Apple introduces 10Ghz G5

[Oakenshield 1]

Well, sort of.

Yours for a mere $17,823:

[Zelgadis 638]

Only $17K? I'll take two.

It's gonna make my G4 look like an Atari 800...

Still, it will be nice when Mac is indisputably on top.

ISF

[GoaSkin 2]

Sim City 4 is ported very badly to the Macintosh platform. Because multiprocessor systems boost the performance only for software which is optimized to be run on a SMP system, I would wonder if this system increases the performance really on SC4. I think it will be less than 20% faster than on a single-CPU G5 with 2.5 GHz.

[gpSIM 0]

Gimme that Dual Core monster machine plus two 30 ACDs and I will be lucky till the end of my life! But as all the others here, I don't think it has any influence in the SC4 speed. Maybe it won't run on it without a several patches - if at all! I think this is just a machine for HD video editing and hi res photo works - that will never be a gaming machine! As Apple never was...

[MayorTim 16]

Just like every Mac... Pretty, Expensive, and nearly completely useless.

16gb of ram is a complete waste of money. Even the most taxing games out today could easily run, and run well, on a system with 2gb, and I doubt that 16gb will be needed any sooner than 8 years.

So, spend the equivilant of a car on a super system that serves no purpose, or spend a coupld thousand in 5 years for the same system, and use it for the games that take detail to the cellular level. Your choice.

[1dera3 28]

Date: 10/21/2005 8:11:41 PM
Author: MayorTim
Just like every Mac... Pretty, Expensive, and nearly completely useless.


16gb of ram is a complete waste of money. Even the most taxing games out today could easily run, and run well, on a system with 2gb, and I doubt that 16gb will be needed any sooner than 8 years.


So, spend the equivilant of a car on a super system that serves no purpose, or spend a coupld thousand in 5 years for the same system, and use it for the games that take detail to the cellular level. Your choice.

quote>

What is wrong with you!?!? (heh...) Macs make Windows look like crap with the way thair OS and computers look. I would prefer a Mac to the best XP-running machine out there. . Just lemme fire up Virtual PC first; SC4 on a Mac is a bit slower and not-as-good-quality as on a PC, but with 16 gigs of RAM, I would have one in an instant. (If only they were cheaper... )

[gradonacelnik 0]

All hope might be lost for SC4 to run well on a MAC but this monster will make 3d modeling childs play. Too bad you can't BAT on a MAC. I have an old version of Form Z on the MAC I think it's time to dust it off and upgrade to the current version and do real time rendering of a mega scraper on this monster machine. Then save the model to 3ds format and port it over to a PC and wait and wait and wait for a BAT render. Oh well.......

Please anyone who is fortunate enough to get one and do some 3d modeling on it, please post how much fun you have not waitng for hourglasses.

[Singletrack 0]

Date: 10/21/2005 8:11:41 PM
Author: MayorTim

16gb of ram is a complete waste of money. Even the most taxing games out today could easily run, and run well, on a system with 2gb, and I doubt that 16gb will be needed any sooner than 8 years.

quote>

My understanding of the Power Mac is that it is a proffesional grade system, so I am sure that 16GB of ram would come in handy when making a movie or something like that. The majority of Power Macs will probably not be used to play games.
But I have almost no experience with Macs so I might be off track.

[Zelgadis 638]

Date: 10/21/2005 8:11:41 PM
Author: MayorTim
Just like every Mac... Pretty, Expensive, and nearly completely useless.


16gb of ram is a complete waste of money. Even the most taxing games out today could easily run, and run well, on a system with 2gb, and I doubt that 16gb will be needed any sooner than 8 years.


So, spend the equivilant of a car on a super system that serves no purpose, or spend a coupld thousand in 5 years for the same system, and use it for the games that take detail to the cellular level. Your choice.

quote>

Obviously, you don't know much about computers, especially not Mac.

Most of that stuff, beyond the processors, is optional equipment. 16GB RAM alone added many thousands to that price, as a maximum RAM upgrade on any new high-end computer would.

If you want the absolute best in what technology has to offer, you're going to pay a lot for it, no matter what platform it is.

The base version of that particular computer is likely to be listed at around $3200, and it will still run circles around almost anything out there. But you missed the point: to oogle over the best technology can offer to the consumer. Using that thing just to play games would be a waste anyway. You could, instead, conquer the world with it.

ISF

[MayorTim 16]

Lol, I knew all the Mac lovers would come in an bash me for my previous comment (Probably deserve it. )

But, a few things I do want to say:

@ 1dera3: I know Macs make windows LOOK like crap, but windows is what almost everything is made for, so it is more functional than Mac (exception being a work environment).

