More than 2 Processor Support in Mac OS X?

[c3ironman]

The new G5's at WWDC

3.0ghz Quad Processor G5 based each with Dual Power5 cores (8 cores total)
1024mb DDR2 memory
1500mhz Bus to each processor

This is what i want

Computers can never be fast enough!

This would make my 3D apps scream. Not to mention the rendering.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

This would make my 3D apps scream. Not to mention the rendering.

That, plus Tiger and a high-end graphics card...would REALLY make those 3D applications fly.

 

[wdlove]

Yes, this level of scrutiny by the mac faithful borders almost on hilarity. I don't know whether Apple and Steve Jobs are amused by this, or completely livid. Or is this some sort of masterplan, for Apple to leave behind breadcrumbs to keep the fans interested in Mac products.

For a complete so notoriously secretive, they've had their fair share of slip-ups.

I think that its a little bit of both. Yes, according to Steve himself, they are aware of what's being said on a forum like ours. Keeping our interest peaked also helps to increase sales. They can also learn what customers want.

 

[mangoarts]

SWITHER

Ok, speed is great but in my world I need a professional level video card. Friends are moving to PC because they are tired of waiting. Long time Mac users too. Sad.


Mango

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Ok, speed is great but in my world I need a professional level video card. Friends are moving to PC because they are tired of waiting. Long time Mac users too. Sad.


Mango

I'm not sure who's to blame for the professional graphics cards not making it to Macs, or if more than one company is contributing to the problem. Three things must happen for these cards to appear in Macs:
1. Flash code to boot a Mac must be written for these cards. I don't know whose responsibility this is.
2. Apple must write Mac drivers. This can only happen after #1 has been done.
3. Apple won't offer them even if #1 and #2 are in place if it doesn't see demand for them. This one you can do something about.

 

[Sunrunner]

I think that its a little bit of both. Yes, according to Steve himself, they are aware of what's being said on a forum like ours. Keeping our interest peaked also helps to increase sales. They can also learn what customers want.

Interesting... any anecdotal evidence perhaps that Apple monitors threads such as these? I hadn't heard that before....

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Interesting... any anecdotal evidence perhaps that Apple monitors threads such as these? I hadn't heard that before....

I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Apple not only knows about this place, but regularly visits and reads these forums. I wonder if Apple (or anyone here) read all 4000-odd posts I've made since registering...

 

[wdlove]

Interesting... any anecdotal evidence perhaps that Apple monitors threads such as these? I hadn't heard that before....

During a Keynote, can't remember which one. Steve said that he was aware of comments about him and Apple on the forums. No reference to this forum in particular was made.

 

[Lacero]

Steve's aware all right. He made several comments that could only have come from the postings on rumor sites, especially from MR.

 

[mangoarts]

What is Flash code?

Thank you for the response. Over two years ago I spoke with Nvidia about writing mac drivers. The engineers I spoke with said they would love to do it but Apple will not let them. Apple wants to write there own drivers for Nvidia cards. Why? ATI seems fine building drivers. It's as if Apple can't see the demand beyond gamers and 3D hobbiest. Well, for now I keep waiting. About "Flash Code"is this what you are talking about?

http://flashcode.com/downloads.html

Thanks again,

Mango

I'm not sure who's to blame for the professional graphics cards not making it to Macs, or if more than one company is contributing to the problem. Three things must happen for these cards to appear in Macs:
1. Flash code to boot a Mac must be written for these cards. I don't know whose responsibility this is.
2. Apple must write Mac drivers. This can only happen after #1 has been done.
3. Apple won't offer them even if #1 and #2 are in place if it doesn't see demand for them. This one you can do something about.

 

[LGRW3919]

Ok, speed is great but in my world I need a professional level video card. Friends are moving to PC because they are tired of waiting. Long time Mac users too. Sad.


Mango

at macosrumors.com they are posting about apple and ati about introducing the firegl to the mac

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Thank you for the response. Over two years ago I spoke with Nvidia about writing mac drivers. The engineers I spoke with said they would love to do it but Apple will not let them. Apple wants to write there own drivers for Nvidia cards. Why? ATI seems fine building drivers. It's as if Apple can't see the demand beyond gamers and 3D hobbiest. Well, for now I keep waiting. About "Flash Code"is this what you are talking about?

http://flashcode.com/downloads.html

Thanks again,

Mango

Nope, wrong "flash code". The "flash code" I'm referring to is this: writing new firmware to the card, which involves erasing and writing to an EEPROM (Electrically-Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory, from Wikipedia). This procedure is called "flashing" the card. Firmware is simply software resident in hardware - typically in ROM of some sort.

 

[nouthy]

Proof in the latest Apple-Tiger ad?

Well - to me it looks like a proof:

see it on http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/systempreferences/

greetz

 

[Kagetenshi]

Eh? What are you seeing as proof?

