The beginning of the end as we knew it. A mac pro with ipad chips. Can't wait.
Raid 0 of iPad CPUs and there you go - blaaaaaaaaazing fast rig
The beginning of the end as we knew it. A mac pro with ipad chips. Can't wait.
Of course. Intel's MacBook Air cloning strategy will backfire.
Nothing is going to kill a (big) tower in terms of versatility...Nothing is going to kill x64 in terms of performance
But this is all just a contingency plan. Apple will only switch away from Intel or x86 (I guess x64 actually) if they have something better.
The beginning of the end as we knew it. A mac pro with ipad chips. Can't wait.
Why? AMD's top of the line may not compete with Intel's top of the line, but their (significantly) cheaper processors beat Intel's much more expensive chips.
Problem is that CPU power consumption isn't all. Especially on something like the retina iPads, the screen is actually the biggest consumer of power. So an ARM processor may use only 5% of the power of an Intel processor, but that doesn't help that much if the computer with ARM processor still uses 80% of the power of a computer with Intel processor.
When a single ARM CPU is not enough, multiple will succeed!
The low power consumption of ARM opens the road for multiprocessor personal computers.
Like the previous multicore revolution, there would be a multiprocessor revolution in personal computers world.
And it seems that Apple was preparing to this for a long time: in example,
"Grand Central Dispatch" open-source technology developed by Apple for multicore systems
was designed with future in mind so that it would not be hard to extend this technology
on multiprocessor systems.
Since ARM CPUs have such a low power consumption, it is possible to put several of them to one machine. So, it's still valid.
What about bootcamp (which egged many people on moving to mac), professionals sector (which is increasingly neglected) ?
Intel continuously improves its cpu consumption, the firm offers a finer engraving at each generation (14nm is on the way), while their superiority in term of power over ARM architecture cannot be denied.
For example, here are some Geekbench results:
A6X: 1700
Mac Mini 2011 CPU : 8500
Mac Pro 2012 CPU: 25000
...
http://browser.primatelabs.com/mac-benchmarks
In addition, to compete with Intel and Samsung, Apple may have to produce his own CPUs, so is a purchase of TSMC possible?
Why? AMD's top of the line may not compete with Intel's top of the line, but their (significantly) cheaper processors beat Intel's much more expensive chips.
Really can't see why many people think Apple will switch to ARM tomorrow. Obviously a day can come that make sense, like switching to intel did. Obviously the day is not today or tomorrow, neither the article try to imply that.
Why would you have 8x quad core ARM CPUs (for example) when a single quad core x86 processor can accomplish the same level or performance?
8x4 = 32 physical cores ==> a much higher level of multithreading in this example
Nice to see someone posting a thoughtful response on this thread to counter all of the knee-jerk reactions. Seriously, people, do you not know that MS is also working at porting the full version of Windows to ARM? The best strategy in this business is to keep your options open, because things can change quickly. At some point, something will surpass Core technology, just as Core tech surpassed Netburst. If ARM surpasses Core, then it makes sense to have the capability to switch to ARM. That is not to say that Apple or MS must make the transition to ARM, or even that it will happen in the next 5 years, but if it is advantageous to do so, both OS makers want to have the ability to do it. And I suspect that ARM is not the only alternative processor technology that Apple and MS are working to port their systems to.I can see why people are freaking out here. After all to most this likely sounds like "Here, have a mac with the processor from an iPhone" but I think people need to consider a few things
1. This is a rumour: nothing else. Apple dabbles in a bunch of stuff they never end up using AND
2. Even if they do use it, it'll be DOWN THE ROAD.
People are reacting as if the next generation macs will have ARM processors in them which is ridiculous. The technology simply isn't there yet, it's not even close. This might become a feasible option by 2015 at the earliest (I'm no tech expert but just given where things are now) so I wouldn't freak out about it.
With that said, if apple does cripple itself in order to turn macs even more into iPad's then it will be the sad day where I give in and build a PC. I hate windows as much as anyone basically can but I need a computer with power; not mobile connectivity. If building my own and suffering through windows is the only way to get that I'll have no real choice.
That isn't a choice I expect I'll have to make though. Chances are if this ever does happen (big if) it will be down the road when the technology is strong enough to handle the load. Apple may not care about the mac as much as they used to but I don't believe they'll completely cripple their computers so that they work a bit better with their mobile devices.
Just get Asus or Gigabyte to put together a server class Motherboard based on the latest server based chipset, drop in the newest server CPUs