abrooks
Oct 23, 07:18 AM
You do know that you'll be getting a US-formatted keyboard and AC adapter, yes?
Worth it, he could end up saving several hundred pounds!
I always by my portables in America.
Worth it, he could end up saving several hundred pounds!
I always by my portables in America.
rovex
Apr 19, 11:31 AM
Finally! An iMac rumor!!!!
desktops are slowly but surely dying out. Notebooks are becoming more and more powerful and even moreso portable so what will an iMac offer that MacBooks won't have? Larger screen?
desktops are slowly but surely dying out. Notebooks are becoming more and more powerful and even moreso portable so what will an iMac offer that MacBooks won't have? Larger screen?
aiqw9182
Mar 24, 02:27 PM
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8F190 Safari/6533.18.5)
Don't fall for anandtechs crap. Those tests where designed to make Intels GPU look good. The minute you do anything demanding the GPU falls flat on it's face. By this I mean turn on all the latest features to get the best on screen results.
For many other reasons I don't consider anandtech to be a credible web site. It has become an extension of Intels marketing team. A lot of people don't want to hear that but there is a trend in the articles that indicate that they have become a fan site and have lost the ability to report objectively.
Lol, OK BRO. They were designed to make the Intel GPU look good? That's pretty hilarious. Then you post a video of you comparing the 320M and Intel 3000 under OS X playing Starcraft 2 and tell me your results that prove those benchmarks wrong.
With only a couple months difference in release date, Sandy Bridge is a bad purchase.
Yeah, because we all know how lovely AMD's desktop processors have been. :rolleyes: Let alone their mobile processors. The only thing they have going for them is their price. If you want a better processor, buy Sandy Bridge. If you want a better GPU, buy Llano. Or just buy a Sandy Bridge machine with a discrete GPU that take a crap all over both the Llano and Intel's IGP. Stop with your unreleased AMD propaganda.
Don't fall for anandtechs crap. Those tests where designed to make Intels GPU look good. The minute you do anything demanding the GPU falls flat on it's face. By this I mean turn on all the latest features to get the best on screen results.
For many other reasons I don't consider anandtech to be a credible web site. It has become an extension of Intels marketing team. A lot of people don't want to hear that but there is a trend in the articles that indicate that they have become a fan site and have lost the ability to report objectively.
Lol, OK BRO. They were designed to make the Intel GPU look good? That's pretty hilarious. Then you post a video of you comparing the 320M and Intel 3000 under OS X playing Starcraft 2 and tell me your results that prove those benchmarks wrong.
With only a couple months difference in release date, Sandy Bridge is a bad purchase.
Yeah, because we all know how lovely AMD's desktop processors have been. :rolleyes: Let alone their mobile processors. The only thing they have going for them is their price. If you want a better processor, buy Sandy Bridge. If you want a better GPU, buy Llano. Or just buy a Sandy Bridge machine with a discrete GPU that take a crap all over both the Llano and Intel's IGP. Stop with your unreleased AMD propaganda.
lordonuthin
Mar 5, 06:22 PM
this is for F@H right? im keen to start up with my numerous amounts of computers.
where do i start? everything is all console based :(
oh wait its an installer thingo.. it wants a key hekp1
You can start here (http://folding.stanford.edu/), ask questions if you need any help or faster - google your question. It's a learning process but most people don't have any problems. AND thanks for joining the team (3446) that is.
Remember to set the machines so they don't sleep ... :p
where do i start? everything is all console based :(
oh wait its an installer thingo.. it wants a key hekp1
You can start here (http://folding.stanford.edu/), ask questions if you need any help or faster - google your question. It's a learning process but most people don't have any problems. AND thanks for joining the team (3446) that is.
Remember to set the machines so they don't sleep ... :p
KnightWRX
May 2, 06:13 PM
Never said anything about cooperative multi-tasking.
iOS is not cooperative multi-tasking. It's fully pre-emptive.
I know it is, unfortunately, the userspace APIs don't allow 3rd party apps to profit from that. You can't just write code and hope the process scheduler will happily deal with you (as any modern, pre-emptive OS scheduler does). No matter what, your apps gets sent messages to suspend itself and the frameworks are built in a way that if you don't intercept these to "background" certain tasks using a certain limited API to do so, the defaults kick in and you get sent to oblivion.
