awmazz
Mar 14, 12:07 AM
I sure as hell would not want wind turbines on the roof of houses. The noise from them would drive me insane.
The small ones, like satellites dishes. You can buy them at Jaycar.
http://www.jaycar.com.au/productResults.asp?whichpage=3&pagesize=10&keywords=wind&form=KEYWORD
Pretty much like a weather vein or TV aerial. Provides a couple of hundred watts at 24V or 12V. I was thinking about one for if there is ever a blackout (ie a drunk hitting a power pole, it's happened) instead of needing a petrol generator.
Every home generating 500W of their own wind power with one of these little things on their roof in a city of Los Angeles with a million homes = 500,000,000 watts. As well as a solar panel at 500W too is up to a billion watts not required from any central power source.
The small ones, like satellites dishes. You can buy them at Jaycar.
http://www.jaycar.com.au/productResults.asp?whichpage=3&pagesize=10&keywords=wind&form=KEYWORD
Pretty much like a weather vein or TV aerial. Provides a couple of hundred watts at 24V or 12V. I was thinking about one for if there is ever a blackout (ie a drunk hitting a power pole, it's happened) instead of needing a petrol generator.
Every home generating 500W of their own wind power with one of these little things on their roof in a city of Los Angeles with a million homes = 500,000,000 watts. As well as a solar panel at 500W too is up to a billion watts not required from any central power source.
spicyapple
Oct 25, 10:29 PM
seems unlikely that Clovertown would replace the current Mac Pros... just add another high end config.
It would be the first for Apple. :cool:
It would be the first for Apple. :cool:
Multimedia
Oct 13, 09:00 PM
Hmph... I haven't been to the Dell forums in a while or I probably wouldv'e seen that. Oh, well. Already ordered my other 30" display the other day, I'm not going to complain. :cool:The one I ordered the other day shipped yesterday and I'm expecting delivery on monday. I requested the forum coupon and will see if they will credit me. But I don't know. i'm not planning on going through the brain damage of ordering another monitor with the coupon and sending one back just to save ~$100.I currently have a 30" Dell that I bought last year when Dell first introduced them. I love the thing... My only gripe is 1 stuck pixel, but Dell requires like 7 or more to replace and I didn't swap the monitor within my 30-day window because the pixel didn't show up until after nearly 3 months. :(
I have an Apple 30" on my other G5 quad and I've never had the two side by side, but I think I like the Dell one better. I use a Gefen 4x1 DVI DL Switcher (Parallel Control) $899 (http://www.gefen.com/kvm/product.jsp?prod_id=3499) and have the G5 and two PC systems connected to the Dell with an extra cable for my MBP or whatnot if I want to connect that. I ordered the second 30" because I'm going to expand my desktop to dual 30" displays. :D I had to order another Gefen switcher for the second monitor too since the G5 and one of my PC boxes both support dual-link DVI out of both DVI ports as will the Mac Pro I'm planning to buy in the near future.Yeah, rxse7en -- you da man!
I had been considering getting another one of these 30" Dell monitors since I love the one I've got and as big as it is, when working on compositing images from two or three 1080p sources, doubling my desktop space would be a dream. I pulled the trigger on one the other day with the recent price drop plus Dell's 15% off. Then this coupon came along. I called up Dell and they refused to apply the coupon at first so I just threw at them, well how about I cancel my order, refuse shipment and order another monitor with the coupon. ;) The guy thought about it for a bit and then decided to adjust my order.
It should be here monday, but I still have to get a sales tax issue cleared up... They charged me too much tax to begin with and then also didn't adjust it when altering my invoice. So I live in an area where I'm supposed to pay a max of 4.6% yet I'm getting charged nearly 8% of the pre-adjusted amount. Ouch. :mad:I am so glad you tried and succeeded in getting that discount. That's great. Hope you didn't suffer too much brain damage ripping on that sales rep. Wish I could have heard that. lol. :p
Want to have a contest to see who can have their 8-Core Mac Pro delivered first? I will have to drive to Santa Clara 35 miles to buy an Apple gift card so I can complete my online purchase so you might be able to beat me.
