iMac very thin...when is powerbook going g5?

whitesaint

whitesaint

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Well we are all very pleasantly surprised at how the new iMac turned out. I myself am kind of shocked at how thin it is. They came out wit the PowerBook G4 a full year before the iMac went G4. And now the iMac has a PowerPC G5 in it, and now the question remains...if they were able to get a G5 in the iMac that thin...shouldn't the Powerbook G5 be on its way NeXT? I never thought they would be able to fit a G5 in such a small/thin space... but now we know the truth..i cant wait til the PowerBook goes G5...if and when it does, are we going to have the first 64 bit notebook too? or am i mistaken..? All feedback is welcome and appreciated thanks...
 
The new iMac is 2 inches thick. The current Powerbooks are 1 inch thick. To fit the G5 in the current Powerbook form would require halving the size of the iMac. Still a fair way to go IMO...
 
...and then you have the issue of the battery, a secondary lid and the keyboard and trackpad. Yeh, I think within a few months Apple could probably make an 10 to 12 pound Powerbook G5 at a about 1.75 inches, but I for one probably wouldn't buy it. I think we are still a good year away from seeing any form of the G5 in a similar size powerbook product that we have today.
 
its quite obvious (by the fact that the G5 has 12 fans and is liquid cooled) that the G5 has a serious thirst for electricity. that also means that its going to be about as easy to put a G5 in a powerbook as it is to stuff an elephant through a soda straw.
 
Why would the release of the G5 iMac, even at 2" thin (thick) have any bearing on when the PowerBook G5 is going to be released? Apple said not before next year, so it's gonna be next year -- iMac G5 or not, 2" thick or not, liquid-cooled or not, flat-screen or not, red or blue or not, or anything or anything not.

This is the same "PowerBook G5 when?" thread that's been posted here 43 times already by 43 different people.

As is being done with the iMac G5 threads, I think all future "PowerBook G5" threads should be combined and any new threads started on the PB G5 should be referred to the master thread and then closed.

Just my $0.02 -- you said all feedback is welcome!
 
Well to be honest.. I think apple already has a Powerbook G5 made or almost close to being made. It just will be release in about a year's time because we don't want to kill the market and overshadow the current powerbook g4 which was recently upgraded. If the Powerbook G5 was to be released any time soon it would make the efforts of the upgraded powerbook g4 in vain.
 
ElDiabloConCaca said:
Why would the release of the G5 iMac, even at 2" thin (thick) have any bearing on when the PowerBook G5 is going to be released? Apple said not before next year, so it's gonna be next year -- iMac G5 or not, 2" thick or not, liquid-cooled or not, flat-screen or not, red or blue or not, or anything or anything not.

This is the same "PowerBook G5 when?" thread that's been posted here 43 times already by 43 different people.

As is being done with the iMac G5 threads, I think all future "PowerBook G5" threads should be combined and any new threads started on the PB G5 should be referred to the master thread and then closed.

Just my $0.02 -- you said all feedback is welcome!
Click to expand...

I would say that the ability to create this iMac is a step towards the PowerBook. As far as we knew, the G5 needed that huge case and thermal zones complete with high speed fans to keep the machine cool. We then saw the Xserve, and when people said "wow, smaller form factor, we're getting closer to get it into a portable" the response was "sure, if you want a portable that has two large blowers in the front to keep it cool". We then see the water cooled G5's and people say that this is another step forward in being able to keep the G5 cool in small places, again, people laugh at the idea. With each version, we see less fan activity and we see machines running cooler and quieter.

Now we have an iMac G5. Its in a form factor that, if cooling wasn't proper, I'm assuming we'd see LCD screens melting in short order, yet Apple has kept a 1.8GHz G5 cooled properly in a 1.99" enclosure. Granted, its not as slim as the slightly-over-one-inch PowerBook G4, but its a lot better than what most people thought after seeing the G5 towers for the first time. It has a full sized SATA HD in it, from what I can see, which would be considerably larger than the newer laptop drives. Is the SuperDrive a laptop version or desktop version in this unit? I would also assume that Apple could have more flexability in cooling and acceptable component temperatures not having all those parts directly mounted behind the LCD, but 90 degrees away.

Does that mean that the PowerBook G5 is a week away? Of course not. Would I be shocked to see it before the holiday season? Not at all. Innovation is a great thing. Time and time again Apple has found a way to astound us all, why should we expect any less? I would think that the PowerBook G5 will be Apple's most impressive G5 yet. Not because its the newest, but because they know the emphasis that the computing world is putting on it. It's combining Apple's best assets. Anyone who uses a computer will admit that they'd love a PowerBook, or Apple portable. Everyone knows that the G5 is a beast. Apple realizes that this product will be put under a brighter spotlight than even the original G5 was.

When it comes, it comes and I have full faith it will be even better than we all expect.
 