It's pre-emptive cooperative multi-tasking if you will. It's limiting. This is a "Truck" OS. I don't need limits on truck. If I wanted limits, I'd drive a car, to use the Steve analogy. ;)
I'm talking about intelligent pre-emptive multitasking with API's that allow the Apps to make intelligent decisions removing the burden from users to "clean up" after apps they have launched but aren't using.
Apps aren't intelligent (artificial intelligence ain't quite there yet). If I have apps open, there's a reason and I want them to stay open. I'm not CPU/memory limited enough to warrant dumping these to some kind of swap space and prevented from sitting in their idle loop, waiting on their input.
Taking control away from the user is in the end dumbing down the experience. This is what most folks are afraid of with all these features.
I'm talking about Apps that are, to the user, ALWAYS instantly available in exactly the same state that they left them in.
They can only be instantly available if they stay resident in RAM. If they are swapped out, then they need to be swapped back in.
iOS is not cooperative multi-tasking. It's fully pre-emptive.
I know it is, unfortunately, the userspace APIs don't allow 3rd party apps to profit from that. You can't just write code and hope the process scheduler will happily deal with you (as any modern, pre-emptive OS scheduler does). No matter what, your apps gets sent messages to suspend itself and the frameworks are built in a way that if you don't intercept these to "background" certain tasks using a certain limited API to do so, the defaults kick in and you get sent to oblivion.
It's pre-emptive cooperative multi-tasking if you will. It's limiting. This is a "Truck" OS. I don't need limits on truck. If I wanted limits, I'd drive a car, to use the Steve analogy. ;)
I'm talking about intelligent pre-emptive multitasking with API's that allow the Apps to make intelligent decisions removing the burden from users to "clean up" after apps they have launched but aren't using.
Apps aren't intelligent (artificial intelligence ain't quite there yet). If I have apps open, there's a reason and I want them to stay open. I'm not CPU/memory limited enough to warrant dumping these to some kind of swap space and prevented from sitting in their idle loop, waiting on their input.
Taking control away from the user is in the end dumbing down the experience. This is what most folks are afraid of with all these features.
I'm talking about Apps that are, to the user, ALWAYS instantly available in exactly the same state that they left them in.
They can only be instantly available if they stay resident in RAM. If they are swapped out, then they need to be swapped back in.
boxandrew
Sep 6, 06:22 PM
Yes. I want rentals. I almost never want to see the same movie again, so I won't want to store it.
Rentals are what I would use. At a sufficiently low price, of course. $2 for close to DVD quality would be OK. (I'm less picky about rental quality than purchase quality.)
Seems a lot of people are agreeing with this. If they don't have a netflix style rental model then I can't see myself using the movie store at all. If they do have rentals, then I'll say bye-bye to netflix the same day.
Having read all the rumours, I'm not holding out much hope... :(
Rentals are what I would use. At a sufficiently low price, of course. $2 for close to DVD quality would be OK. (I'm less picky about rental quality than purchase quality.)
Seems a lot of people are agreeing with this. If they don't have a netflix style rental model then I can't see myself using the movie store at all. If they do have rentals, then I'll say bye-bye to netflix the same day.
Having read all the rumours, I'm not holding out much hope... :(
cderalow
Jan 11, 08:47 PM
That's a nice Si. Don't believe I've ever seen one in that color. My friend had an '08 Si sedan for about 7 months or so, but had to get a 4WD for work. His was black. It was a BEAST! He put a Skunk2 catback on it and a Weapon R intake and I swear, that thing would scream. It sounded like a Ferrari. :eek: I miss it.
Galaxy Gray Metallic
He's also rocking rims from an acura tsx
my current family ride:
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4070/5154868167_07b8e86d15.jpg
2007 Honda CR-V AWD EX-L
though, likely to be trading to a 2011 Honda Odyssey EX-L in a bit to support the expanding family
Galaxy Gray Metallic
He's also rocking rims from an acura tsx
my current family ride:
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4070/5154868167_07b8e86d15.jpg
2007 Honda CR-V AWD EX-L
though, likely to be trading to a 2011 Honda Odyssey EX-L in a bit to support the expanding family
ethernet76
Sep 6, 10:47 AM
i agree. i would never buy a computer that didn't have a dvd burner....and i'd never advise someone else to either
Remind me to never ask you for computer advice.