~J

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Eh? What are you seeing as proof?

~J

The presence of the "Processor" preference pane in Tiger System Preferences is proof that Tiger supports more than 2 CPUs, apparently.

 

[~loserman~]

I'm not sure who's to blame for the professional graphics cards not making it to Macs, or if more than one company is contributing to the problem. Three things must happen for these cards to appear in Macs:
1. Flash code to boot a Mac must be written for these cards. I don't know whose responsibility this is.
2. Apple must write Mac drivers. This can only happen after #1 has been done.
3. Apple won't offer them even if #1 and #2 are in place if it doesn't see demand for them. This one you can do something about.

4. The video card manufactures won't do #1. or #2. if their isn't a large enough market for them.
5. The circle continues.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

4. The video card manufactures won't do #1. or #2. if their isn't a large enough market for them.
5. The circle continues.

Agreed. If the market isn't there, this'll never happen. Why don't we show them that there is a big enough market for these that Apple and ATI/nVidia could make some money from?

 

[Kagetenshi]

The presence of the "Processor" preference pane in Tiger System Preferences is proof that Tiger supports more than 2 CPUs, apparently.

Looks to me like a rebadging of the Hardware preference pane, which only affected processors, used the exact same icon, and had the exact same placement.

~J

 

[nouthy]

DualCore COMING :: SURE!

Seen over at macnn.com:

http://www.macnn.com/articles/05/04/18/lightwave.3d.8.3/

If they integrate it into their product....it MUST be coming!!¨
KEWL

 

[DavidCar]

Seen over at macnn.com:

http://www.macnn.com/articles/05/04/18/lightwave.3d.8.3/

If they integrate it into their product....it MUST be coming!!¨
KEWL

They're apparently not talking about PowerPC:

"We commend NewTek for their leadership role in supporting AMD64 processor innovations, including multi-core technologies,” said Ben Williams, vice president, enterprise and server/workstation business, Microprocessor Business Unit, CPG, AMD. “Because NewTek has taken a customer-centric approach, LightWave users will benefit from software that is finely tuned to take advantage of all the performance and efficiency the AMD Opteron ™ processor with Direct Connect Architecture can offer without having to pay pricing penalties."

 

[tdewey]

Once again ThinkSecret might be dead on right:
http://www.thinksecret.com/news/antares.html

At this point I think we're likely to see dual core PB's (using the e600 from Freescale) before we see dual core PMs.


Edit:
And long before we see PB G5's. It is all good with me. I think I'd rather have a dual-core e600 PB than a G5 PB...

 

[ffakr]

No one noticed?

I can't believe no one but me noticed.

When Apple put the Tiger pages up on the day of the announced ship date, they had a page covering the Unix core, basically the under the hood stuff.

On that page, one of the new core features was (I'm paraphrasing):

'Fine Grained Locking
Increased thread granularity allowing for more increased SMP scailability'

Then, on the very next day it changed to:
"Fine Grained Locking
Invite more threads to the party in your processor."

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/unix/

Hmn.. why would we care about SMP scialability if Tiger only supports 2 CPUs like every other version of OS X? Apple slipped up.

 

[daveL]

I can't believe no one but me noticed.

When Apple put the Tiger pages up on the day of the announced ship date, they had a page covering the Unix core, basically the under the hood stuff.

On that page, one of the new core features was (I'm paraphrasing):

'Fine Grained Locking
Increased thread granularity allowing for more increased SMP scailability'

Then, on the very next day it changed to:
"Fine Grained Locking
Invite more threads to the party in your processor."

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/unix/

Hmn.. why would we care about SMP scialability if Tiger only supports 2 CPUs like every other version of OS X? Apple slipped up.

Although OS X has always supported SMP, it hasn't done it very gracefully. Basically, large sections of the kernel are locked during system calls. Tiger refines the locking strategy and allows other threads to enter the kernel, even when a thread is already executing a system call (2 threads still can't execute the same critical section, of course). So we'll see a much more efficient use of the dual processor systems, when executing kernel code.

As far as the above Web content, I think the first version is simply poor writing.

 

[ffakr]

This is true, but SMP Scalability has a pretty clear meaning. That would an awful case of poor writing. I'm not too quick to jump on the crazy conspiracy theories but I think this is more than an innocent mistake.

 

[daveL]

This is true, but SMP Scalability has a pretty clear meaning. That would an awful case of poor writing. I'm not too quick to jump on the crazy conspiracy theories but I think this is more than an innocent mistake.

I agree that SMP Scalability does invite the notion of something beyond 2 CPUs (cores). However, Tiger will provide noticeable improvements on 2 CPUs (cores), compared to Panther. Panther would have choked on a 4 CPU box, whereas Tiger should provide decent performance.