@ Singletrack: I realise that it is a professional system designed for 3d modeling, high quality image editing, and the like, but this is a gaming website, and this topic was made to talk about playing SC4 on it, so I wrote my comment as such.

@ zelgadis: I do have a somewhat limited knowledge of computers (though I have been in the market for a new computer the the past few months, and now know a substantial bit about various components. I do have a very limited knowledge of how a Mac works, but it works the same way as any other computer, so I do have a basic knowledge.

I understand that the base model doesn't come with 16gb, but it appeared to me that the highest end version of this model is what was being discussed in this thread.

The base version will likely be pretty powerful, however I only use computers for games and multimedia, so a Mac is very close to useless to me, even if it is a $17,000 one.

[safemining1 0]

Date: 10/19/2005 3:55:17 PM
Author:Oakenshield
Well, sort of.


Yours for a mere $17,823:


•2 x Dual-Core 2.5Ghz G5s

•16GB 33DDR2 ECC SDRAM (8x2GB)

•2 x 500GB HDs

•512MB nVidia Quadro FX4500 Video Card

•Bluetooth & Airport (802.11g)

•16x Dual Layer Superdrive

•Keyboard & Mighty Mouse

•OS 10.4



Oh. My. God.


Wonder how that nasty son-of-a-$@&% would run SC4?

quote>
OHMYGOD; a 10 GHz personal computer with the hard-core OS; Mac OS X Tiger. the computer world is changed. Prepare for the PSC (Personal Super Computer)! I woulder what microsoft will say?

[firedfns13 0]

i think the game would run to darn fast......daynightdaynidanidandndndndndndndnd....

[xiziz 11]

Though its still using multiple prosessors, and the aplication would have to programed to take use of that, which btw, Sc4 isnt.
Sc4 Should be able to utilse 5ghz of that power, but im not sure of how dual-core works, so it might aswell be 2.5ghz.

Are those G5's 64bit? because if they aint its like buying a motherboard for SD-Ram when RD& DDR were released. just plain stupid.

Though my knowlage of dualprosessors is some 3 years old, and i never did read a lot about dualcore. so ive based it on that, but asfar as i know, the program has to support Multiprosessing to take advantage of multiple processors(and it could be the case with dualcore too), Though, having Sc4 runing on a dedicated processor isnt bad that eather...

And im not going into my oppinions on mac's here. It sure is an impresive system at spec level. I Belive one could get a P4 system with 2 prosessors over 10ghz a year ago. (then again... intel... bleeech)

Cheers
//Sim

[GoaSkin 2]

Companies like Microsoft and Apple are too mighty on the marked. Set them a trap by using Linux and Open Source, to damp the profit potential on the software business!

These companies want to be monopolists and to dictate the users and the economy how IT infrastructures have to look and to be used.

But if you avoid using commercial software, their game will be over and they will be nothing.

For the most things, you really don't need to invest money into software. There are millions of open source titles and some of them have the same quality like popular commercial software.

Do never use Windows and M$-products and Mac OS only, if Linux or BSD really isn't usable to do what you need to do.

[JoeMeister 1]

in Holland this 'baby' costs

[gpSIM 0]

Well I'm with you with the power of Microsoft, which really should be broken by using open source software. But Apple really isn't that expensive everyone alway says: You get a lot more for your money instead of buying an alternative MS system. Also the software is best calculated and you get alot of functions for less than other products offer. This is especially for the Pro software from Apple and the iLife components, which are really powerful and cheap. I agree with the point, that you wouldn't find alot of games for Macs and also the illegal p2p platforms are rare for Mac users. I do using Macs for over 5 years now, having a PowerBook G4 and a Dual 2GHz G5 and I'm very happy with this choice! No crashes for months, easy fixes, no viruses and enormes power! So I'm really addicted and I would love to own a 10GHz G5 system someday, but you really need the need for such a super computer. So HDTV film editing, photo or image works or 3d modeling will be the processes for such a machine. Apple computers were never ment for gaming, although games like SimCity, The Sims or even X-Plane are very popular also for Macs.

Hough!

[Zelgadis 638]

@MayorTim: Useless to you. Ah, now that makes more sense. There are really only two types of programs that aren't readily Mac available: games and some little internet freeware programs. Otherwise, all the major stuff is Mac compatible. If you're an avid computer gamer, you really have to have at least one AlienWare in your home. But I play all my games except one on consoles, so it isn't an issue for me.

Mac game ports used to be pretty good actually, until Aspyr cornered the market. I appreciate that they port the games, but it would be nice if they'd actually do a good job.

I'd still like to have that 10Ghz beast. All that power would actually be useless to me too, except for supreme bragging rights.

