Future of the PPC? (970, 980, 990, 9900)
The following information is from an unconfirmed and anonymous source. As such, authenticity is always uncertain, but due to the content of the piece, was felt to be of sufficient interest for publishing. Of interest, MacBidouille has posted similar (but fewer) details in their unconfirmed rumors of the PPC's timeline. This information below may represent corroboration -- or simply a common source. Take, as with all rumors, with an appropriate amount of skepticism.
Apple and IBM have been working on parallel development of the Power5 and PPC 980. The PPC 980 is a single core version of the Power 5. While prototype forms of this chip exist, it is almost a year away from shipping in Macs.
Improvements in the PPC 980 include Hyperthreading, eLiza error correction, and more massive parallelism. IBM's implementation of hyperthreading provides a 30% gain over Intel's. eLiza technology will reduce the bottlenecks when the branch prediction unit fails. Altivec will split into 3 pipelines (vs 2 in the 970), 4 Integer and 4 Floating point units. 980 will have to be built on a 90nm processor due to heat dissipation requirements.
Steve's comment of 3GHz in 1 year will not be accomplished with the G5 (970) - which will top out at 2.6-2.8GHz. The PPC 980 will start at speeds of 2.6-3GHz and top out around 4.5-5GHz. The G5 will make its way into PowerBook lines in Jan/Feb, Xserve's later this year, and iMacs in approximately one year.
Marklar's project size has decreased, but remains ongoing. There are four generations of the PowerPC including and beyond the 970 that are in development and planning. Besides the 980 chips (targetted at end of 2004), there are plans for 990 chips on a 65nm process in 2005/2006 @ 6GHz and scaling up to near 10GHz. Beyond this, the PPC 9900 starting on a 45nm process is targetted in 2007/2008 starting at 9-10GHz and reaching up to 20-25GHz by 2010-2011.
Popular Stories
iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max, iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max, and iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max models feature a LiDAR Scanner next to the rear camera that can be used to measure a person's height instantly in Apple's preinstalled Measure app.
To measure a person's height, simply open the Measure app, point your iPhone at the person you want to measure, and make sure they are visible on the screen from...
Apple in late October began testing iOS 16.2 and iPadOS 16.2 updates, providing betas to both developers and public beta testers. As of now, we've had four total betas, with the fourth beta having been released earlier this week. iOS 16.2 and iPadOS 16.2 are expected before the end of the year, and we thought we'd try to narrow down the launch timeline.
With only four betas released since...
The next-generation MacBook Pro models could feature faster RAM, according to a recent report from a reliable source.
MacRumors Forums member "Amethyst," who accurately revealed details about the Mac Studio and Studio Display before those products were announced, recently provided information about Apple's upcoming 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro models. The new machines are expected to feature...
Apple plans to publicly release iOS 16.2 for the iPhone in mid-December, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. The update remains in beta testing for now, with at least eight new features and changes already uncovered so far.
iOS 16.2 introduces a number of new features, including Apple's new whiteboard app Freeform, two new Lock Screen widgets for Sleep and Medications, the ability to hide...
Mass shipments of Apple's long-rumored AR/VR headset may be delayed until the second half of 2023 due to unspecified "software-related issues," according to the latest information shared today by tech analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
Apple headset render by Ian Zelbo Kuo said mass shipments of components for the headset are still likely to begin in the first half of 2023, but he believes that mass...
With the launch of iOS 16.1, Apple rolled out a Emergency SOS via Satellite, which is designed to allow iPhone 14 owners to contact emergency services using satellite connectivity when no cellular or WiFi connection is available. The feature was put to the test in Alaska today, when a man became stranded in a rural area. In the early hours of the morning on December 1, Alaska State Troopers ...
While we're still around nine months away from Apple unveiling the iPhone 15 lineup, rumors already suggest that the higher-end Pro models will have even more exclusive features than usual compared to the standard models next year.
There are currently at least five features rumored to be exclusive to iPhone 15 Pro models:A17 chip: iPhone 15 Pro models will be equipped with an A17 Bionic...
With Black Friday and Cyber Week shopping events winding down and the calendar flipping over to December, our attention is starting to turn to 2023 and all of the Apple news we're expecting to see.
This week saw an alleged benchmark leak for an "M2 Max" chip expected to make an appearance in upcoming Macs like the MacBook Pro early next year, as well as fresh rumors about the iPhone 15...
Google is continuing on with its attempt to convince Apple to adopt the RCS messaging standard, publishing a new "it's time for RCS" blog post. Promoted heavily by Google, RCS or Rich Communication Services is a messaging standard that is designed to replace the current SMS messaging standard.
It provides support for higher resolution photos and videos, audio messages, and bigger file sizes, ...
Due to production issues at Apple supplier factories in China, the iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max are backordered and basically out of stock at every store. If you were planning to gift or receive an iPhone 14 Pro model for the holidays and didn't already get one, you're basically out of luck because they're gone until late December.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more ...