The parents bought a top of the line g4 iMac back when superdrives were 2x.
They still haven't used the superdrive to burn a dvd.
Remind me to never ask you for computer advice.
The parents bought a top of the line g4 iMac back when superdrives were 2x.
They still haven't used the superdrive to burn a dvd.
bagelche
Apr 12, 10:28 PM
Wow, looks like the rumours WERE true after all! Apple killed the Pro of Final Cut Pro. That guy who turned the much admired iMovie into garbage has done it again. All they had to do was rewrite the engine with 64 bit support, had proper file handling, rendering titling tools amongst other necessary pro features and keep the same F*&$#@*&& interface as pro users of ANY pro software don't want to re-learn an interface for no reason! It takes YEARS before you really know a software under the hood.
We'll now see FCPx turn into a hit with amateurs and will be completely abandoned by pro users who will all return to avid.
Yawn...'cause if it ain't kludgy, it ain't pro.
We'll now see FCPx turn into a hit with amateurs and will be completely abandoned by pro users who will all return to avid.
Yawn...'cause if it ain't kludgy, it ain't pro.
bushido
Apr 26, 02:21 PM
well we all know who really controls the goverment and everyone involved ... companies. so whoever throws more money at them is obvs gonna win
celo48
Apr 3, 07:56 AM
I like the ad. At least it does not end like this.
"If you don't have an iPad, then you don't have an iPad."
"If you don't have an iPad, then you don't have an iPad."
macnews
Nov 15, 03:09 PM
Any one have an idea how this might affect OSX server usage? I am starting the process of looking to add another X serve and while I like the Woodcrest numbers I see, will Clovertown be a huge impact?
I normally run AFP, Mail, FTP, web services, LDAP and want to add QT streaming server along with some new features in Tiger which I hope get improved upon in Leapord.
My gut says 8 cores would give some performance improvements but I'm sure other's out there know more than I....
I normally run AFP, Mail, FTP, web services, LDAP and want to add QT streaming server along with some new features in Tiger which I hope get improved upon in Leapord.
My gut says 8 cores would give some performance improvements but I'm sure other's out there know more than I....
MikhailT
Apr 10, 10:35 AM
I don't understand why everyone seems to dislike the "new" iCal so much. Clearly, it was adopted by iPad iOS at first and now by Mac OS X Lion. Nothing new here. Nothing unexpected.
I don't remember people disliking/complaining about the iCal look on iPad at all. I tell ya, people complain just for the sake of complaining. What a crowd. :rolleyes:It doesn't look exactly the same on the iPad and an interface tuned to iOS shouldn't be used in the same away on the desktop. You can be creative with the interface controls and so on but this is too far. The colors are too distracting and much *brighter* than the one used on the iPad.
The problem that I have is that Apple seems to breaking away from their Human Interface Guidelines that every developers on the Macs platform follows. The sooner they do this, the more likely the third party apps are going to not follow it either. If every apps looks completely different, then it's going to be harder to get used to how things work on the Mac platform. Consistency is the number 1 thing that Mac OS X does successfully and if we break away from it, it's going to look ugly overnight.
I don't think people are complaining for the sake of complaining, in this case, they have a valid reason to. Not only is it look completely different, it can be distracting when you're used to all metal theme on OS X and you can't choose to disable this interface.
IMO, it's distracting, ugly and I want an option to turn this off. Otherwise, I'd just wait for a third-party app with a better interface and/or hacks to enable the *Aqua* theme.
I don't remember people disliking/complaining about the iCal look on iPad at all. I tell ya, people complain just for the sake of complaining. What a crowd. :rolleyes:It doesn't look exactly the same on the iPad and an interface tuned to iOS shouldn't be used in the same away on the desktop. You can be creative with the interface controls and so on but this is too far. The colors are too distracting and much *brighter* than the one used on the iPad.
The problem that I have is that Apple seems to breaking away from their Human Interface Guidelines that every developers on the Macs platform follows. The sooner they do this, the more likely the third party apps are going to not follow it either. If every apps looks completely different, then it's going to be harder to get used to how things work on the Mac platform. Consistency is the number 1 thing that Mac OS X does successfully and if we break away from it, it's going to look ugly overnight.
