New Server line

[soilchmst]

Forgive me if I am wrong but...
1. Two people are speaking Sept. 10. Steve Jobs at Apple Expo Paris and Philip Schiller at Seybold. Philip will be speaking about 8 hours after Steve. Steve intros and hypes products, Philip usually shows the audience the raw processing power of the machines.
2. "Apple is about to launch ... the XRaid. This box is a 3U unit that has Fiber and holds 1.63TB of data. This was shown in LA at the MGLA (Motion Graphics Los Angeles) meeting on Tuesday the 20th."
The XRaid is making the rounds and due for release.
3. Apple has bought up much of the high end graphics software companies.
4. Maya is coming out for Mac OSX
5. Apple current desktop has a 720 watt powersupply (2x quicksilver's), twice as many drive bays, twice the hard drives, and a coolling system that seems to be way overkill
6. Apple's web page says "G4 servers coming soon"
7. XServe was slated as an entry level server
8. Remember the rumors of a quad machine
So... An XRaid, Maya for Mac OSX, maybe an XServe update, and a new quad processor mid/high end server
Crazy ? Not so much. Think about. Apple wants to replace all those NT and SGI workstations. A quad processor server could easily go in the current case and become the ultimate graphics workstation. It would definitely utilize all the power being unused in the current design.
Steve will introduce it. Philip will tell all the people in SF how their lives will never be the same
Remember, Seybold has been the launch of some cool machines in the past.
OK, tell me your thoughts

 

[Sun Baked]

5. is BS, the new power supply has 400 watts - 40 more than the last model.

There are also two more drives to support, another optical drive, and increases in bus & processor speeds (yes this takes more watts).

Doesn't sound like overkill to me.

XRaid was pre-announced during the introduction of the XServe, everyone has just been waiting for Apple to officially intro the Raid drive holder.

 

[vniow]

I could definately see all of that except for the quad-processors, (and #5) I think the heatsink overkill is for a possible dual-core IBM Power4minime, but as for the rest of it, I could see happening at Seybold. Apple's getting serious and moving away from pretty colors and 1.63 TB of data will be a major selling point.

 

[soilchmst]

watts

I saw the XRaid announcement. I am just saying its release appears immenent (sp?). About the power usages, if it is only forty more watts, I could see that. The two extra HDs take about twenty, and the new optical and bus could use the other twenty. But, according to Apples website:
XServe:
"Maximum input current: 3.6A
...
— Maximum continuous power: 400W"

and
PowerMac:
"Maximum current: 6.5A (low voltage range) or 7.5A (high voltage range)"

True, Apple does not specify the wattage of the new machines. But, with my limited understanding of wattage, if the amps double and the volts stay constant, the wattage changes (to about 700ish). Though, maybe this is not true.

 

[Sun Baked]

Don't forget to factor in that the PowerMac's power supply is essentially a power brick for the ADC monitors - so you need to factor in a some for that. The XServe doesn't perform this function it's VGA/DVI.

But the math doesn't hold in any case the power supply on my G4/400 AGP w ADC has 8A stamped on the back and 10A stamped inside, and it definitely isn't rated too extremely high in continuos watts output.

Anyways the people who have looked inside the machines say they're stamped 400 watts.

 

[Dr. Distortion]

Re: watts

Originally posted by soilchmst
I saw the XRaid announcement. I am just saying its release appears immenent (sp?). About the power usages, if it is only forty more watts, I could see that. The two extra HDs take about twenty, and the new optical and bus could use the other twenty. But, according to Apples website:
XServe:
"Maximum input current: 3.6A
...
— Maximum continuous power: 400W"

and
PowerMac:
"Maximum current: 6.5A (low voltage range) or 7.5A (high voltage range)"

True, Apple does not specify the wattage of the new machines. But, with my limited understanding of wattage, if the amps double and the volts stay constant, the wattage changes (to about 700ish). Though, maybe this is not true.

Well, we can prove this with a simple calculation. Since voltage x amps = watts, we can do this:

3.6 * 110 = 396 watts --> this must be the 400 watts of continuous power of the old power supply

6.5 * 110 = 715 watts --> that's about the 720 watts soilchmst was talking about

The question whether this concerns total input power, or effective output power needs to be answered. Power supplies generate heat too, and heat means a loss of effective output power.

-Dr. D.

 

[Sun Baked]

Re: Re: watts

Originally posted by Dr. Distortion
Well, we can prove this with a simple calculation.

-Dr. D.

Quit while you're behind, give up, put the protractor away before you hurt yourself, the equation does not compute, your calculation is wrong, etc.

Originally posted by pauli
trying to extrapolate the total wattage of the psu from the stated max current is silly. let's grab some numbers from spare psus i've got laying around... all numbers are for 100-125v, mostly 115v though:

dve 150w: 4a
astec 160w: 5a
sparkle 235w: 7a
macase 250w: 8a
fki/enhance(iirc) 250w: 6a
deer/l&c 250w: 6a
emacs 250w(redundant): 6a
sparkle 350w: 10a
pcp&c 5/700w: 10a

notice a tight (ie, something that can be used as a point to reason from) mathematical correlation here? what's that? no, neither do i, really. but i can easily go pull a dozen more sample points...

In other words, READ THE WORDs PRINTED ON THE POWER SUPPLY and stop trying to use formulas.

The XServe Power Supply does not equal one from a Mirror Mac (IT FEEDS the MONITOR in addition to the computer).

And if you don't understand what I'm saying then ...

 

[mnkeybsness]

Re: New Server line

Originally posted by soilchmst

4. Maya is coming out for Mac OSX

6. Apple's web page says "G4 servers coming soon"

in case you were unaware of this...maya is already os x native...i've used it on os x since about april.

and the servers were released today.

 

[snoopy]

Re: Re: watts

Originally posted by Dr. Distortion


... Since voltage x amps = watts, ...

Forget the equations. The maximum current stamped on the back is just there because of regulations. It can be double the real life current and UL does not care, just so it is high enough to cover worst case. The designer may be playing it safe, by estimating high. Another consideration is how low the line voltage drops. If the PowerMac is designed to operate in Japan, the line can drop to almost 90 VAC. Their nominal is 100 VAC not 120 VAC.

BTW, Volts X Amps = Volt-Amps in AC circuits, or VA, not Watts. There is a power factor which must be considered. If the power factor for this supply is lower than another supply, the input current will be higher for the same power out. The power factor is 1.0 only for a purely resistive load, with no reactance, where the current and voltage are perfectly in phase.

There. Does that make sense?