The Mac Observer

Skip navigational links

Featured Article: Podcast - Apple Weekly Report #125: iPhone Expansion, NBC and Zune, Apple's Eco-stance

Apple Bumps Power Mac G5 to dual 2.7 [UPDATE]

by , 8:55 AM EDT, April 27th, 2005

Apple Computer announced a bump in the Power Mac G5 product line Wednesday, bringing its professional Mac offering to dual 2.7GHz, up from 2.5 GHz. As suggested by Amazon's accidental posting of the upgrade on Tuesday, the high end model now comes with 512 megabytes of memory with a faster 16X SuperDrive, and 250 gigabytes of hard drive space.

The dual 2.7 GHz model also features a front-side bus of 1.35 GHz, which can provide data bandwidth of up to 21.6 giga bits per second. The high-end unit comes with an ATI Radeon 9650 video card with 256MB DDR SDRAM and support for one 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Display.

"The Power Mac G5 continues to deliver the ultimate performance for our most advanced customers running bandwidth- and compute-intensive applications," Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, said in a statement. "With dual 2.7 GHz 64-bit G5 processors, dual 1.35 GHz front side buses, ATI Radeon 9650 graphics, 16X SuperDrive with double-layer support and Mac OS X Tiger, the new Power Mac G5 is the most powerful and advanced Mac we have ever made."

Apple will also be offering a dual 2.0 GHz and a dual 2.3 GHz model, making three dual processor models in the product line. Both of these models will include the ATI Radeon 9600 with 128MB DDR SDRAM, the 16X SuperDrive, and 160GB and 250GB hard drives respectively.

A single processor 1.8 GHz unit is still being offered, as well, with a starting price of $1,499.

A new built-to-order option for all three units is the NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL high-performance graphics card that can drive up to two 30" Cinema Displays with the single card. This option is priced at $450 at the Apple Store.

All three units will ship with Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger," which ships this week on Friday, April 29th.

The three new configurations are as follows:

The Power Mac G5, with a suggested retail price of $1,999, includes:

  • Dual 2.0 GHz 64-bit PowerPC G5;
  • 512MB 400 MHz DDR SDRAM (4GB maximum);
  • 160GB Serial ATA 7200 rpm hard drive;
  • AGP 8X Pro graphics slot;
  • ATI Radeon 9600 with 128MB DDR SDRAM;
  • 3 PCI slots (64-bit 33MHz); and
  • 16X SuperDrive (DVD+R DL/DVD±R/CD-RW).

The Power Mac G5, with a suggested retail price of $2,499, includes:

  • Dual 2.3 GHz 64-bit PowerPC G5;
  • 512MB 400 MHz DDR SDRAM (8GB maximum);
  • 250GB Serial ATA 7200 rpm hard drive;
  • AGP 8X Pro graphics slot;
  • ATI Radeon 9600 with 128MB DDR SDRAM;
  • 3 PCI-X slots (one 64-bit 133 MHz, two 64-bit 100 MHz); and
  • 16X SuperDrive (DVD+R DL/DVD±R/CD-RW).

The Power Mac G5, with a suggested retail price of $2,999, includes:

  • Dual 2.7 GHz 64-bit PowerPC G5;
  • 512MB 400 MHz DDR SDRAM (8GB maximum);
  • 250GB Serial ATA 7200 rpm hard drive;
  • AGP 8X Pro graphics slot;
  • ATI Radeon 9650 with 256MB DDR SDRAM and support for one 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Display;
  • 3 PCI-X slots (one 64-bit 133 MHz, two 64-bit 100 MHz); and
  • 16X SuperDrive (DVD+R DL/DVD±R/CD-RW).

You can find more information on the Power Mac G5 product line at Apple's Web site, and you can find pricing on the units at the Apple Store.

Apple also dropped the price of its 20" and 23" Cinema Displays Wednesday.

Observer Comments

Show: Subjects Only | Full Comments
Close Name:Intruder -   TMO Mac Specialist Posts: 2843 Joined: 07 Jul 2004
Subject: Hmmmm...

I wonder if the 7 machines I ordered (BTO thru a purchaser) last Thursday will be bumped up? Shipping time was estimated at 7-10 days when I ordered. Maybe it will be in the queue for the new hardware.

View Name:RealityCheck -   Troll Posts: 392 Joined: 06 May 2004
Subject: Wow! .2GHz Faster, Where's The 3GHz Steve Promised
Close Name:jcbeckman Posts: 55 Joined: 06 May 2004
Subject: Not all Duals

"making the entire Power Mac G5 product line dual processor"

The 1.8 Single is still available.

Close Name:macnut Posts: 52 Joined: 28 Jul 2004
Subject:

The prices haven't changed. What are you talking about??

Quote
RealityCheck wrote:
Sorry iLemmings no 3GHz for you. Also notice the 33% price increase in the base Power Mac to $2K. Since Apple Power Mac sales have collapsed, Apple strategy is to extract the maximum dollars from the Macbots who don't know any better.

Close Name:Biff Posts: 1479 Joined: 08 Apr 2004
Subject:

Looks like the liquid cooling is still around for the high end machine.

