "Snatch". An accent so heavy you can hear it when typed! Brilliant, mate :)
 
Well I have expressed my interest. Cant buy in Australia right now:(

Apple Australia Store G5

Being Limited to 1 optical drive and 2 hard drives internally means nothing to me. I have never felt the need to add drives internally beyond scsi drives in the old days. If I need it then their is a terabyte+ at the other end(s) of the network anyway.

The case design is function over form and I am fine with that and while the G5 isnt pretty at least it looks sleek.

I would have said It will be hidden away under my desk anyway but I just realized 20'' high and the cupboard in my ally and glass desk is 18'' high. Oops!. Dang and I really liked the old laminate benches we used to have and was forced to give up!

The Geoforce 5200 has to be better than my current geoforce 2 mx right?:)

I will buy the bottom or mid machine just need to see some real tests to decide which gives me the better price/performance ratio and I will wait till August before ordering just in case a G5 pbook appears as I woud rather have that.

mmm My current speakers are 4 years old. Might just have to update even at that price. Ouch!.
Digital Speakers
 
Drive expansion

>which limits us to 1 optical drive and two hard drives, according to Apple's PowerMac 'Expandability' webpage.<

Of course you can always connect an XServe RAID or a Fibre Channel switch...
 
Originally posted by DTphonehome
See iMook's post...indeed, a 10 BEL increase would be a tenfold increase in power, but a 10 decibel (which is just 1 bel) is a doubling of power.
Actually, 10 bels would be a 1024 fold increase in power. Logarithms are pretty impressive.

Why the confusion? Well, the loudest non-harmful sound level is regarded as being around 110 dB, while the lowest audible sound is defined as 4 dB. That range represents a difference in power output of 40,000,000,000:1. Since those numbers are kind of bulky, this way makes sense.

0 db - the quietest sound you can hear
20 db - whisper
35 db - new dual Power Mac 2ghz
50 db - rainfall
60 db - conversational speech
75 db - washing machine
85 db - big city traffic
90 db - hair dryer
100 db - tractor in use
110 db - chainsaw, rock concert
120 db - jack hammer, ambulance siren
130 db - jet aircraft from 100 feet away
140 db - gun shot, fireworks
175 db - rocket launch

Anything over 180 (or so) db is considered a sonic weapon.

-Richard
 
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