ISF

[Voar Tok 4]

Date: 10/21/2005 9:54:46 PM Author: MayorTim Lol, I knew all the Mac lovers would come in an bash me for my previous comment (Probably deserve it. ) But, a few things I do want to say: @ 1dera3: I know Macs make windows LOOK like crap, but windows is what almost everything is made for, so it is more functional than Mac (exception being a work environment). @ Singletrack: I realise that it is a professional system designed for 3d modeling, high quality image editing, and the like, but this is a gaming website, and this topic was made to talk about playing SC4 on it, so I wrote my comment as such. @ zelgadis: I do have a somewhat limited knowledge of computers (though I have been in the market for a new computer the the past few months, and now know a substantial bit about various components. I do have a very limited knowledge of how a Mac works, but it works the same way as any other computer, so I do have a basic knowledge. I understand that the base model doesn't come with 16gb, but it appeared to me that the highest end version of this model is what was being discussed in this thread. The base version will likely be pretty powerful, however I only use computers for games and multimedia, so a Mac is very close to useless to me, even if it is a $17,000 one.

quote>

Apple will probably never get on top.  The mass public uses PCs, and all of the powerusers know how to build one.  You can't build a Mac, cause if you did, you'd have a PC, not a Mac.  I've used Mac's, and frankly, I think that the latest edition of Mandrake Linux looks better.

[Keiran Halcyon 0]

Ok, everyone, listen up. 4x 2.5 GHz processors != 10 GHz. That's does not equal, for those of you who were wondering. Each of those processors needs to run a different process/thread in order to see any speedup. So a single-threaded program will only be able to run at 2.5 GHz on that system, though the OS will have the option to run other processes in the background on the other three processors.

Having said that, I've seen a core dump from SC4 that seems to indicate that it is multi-threaded. To what degree, I don't know, but it should see at least some performace gain from the multi-core system, as long as the OS knows that it can put the different threads on different processors. Having little to no experience with the most recent incarnation of MacOS, I can't say whether or not it supports multithreading in that way.

I myself have a dual-core system (Pentium-D @ 3.2 GHz), and while I see a significant improvement in SC4 performance over my last system, I mostly attribute that to the fact that my last system was a Pentium-III @ 1 GHz. However, I do see one very noticable effect that I attribute to the dual cores: much reduced latency when switching from SC4 to Simtropolis.com and back. Though multi-core systems may not always increase the speed of a single program, they are very good at multitasking.

[Zelgadis 638]

Date: 10/22/2005 11:08:14 AM
Author: Voar Tok

Apple will probably never get on top. The mass public uses PCs, and all of the powerusers know how to build one. You can't build a Mac, cause if you did, you'd have a PC, not a Mac. I've used Mac's, and frankly, I think that the latest edition of Mandrake Linux looks better.

quote>

I sincerely hope you're right, Voar Tok. I hope that Mac can increase its market share to around 10% and stay there. That way, they'll be just common enough so that software companies will have to pay attention to them.

If they got on top, then Apple would suddenly be designing computers to be purchased en masse to fill up corporate employee desk space (like Dell) and not for the individual user. I.e., dull, bland, boring, and as generic as possible. Kind of like the difference between an Audi A4 and a Honda Accord.

Still, I'd like to get to know Linux and other related OS's better. I have a spare Mac that I've been thinking of installing one on.

ISF

[GoaSkin 2]

A company called transgaming distributes an alternative DirectX framework for non-windows operating systems called Cedega. With Cedega, you can install and run the most Windows games on Linux easily incl. SC4 and RH.

Because Apple uses the PPC CPU yet, it isn't possible to run Windows games with Cedega because another binary format is used. Nevertheless, Transgaming distributes Macintosh versions of games, which haven't really been ported. Some software companies create PPC binaries of their Windows codes and distribute them in combination of a kind of OEM Cedega version.

http://www.transgaming.com

---

When Apple finally realeases Mac OS for X86 CPUs and Intel-based Macs, Cedega will be usable with Mac OS too, but I think the game industry will stop to port the games because every Mac user is able to run Windows on their computers too. The main arguement against Linux ports is that the users can install Windows too.

[toxicpiano 125]

OH MY GOD APPLE ACTUALLY MADE A DECENT GOOD SPEC COMPUTER

i am astounded!!!!!!! all those years where macs were half the speed of pcs and now may finally make something decent.

[diablo_del_bano 3]

you guys do know that 4 2.5ghz processors DON'T make it 10 ghz? you cant just add it up. why do you think apple advertizes it as 2 2.5 ghz processors.
but still, that is pretty cool.

