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APPLE GETS EXCLUSIVE USE OF 110MHz 601 FOR NEW 8100/110 POWER MAC (November 4th 1994) The advantages of being part of the PowerPC alliance were demonstrated yesterday when a new 110MHz Power Macintosh was announced - before IBM had announced a 110MHz chip. The Power Macintosh 8100/110 uses the 601+ processor, which is currently only sold at 90MHz and 100MHz speeds. An IBM spokesman said the company has no plans to make the 110MHz part generally available. "New PowerPC customers are more likely to be steered towards the 604", according to the spokesman. Apple has previously shown a 120MHz technology demonstration at trade shows. These demonstrations were notable for (a) how fast they ran applications and (b) how often the harassed Apple demonstrator had to point a cooling fan at the opened box. Often, it was not the actual processor that was overheating, rather the other components on the motherboard. The motherboard in the new machine is essentially the same as in the existing 8100/80, apart from some Nubus enhancements, according to Apple. By choosing 110MHz, and including a processor-cooling fan, the company should avoid these overheating problems. No doubt IBM's yields of 110MHz chips are substantially greater than 120MHz parts.
The new machine is expensive. The 8100, configured with a 2GB hard disk, 256kB L2 cache and a skimpy 16Mb of RAM costs $6,379 (œ4,899). The price shoots it straight out of the PC market and into the workstation sector. In pricing it outside the range of the usual Macintosh buyer, Apple is positioning the machine as a premium technology for those businesses who simply must have the extra power and don't care too much about the cost. In the words of the company, it is aimed at the "most demanding computer users such as professionals in publishing, multimedia and engineering."
Not only is the box expensive, it is also in short supply at the moment. The 8100/110 is available now, "in limited quantities" in the US, the UK and a few other regions, including the Pacific Rim. Apple could not say whether today's limited availability is due to a shortage of processors or its own manufacturing ramp-up. The machines are expected to be shipping in volume in December.