I completely understand that getting the G5 chip to fit in a 2" enclosure is a big step forward, but it seems that people think that the iMac G5 was designed last week and built yesterday. The iMac G5, I can assure you, has been in the works for quite some time now, possibly more than a year or more. G5 PowerBook production isn't waiting to start until the iMac was released -- I'm sure they were/are designing both concurrently.

The enclosure of the iMac has nothing to do with the PowerBook, though. You can fit a G5 chip inside a matchbox and it'll run, as long as it's cooled sufficiently, and the iMac's design, while rectangular and thin, stops there when it comes to similarities with the PowerBook.

I guess I'm just trying to get at the fact that getting the G5 chip to fit in a 2" vertical enclosure does not further the production nor hinder the production of the PowerBook. It does nothing to the advancement of the PowerBook, since the designs are very different, and both use very different cooling systems.

The iMac is used in a "vertical" position, and hot air has a tendency to rise. The addition of small, low-rotational speed fans helps this process along, cooling the G5 enough for normal operation. We all know that the PowerBook isn't designed like this at all. You need a stronger fan, since you gotta take air in from the sides and expel it from the sides. Plus a whole lot more scientific stuff that I can't think of right now... ;)

At any rate, they look the same, but are radically different, and borrow very little from each other in terms of design.

Speaking of which, I'd like to ask a question now instead of being a pompous ass for once... hehe... since the G5 is different from the G4 (hell, none of the G4 chips required cooling like this bad boy does), do you think we'll see a redesigned PowerBook, or do you think Apple will try and keep the form similar to the PowerBook G4?
 
Well, Apple also is holding off on the release for a G5 powerbook to ensure the required quantities of the G5 chips start meeting the demand. Once they start building up some G5 chips (not before end of the year) then we will see the new Powerbook Q1 '05.
 
I'm _quite_ sure that the PowerBook G5 will not make use of either the PPC 970 nor the PPC 970fx. It'll need a lower-power chip. Sure, we don't want Apple to create a PowerBook that runs 2 hours at the max. and gets too hot, eh? With the current chips, I don't see the PowerBook happening just yet. But we never know... FreeScale's (Motorola) been saying that they'll bring out a 64bit chip (e700) line. Maybe we'll even see the PowerBooks using those instead of a lower-power IBM chip...
 
All very valid points and points that I had considered. It is very true that they couldn't use the same cooling system due to positioning and form factor, but with that said, finding creative ways to get that G5 chip into small form factors is an encouraging sign that they don't really need 65lbs of aluminum to give it enough space! :)

I believe the move to the Aluminum materials was in part to help with the cooling, but I doubt that's the end of the redesign. While looking at the PowerBook G4, in its current form, it has many G5-like attributes, the most notably being the speaker grating, which has a more G5-cooling like feel to it. The elimination of the white borders that the TiBook had, the more fluid design holding the screen to the body and so forth. The exact look for the PowerBook is a really tough one to pin point. On one hand, I believe Apple has a very sleek, elegant looking portable that is a dream to use. I hated portables until I started using the PowerBook series, now I can't live without it. On the converse side of that, this is Apple. I have to believe there are going to be some wholesale changes to distinguis the PowerBook G5 in a crowd and make people's eyes dialate just a bit when it's seen. Apple's biggest edges, for the average consumer, are their design and their distinguished looks. Steve and company will want people to see the new PowerBook G5 and say "oh wow, that's a PowerBook G5!", with no question in their mind. Its all part of the brand appeal. I mean, we all heard Apple talk about the benefits of the iMac G4's design and then break every one of those rules with the iMac G5.
 
Greg Joswiak, Apple’s VP of hardware marketing, would like to remind everyone that just because they came out with that new 2.2-inch thick iMac G5 yesterday does not mean there is a Powerbook G5 right around the corner. The Powerbook is still way thinner than the new ultraslim iMac, which means that ”The challenges of cooling a G5 in a Powerbook design are significantly greater”.
Click to expand...

mmkay?
 
As stated before, Apple somtimes announces machines, and sometimes they let it be a big surprise; however Apple has never said that there won't be a machine, then turned around and introduced one anyway. They've never misled us in that fashion, so when they say that the PowerBook G5 won't be here until 2005, then it most definitely will not be here until 2005.
 
Here's where its really at...

What about AirPort Speakers sold as an add on to the PowerBook G5? We all love our laptops and love our music, lets combine the two and make high quality speakers that have the technologies used in the AirPort express built into them, rather than having powered speakers plugged into an Airport Express at your desk. This way, you sit down and *bam* you have full, high quality sound without a cable going from your laptop to the speakers. Heck, the wireless could just simply be built into the power adapter for the speakers, if they want to fudge it a bit. The difference will be that these speakers can play full sounds from the whole system, or you can disable sound from certain Apps through a preference list, so Entourage doesn't interrupt your 80's rock! :) This will also not provide wireless print sharing or network connections.

That's just a pure idea, nothing documented, but it would be a really cool, distinguishing feature of the PowerBooks. OH, and they have to make those speakers proprietary to Apple's OS X!
 
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