I don't think people are complaining for the sake of complaining, in this case, they have a valid reason to. Not only is it look completely different, it can be distracting when you're used to all metal theme on OS X and you can't choose to disable this interface.
IMO, it's distracting, ugly and I want an option to turn this off. Otherwise, I'd just wait for a third-party app with a better interface and/or hacks to enable the *Aqua* theme.
4God
Sep 6, 12:15 PM
LIMITED SUPPLY of Merom for the first few months. mini will be the last to get C2D probably in November. But you've gotta give kudos to Apple for adopting the Merom Spec Yonahs into the mini right away. This way the switch to Merom in mini can be almost silent with no disruption to the flow of minis to the market.
Looks like it is still Yonah for now:
http://www.macrumors.com/images/macrumorsthreadlogo.gif (http://www.macrumors.com)
Apple has updated the Mac Mini to include all Core Duo models. Other than the processor upgrade, there does not appear to be any differences between the previous Mac Mini and today's release. The Mac Mini is available in two offerings:
1.66 GHz Mac Mini
60 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Combo Drive
1.83 GHz Mac Mini
80 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Superdrive
Both models feature:
-2MB Shared L2 Cache
-512 MB 667 MHz DDR2 RAM standard (up to 2 GB supported)
-GMA 950 Integrated graphics
-1 Firewire 400, 4 USB 2.0
-Optical Digital/Analog Audio In/Out
-Gigabit ethernet
-Airport Extreme and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR standard
Of note, the Mac Mini still uses Core Duo (Yonah), not the more advanced Core 2 Duo "Merom" chip found in today's iMac announcements (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/09/20060906091309.shtml).
Looks like it is still Yonah for now:
http://www.macrumors.com/images/macrumorsthreadlogo.gif (http://www.macrumors.com)
Apple has updated the Mac Mini to include all Core Duo models. Other than the processor upgrade, there does not appear to be any differences between the previous Mac Mini and today's release. The Mac Mini is available in two offerings:
1.66 GHz Mac Mini
60 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Combo Drive
1.83 GHz Mac Mini
80 GB 5400-rpm SATA Hard Drive
Superdrive
Both models feature:
-2MB Shared L2 Cache
-512 MB 667 MHz DDR2 RAM standard (up to 2 GB supported)
-GMA 950 Integrated graphics
-1 Firewire 400, 4 USB 2.0
-Optical Digital/Analog Audio In/Out
-Gigabit ethernet
-Airport Extreme and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR standard
Of note, the Mac Mini still uses Core Duo (Yonah), not the more advanced Core 2 Duo "Merom" chip found in today's iMac announcements (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/09/20060906091309.shtml).
coder12
Apr 19, 11:14 AM
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)
One step closer to a MBA refresh.
One step closer to... every refresh? :)
One step closer to a MBA refresh.
One step closer to... every refresh? :)
UberMac
Jan 1, 07:18 PM
To tell you the truth, unless some better sourced rumors surface I think it may very well be a disappointing keynote.:(
I hope I'm wrong.
So just because there are no rumors makes the Keynote a failure by default?! :eek: :p If you ask me, it makes it all the more exciting - we won't actually know what is coming for once!
Uber
I hope I'm wrong.
So just because there are no rumors makes the Keynote a failure by default?! :eek: :p If you ask me, it makes it all the more exciting - we won't actually know what is coming for once!
Uber
No ice please
Nov 27, 06:46 PM
http://www.thinkgeek.com/images/products/zoom/e66e_iphone_case_with_keyboard.gif
Can't wait for it to get here!!!
Can't wait for it to get here!!!
Alexjungle
Apr 20, 02:33 PM
iMacs will have the new i9 sandy beach chip, 3G and retina display.
twoodcc
Dec 14, 09:32 PM
Thanks.
I was over at kakaostats and saw there is someone new this week "elena" (http://kakaostats.com/usum.php?u=1604130), up only since tuesday and they already have over 4M points! Must be an institution with a wicked fast cluster? Some serious players out there...
hey thanks for that link. i didn't know about kakaostats. nice
You are #103 cruncher for the whole project, whao!
And actually #1 and #2 are default user, not real...
Impressive.
Can't wait for Gulftown Mac Pros and SMP2 (maybe 60k PPD with one machine?).
yeah i'm just worried about the price of those new mac pros.
Thanks!
