Being the caring and compassionate souls that we are, we still feel just a wee bit guilty about having inadvertently sent dozens of highly-strung Mac fans to their self-inflicted deaths by mentioning that there are a couple of people in this world who aren't sure that the Power Mac G5 will be done in time for WWDC. As restitution, we'd like to send our viewing audience (the segment that's still breathing, that is) hurtling into the weekend with a fresh supply of Hope on a Rope. It's the least we can do.

Actually, no-- the least we can do is sit around eating grapes and watching "Family Guy" on TiVo. And we could also opt to do harm instead of good by pointing at the grieving families of the deceased and giggling. So you have to admit, we're being pretty darn saintly, here.

So here's our good deed for the week: faithful viewer Bill Brown informed us of a CNET article which we're in turn passing along to you. It cites "sources" who claim that Apple plans to "discuss how it will incorporate HyperTransport, a rapid chip-to-chip communications technology, into future computers later this month at its developer conference." Yes, that's right, friends; contrary to popular belief, HyperTransport is not the name of Federal Express's new same-hour delivery service. Like the article says, it's actually a super-zippy chip-to-chip communications architecture that can move data at positively stupid rates of speed.

Now, the fact that Apple is going to stick HyperTransport into future Macs isn't really much of a revelation, seeing as the company became a founding member of the HyperTransport Consortium almost two full years ago, and the Apple logo is plainly displayed right on the consortium's home page. But the fact that HyperTransport can shuttle data between chips at the ridiculous rate of 12.8 gigabytes per second certainly implies that at least one of the chips involved in that transfer should actually be able to do something with a data stream that fast. According to noted authority Mr. Chip Guy, since HyperTransport would almost certainly be overkill for the current G4 processors available (whose processing pipelines, he claims, can be saturated by two tin cans and a piece of string), the implication is that if HyperTransport Macs are unveiled at the conference, they'll almost certainly have PowerPC 970s inside. (Note: Mr. Chip Guy is actually a hand puppet and has no credentials whatsoever.)

Then again, note that the article just says that Apple plans to "discuss" how it "will incorporate HyperTransport... into future computers," which we suppose you could interpret as meaning that Apple hasn't actually incorporated it yet into any computers that exist on this physical plane, and that HyperTransport and the 970 aren't going to come to the Mac until sometime well after-- No, wait, we didn't say that! Put down the pills! PUT DOWN THE PILLS!!

Ah, whatever. Where'd we put those grapes?