Please share with us what config you will buy and why. I plan on buying only the 1GB model and buying my RAM from Omni Optival - only 2 more GB. So far it looks like my multi-threaded apps do not use much ram at all while using up to 4 cores EACH. So they're RAM stingy and Core HOGS. I am not getting this for Photoshop but for compressing video in 2 to 4 simultaneous applications.
I have an Apple 30" on my other G5 quad and I've never had the two side by side, but I think I like the Dell one better. I use a Gefen 4x1 DVI DL Switcher (Parallel Control) $899 (http://www.gefen.com/kvm/product.jsp?prod_id=3499) and have the G5 and two PC systems connected to the Dell with an extra cable for my MBP or whatnot if I want to connect that. I ordered the second 30" because I'm going to expand my desktop to dual 30" displays. :D I had to order another Gefen switcher for the second monitor too since the G5 and one of my PC boxes both support dual-link DVI out of both DVI ports as will the Mac Pro I'm planning to buy in the near future.Yeah, rxse7en -- you da man!
I had been considering getting another one of these 30" Dell monitors since I love the one I've got and as big as it is, when working on compositing images from two or three 1080p sources, doubling my desktop space would be a dream. I pulled the trigger on one the other day with the recent price drop plus Dell's 15% off. Then this coupon came along. I called up Dell and they refused to apply the coupon at first so I just threw at them, well how about I cancel my order, refuse shipment and order another monitor with the coupon. ;) The guy thought about it for a bit and then decided to adjust my order.
It should be here monday, but I still have to get a sales tax issue cleared up... They charged me too much tax to begin with and then also didn't adjust it when altering my invoice. So I live in an area where I'm supposed to pay a max of 4.6% yet I'm getting charged nearly 8% of the pre-adjusted amount. Ouch. :mad:I am so glad you tried and succeeded in getting that discount. That's great. Hope you didn't suffer too much brain damage ripping on that sales rep. Wish I could have heard that. lol. :p
Want to have a contest to see who can have their 8-Core Mac Pro delivered first? I will have to drive to Santa Clara 35 miles to buy an Apple gift card so I can complete my online purchase so you might be able to beat me.
Please share with us what config you will buy and why. I plan on buying only the 1GB model and buying my RAM from Omni Optival - only 2 more GB. So far it looks like my multi-threaded apps do not use much ram at all while using up to 4 cores EACH. So they're RAM stingy and Core HOGS. I am not getting this for Photoshop but for compressing video in 2 to 4 simultaneous applications.
djgamble
Oct 7, 09:52 PM
Good luck to them then...
I predict Google will be bankrupt by 2012 when the VC's realize they're not achieving anything.
I predict Google will be bankrupt by 2012 when the VC's realize they're not achieving anything.
shawnce
Sep 26, 11:01 AM
My 2.66GHz MacPro doesn't use all four cores except on rare occassions (e.g. benchmarks, quicktime, handbrake, etc.) and even then it doesn't peg them all.
In other words your average work load doesn't contain enough concurrent work items that are CPU bound.
What I'm most interested in is offloading OpenGL to a core, the GUI to another core, etc. ...some what a nonsensical statement...
Threads of work are spread across available cores automatically. If a thread is ready to run and a core is idle then that thread will run on that core.
Aspects of the "UI" frameworks are multithread and will automatically utilize one or more cores (in some cases the frameworks increase the number of threads they use based on how many cores exist in the system). In other words the UI will already potentially use more then one core on a multi-core system.
The same can happen with OpenGL either now... say if the game developer for example utilizes one or more threads to calculate the game world state and a second thread to call into OpenGL to render that game world ...or by enabling the multithread OpenGL render (only available on Mac Pro systems at this time).
Of course that assumes that the tasks you run are CPU intensive enough to even begin to consume compute resources available to you in new systems... in the end you should measure overall throughput of the work load you want to do, not how utilized your individual core are when doing that work load.
In other words your average work load doesn't contain enough concurrent work items that are CPU bound.
What I'm most interested in is offloading OpenGL to a core, the GUI to another core, etc. ...some what a nonsensical statement...
Threads of work are spread across available cores automatically. If a thread is ready to run and a core is idle then that thread will run on that core.