The Gulftowns, SMP2 and GPU3 will make for an impressive bump in PPD I hope. It will be interesting to see, I'm hoping some overhead will get cleaned up as well.
I wonder what companies besides Apple will get their software ported for Grand Central/OpenCL in the next year? Lots of potential there.
yeah i think we all are ready for smp2 and gpu3. should help us all really
Do far grand central/open cl has done nothing for mac users...
so far, yes. but hopefully soon that will change
I was over at kakaostats and saw there is someone new this week "elena" (http://kakaostats.com/usum.php?u=1604130), up only since tuesday and they already have over 4M points! Must be an institution with a wicked fast cluster? Some serious players out there...
hey thanks for that link. i didn't know about kakaostats. nice
You are #103 cruncher for the whole project, whao!
And actually #1 and #2 are default user, not real...
Impressive.
Can't wait for Gulftown Mac Pros and SMP2 (maybe 60k PPD with one machine?).
yeah i'm just worried about the price of those new mac pros.
Thanks!
The Gulftowns, SMP2 and GPU3 will make for an impressive bump in PPD I hope. It will be interesting to see, I'm hoping some overhead will get cleaned up as well.
I wonder what companies besides Apple will get their software ported for Grand Central/OpenCL in the next year? Lots of potential there.
yeah i think we all are ready for smp2 and gpu3. should help us all really
Do far grand central/open cl has done nothing for mac users...
so far, yes. but hopefully soon that will change
Eric5h5
Mar 25, 05:21 PM
30fps is far from "silky smooth", but that's still pretty cool.
--Eric
--Eric
iStudentUK
Mar 28, 02:34 AM
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8F190 Safari/6533.18.5)
A complete douche, I'd say.
Why is he a douche? Because he uses metaphoric language? He seems like a qualified high level guest. And he didn't say "US European Command". YOU are the one who introduced those "2 letters". I'm just quoting what he said.
Considering that the US sent like 100 tomahawks or whatever out of like 102, or something like that... And the US also has an "air field" there too. Not only in nearby countries, but a huge mobile one! Not to mention large fleets of intercontinental bombers. How do you know he's exagerating? You have a personal recon satelite overlooking that area? :rolleyes:
You are very selective with your figures- both the French and Italians also have carriers in position, the US didn't send all but two of the missiles. The French sent the first planes in and as far as I know are the only nation to have engaged Libyan planes.
Like I said, about 50% of the planes involved are US. Which makes sense as the US has a bigger airforce than France/UK (and the rest of the coalition) which is what you would expect from a country with many more people!
Perhaps it us you that doesnt like the fact that the US isn't the only real player here? The US, France or UK could do this whole thing alone- it isn't that big an operation! Or perhaps, as firestarter points out, you don't like the idea of US working as NATO currently headed by a Canadian?
This is a true coalition with all sorts of countires involved, and we should be happy about that.
A complete douche, I'd say.
Why is he a douche? Because he uses metaphoric language? He seems like a qualified high level guest. And he didn't say "US European Command". YOU are the one who introduced those "2 letters". I'm just quoting what he said.
Considering that the US sent like 100 tomahawks or whatever out of like 102, or something like that... And the US also has an "air field" there too. Not only in nearby countries, but a huge mobile one! Not to mention large fleets of intercontinental bombers. How do you know he's exagerating? You have a personal recon satelite overlooking that area? :rolleyes:
You are very selective with your figures- both the French and Italians also have carriers in position, the US didn't send all but two of the missiles. The French sent the first planes in and as far as I know are the only nation to have engaged Libyan planes.
Like I said, about 50% of the planes involved are US. Which makes sense as the US has a bigger airforce than France/UK (and the rest of the coalition) which is what you would expect from a country with many more people!
Perhaps it us you that doesnt like the fact that the US isn't the only real player here? The US, France or UK could do this whole thing alone- it isn't that big an operation! Or perhaps, as firestarter points out, you don't like the idea of US working as NATO currently headed by a Canadian?
This is a true coalition with all sorts of countires involved, and we should be happy about that.
dornoforpyros
Oct 23, 07:55 AM
oh don't worry kids, they WILL be released tomorrow because I just bought on saturday :P
deputy_doofy
Jul 19, 04:42 PM
This is actually the general trend in the computer market since the rise of
portables against desktop machines. Portables are becoming increasingly
powerful (computational-wise) up to the point that the line between them
and Desktops is blurred.
