Apple Marketing Hypes New PowerMacs 1022
Wacky_Wookie was only one of many who wrote in with a mention of Apple's "leak" of specifications for a new line of PowerMacs to be dubbed "G5", apparently running the new PowerPC 970 CPUs. No offense, but anyone who thinks it was a mistake or leak doesn't understand marketing. :) Update by J : In case those linked sites get taken down too, try
MacNN.
Well then... (Score:4, Insightful)
And I still can't afford it...
huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
No offense, anyone who has half a clue is fully aware that Apple is particularly fascist and litigious regarding details of product launches leaking out. In particular, Steve Jobs simply loves the "wow" he gets from the audience by completely surprising them. In this case, few people actually expected DUAL 2Ghz PPC970 (G5) configurations available. Now, people are going to be less surprised on Monday.
Surely Michael is welcome to tell us how much he understands marketing and what products has he actually marketed, and we can see how much his credentials stack up against someone in charge of Apple and Pixar.
Re:Yes... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not a mac fan, and I would have had no clue whatsoever that the G5 was on the way, had it not been for this..
It seems as "leaks" theese days are becomming more and more frequent.. At least the ones that gets people excited.
And why not, it's a great way of getting peoples attention, because everyone wants to see other peoples "misstakes". And if your hear about something secret leaking out of a big company, and then beeing removed a few minutes later, your gonna read about it. And most likley hear about the product in question at the same time.
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:3, Insightful)
G5 is a marketing name and not a chip name. They can happily call the PPC 970 anything they want and G5 kind of makes sence.
The PPC 970 requires a bus speed half that of the processor speed hence the 1Ghz bus on the 2Ghz model. That would be achievable using HyperTransport.
And saying something it not real due to their use of the words one and two instead of the numeral ? Please.
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:5, Insightful)
The rest of Apples site would say "3 USB Ports" not "Three". Also, Apple have a long standing habit of using Firewire instead of USB 2.0. I take this as one point impossible
Yeah, except the current G4s have USB 2.0 hardware onboard, [slashdot.org] Apple just restricted it to USB 1.1 operation.
- One FireWire 800, two FireWire 400 ports
Once again use of the verbal "One" instead of the numeric. Only one FW800 port? Why would Apple stick with FireWire 400 anyway? I mark this impossible
Oh, yeah? That's what's shipping in the current G4: 2 FW400, and 1 FW800. Since 800 is rather new, people will be more likely to need more 400 ports for their existing devices-- plus it would be dumb to make someone have to 'waste' an 800 port on a 400 device. For now, 2 of the older standard makes sense.
- Bluetooth & AirPort Extreme ready
Likely
Again, thank you, Captain Obvious-- since this is how current G4s are shipping.
~Philly
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:2, Insightful)
> Also, Apple have a long standing habit of using Firewire
> instead of USB 2.0. I take this as one point impossible.
>
Didn't I read that the USB port on recent Macs _is_ an USB 2.0 port, and that only the driver was missing?
>
> Bad grammar..
>
Careful where you pont that thing, son. You might shoot your own self.
>
>
> but this sounds like wishful thinking.
>
The Macs will do whatever you want: calling them a "graphics machine" only shows that _your_ vision is limited. I mean, they're not the front-end console for a drum-scanner or a Cray, fer chrissakes. Think the old "digital hub" idea, and imagine one of these Bad Larrys plugged right into your home stereo.
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:3, Insightful)
G4/G5 is a branding thing, or at the very least a processor family classification. The G4's are PPC74**'s, such as the 7450 in my PB. Apple would go with the term "G5" if only from a branding perspective.
Don't take this as truth, but I have read that the processor:bus ratio for the 970 is 2:1, making the bus speed on the 2Ghz 1Ghz. This is in line with the graphic.
Apple still uses NVIDIA as their low-end graphics card on the PM, and on one of the current PB (the 17" I think). Not impossible in the least
In regards to the "three" vs. "3" comment, look at this graphic:
Current PM Specs Graphic [akamai.net]
It uses both the numeral and spelled out number. Some of the uses look like they were done to preserve spacing or lengthen a short sentence.
Apple has a long standing habit of using USB 1.1 as well as Firewire. Apple has always stated that both have their uses. People have been clamoring for USB 2.0 for a while now and there is no reason for Apple to not include it.
FW400 and FW800 use different connectors. FW400 is for legacy devices and those that do not need to run at the new specs speed
Remember the Mac is also used in numbers in the video and audio fields. Both of these would benefit strongly from the use of optical audio.