[ajteshin 0]

You guys are funny. You're arguing about things that only become critical if you're using your internet connection to save lives or cure cancer or something. I use macs simply because it is part of my culture. I'm a 33 year old artist in Los Angeles. I grew up in the States, and except for a TRS-80 Radio Shack computer I started with in second grade, my life has been completely macintosh. That includes both colleges. Interesting, hunh?

I just bought an iMac 2 GHz Power PC G5 with 512 MbDDR SDRAM with a 20 inch monitor, and I'm happy to piss away my hard earned $$ on half the computer (so they say) a PC user is used to, but it looks sexy, feels sexy and runs faster than my k-mart dsl can appreciate. You feel differently, you act differently and you behave differently when you use a mac. Same argument I had with my Dad about buying a used Mercedes vs. a brand new Pontaic Grand Am. People just like different things cuz they think in other, different directions.

Now, all I need to do is get the iMac to run SM4 in the BACKGROUND on a MINIMIZED window so I can watch my pornos in the other, but I won't blame that on apple...I'll blame EAGAMES or Maxis. For cryin out loud!!

from a. j.

[GoaSkin 2]

I think a quad-CPU Mac isn't able to increase it's speed by more than 20%.

To simulate a 10 GHz CPU, the engine needs a 256 Bit Bus, another type of RAM with 4 times of the speed than regular RAMs, very fast (and expensive) bridge chips and at last another binary format of the software.

[toxicpiano 125]

Date: 10/24/2005 2:30:00 PM Author: GoaSkin I think a quad-CPU Mac isn't able to increase it's speed by more than 20%. To simulate a 10 GHz CPU, the engine needs a 256 Bit Bus, another type of RAM with 4 times of the speed than regular RAMs, very fast (and expensive) bridge chips and at last another binary format of the software.

quote>

yes exactly, although by the time quad processors are intoduced, probably about 2007, these problems will have been overcome.

[safemining1 0]

Date: 10/21/2005 8:11:41 PM
Author: MayorTim



16gb of ram is a complete waste of money. Even the most taxing games out today could easily run, and run well, on a system with 2gb, and I doubt that 16gb will be needed any sooner than 8 years.

quote>
well, you are a bit right there. 16 GB of ram is a waste, for simple MS word prossesing, web browsing and email. but...

[TheCrybKeeper 300]

Ajteshin: Well, being an artist and probably doing graphic design in college; the MAC makes better sense for you. I can use both, but I still render through my PC's for graphics at home.

That new MAC will definitely be faster, on network renders and movie graphics. Which has always been the MACs secondary goal, I believe. Business computer first and graphics creation station, a close second.

 

 

We just got a G5 in at work, with the 20 inch flat panel. It feels like I am in an old re-run of StarTrek, when I sit in front of it. Sleek and compact.

 

Too bad, I am not allowed to play around with it a bit Oh well, I can mess with the G4's on lunch hour.

[+Guest]

Date: 10/19/2005 3:55:17 PM
Author:Oakenshield
Well, sort of.


Yours for a mere $17,823:


•2 x Dual-Core 2.5Ghz G5s

•16GB 33DDR2 ECC SDRAM (8x2GB)

•2 x 500GB HDs

•512MB nVidia Quadro FX4500 Video Card

•Bluetooth & Airport (802.11g)

•16x Dual Layer Superdrive

•Keyboard & Mighty Mouse

•OS 10.4



Oh. My. God.


Wonder how that nasty son-of-a-$@&% would run SC4?

quote>


Poorly, I'm afraid. But I think (hope!) that this is because of the issue with 10.4.3. Other games run great.

(And I do have to admit that my setup is a little more humle than the one you described -- standard graphics card and only 3G RAM...)

[jackel.22 3]

that computer just proves my theory:

macs are like german tiger tanks, both were built to be the best, they both are supremely powerful, both have/had great components that make them work. they are carfully built to be the best at whatever they do regardless of other factors. and they are never restricted by budget, only by technology.

 

heres the problem, windows computers are the equivilant of sherman tanks - cheap and chearful.

they have no where near the power of the tiger, they fall well below the tiger in almost every aspect.

 

except: manuvarability and versatility, because pc's arnt trying to be the best they can afford to cut back on costs and performance. the problem is becasue of this they outnumber the apples and no matter what, with that much of a superiority in numbers apple cant win.

 

just like history (although tigers were 1000 times better they couldnt be repaird as quick (sometimes taking as much as 2 weeks just to fix properly) or as cheaply due to their complxity, where as every time a sherman was lost 5 more rolled off the production line.)

 

in short that is my analogy for the difference in systems.

 

to fix this, (i will probably get flamed for this) they have to stoop down to the pc's level and build up from there. other wise it will take them a really long time to get a decent share in the market. so that developers take them seriously, and bear them in mind when planning games.