by , 12:30 PM EDT, October 19th, 2005

Apple on Wednesday used its pre-PhotoPlus Expo 2005 press conference to introduce the Power Mac G5 Quad, which uses a pair of dual-core 2.5GHz G5 processors with dual Altivec Velocity Engines in each. The company added dual-core processors across the line-up, with the single-processor 2.0GHz and 2.3GHz models simply known as Power Mac G5 Dual.

Apple also increased the new Power Macs' L2 cache to 1MB and noted that they support up to 16GB of 533MHz DDR2 SDRAM and up to 1TB of storage. In addition, the company added PCI Express to the new machines and included a second Gigabit Ethernet port, which it said is aimed at users working in an Xsan environment, for example. Each computer includes three open PCI Express slots: two four-lane slots and one eight-lane slot.

Each of the new Power Macs feature one FireWire 800 port, two FireWire 400 ports, four USB 2.0 ports, two USB 1.1 ports, optical and digital audio input and output and support for AirPort Extreme and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR. Apple also added its new Mighty Mouse across the line-up.

Four NVIDIA video cards also debuted with the new Power Macs: the GeForce 6600 LE, with 128MB Video RAM; the GeForce 6600, with 256MB RAM; the GeForce 7800 GT, with 256MB RAM; and the Quadra FX 4500, with 512MB RAM and a stereo 3D port for connecting goggles for stereo-in-a-window applications. The last two models are build-to-order options. All of them support Apple's 30-inch Cinema Display, which has been reduced to US$2,499.

The Quadra FX 4500 video card can drive two monitors, including a pair of the 30-inch Cinema Displays. Apple noted that any of the new Power Macs can accomodate two of those video cards, which means users can now run four displays from their machines.

Apple will ship the Power Mac Quad in early November; the other computers are available now. The $1,999 2.0GHz Dual comes with 512MB RAM, a 160GB hard drive, the NVIDIA GeForce 6600 LE video card and a 16X SuperDrive with double-layer support. The $2,499 2.3GHz Dual ups the hard drive to 250GB and comes with the NVIDIA GeForce 6600 video card. The $3,299 dual-processor 2.5GHz Quad is the same as the mid-range model, except for its processor complement and their speed.

1:30 PM, EST: This story has been updated with additional information from Apple; original source: Engadget.