All this being said, these still could not be the true specs but they are not outside the realm of possibility as you claim. We'll have to wait until Monday to find out for sure.
Re:My analysis of why this is fake. (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, you can still think it's a fake (it's quite possible, I don't know), but your arguments sound quite unconvincing to me.
Re:New Mac (Score:-1, Insightful)
Really? The last time I checked the local BestBuy still only had 1 shelf of Mac software. The local Circuit City still had 0 shelves of Mac software.
the only thing that might make the PC platform attractive...
would be the wide availability of any type of software a person could be looking for. That level of choice just isn't available with the Mac.
Re:G5 name is taken.... (Score:5, Insightful)
IIRC, that was Apple's defense when they announced Mac OS 9.0 and Microware (makers of OS-9) took issue with it.
~Philly
Re:Well then... (Score:2, Insightful)
how do you know? they didn't leak the prices...
Understanding (Score:3, Insightful)
And anyone who thinks these specs would be deliberately leaked three days before a "Stevenote" doesn't understand Apple.
Re:mmmmm, NUMA! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:New Mac (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well then... (Score:5, Insightful)
Expensive "strategic" leak (Score:5, Insightful)
Understanding Marketing? (Score:5, Insightful)
And whomever would write something like that about an internal Apple leak doesn't understand Steve Jobs.
I'm sure heads rolled on this one...especially if they're to be officially announced on Monday at WWDC (which is likely).
Re:Don't believe it. (Score:3, Insightful)
2) There is no need for a non-server system to have removable drives. The new pro systems will not have "the same drives you can get in an Xserve today."
3) The Xserve already has a PCI-X slot.
4) "Someone not related to Apple['s website store]" would not have access to the location this image file was found. It was on an Akamai server. This actually showed up on the Apple Store. I saw it with my own eyes. This isn't a hoax unless it's internal to Apple.
Re:New Mac (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not a natural law of the universe that Apple must be behind Wintel. Prior to the G4 debacle Macs were very competitive, and depending on the prices and performance of the G5 systems they may be again very soon.
Re:New Mac (Score:4, Insightful)
I always make sure that all of the software I purchase is compatible with that of a convicted monopolist [microsoft.com]!
[end snide commentary]
Vendor independence? From whom? Microsoft [microsoft.com] or Intel [intel.com]? Multiple distribution channels does not correspond to vendor independance.
Re:$$$$$$$$Money (Score:2, Insightful)
Coz there's fuck all profit in it?
Just a guess...
No, it certainly wasn't intentional (Score:5, Insightful)
No offense, but anyone who thinks it was a mistake or leak doesn't understand marketing.
No offense, Michael, but you pretty clearly don't understand marketing. There's no way this was intentional.
Why? Let's assume you have a big event coming up, with one big piece of news everyone is waiting for (in this case, G5s) and lots of other, smaller items that you want to talk about (Panther, whatever other goodies they have hidden). Remember, that big piece of news is the lure to get everyone watching the rest of the show.
So why on Earth would you spill the beans beforehand on your big item, so that some people would have gotten the info they wanted and will now not tune in to see the rest of it?
It's also media suicide! If the mainstream press reports today "Apple is announcing G5s," then they won't have the same level of "big news" to report on Monday, and reports of all the other stuff Apple desperately wants people to know about (like the goodies of Panther and their carefully-worded spin on the advantages of 64-bit-ness) won't get the same headline "punch" because the big cat's out of the bag. And Apple is a past master at manipulating the press, so they would never consciously make that kind of mistake.
Lastly, if they were going to deliberately leak it, why would they leak only specs (which geeks care about) and not something like a spec-free marketing piece written about the G5 which would get people quoting their words on its goodness, but still keep prospective buyers tuned in for the details? Again, not a smart move.
In sum, this was pretty clearly an actual goof by a (newly unemployed) Apple web tech. I trust the Slashdot staff to know their s**t about a variety of things ... but oh dear God is marketing NOT one of them.
Re:Too Good To Be True (Score:3, Insightful)
I tend to agree with the idea that it was an intentional "leak", since nothing posted was totally unexpected. Apple *had* to know that everyone was wanting 970s. If they have them, leaking some specs increases the fervor without giving too much away.
Re:huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
It takes a monumental amount of incompetence to leak a single page accidently on a site as mission critical as Apple's. The company would have at least one staging server, if not more. They'd have people double checking everything. When I worked at Dyson, every upload to the live site had me quaking in my boots, even after the three times I checked the stage server to make sure everything was working A-OK.