View Name:Guest
Subject: Looks like the doorknob fixed his error.
View Name:Guest
Subject: Reality Check
Close Name:Wings Posts: 85 Joined: 30 Mar 2004
Subject: RC - Go Back To School

RC, you need a little education on what "overclock" actually means. To quote WikiPedia, "Overclocking is the practice of making a component run at a higher clock speed than the manufacturer's specification. The idea is to increase performance for free or to exceed current performance limits, but this may come at the cost of stability." 2.7GHz IS IBM's spec for speed for these parts, so they are not being "overclocked". Also, the 2.7's won't be a cause for instability - we'll leave that for your Windoze box.

Close Name:donovan Posts: 23 Joined: 24 Jan 2005
Subject:

Why is it anti-MAC people even post here? A life is in order perhaps?

Close Name:squintbro Posts: 241 Joined: 23 Jul 2002
Subject: RC not too far off track

RC is right about this being a very small speed increase. At least the prices are the same. The big problem with these small updates are that it seems everyone gets way too excited when the Apple store is down for an update.
I'm sure Dell Computer does a 200 MHz speed increase on one of their systems, and it goes un-noticed. Apple has the same increase, and it brings moans from the collective masses that it's not enough.
We Mac users just need to relax a bit, since most of us don't use the fastest Powermac available anyway.

View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: speed is relative
Close Name:allanimal Posts: 28 Joined: 18 Apr 2005
Subject: Interesting...

At the German apple store, the 2.0 GHz powermacs have PCI-X slots. Wonder which one is right, hopefully the German store.

Close Name:fultonkbd Posts: 121 Joined: 02 Mar 2004
Subject: Usually

Quote
Guest wrote:
- "He who has the gold, makes the rules".


Unfortunately, that is usually the case. Be it Microsoft or others.

View Name:Guest
Subject: Reality Check is Jealous!
View Name:Guest
Subject: Don't feed the trolls
Close Name:Bryan -   TMO Staff Posts: 7325 Joined: 11 Jun 2001
Subject: Re: Not all Duals

Quote
jcbeckman wrote:
"making the entire Power Mac G5 product line dual processor"

The 1.8 Single is still available.


Thanks for the note. The story was corrected with the updated information.

Bryan
Editor
TMO

View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: fair point
Close Name:Small White Car Posts: 1937 Joined: 02 Jul 2004
Subject: Re: fair point

Quote
Anonymous wrote:

3. not enough hard disk space? go buy that Lacie 1TB Raid - it's external firewire 800, so guess what, it's portable as well


This reminds me, something that's been ignored by most people is that the internal SATA drives are now available up to 400 GB.

That means you can order this thing with 800 GB of internal space. I was someone who was hoping for more drive bays, but I have to say that short of that happening, this is pretty cool!

View Name:Guest
Subject: one more thing
View Name:Guest
Subject: RC Posting = Apple Success
View Name:Guest
Subject: Radeon X800 XT mac versus the 9650
Comment on this Article


You cannot edit your comments.   You cannot delete your comments.
Log in | Register | Having Problems? Reset TMO Cookies & Try Again
Username:   Password:   Log me on automatically each visit   

You are not logged in, and this post will appear as "Guest." Log in with your username and password from the TMO forums. If you do not have a username, you can register here.
Please note that guests are limited to including a maximum of two URLs per post.


Post A Comment
  Subject


  Your Comments



Please enter the word exactly as you see it in the image above. Registered users aren't prompted for this. Having trouble reading the image get a new one.


Recent Headlines - Updated Friday, May 16th, 2008

Fri., 8:00 PM
iPodObserver - Dr, Danger, Brickfilms, Narnia and More
5:10 PM
StrangeCharm - Explosions and Debris (Week of May 12)
4:15 PM
TMO's DealsOnTheWeb.com - 8GB iPod Touch: $229 Delivered
3:35 PM
Safari Suffers from "Carpet Bomb" Issue
2:55 PM
iPodObserver - Barack Obama's Smartphone of Choice
2:35 PM
Parallels Releases Update for Vista SP1 and XP SP3
1:00 PM
iPodObserver - AT&T: Back to Three iPhone Limit Per Customer
12:55 PM
Mac Gaming News - Macgamestore Intros Agatha Christie: Peril at End House
10:35 AM
Hot Forum Topic - The iPhone's Growing Global Reach
10:05 AM
Unparsed - I found Those Missing iPhones!
9:45 AM
Fone2Phone 2.01 Improves Performance, Cell Phone Support
9:20 AM
Apple Scores 2 Black Pencils at D&AD Awards
8:40 AM
Yahoo to Icahn: Get a Clue
8:05 AM
iPodObserver - Orange Gets Europe, Middle East, Africa iPhone Deal
7:30 AM
TMO Quick Tip - Quick Look: Web Archives
 

The Mac Observer Reader Specials

Apple Stock Quote

  • AAPL: $187.6201. Change Today: -2.1099.
  • (Prices delayed up to 20 minutes.)
  • Discuss in our Apple Finance Board

Hot Topics

Top Deals From DealsOnTheWeb