Aspects of the "UI" frameworks are multithread and will automatically utilize one or more cores (in some cases the frameworks increase the number of threads they use based on how many cores exist in the system). In other words the UI will already potentially use more then one core on a multi-core system.
The same can happen with OpenGL either now... say if the game developer for example utilizes one or more threads to calculate the game world state and a second thread to call into OpenGL to render that game world ...or by enabling the multithread OpenGL render (only available on Mac Pro systems at this time).
Of course that assumes that the tasks you run are CPU intensive enough to even begin to consume compute resources available to you in new systems... in the end you should measure overall throughput of the work load you want to do, not how utilized your individual core are when doing that work load.
itickings
Apr 15, 07:09 AM
I still miss the ability to easily control the computer with only a keyboard without reaching for the mouse/trackpad all the time.
Sure, there are many shortcuts, but no real equivalent to the underlined entries in menus, and the obvious keyboard navigation in dialogs. But then again, I'd been primed to that since Windows 3.0 through XP and other systems.
I'm sure some people will want to correct me now by pointing out the keyboard control possibility available in the accessibility settings, but that'll only end with uncontrollable laughter...
Sure, there are many shortcuts, but no real equivalent to the underlined entries in menus, and the obvious keyboard navigation in dialogs. But then again, I'd been primed to that since Windows 3.0 through XP and other systems.
I'm sure some people will want to correct me now by pointing out the keyboard control possibility available in the accessibility settings, but that'll only end with uncontrollable laughter...
1tigerlivejob
May 8, 01:12 AM
there pretty reliable I had them for 5 years now
SandynJosh
Apr 8, 11:04 PM
That is an interesting idea, but Nintendo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo) has survived 122 years of business... ;)
Velly Intelrsting. Did they start out making games from rocks?
Velly Intelrsting. Did they start out making games from rocks?
Bill McEnaney
Mar 27, 04:39 PM
Indeed sir, that is why I tried.
Deo favente
Pax
Thank you. That's very kind of you.
Deo favente
Pax
Thank you. That's very kind of you.
justflie
Sep 20, 08:28 AM
I guess it wouldn't necessarily even need a hard drive. what about the option of including some video inputs on the back and streaming the video it sees on the screen BACK to your computer? It already has the bandwidth to stream from your computer, so why wouldn't it be able to do the opposite (given it has video inputs)? While this might not be ideal for some people who don't have a lot of HDD space, it would allow for editing out commercials, compression to ipods, etc, much like my eyetv 250. I think it would probably be better this way since it would be cheaper buying an external HDD for your computer than havnig a big HDD in ur ITV.
myamid
Sep 12, 06:17 PM
An interesting device it sounds like the El Gato EyeHome. As long as it can play all normal video/audio formats (whatever you have QuickTime components for) and it has support for El Gato EyeTV I'll happily replace my XP MCE box with one.
I actually have an EyeHome and if you ask me, the iTV is pretty much the same thing... There are only small obvious differences
-Wifi & HDMI on iTV
-Ability to stream Fairplay protected content...
Probably not enough for me to dump my EyeHome...
I actually have an EyeHome and if you ask me, the iTV is pretty much the same thing... There are only small obvious differences
-Wifi & HDMI on iTV
-Ability to stream Fairplay protected content...
Probably not enough for me to dump my EyeHome...
Multimedia
Oct 11, 12:45 PM
Costco Deal (http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11163877&search=viewsonic&Sp=S&Mo=3&cm_re=1-_-Top_Left_Nav-_-Top_search&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&N=0&whse=&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntk=All&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=viewsonic&Ntt=viewsonic&No=2&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nty=1&topnav=&s=1) You are correct in the resolution, BUT with two of them at less than the cost of one 24"er from Dell it does make up for the real estate--+10 on dual monitor cool factor :DI have the 24 left of the 20. Way cooler for a total of 3520 x 1200.I sent in my Macbook on Monday to get the random shutdown issue repaired. Shipped back to me today--and for some unknown reason was delivered to the Apple Store here in Jax. While I had them on the phone I asked about the Mac Pros they had in stock and I was told they are "out of stock." Take it for what it is, BUT, I'm wondering if it could mean an EOL on the current line.No. I think the line will stay the way it is adding 2.33GHz + $800 and 2.66GHz + $1500 Clovertown options in the Processor section on the configure page. That way according to your type of workload style you can choose between 4 faster cores if you do less multi-threaded work vs 8 slower cores if you are all about a Multi-Threaded Workload.Now that I'm thinking about it, ya think the 1050 height will allow for a 100% 8.5X11 page view?I can't stand less than 1200 high. You know Dell monitors rotate too and rotation is supported with ATI Video cards but not NVIDEA.If your a member of the Dell Forums, you can receive a $350 coupon off the price of the 30"--very tempting.Link please? Never mind I found it with Google.