I have absolutely zero doubt in my mind that at least the first tabbed version of Safari was leaked intentionally (I'm using this as the most recent example). Apple builds up hype just like everyone else. Mac fanboys (including myself) are pretty much excited all year round because of rumour sites, why not cash in with a few tactical leaks here and there so they can get the word around? Why have one slashdot story when you can nab three? Another example that just came to mind: Whenever some new hardware is coming soon, Apple always bump up the shipping dates. If they wanted to be oh-so-careful, they wouldn't bother and give out false information on the public pages. Then on the customer account pages simply write something like the computer is still being built, rather than making it obvious what's going on.
Apple has done it before and it will do it again. There have been leaks that shouldn't have happened, and heads have publically rolled, such as the mirror-faced PowerMacs on eWeek. I would be amazed to see anyone take a public hit for this one, because it was quite intentional. Taking Safari again, if the leak was *gasp*, such a big deal, then maybe they'd have stopped on the developer seeding and taken legal action? The Apple lawyers love being busy.
Re:Well then... (Score:2, Insightful)
Just my two cents...
Re:$$$$$$$$Money (Score:5, Insightful)
And Ill wait to buy a Ferrari when they have one thats less than $20,000. Apple doesnt go for the low end because it doesnt have to, and it couldnt gaurentee the quality its got if it did. You get what you pay for.
Re:New Mac (Score:4, Insightful)
Not at all. That is, in fact, my point. I think the RDF gets modded down pretty fast. Slashdot is a tough crowd. Facts are paramount. You don't have any "points" you just put forth an opinion.
You can't seem to help taking a swipe. It's tiresome.... And yet I keep getting modded up for it! You know what is really tiresome?
That you keep getting modded up for it? +5 'I agree'. Look, I'm not trying to start a war here. But there are other opinions. I do respect yours but you need to back it up every so often.
Why is this news? There has been plenty of competition in the high end workstation space for years. Oh right, I forgot. This is Apple. Their cases glow in the dark. Of course it's news.
THAT is what I am talking about. You know when AMD comes out with a new Opteron I don't go all frothy, I think, "That's cool." Apple comes out with a new chip and its "ooh, Apple, they glow, they blow." You just illustrated my point beautifully.
Think about it - almost everyone on here drools over Mac OS X...I hate to burst your bubble, but no they don't.
No worries. They do. I see it every day. People love love love OS X. Maybe you don't. Thats' fine. But its evident all over Slashdot.
Classic Mac apologism at work.
Fuck off. "Classic Mac troll at work." See how that goes?
I was merely intimating that many PC - and Mac - people yell about speed they don't need, but merely want. Nothing wrong with that per se but I get sick of people saying computers aren't 'fast enough'. Practically all of them are fast enough by practically anyone's standards. It was just an observation, it's not a platform 'apology'. If anything you are dodging the issue.
This does of course lead to the question of why you look forward to it. You look forward to it, because you have made a large (almost certainly personal) investment in the platform.
It's true that I have a Mac at home, not at work. It's true that I want them to hang around because they seem to be the only ones innovating at times. But, again, stop telling me what I think. You've dodged the issue once again and are dancing on the periphery of an ad hominem.
Clearly, this is the type of thinking that keeps Microsoft in the top spot, keeps IE dominating the web in the face of superior free alternatives etc. You want people to use Macs, despite the fact that this ultimately profits only Apple...
Clearly not. I just want people to stop pissing on Apple - strike that, any companuy, for stupid political reasons. That's it.
Re:Well then... (Score:3, Insightful)
It would seem odd to have three processor lines, with the 12" PowerBook now selling for the same price as the iBook was last year, it must be possible to get G4 machines into the sub £1000 market.
Since the original iMac has now gone to the great retailer in the sky, the iBook is a bit of an obvious candidate for abolition / complete revamp.
Best wishes,
Mike.
The world's fastest personal computer. (Score:4, Insightful)
"The world's fastest personal computer." Now, as David Letterman likes to say, that's something.
Apple hasn't been able to claim anything like that, with anything like a straight face, in a long, long time. The implication is that there will be a convincing display of this CPU prowess, and not just Jon Rubenstein talking about the length of his pipe, either. And I would bet it will involve something other than just Photoshop.
The speed perception issue has been holding Apple and OS X back - if the developers and then the tech are convinced this hobble has been removed from the camel's back legs, it will be a huge deal.
