$2.539

Well, quad Apple cores, specifically.

Today, Apple announced the machine I was expecting to hit the streets soon: a dual-core, dual processor PowerMac. This box is amazing, with the new dual-core 2.5Ghz G5 processors, and loads of good stuff. My configuration would include 8Gb RAM, a 30″ monitor, and all the goodies I could stuff in there. That’s about $8k — not cheap, and something that can’t happen for some time.

They also announced an upgrade to the resolution of the panels on the 15″ and 17″ PowerBooks. I still wouldn’t mind ending up with a PowerBook someday, to replace the Gateway I’m typing on right now. However, I wanna see if they can cram the G5 processor into the chassis, or if they’ll move to Intel before making a big upgrade to the hardware platform. I think that’s a nice box, and the 17″ model is as light or lighter than my 15″ Gateway. Again, a cool box, but probably a little underpowered compared to the AMD 64 I’m using now. A big difference, of course, is that OS X can use the 64-bit processor, which Windows and the apps I run on it cannot take advantage of.

The last cool announcement is a new piece of code called Aperture. This is a software tool designed for photoediting, and appears to be targeted as a Photoshop-killer. The cool thing — at least from the announcement — is that it is designed for handling RAW photos as part of the workflow, rather than having to go through a conversion step first. That is extremely cool, and could be a big change to the workflow for a lot of us that shoot in RAW.

Neat stuff, and maybe a glimpse of where I may be in the future….