leekohler
Mar 25, 03:39 PM
You have to prove the rights existed in the first place otherwise I could argue the government is denying my right to drive a tank
No- you have to prove why I should be denied that right. It clearly exists.
You guys continue to ignore that marriage is in fact, a right. That has already been proven to you. And again, quit comparing us to weapons of mass destruction or murderers. I'm sick of it.
The Catholic view does not demand the death of homosexuals, instead it seeks to change the behavior for they are lost sheep.
I am not lost. I know exactly where I am. I am also not a sheep. I don't blindly follow any leader or religion.
No- you have to prove why I should be denied that right. It clearly exists.
You guys continue to ignore that marriage is in fact, a right. That has already been proven to you. And again, quit comparing us to weapons of mass destruction or murderers. I'm sick of it.
The Catholic view does not demand the death of homosexuals, instead it seeks to change the behavior for they are lost sheep.
I am not lost. I know exactly where I am. I am also not a sheep. I don't blindly follow any leader or religion.
Bill McEnaney
Mar 28, 12:50 AM
Amazing. Not a word in response.
Bill, all gay people want is to be accepted for what we are, not what you want us to be.
Not so different from what you want, is it?
I was just replying to your previous note, Lee. But I stopped writing because I wanted to reconsider what I was saying and to ensure that I expressed my thoughts as politely as I could express them.
I accept same-sex-attracted people as they are. But I won't accept some things that many of them do.
If I harm others, I want them to tell me what harm I did. Then I'll try to make amends for what I've don't. But I need to say something that others may hate to hear, I'll say it.
Bill, all gay people want is to be accepted for what we are, not what you want us to be.
Not so different from what you want, is it?
I was just replying to your previous note, Lee. But I stopped writing because I wanted to reconsider what I was saying and to ensure that I expressed my thoughts as politely as I could express them.
I accept same-sex-attracted people as they are. But I won't accept some things that many of them do.
If I harm others, I want them to tell me what harm I did. Then I'll try to make amends for what I've don't. But I need to say something that others may hate to hear, I'll say it.
CoryTV
Apr 12, 11:00 PM
and you can use Magic bullet or whoever wants to make a grading app inside of FCPX.
I can't even believe I was arguing with someone who things that magic bullet and Color are even remotely the same thing.
Goodnight, junior.
I can't even believe I was arguing with someone who things that magic bullet and Color are even remotely the same thing.
Goodnight, junior.
MacCoaster
Oct 10, 04:03 PM
ddtlm:
Ah, thanks for clarifying.
Ah, thanks for clarifying.
edifyingGerbil
Apr 23, 04:14 PM
No, the basis of Christianity is the Old and New Testaments.
The Old and New Testaments make up the Bible :confused:
I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here.
The Old and New Testaments make up the Bible :confused:
I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here.
bokdol
Sep 26, 02:18 PM
You're kidding, right? Here we are sitting around waiting on the C2D and you're saying that in about two months we'll have the option to buy a QUAD? Please say your kidding. PLEASE.
not mac book pro...
mac pro
not mac book pro...
mac pro
bugfaceuk
Apr 9, 09:32 AM
Nah. All those games you mentioned would be part of a pack of 25 on Nintendo for 19.99 like Namco museum.
Or would be part of a larger game as sub-games. Nintendo do understand this kind of gaming but package it differently. I am not at all convinced that that packaging & pricing strategy would not work on iOS.
