New PowerMac G4, has a fan???????

[whitesaint]

I was up at Comp USA not too long ago checking out the new G4 Towers. And oh man are they gorgeous, but it has a fan. Does anyone know why Apple put fans in it's top models when they havnt had fans for so long?? All feedback is welcome and appreciated, thanks

-whitesaint

 

[endian]

the towers have always had fans - noisy ones too... only the iMac & cubes didn't have them.

with all the stuff you can pack into that case, it has to have a fan, or some kind of active cooling system.

 

[whitesaint]

okay i know ur real smart endian and i envy you, but this somewhat surpasses a common sense question. Doesn't the size of the computer matter how much heat it generates, and call me crazy, but i would think that a smaller computer would generate alot more heat than a larger one. So the smaller ones dont have fans but the bigger ones do....im confused

 

[endian]

The size of the computer might be a factor in airflow, but the amount of heat it generates depends on the amount of stuff inside it that's generating heat (common sense enough for ya? )

Apple knows the heat output of everything that'll ever be inside an iMac or Cube, because except for RAM, you aren't supposed to be adding anything to it. With a tower, Apple has no idea - 4 73GB SCSI drives plus an Orange Micro Pentium card (if they still make them) will increase the heat output significantly

Also, I just thought of this, the cooling really depends on the airflow rate. With the smaller cases it's easier to get a quick enough airflow using only convection. That'd be alot harder in the wide open spaces of the tower case.

I do hope the next case is quieter WITHOUT sacrificing accessibility. My G4 is the noisiest Mac I've ever had, even without the vibrator disease.

 

[whitesaint]

ah i see now thanks for clearin that up for me

 

[tagliatelle]

I'm sure that a computer without fan is nice, and such computers don't brake the bank.

 

[l008com]

Yeah my new G4 HAS that vibrator desiese!! Does anyone know how I can stop my girlfriend from sitting on my Mac?

 

[scruffy]

The trick to get iMacs cooled is that the monitor is directly over the motherboard. All the heat from the monitor draws a lot of air up past the board. Also, G3s don't generate much heat.

The Cube could do without a fan because of a couple of things:
a)External power supply. Possible because you couldn't put anything in there to suck up extra power. If three hard drives try to spin up all at once, or some such thing, you need the power supply much closer to the action.
b)Low clock speed. What do those run at, about 400 MHz? Not all that fast, anyway. With G4s running at 8-900 MHz now, Apple has had to make the heatsinks on those things absolutely huge, just to keep them cool without their own fan right on top of the chip.

Who knows, maybe the G5 will need its own CPU fan. Then the days of forgetting wether or not you turned off the computer will be well and truly over...

Personally, I'd really go for a computer, (lower power & lack of expansion would be OK) that could run without a fan, but also do two monitors. Like an iMac that could do more than just video mirroring.

 

[scruffy]

Originally posted by l008com
Yeah my new G4 HAS that vibrator desiese!! Does anyone know how I can stop my girlfriend from sitting on my Mac?

Yeah, let her see that post. Never have her around the house again.

 

[AdmiralAK]

I wish they still made pentium cards
I would buy up a P4 or AMD one right away lol (image all the OS fun I would have )


Admiral

 

[sheepguy42]

Originally posted by scruffy
The Cube could do without a fan because of a couple of things:
a)External power supply. Possible because you couldn't put anything in there to suck up extra power. If three hard drives try to spin up all at once, or some such thing, you need the power supply much closer to the action.
b)Low clock speed. What do those run at, about 400 MHz? Not all that fast, anyway. With G4s running at 8-900 MHz now, Apple has had to make the heatsinks on those things absolutely huge, just to keep them cool without their own fan right on top of the chip.

Yes, the external power supply helps A LOT, but it's not the 450-500 mhz speeds that help so much as the elegant design-note that the 400-500 mhz towers also needed a fan. As for that elegant design, if you look at a cube, its outer clear plastic case holds the whole computer 1-2" above the surface it's sitting on. there is an opening in the back for cords- and airflow. the air gets pulled up through the heat sink out the vent in the top by the heat generated by the processor, much like how you described the cooling of the iMac. The Cube is best described as a scaled-down G4 with an outsourced power source wrapped around a heat sink.

 

[l008com]

''Who knows, maybe the G5 will need its own CPU fan. Then the days of forgetting wether or not you turned off the computer will be well and truly over..''

Dude, my old dual 533 has its own CPU fan, a fan in the power supply and a huge fan blowing on where the PCI cards go.

Even the really old dual 500's had one in the power supply and a giant one blowing on the cards.

Macs have always had fans.... the imac and cubes were the first with out.

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

I think by the phrase, "need it's own CPU fan," they meant something similar to what Pentiums do -- with a small fan attached to the heatsink solely meant to draw air through the heatsink and dissipate heat created solely by the processor. You can actually install one on your G4 processor for about $4, with one of those thin, tiny computer fans they sell at Radio Shack and significantly reduce the amount of heat generated by your processor.

I think Apple has accomplished this, as well as cooling off the PCI cards by installing that vacuum-like, monster fan you described. But, as clock speeds go up, heat goes up, and that fan may not suffice in cooling off the processor. The future G5s may need this increased airflow concentrated around the processor to adequately cool it off and prevent it from overheating.

 

[sheepguy42]

Originally posted by l008com
Dude, my old dual 533 has its own CPU fan, a fan in the power supply and a huge fan blowing on where the PCI cards go.

You're calling the dual 533 "old". lol. Dude, I got a 450 Cube, what I wouldn't give to have a dual processor machine, esp. 533 or (dare I dream) 800.

 

[tagliatelle]

Electronics need cooling, so the new locomotives in Belgium are very noicy (compaired with earlier). These locomotives are easier for the traincompany but not good news for the health from the passengers when they are in the station.