Okay, so what now?

[salterbomb]

i originally asked about the 970 chip and when it would be on sale and was told that it probably wouldn't be out til next year at the earliest. well now the MacRumors site is saying that they will be available in june. should i wait a month and see if they will come out or should i go ahead and get the dual 1.42 powermac?

[Tim Dorr Veteran]

I dunno. I'd be fairly split on the issue too, but to be honest, I think now is an ok time to buy. Sure, you might be outdated in just a few months (probably more like half a year, though), but I think not having a mac all that time wouldn't be as fun :)

Plus, it's not like the machine you're looking at will be a slow box when the 970's come around. It just won't be the fastest :)

[Diata]

i would personally wait through june

[wtmcgee]

even if you can get it in june, it probablly will be SLOWER than a g4 right now, because so many things are optimized in 10.2 just for the g4.

10.3 will most likely have a ton of support and optimizations for the 970s. the first generation adopters of the new chips, whenever that may be, will most likely see no improvement over a DP g4 machine.

if you need a good, stable machine in the next 6 months, get a g4. if you can hold off till the end of the year or so, wait for the 970s.

[Dazzla Veteran]

10.3 is being shown in June 23-27, if that has optimisations for the 970 it will goddamn rock!

Wouldn't hurt wating 5 or so weeks, unless you deadly need the machine now.

[salterbomb]

well here's my dilemma:

i am going to upgrade my PC to an uber-PC around Q3-Q4 of 2004 and you know how much that will cost. i would like to have at least a year to save up that money so that's why i want the mac now. however, if all i have to wait is a month or so to get a new gen mac then i'll wait. if i gotta wait til november-december for one i'll get one now.

so what do you guys think?

[DrunkenMaster]

Assuming IBM is also going to make them 970s for their workstations or lower end servers, I don't think they have the quantity right now to serve themselves let alone a 3rd party as well as the QA testing.

[frod]

making your pc uber eh? that won't cost you more than $1000. unless you're buying things like monitors.

start saving your money now. it's not going to make a difference when you buy your mac if you are just saving more and more money. personally, from now on, if i want a mac product, i'm going to wait until they release the next update to the line before i buy. i probably would have gotten a 17" pbook if i had done this recently. oh well

[salterbomb]

when i make my pc uber i am going to buy top of the line parts for everything. so i guess uber expensive.

[wtmcgee]

i doubt they'll SHIP in june. my guess is they'll announce the new 970s in the high end powermacs and xserves, and they will most likely ship when 10.3 comes out. just a guess, but that seems to be how apple does things nowadays with releases. build the hype for the new item before it's done, then ship it out later when it's actually ready..

[Dazzla Veteran]

Yeah, even if they show the 970 in June (which I'm still sceptical about :( ) then you won't be able to buy the 970 in June. Expect August at the very earliest.