Or would be part of a larger game as sub-games. Nintendo do understand this kind of gaming but package it differently. I am not at all convinced that that packaging & pricing strategy would not work on iOS.
darkplanets
Mar 11, 06:38 PM
And this is why we have passive cooling and shutdown systems, so you don't have to rely on mechanical means for core safety. It is my understanding that these reactors should have control rods to pretty much kill the core, however since it's a BWR that doesn't mean the heat will stop. I'll bet money that the safety systems aren't up to par, and since these were constructed in the 80's there certainly isn't any passive control systems.
Multimedia
Jul 12, 10:06 AM
So, what, this leaves us with:
* Mac Pro - Xeon/Woodcrest
* iMac - Core2 Duo/Conroe
* Mac Mini - Core Duo or Core2 Duo
Would the laptops get updated with the Core2 Duo?I'm still wondering why not both - Xeon Woody in pairs for the top of the line Quad and Conroe in the mid and low Core 2 Duo models. I can't see Apple spending all that extra money to support two cores from one Woody when it will cost them a lot less to use Conroe and a Conroe motherboard for the same two core performance. Can you?because the price difference is not that much and it saves apple more on design/engineering/testing/support ect. it makes great financial sense to consolidate your product line into one platform.Fair enough. Thanks for helping me understand why you think the line won't be split. I see Boncellis' point of view as well. Well we only have 26 more days to find out.
I expect MacBook Pros will get Merom ASAP up to 2.33 GHz and that mini and MacBooks will go Merom later by January at the latest only 2GHz max.
* Mac Pro - Xeon/Woodcrest
* iMac - Core2 Duo/Conroe
* Mac Mini - Core Duo or Core2 Duo
Would the laptops get updated with the Core2 Duo?I'm still wondering why not both - Xeon Woody in pairs for the top of the line Quad and Conroe in the mid and low Core 2 Duo models. I can't see Apple spending all that extra money to support two cores from one Woody when it will cost them a lot less to use Conroe and a Conroe motherboard for the same two core performance. Can you?because the price difference is not that much and it saves apple more on design/engineering/testing/support ect. it makes great financial sense to consolidate your product line into one platform.Fair enough. Thanks for helping me understand why you think the line won't be split. I see Boncellis' point of view as well. Well we only have 26 more days to find out.
I expect MacBook Pros will get Merom ASAP up to 2.33 GHz and that mini and MacBooks will go Merom later by January at the latest only 2GHz max.
Eidorian
Sep 26, 10:29 AM
Pardon Me But Would You Please Track Down The Link To That Card And IM Me and post it here? I need it NOW! Thanks.
I will be on this thread until the Mac Pro Clovertown option ships. :D
This is the Mac Pro I have been waiting for.http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2480
I know they're making a PCI Express, DDR2, SATA II version though. Old news to me...
I will be on this thread until the Mac Pro Clovertown option ships. :D
This is the Mac Pro I have been waiting for.http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2480
I know they're making a PCI Express, DDR2, SATA II version though. Old news to me...
blue22
Apr 12, 11:00 PM
Steve Jobs said the new version would be "awesome," well I disagree. He was completely wrong... IT IS FREAKIN' ASTOUNDING! Bravo Apple!
+1
Yes, this is a great update for FCP. And the $299 price tag makes it that much more "astounding" so I don't know why some people here are bemoaning this release.
+1
Yes, this is a great update for FCP. And the $299 price tag makes it that much more "astounding" so I don't know why some people here are bemoaning this release.
Multimedia
Oct 6, 01:59 AM
Just a small point, but I think back in 2002? Apple's top end Quicksilver G4 towers were configured like this:
Fast 733Mhz, Faster 867Mhz, Fastest Dual 800Mhz
So I could see them having an octo 2.66 above a quad 3.0.I think they will offer a Dual 2.33GHz Clovertown because each Clovertown is priced the same as each 3GHz Woody - $851. If they did offer the 2.66GHz Clovertowns, the premium would be more than $642 more as they each cost $321 more than the 2.33GHz models - $1172. That's almost 40% more money for an 8% 330MHz bump in speed - hardly an amount any logical person would pay extra for.