Agreed. I love my dual-proc G5, but a little more than a year later, I still find myself using my PB G4 more simply because it's with me almost all the time. That said, I'll be buying a nice, little portable monster (MPB w/C2D) to rival my G5. :D
portables against desktop machines. Portables are becoming increasingly
powerful (computational-wise) up to the point that the line between them
and Desktops is blurred.
Agreed. I love my dual-proc G5, but a little more than a year later, I still find myself using my PB G4 more simply because it's with me almost all the time. That said, I'll be buying a nice, little portable monster (MPB w/C2D) to rival my G5. :D
ffakr
Nov 26, 09:29 PM
Ah, I see... But then again, you have more config options if you talk to one of Apple's business consultants and you can configure an Xserve with no drives if you'd like. Not sure what else the prior cluster node configurations had though, I guess I was unaware of their existence -- never saw them on the site, but I didn't really look.
I wasn't aware you could buy an XServe with no drives. It's odd for vendors to ship devices that can't be bench tested as is (unless Apple remote boots them on the line).
One of my big complaints with the XServe is that you don't get empty drive sleds if you don't order Apple drives. Apple ships covers for the un-used drives and you don't get the drive sleds unless you buy an expensive module from Apple.
Another complaint, Apple uses SMART but they don't support SMART on drives other than those that ship in XServes. The drives have to have Apple approved firmware. We bought 80GB modules and upgraded to nicer 300GB models (cheaper OEM even with a spare on the shelf compared to Apple's 250s) and the XServe won't read the SMART data from the drives.
The whole point of the XServe Cluster Node was to leave the frills out, like the drive bays and drives, so that you can get the most bang for the lowest buck. If Apple does go back to a cluster node, they'd likely drop the dual PowerSupplies also since a cluster node can go off line without pulling down a cluster.
A few bucks doesn't seem like much until you start pricing 40 or 100 or even 1000 compute nodes and then $300ish per machine becomes real money. I've got a group that has funds for a $300,000 cluster next year (and no money for additional IT ;-). Even if you dropped $250,000 on compute nodes and the rest on infrastructure you're looking at 50 nice compute nodes (at 5K apeace). Drop $300 per node and you've got another free $15,000. On a tight IT budget, that's a lot of money. Hell, my most metrics that's a lot of money.
I'm actually not looking to buy an Apple server for the small project I mentioned earlier. I need something with guaranteed Debian Linux support (or SuSe at the very least). I do want to go Core2Duo or Core2Quatro since we have tight thermal requirements and price/performance is a huge issue.
I wasn't aware you could buy an XServe with no drives. It's odd for vendors to ship devices that can't be bench tested as is (unless Apple remote boots them on the line).
One of my big complaints with the XServe is that you don't get empty drive sleds if you don't order Apple drives. Apple ships covers for the un-used drives and you don't get the drive sleds unless you buy an expensive module from Apple.
Another complaint, Apple uses SMART but they don't support SMART on drives other than those that ship in XServes. The drives have to have Apple approved firmware. We bought 80GB modules and upgraded to nicer 300GB models (cheaper OEM even with a spare on the shelf compared to Apple's 250s) and the XServe won't read the SMART data from the drives.
The whole point of the XServe Cluster Node was to leave the frills out, like the drive bays and drives, so that you can get the most bang for the lowest buck. If Apple does go back to a cluster node, they'd likely drop the dual PowerSupplies also since a cluster node can go off line without pulling down a cluster.
A few bucks doesn't seem like much until you start pricing 40 or 100 or even 1000 compute nodes and then $300ish per machine becomes real money. I've got a group that has funds for a $300,000 cluster next year (and no money for additional IT ;-). Even if you dropped $250,000 on compute nodes and the rest on infrastructure you're looking at 50 nice compute nodes (at 5K apeace). Drop $300 per node and you've got another free $15,000. On a tight IT budget, that's a lot of money. Hell, my most metrics that's a lot of money.
I'm actually not looking to buy an Apple server for the small project I mentioned earlier. I need something with guaranteed Debian Linux support (or SuSe at the very least). I do want to go Core2Duo or Core2Quatro since we have tight thermal requirements and price/performance is a huge issue.