7470 PPC and Why no G5's.
After publishing possible specs for upcoming PowerMacs, the discussions invariably return to G5s, with people holding out hope that G5's will be released "any day now". However... based on all available information, G5's are likely not expected until 2003 at least.
In Feb 2002, the G4's and Beyond article references a Register article which reports upcoming G4 processors that are to be introduced over the coming year:
According to Motorola sources, a tweaked version of the Apollo 7450 G4, the 7470, will be ready for volume production shortly after the end of Q2, in time for a summer ramp. The 7470 will be manufactured on a 0.13 micron process, allowing for a smaller die size with room for 512K of L2 cache, and support up to 4MB of DDR-SDRAM L3 cache.
The 7470 supports a modified bus protocol, MPX+, which supports double data transfer and which should effectively run at 266Mhz according to sources.
The MPX+ bus retains MPX's 36-bit addressing lines, and is described as an interim measure. Don't expect dramatic leaps in SMP scaling - two will remain the sweet spot. The 7470 should scale to 1.5GHz. In parallel development, Motorola is priming a cut-down 7470, labelled the 7460, which doesn't support L3 cache.
In another report from Jan, 2002, MacCentral quotes Motorola on how the G4/Apollo chip still has a lot of life left in it:
It is important to note that this is only the first installment in this [G4] processor family. "The big news here is that this device is certainly not topped out," said Swearingen. Mac users can reasonably expect incremental performance increases from this processor family in the future, taking Apollo to its promised GHz+ performance levels.
While we'd like to tell you outlandish tales of teleporters and G6's... expecting true G5 processors "any day now" is setting yourself up for disappointment, based on available information. That being said, there were alternative rumors (Register), Architosh as well... and we'd love to be proved wrong.
Popular Stories
iOS 18.3 should be released to the public this week, following beta testing since mid-December. While the software update is a relatively minor one, it still includes a handful of new features, changes, and bug fixes for iPhones.
Below, we recap everything new in iOS 18.3.
Notification Summary Changes
Examples of inaccurate Apple Intelligence notification summaries
Apple Intelligence...
Apple is set to release iOS 18.3 next week, bringing further refinements to Apple Intelligence features, a couple of neat new capabilities to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 devices, and bug fixes.
While not quite as packed with new features as Apple's preceding iOS 18 point releases, iOS 18.3 still introduces capabilities that aim to make your iPhone smarter and more intuitive. Below, we've...
iOS 18.3 is expected to be widely released next week, and that means the first iOS 18.4 beta for iPhones should be just around the corner.
Apple has previously implied that iOS 18.4 will be released in April, as that is when it promised to make Apple Intelligence available in even more languages.
Below, we outline what to expect from iOS 18.4 so far.
Apple Intelligence for Siri
Siri ...
Walmart still does not accept Apple Pay or other NFC payments at its more than 4,600 stores across the U.S., and it stood firm on its reasoning for that today.
A spokesperson for Walmart today informed MacRumors that its position on contactless payments has not changed since we last reached out about the matter in 2022. The big-box retailer said it remains focused on its own convenient...
A new Apple TV is expected to be released later this year. In this article, we recap rumored features and changes for the device.
The next Apple TV will be equipped with Apple's own combined Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chip, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. He said the chip supports Wi-Fi 6E, which would be an upgrade over the current Apple TV's standard Wi-Fi 6 support. Wi-Fi 6E extends the...
Apple provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate version of iOS 18.3 today, and with it comes release notes confirming what's new. While we knew about several of the features that are in the update, there are some lesser known tweaks and bug fixes.
The update adds new Visual Intelligence features for iPhone 16 models, it tweaks Notification summaries on all...
The upcoming iPhone 17 models that Apple plans to release this year will not feature a smaller Dynamic Island, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said today.
On social media, he said that he is expecting the size of the Dynamic Island to remain "largely unchanged" across the iPhone 17 lineup. His statement is contrary to prior rumors that we've heard about planned changes for the iPhone 17 models.
...
Apple continues to explore the idea of releasing camera-equipped AirPods in the future, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Gurman only briefly mentioned the possibility of AirPods gaining tiny cameras, as part of his Power On newsletter intro this week, focused on Apple's future wearables ambitions. He did not explain what the cameras would be used for.
The tiny cameras would not be...
Apple's retail stores will be rolling out "merchandise/floor marketing updates" next week, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Gurman did not explicitly say if the store updates are related to any upcoming product announcements, but he did mention that next week is around the time that Apple rolls out its annual Black Unity watch band for the Apple Watch.
In each of the past four years, ...
