The hearts and minds of Many Mac professionals are focused on August with Apple’s announcement Monday of the Power Mac G5, the new PowerPC 970-equipped behemoth that will be available in dual-processor configurations at clock speeds up to 2GHz and with features heretofore unrealized on the Mac. Until then, users interested in one of Apple’s G4-based pro desktop systems will find their choices more limited than before, although bargain hunters may find some deals.
Up until Apple’s Monday announcement, users had three basic flavors of Power Mac G4 to choose from: A single-CPU system clocked at 1GHz and dual-processor boxes clocked at 1.25GHz and 1.42GHz respectively. Those systems were introduced in January, alongside Apple’s 20-inch Cinema Display. Today, you’ll still find three configurations of Power Mac G4 for sale at the Apple online store, although they’re all clocked at 1.25GHz.
Apple’s new entry-level $1,299 Power Mac G4 features a single 1.25GHz CPU, and comes equipped with 1MB L3 cache, 256MB DDR333 SDRAM, an 80GB Ultra ATA hard drive, a CD-RW/DVD Combo Drive and ATI Radeon 9000 Pro graphics card — a speed bump of 250MHz and cost savings of $200 compared to its predecessor.
Apple also has a new custom-built mid-range Power Mac G4 available, offering dual 1.25GHz processors, 2MB of L3 cache per processor, 256MB DDR333 SDRAM, 80GB Ultra ATA drive, Combo Drive, and ATI Radeon 9000 Pro graphics, for $1,599.
The similarly custom-built high-end machine comes with dual 1.25GHz G4 chips, 2MB L3 cache per processor, 2GB of DDR333 SDRAM, 2 160GB Ultra ATA hard drives, a DVD-R/CD-RW “SuperDrive,” and Nvidia GeForce4 Titanium graphics, for $3,274.
As both the mid-range and high-end dual-processor 1.25GHz systems are custom built at the Apple online store, you’ll find that prices and configurations on these systems may vary if you purchase them through independent, authorized Apple resellers.