Motorola sources are now reporting that the first fully functional G4e prototypes to be demonstrated outside the company have recently rolled off the production line. Running at 600-700MHz, these processors sport more than double the performance of current G4s with a number of very attractive features: Deeper pipelines, allowing for higher clock rates (up to 1.2GHz) Initial clock rates ~650MHz-800MHz, with 1GHz projected at approximately five months after release. 256K on-chip Level 2 cache running at full processor speed on a 256-bit data bus, offering performance well in excess of current 1MB backside L2 caches. Backside Level 3 caches up to 4MB, running at half processor speed 64- and 128-bit MaxBus support Optimized for multiprocessing with direct processor-to-processor communications capabilities and full-speed cache sharing across CPUs Smaller, cooler, faster: .15 and later .13/.10 micron wiring processes Two additional Integer units, one additional Altivec unit. These same Moto sources had originally reported that fully functional G4es would likely not be available to third party developers (Apple, etc.) until June. It is much too early to draw major conclusions from this, but it does foster hope that Motorola is going all-out to introduce this revved-up G4 that may be the answer to many of today's clock speed and shrinking performance advantage woes. In fact, if progress continues at this rate, we may see the first G4e-based PowerMacs shipping this Summer, rather than the previously projected early-Autumn estimates.....