G5-Optimized Mathematica to Be Released

July 1, 2003--Wolfram Research is actively working on a G5-optimized Mathematica 5. An early-development version was previewed by Theodore Gray, Director of User Interfaces for Wolfram Research, during Steve Jobs's WWDC 2003 keynote on June 23.

Gray joined Jobs onstage at an hour and forty minutes into the talk to demonstrate a computationally intensive operation performed simultaneously in Mathematica on both a G5 and a Windows PC machine. Mathematica for the G5 is ideal for when you have "deadlines where you need an answer today, not next week," said Gray. Viewers were able to see that the G5 completed the calculations in less than half the time of the PC, "without breaking a sweat," added Jobs.

Wolfram Research is also planning to release an upgrade to Mathematica 5 after the G5 is shipping in volume but does not yet have a firm release date. The upgrade will be free to Premier Service subscribers on request.