"IBM said its new PowerPC chip would go into production late next year and process 64 bits of data at a time at 1.8 Gigahertz." Hm. That's a long time to wait for something that really should be out on the shelves in time for this Christmas.... It's really painful to have to wait for something so yummy....

The cool thing here is the fact the the chip will run both 32 bit and 64 bit chunks without emulation. This means that exisiting softwre could be ported over to it rather painlessly. It's also altivec based, too. As to waiting a year, i don't think it's too long for apple to go from a 32 bit 1.25 ghz processor to a 1.8ghz 64 bit one. I've waited longer for less in the past...

wow...when that happens I might have to move to a mac. That is pretty sweet.

Thanks John H for that excellent summary! Do I get a mirror 2 x 1 Ghz, or do I wait???? Will my 400 hang in for another year??????? Decisions.......

john h -- thanks for the info, although i could only follow about 20 percent of it. while people are thinking about what to buy: if past performance is any indication, the first Macs with a new chip aren't to be trusted. remember the Yikes model G4? even the current G4s have problems with fan noise, logic boards, etc., and they don't represent anything like the kind of quantum leap (and entirely new architecture) that the first Macs with these new chips will. so if your speculative timeframe is right and the first superfast 64-bit-crunching Macs come on the market in the fall of 2003, the first reasonably stable superfast 64-bit-crunching Macs won't be out until early spring 2004. obviously we're deep into the realms of the speculative here, but anyone who's planning major purchases based on today's news reports would be wise to do a little informed speculation.