Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[Michael Moy]

> Explains why Apple is waiting for Merom before
> they transition their PowerMac G5 lines to Intel
> processors, while the G4 based laptops are getting
> upgraded this month.

Well I explained that part last year. As I said, you
wouldn't go from a 64-bit PowerMac Quad-Core G5 system
with 16 GB of memory to a dual-core 32-bit system based
on the Pentium M. Especially when power consumption is
not an issue for the market.

> But like in Apple's case, people are going to be
> concerned less about the lack of 64-bits in their
> laptop than in any other mainstream PC market.

Perhaps with the exception of the 17 inch Powerbook.
I know people that bought these things for video
rendering that bring them into the office and do video
rendering while they're doing their regular job. And
there have been complaints for quite some time that
there wasn't a G5 processor available. So there is a
demand out there for 64-bit capability.

BTW, there's nothing stopping companies like Panorama
from implementing larger supported image sizes on a
32-bit machine. But the engineering work and cost is
high. It's a lot easier just to say go buy a 64-bit
machine and you're all set than it is to do the
reengineering work.

I still don't see a compelling reason for dual-core on
laptops for the average office user unless it's free.
I certainly could make use of it (I've been running my
current laptop for the last two weeks doing builds and
dual-core would help though a 20% faster processor would
probably help just as much as there's a bunch of single-threaded stuff along with the multithreaded stuff
and I do run benchmarks from time to time where a faster
processor is an advantage.