Well, whenever we hear about an upcoming chip improvement from Motorola, we feel a little like someone's trying to sell us some time-share swampland in Florida-- but sometimes the best thing for one's sanity is just to close one's eyes, take a deep breath, and put the pessimism back on the shelf. Prolonged exposure to extreme megahertz deficiency is extremely hazardous to one's mental well-being, and so the occasional indulgence in a bit of unbridled (and probably unjustified) optimism is just what the doctor ordered. Thank heaven, then, for faithful viewer Milo Auckerman's eagle eyes; he pointed out that everyone's favorite PowerPC scapegoat is listed in the lineup for Microprocessor Forum 2000, the Macworld Expo of the chip world. Better yet, Motorola's scheduled to disclose details about a "GHz+" G4, meaning that the company known throughout Cupertino as "Slo-Mo Moto" may finally breach the 1000 MHz barrier soon after all.

Now, we know that some of you are skeptical because you've come to the conclusion that, as far as PowerPC development is concerned, Motorola is no more likely to compete with Intel and AMD on the clock speed issue than Larry Ellison is likely to swear off yachts and that bad-guy-in-Die-Hard facial hair. But you may be interested to hear that the "whopping big dose of go-juice" Motorola's injecting into its chips is none other than silicon-on-insulator technology from fellow PowerPC-maker IBM. You remember IBM, right? The folks who are building licensed Altivec-enhanced G4s for Apple because Motorola couldn't keep up with the demand? The ones who are rumored to have current G4 designs running at up to 650 MHz but aren't allowed to ship them because Motorola's afraid of looking even more incompetent? Yeah, them. Sounds like Motorola's not afraid to borrow a trick or two from Big Blue, and that's clearly a Good Thing.

It's almost like the AIM alliance is acting like, well, an alliance! Since Microprocessor Forum is slated to begin on October 10th, it sounds like there is in fact a chance that we'll see commercially-available Motorola-built G4 chips with significantly higher clock speeds before the end of the year. Of course, there's also a chance that an all-Chee-tos diet can cure syphilis, but we wouldn't bet on it. Still, the news that Motorola's embracing more of IBM's innovations is a hopeful sign. Back in May, IBM did say that an SOI-enhanced processor would be used in an Apple "portable device" in 2000-- so perhaps that long-awaited PowerBook G4 might make it onto a few Christmas lists after all. Think positive.