line of tower computers designed and manufactured by Apple

The Power Mac G5 was introduced on 2003.06.23 – the same day Intel officially unveiled the 3.2 GHz Pentium 4. In terms of increased clock speed, that means Intel had a 6.7% speed bump the same day that Apple announced a 40% improvement in clock speed (from 1.42 GHz to 2.0 GHz), allowing it to call the Power Mac G5 the world’s fastest personal computer at the time.

Apple is using the 64-bit PowerPC 970 processor from IBM, since Motorola abandoned its G5 development plans long ago. The PPC 970 is based on the same POWER CPU core as IBM’s supercomputers. .

Both the Power Mac G5 and the PowerPC 970 CPU were designed from the ground up to support symmetric multiprocessing (using two or more CPUs to run processes in parallel). The PPC 970 uses the same Velocity Engine instructions as the AltiVec engine in Motorola’s G4 processor, and it’s fully compatible with existing 32-bit software.

Specs (via Low End Mac)

• Announced: June 23rd, 2003 Shipped August 18th, 2003 Also introduced November 18th 2003: Dual 1.8
• Pram Battery: 3.6V 1/2AA
• Weight: 39.2 lb. (17.8 kg)
• See: Power Mac G5 Overview and Hardware Reliability (Article + MacinTouch 2006 Stats) .
• Known Compatible Ssds: Sandisk SSD Plus 2.5″ OWC Mercury Electra 3G/6G 2.5″ Older Intel SATA SSDs or legacy style SATA SSDs Crucial MX500 M.2 SSD + M.2 to 2.5″ SATA SSD Adapter (by IcyDock) Fanxiang , S&K , Drevo, and other Chinese AHCI style SSDs See: Adding SATA to your PowerPC Mac .
• Top-Tier Gpu Upgrades: ATI Radeon X850XT vs Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL .
• Modernizing Your Wifi: Add Wifi 4-Draft and Bluetooth 2.1 to your PowerPC Mac .
• Shipped: August 18th, 2003
• Also Introduced November 18Th 2003: Dual 1.8
• Model Identifier: PowerMac7,2 Apple Model Number: A1047 (EMC 1969) All Power Mac G5s shipped in Silver anodized Aluminum color
• Apple Model Number: A1047 (EMC 1969)
• Model Number: M9020 (1.6 GHz), M9031 (1.8 GHz), M9032 (2.0 GHz)
• Note: Only the 1.6 Ghz “Base” model maxes out at 4 GB RAM. 4 RAM slots total. .
• Wifi: antenna and connector for 802.11g AirPort Extreme card
• Power Supply: 450W (661-2903) for single CPU models, 600W (661-2904) for duals IEC 60320 C14 Inlet is used for power connection interface on all 3 models. See: Which Power Supply Works in My Power Mac G5?
• Power Mac G5 Reliability:
• L1I: = L1 Instruction Cache,
• L1D: = L1 Data cache
• ($1999): 1.6 GHz PowerPC 970 ,
• 1 Cpu: , 1 Core, 64-Bit, 800 MHz System Bus
• 2 Cpus: , 2 Cores, 64-Bit, 900 MHz System Bus
• Per-Cpu: 64 KB L1i, 32 KB L1d, 512 KB L2, 162x SIMD, AltiVec,
• ($2399): 1.8 GHz PowerPC 970 ,
• ($2999): Dual 2 GHz PowerPC 970 ,
• 122W Tdp: .
• 1.6 Ghz: 256 MB – 4 GB 333 MHz PC-2700 DDR SDRAM ~2.666 GB/s
• 1.8 Ghz And Up: 256 MB – 8 GB 400 MHz PC-3200 DDR SDRAM ~3.2 GB/s
• For ($1999 And $2399):
• (Optional): ATI Radeon 9800 Pro , 128 MB DDR SDRAM @~21.6 GB/s, R300, 256-Bit Bus
• ($2399+): 160 GB 7200 rpm Serial-ATA (SATA), Superdrive 4x (DVD-R/CD-RW) via ATA
• 1.6 Ghz Model Only: 3x Open-Length, 33 MHz 64-Bit PCI Slots in place of PCI-X slots
• Iec 60320 C14: Inlet is used for power connection interface on all 3 models.