Love - the delusion that one woman differs from another. [H.L. Mencken]
Re:huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
I think Michael is right. Go back and read the Jobs/Bezos/Segway article, and you'll see that Jobs fully understands the impact of the launch. You're crazy if you think Jobs hasn't explored in his mind the ways he can exploit the Mac rumors community to Apple's advantage.
Jobs's keynotes have been losing their luster lately. Why? "Oh, another speed bump... ho hum." He knows that he needs to get as many eyes as possible watching that keynote on Monday, and the cheapest/easiest way to do that is to tap the rumors websites.
Notice that there were no prices given? Just enough info to tantilize, tune in if you want to know how much. Apple has to do a speed bump at least every six months if they want to stay competitive, so the leak is no big surprise.
Of course, the real star of the show is not going to be speed-bumped hardware, but the Panther upgrade for OS X.
Re:Duh. (Score:5, Insightful)
What is a"site" ? No, "sites" don't do that. However, overworked, stressed frazzled code monkeys who are trying to build and test a site in advance of a major product announcement in 3 days can easily put an image in the wrong folder.
Re:Nope--no CAD software (Score:3, Insightful)
Try finding any of the following that will run on the Mac:
ProE
Solidworks
SolidEdge
Ideas
Inventor
U
Catia
Mechanical Desktop
Alibre
Linux PPC (Score:3, Insightful)
Yellow Dog will probably be the first of the PPC distros to support the new 64-bit processors. You can run 32-bit until then. Mandrake 9.1 PPC is also very good, and there are others.
8Gb of RAM. What fun.
Re:huh? (Score:1, Insightful)
Somebody lost their job last night. Steve Jobs is the king of the Keynote Surprise (tm), and anything that gets in the way of that will feel the full force of his wrath (remember ATI a few years ago? they accidentally leaked info ahead of time, and suddenly whoops! no Macs available with ATI cards!). michael obviously has no idea how Steve Jobs like to pull the old "And one more thing
Furthermore, as other people have already mentioned (but apparently you can't say it too many times to try to get through to that dumbshit michael), Apple has a history of keeping a very tight lip on any details of future products. They simply don't say anything until it's time to let the cat out of the bag in grand fashion. This was not it. michael, the moron, would rather believe his retarded conspiracy theory and fell all smug about it. Yeah right, somebody at Apple said, hey, let's look like we fucked up and ruin Steve-o's Monday Surprise! Steve, that's cool with you, right? Steve: Yeah, I'm tired of the "and one more thing" routine, go for it! This'll generate a lot of buzz!
Bull fucking shit. Sure, it's definitely generating a lot of buzz, and could be good for Apple in the long run. But this is not how they operate. They (by extension of Steve Jobs' personality throughout the company) require complete control over everything. This is not something they would do.
The only possible way this was intentional (and approved all the way up to Big Steve) is if, as a few souls have suggested on the rumor site forums, maybe Apple actually has even faster machines ready to go. There are reports that Apple has already taken shipment of 2.5 GHz 970s from IBM in unknown quantities. What if those fuckers were ready to go? Then Steve could pretend he's all mad about the leak, go through his Keynote as if that's all they have, and then... And one more thing... here's the new dual 2.5 GHz G5, shipping today. People would go absolutely apeshit. However, this is pure fantasyland, along the lines of predictions of G5 computers in 2001.
I'll take the red pill, thank you. Unfortunately michael was a dipshit and took the blue one, and then started choking on it, spewing all kinds of crazy bullshit.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
upgraded... (Score:1, Insightful)
My MDD is so freaking load! Even after the fan replacement kit, it is way louder than my dual celeron with all the groovy heat sink and blow hole fans.
Come on Apple! For $5,000 the thing should be silent. Hell, it should absorb sound from the surrounding area.
1.2 and 1.4 Ghz 970s? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Nope--no CAD software (Score:5, Insightful)
There may be some hope though with WWDC next week. I heard rumblings that science and engineering (CAD/CAE) developers may be targeted because of their UNIX heritage. I know that last year I was told that Apple was targeting biotech first, and that they would evaluate where to go next. I made noise with a few managers at Apple, that in the companies that I had worked, engineering charted the course for the rest of the IT policies to follow. Most of this was because of the intensive hardware and software demands of running high-end CAD software.
One of those listed (Pro/E) has released a Linux version in cooperation with HP. With Apple's new machines and the fact that they have the largest installed base of UNIX (don't care what the Open Group says), there may be a few ISV's which may be persuaded to port to OS X.
