EE Times has published an interesting story on Motorola's RapidIO technolog y and its industry support gains. Of particular interest to Mac users wondering what ever happened to the G5 processor, the article reveals a comment by Moto that states the company can and does integrate any IO technology a customer asks for. David Perkins of Motorola when asked about Cisco's plans to adopt HyperTransport stated: "Motorola supplies a lot of silicon to Cisco. One of the advantages of PowerQuicc III is that we can integrate other IP [intellectual property] fairly quickly. If Cisco says they need a certain interconnect capability or some other specific technology, we have the capability to integrate that."

HyperTransport And RapidIO

In an Architosh story on the Moto chip code named Eleven (what was to be the G5) it was speculated that Motorola may have had difficulty "economically justifying developing a processor with a major architectural I/O component meant solely for Apple's use." Perksin's comment can be interpreted as contradicting that theory. However, we stand by that as a plausible reason for the falling out of the G5. Just because Moto states publicly that they can add HyperTransport to a chip for Cisco in lieu of or in addition to RapidIO does mean they can easily do this for the PowerPC line of processors. The PowerQuicc III is a networking processors product.

PowerPC Users and RapidIO

The article makes mention that in the networking chip world companies are deciding on RapidIO over HyperTransport not because of their like or dislike of any I/O technology but because of their preference for a particular processor. "Thus Cisco uses HyperTransport in part because it has chosen Broadcom and PMC-Sierra parts. Storage array maker EMC Corp. is said to be adopting RapidIO because it is a PowerPC user." Ericsson is also going to utilize RapidIO in its networking chip equipment.

Also in the article is a mention of the ability to use RapidIO to tie together the networking and computing worlds. Remarked senior analyst Eric Mantion at InStat/MDR: "It's the first high-performance bus that can connect a PowerPC with a communications controller like the PowerQuicc-or, in the future, a network processor like the C-Port-over a given chassis' control plane."

Back to Apple's Future Processors

Tying this back to Apple then, it appears perhaps the issue on choice of I/O technology to use for the ApplePI (Apple Processor Interconnect) may not have been the problem with the G5's development. If Apple insisted on HyperTransport as the high-speed medium for the G5 back in 2001, why would Moto resist that? One possible answer is that Moto wanted to prove that RapidIO had legs. But perhaps the real reason for the G5's untimely delay (is it permanent or is it just a long delay?) came down to manufacturing difficulties. In other words, the G5 would have had the same set of issues as the G4: the inability to scale the chip in frequency and performance.

Given everything we know about the G4's progress or lack thereof, we think that the latter problem was the real reason behind the G5's cancellation. Apple went to IBM to work on some high performance processors that the company could actually make. If you follow the IBM PowerPC news like we do you would know that IBM is now licensing processor IP and that this can extend to the PPC970/980 line. We take this to mean that Apple's elite hardware and processor engineers can essentially design a custom Macintosh processor around IBM's 970 core IP and utilize whatever proprietary ApplePI bus interconnect unit they like.

Apple Can Make Communication Systems Fly

The one thing that Apple's hardware engineering team has going for it is the ability to create market-leading high-speed communication buses: like FireWire 800. They also purchased Raycer Graphics's entire IP patents and their chief hardware wizard. It seems to us that Apple's options and abilities in regards to hardware design are extremely promising and open, and it is only a matter of time (after all the new IBM PowerPC 970/980 technology is relatively new) before they crank out a Monster Mac that takes back the performance crown and puts it where it rightfully belongs: on the head of superior OS technology.

Thanks Mark for pointing out the story on EE!