I think Apple won't want to sell a $4,000 Mac Pro when they can sell a lot more $3,300 ones. At 2.33GHz, the Clovertown OctoMacs are still going to be able to process a total of almost 19GHz or more than 50% more crunching power than the 3GHz Quads. This is all about who needs more cores vs. who needs more power. Different workflows call for different choices. Some need 4 high powered cores while others, like myself, need more cores totalling more power that we know we can use simultaneously since our workflow applications can use 3-4 cores each.
Finally, Apple's all about the perception. Apple has held back cpu releases because they wouldn't let a lower end cpu clock higher than a higher end chip. They did it with PPC 603&604 and I think they did it with G3 & G4.
It's against everything Apple's ever done to have 3.0 GHz dual dual-core towers in the mid range and 2.33GHz quad-core cpus in the high end.One will not be priced higher than the other. Both options will be +$800. Where did you get the idea that the 2.33GHz Octo would be priced above the 3GHz Quad? Both pairs of processors sell from Intel to Apple for exactly the same amount of money. Did you overlook that fact? Or do you think Apple is going to gouge us?
All that's going to happen is one added line in the processor section of the BTO page which will look like this:
Two 2.33GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon [Add $800]
Mac Pro buyers need to do their homework so they know which way to go. The 8-core Mac is not a replacement for the current line. It's not "better" for many users. It is only "better" for a certain class of users who know the applications they use can take advantage of several cores at once or that they can imagine a workflow of running multiple applications that could use more cores simultaneously. So it's evolutionary not revolutionary.
There is no reason to believe that any of the three existing lines in the processor section of the "Configure Now" page will be deleted, only that the above line will be added with little fanfare - probably a press release is about all. And perhaps Steve will mention it in his January 9 SteveNote.
I still think the 2.66GHz Quad for $2499 will remain most popular among the vast majority of Mac Pro buyers. Those of us who are hungry for more cores are a rare breed of users who have figured out how to keep all those cores busy most of the time. :pMultimedia, you're so far out of mainstream that your comments make no sense to all but .01 % of computer users.
Seriously.. Most people don't rip 4 videos to h264 while they are creating 4 disk images and browsing the web.Neither do I and I think your characterization of what I do and how I do it is completely a fabricaiton of your imagination. I never use h.264 EVER. And I certainly never encode 4 videos at once - even with the Clovertown I won't be able to do that without compromizing the speed of each encode. You are trying to trivialize what I do by exagerating and mocking a real workflow situation because you have made up your mind that 4 cores are enough. Why do you think it's just fine to MOCK a fellow Mac user because you don't do the same work as he or she does?
Is Intel putting Clovertowns on the market because no one has any use for them?
You are way exagerating how I need more cores for what. You are totally underestimating how many cores ONE application can use. Toast 7.1 will use almost 4 cores of an Intel Mac to create ONE DVD image. Handbrake will use almost 3 to rip one mp4 file from one of those images and it hasn't been optimized for the Mac Pro yet although it is UB. I think you are way out of line to say that it will be highly uncommon for many users to hose an 8-core Mac easily. There are numerous ways to do so in nothing flat. Seems like your imagination is weak.
I have one of those 2GHz Dual Core (DC) G5's here and it is making my life a lot easier because I can continue to record video on the Quad while off-loading just recorded video for editing over there via the GB Ethernet. Then I rip the images back on the Quad via the GB Ethernet conection because ripping them on the DC is much slower. Even ripping two DVD Images simultaneously is faster running both on the Quad than one on the DC and the other on the Quad.
So I don't agree with you that a 2GHz DC G5 Mac is great for most unless everyone is still only doing one thing at a time. While I agree I am in a very small group of compression fanatics, I submit to you that there are plenty of other different kinds of small groups out there who can also use 8 cores all day and all night long. And the sum total of all of us equals a significant market that Apple can serve by simply ordering a thousand Clovertowns and adding that line above to the "Configure Now" page of the current Mac Pro offering.
Fast 733Mhz, Faster 867Mhz, Fastest Dual 800Mhz
So I could see them having an octo 2.66 above a quad 3.0.I think they will offer a Dual 2.33GHz Clovertown because each Clovertown is priced the same as each 3GHz Woody - $851. If they did offer the 2.66GHz Clovertowns, the premium would be more than $642 more as they each cost $321 more than the 2.33GHz models - $1172. That's almost 40% more money for an 8% 330MHz bump in speed - hardly an amount any logical person would pay extra for.