I know that in the shops that I've worked in and or managed, the high-end stuff (Pro/E, I-deas, etc.) just doesn't work well enough on Windows to be valuable. The midrange stuff (Solidworks, SolidEdge, Mechanical Desktop) only exists on Windows, and can't touch the high-end stuff for utility. Apple could woo the high-end over, and open a can of whoop ass on Microsoft on the CAD front.
We'll have to just wait and see.
-- Len
Apple has balls; Gateway doesn't; GNU is eunichs (Score:3, Insightful)
The whole "we're getting there" crap gets really tiresome after seeing the same usability problems creep up again and again for year after year after year. But what should we expect from a bunch of command-line nerds who think that they can do desktop stuff.
Clearly, this is the type of thinking that keeps Microsoft in the top spot, keeps IE dominating the web in the face of superior free alternatives
Or perhaps the free alternatives are crap, and the desktop linux developers have way too many apologists running around artificially inflating the quality of those alternatives. And when the true quality of those apps is brought into question by a non-geek who has trouble doing something, those linux developers start screaming "quit whining about what you're getting for free". If I had to pick the number one thing that was really keeping microsoft dominant on the desktop, I would have to say it would have to be Free Software's obvious non-commitment to usability.
The freedom to get your work done easily and with a minimum of fuss is the most valuable and sacred freedom an end-user can have, and currently the "Free" software developer community does not recognize the existence of this freedom. The GPL is a programmer's idea of freedom, not an end user's. "Join us all and share the software. You'll be free -- once you read the fine manual".
What's the reason for such staunch pro-apple/pro-mac beliefs?
Apple put a GUI on their machines while the PC's forced people to use confusing command-line crap like DOS.
Apple was the first company to put trackballs in their laptops while other laptop makers forced users to clip a trackball onto the side of laptop every damn time they turned the thing on. Apple also created the first laptop that actually had a generous portion of real-estate behind the keyboard where a user could rest their hands. It was only later that the other vendors starting aping this feature.
Apple was the first computer maker to truly embrace the more usable usb and firewire back when other computer makers stayed in their happy, crappy comfort zones of serial and parallel connectors. If Apple didn't force the USB/Firewire migration issue with the perhipheral harware companies in 1997 with the iMac, it would have taken several more years for the "alternative vendors" to even begin that migration themselves.
Apple was the first company to truly make an easy, usable, and integrated alternative to illegally swapping mp3's on Kazaa. It will probably hit some snag and will be replaced by something better, but the point is that Apple had the wherewithall to do it.
The poing is that Apple has the balls to make the computing experience better for everyone while other vendors like Gateway, Dell, and Compaq choose to sit on their ass and do nothing. I agree that liking a company just because they make pretty cases is ridiculous; it is the attention and care paid to the user experience which truly builds loyaltly.
Yes, the code for Cocoa and Quartz is closed. It would be nice if it were open, but given the shennanigans that are GNOME, KDE, and the X-Windows system, the current batch of Free Software developers have shown that they could never be trusted with it. Leave them with the code for Cocoa for five minutes, and they'd immediately start to make things inconsistent and unusable.
Ideally, I'd like to see those mac values transplated into efforts to make open and viable alternatives to microsoft. If we could just find a way to remove the current batch of linux developers and replace them with competant mac developers, then an open desktop would truly be in business.
Apple masses (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:$$$$$$$$Money (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Well then... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Specs may be fake according to Dutch website (Score:4, Insightful)
And you can observe that what Apple was likely trying to do was to update the interface to the store slightly. First: instead of something such as "Step 1: choose your iMac," you now just get "Choose your iMac." Once you do choose your particular system, the buttons are also noticeably different: they're all flat, solid-colour buttons.
Knowing that these changes have been made, we can easily use Occam's Razor: the simplest answer is that Apple unintentionally posted the specs image while they were in the middle of testing and updating other content. There's no sinister conspiracy involving disgruntled employees or clever hackers.
Re:$$$$$$$$Money (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason people like Macs so much is that it makes computing fun and easy. The reason OS X is so incredibly awesome is that it's very user-friendly without sacrificing the power of Unix for those who want it. But if you're not a power-user, you'll never see a command line and still have a great computer that you'll enjoy immensely. Linux can't possibly give you a comparable experience, and that's what you pay the extra $1000 for. They're both computers, they're both about as powerful as eachother (for all intents and purposes,) but the Mac lets you do everything in style. THAT is why you buy a Mac, those who own them know this, those who don't just haven't figured it out yet.