I think Apple won't want to sell a $4,000 Mac Pro when they can sell a lot more $3,300 ones. At 2.33GHz, the Clovertown OctoMacs are still going to be able to process a total of almost 19GHz or more than 50% more crunching power than the 3GHz Quads. This is all about who needs more cores vs. who needs more power. Different workflows call for different choices. Some need 4 high powered cores while others, like myself, need more cores totalling more power that we know we can use simultaneously since our workflow applications can use 3-4 cores each.
Finally, Apple's all about the perception. Apple has held back cpu releases because they wouldn't let a lower end cpu clock higher than a higher end chip. They did it with PPC 603&604 and I think they did it with G3 & G4.
It's against everything Apple's ever done to have 3.0 GHz dual dual-core towers in the mid range and 2.33GHz quad-core cpus in the high end.One will not be priced higher than the other. Both options will be +$800. Where did you get the idea that the 2.33GHz Octo would be priced above the 3GHz Quad? Both pairs of processors sell from Intel to Apple for exactly the same amount of money. Did you overlook that fact? Or do you think Apple is going to gouge us?
All that's going to happen is one added line in the processor section of the BTO page which will look like this:
Two 2.33GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon [Add $800]
Mac Pro buyers need to do their homework so they know which way to go. The 8-core Mac is not a replacement for the current line. It's not "better" for many users. It is only "better" for a certain class of users who know the applications they use can take advantage of several cores at once or that they can imagine a workflow of running multiple applications that could use more cores simultaneously. So it's evolutionary not revolutionary.
There is no reason to believe that any of the three existing lines in the processor section of the "Configure Now" page will be deleted, only that the above line will be added with little fanfare - probably a press release is about all. And perhaps Steve will mention it in his January 9 SteveNote.
I still think the 2.66GHz Quad for $2499 will remain most popular among the vast majority of Mac Pro buyers. Those of us who are hungry for more cores are a rare breed of users who have figured out how to keep all those cores busy most of the time. :pMultimedia, you're so far out of mainstream that your comments make no sense to all but .01 % of computer users.
Seriously.. Most people don't rip 4 videos to h264 while they are creating 4 disk images and browsing the web.Neither do I and I think your characterization of what I do and how I do it is completely a fabricaiton of your imagination. I never use h.264 EVER. And I certainly never encode 4 videos at once - even with the Clovertown I won't be able to do that without compromizing the speed of each encode. You are trying to trivialize what I do by exagerating and mocking a real workflow situation because you have made up your mind that 4 cores are enough. Why do you think it's just fine to MOCK a fellow Mac user because you don't do the same work as he or she does?
Is Intel putting Clovertowns on the market because no one has any use for them?
You are way exagerating how I need more cores for what. You are totally underestimating how many cores ONE application can use. Toast 7.1 will use almost 4 cores of an Intel Mac to create ONE DVD image. Handbrake will use almost 3 to rip one mp4 file from one of those images and it hasn't been optimized for the Mac Pro yet although it is UB. I think you are way out of line to say that it will be highly uncommon for many users to hose an 8-core Mac easily. There are numerous ways to do so in nothing flat. Seems like your imagination is weak.
I have one of those 2GHz Dual Core (DC) G5's here and it is making my life a lot easier because I can continue to record video on the Quad while off-loading just recorded video for editing over there via the GB Ethernet. Then I rip the images back on the Quad via the GB Ethernet conection because ripping them on the DC is much slower. Even ripping two DVD Images simultaneously is faster running both on the Quad than one on the DC and the other on the Quad.
So I don't agree with you that a 2GHz DC G5 Mac is great for most unless everyone is still only doing one thing at a time. While I agree I am in a very small group of compression fanatics, I submit to you that there are plenty of other different kinds of small groups out there who can also use 8 cores all day and all night long. And the sum total of all of us equals a significant market that Apple can serve by simply ordering a thousand Clovertowns and adding that line above to the "Configure Now" page of the current Mac Pro offering.