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Apple Considering Switch From Intel Chips in Future Macs
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Maybe they want to pay more for quality? It's kinda weird how the Mac/PC line of thought gets flipped around when you get into the high end.
What? Are they gonna quit making movies or something?
What's wrong with buying chips from another company and having them extremely popular? Why do they need to make their own and have them be incompatible?
That 12 core is using outdated first generation core i7 technology. It also has like half the memory bandwidth and is clocked lower. You may think the workstation market is gone for apple, but for the rest of the world it still is a very important segment. Apples workstation options have always been lackluster and had poor sales. Thats because they don't know how to build the support and pro level environment to go with them. They don't offer enterprise support, no onsite service and they don't update it nearly enough. Companies do not want to pay the same price for when it first came out for 3 year old technology.
Also keep in mind that the 4999.99 system you quoted is a 16 core system. Look at the cpu count. It says 2-8 cores hence why it costs so much. Trust me it completely tramples the mac pro in cpu power and memory speed.
HP still offers that same CPU options so it's not correct that there is no interest. I'm fully aware that it's one generation old architecture but it comes in at a nicer price point. Enterprise has never been Apple's market, at least not significantly so, I believe they do offer support for their pro applications (at least they used to).
what you're saying is valid, its speculation, its all 'could' which makes it just as likely as what i said could happen - it could be the tipping point of not having the best computers, but having the best consumer computers along with best mobile devices.
the rest of what you're saying, simply underlines what i already said - yes, apple became a new apple once they started getting outside of computers in their products. and it made them alot of money, but apple as a whole is having a change of heart process it seems - pro is not priority. the best computers may be losing priority next. apples priority since 2010 has been consumers. not pros.
apple are leaving behind it seems, the company to make the best computers, no updated mac pro's, no pro- innovations in the OS, its all just consumerfied.
apple is split between making the best computers, and making the best mobile devices. they could keep making the best of both, but if there isnt a cpu architecture or design that supports 1 unified OS to run on macs and idevices, and they end up pushing the uniformity despite, then MAC at this point, is likely to suffer. and this should be no surprise - because PRO is not apple priority like it used to be.
its now about market and numbers.
Jury's still out, IMO ...
I'll be honest... something kinda bummed me out about the switch to Intel, because that essentially turned the Mac into just another PC clone (if an elegantly designed one, pre-loaded with a superior OS).
I really think the PPC could have been superior to the Intel CPUs if IBM really got behind it 100%. Instead, it became clear they weren't really willing to put much R&D money into the processor ... and were mainly interested in selling a bunch of them to power XBox game consoles at the time (which weren't going to keep coming out every 6 months with new revisions with faster CPUs inside).
Apple got the shaft on that, so they had to switch to Intel to keep moving forward. There's nothing really saying it's impossible to design a better CPU than what Intel offers though. It's just not something you can do in an instant. I'd buy a Mac with a custom Apple processor in it, if it was optimized for OS X and was really a better performer. I don't think such a thing can possibly be ready right now though.... Maybe in a few more years?
I'll be honest... something kinda bummed me out about the switch to Intel, because that essentially turned the Mac into just another PC clone (if an elegantly designed one, pre-loaded with a superior OS).
I really think the PPC could have been superior to the Intel CPUs if IBM really got behind it 100%. Instead, it became clear they weren't really willing to put much R&D money into the processor ... and were mainly interested in selling a bunch of them to power XBox game consoles at the time (which weren't going to keep coming out every 6 months with new revisions with faster CPUs inside).
Apple got the shaft on that, so they had to switch to Intel to keep moving forward. There's nothing really saying it's impossible to design a better CPU than what Intel offers though. It's just not something you can do in an instant. I'd buy a Mac with a custom Apple processor in it, if it was optimized for OS X and was really a better performer. I don't think such a thing can possibly be ready right now though.... Maybe in a few more years?
If people haven't noticed by now: Microsoft's Windows RT is written for ARM processor and is on sale today with all day battery life.
I for one, am happily trade some performance for all day battery life for my ultra portables (a.k.a Macbook Air). Desktop, on the other hand, is fine the way it is.
I for one, am happily trade some performance for all day battery life for my ultra portables (a.k.a Macbook Air). Desktop, on the other hand, is fine the way it is.
I could care less if Apple used their own chipsets, but just as long as they offer different models, especially Intel processors. I won't purchase any Mac EVER again if I don't see Intel CPU installed. Not even AMD can convince me to their band wagon when they are practically a few years behind in performance and technology. If Apple does happen to use their technology, I better expect cheaper price tags by $300 or more, since Intel CPUs cost about $200+, depending on model.
I mean use a completely different architechture than things widely used across all computers. It just seems like it's an unneccessary hassle for too little gain.
You're missing the point that they neither designed the CPU nor the GPU. They designed the chip that integrates them. The design requirements of this are minimal compared to design of the CPU/GPU.
i dont mind ARM if
1. they give same power as intel
2. It can run windows (Heard rumors of windows shifting to ARM)
3. All apps run as usual.
Being in the middle of transition is really worse than being on either side of it.
1. they give same power as intel
2. It can run windows (Heard rumors of windows shifting to ARM)
3. All apps run as usual.
Being in the middle of transition is really worse than being on either side of it.
outside the box
I can see how an ARM CPU could be in there in addition to a standard Intel CPU just like how there is a integrated and discrete GPU. The ARM would be fine to run things like web browsing and mail at much lower power consumption; about 2W compared to maybe 8W~45W for the Intel CPU.
So it could be a system with a ARM CPU + PowerVR GPU (with OpenCL) running all the basic functions such as browsing, mail and any non intensive applications. Launch Photoshop and you spin up the Intel CPU without the built in GPU giving you lower power consumption. Launch a game and the discrete GPU gets going.
Also with a more advanced Powernap feature + cellular the ARM CPU could be permanently "on" downloading email, iMessages etc. Battery life would be measured in days as opposed to hours on ARM if they can get the display power down more so that the total system power use of under 6W (4W for display and 2W for remaining system) you could run the 15" rMBP for 16+ continuous hours.
Also Apple is probably the only company that could pull this off because they control both the hardware and software stack as well having the IDE that could be configured to produce an additional code path for ARM instructions in addition to x86.
I can see how an ARM CPU could be in there in addition to a standard Intel CPU just like how there is a integrated and discrete GPU. The ARM would be fine to run things like web browsing and mail at much lower power consumption; about 2W compared to maybe 8W~45W for the Intel CPU.
So it could be a system with a ARM CPU + PowerVR GPU (with OpenCL) running all the basic functions such as browsing, mail and any non intensive applications. Launch Photoshop and you spin up the Intel CPU without the built in GPU giving you lower power consumption. Launch a game and the discrete GPU gets going.
Also with a more advanced Powernap feature + cellular the ARM CPU could be permanently "on" downloading email, iMessages etc. Battery life would be measured in days as opposed to hours on ARM if they can get the display power down more so that the total system power use of under 6W (4W for display and 2W for remaining system) you could run the 15" rMBP for 16+ continuous hours.
Also Apple is probably the only company that could pull this off because they control both the hardware and software stack as well having the IDE that could be configured to produce an additional code path for ARM instructions in addition to x86.
yeah i could see this concept being done by apple, but i dont know squat about cpu's or hardware.
btw, am i the only one who feels apple, since iPad, shouldve made all their laptops carry cellular internet? now that 4g lte can rival wifi speeds, i can't believe it hasn't been done.
I guess it's just the next step in merging iDevices and Macs together. I reckon this transition will be happening before the 2010's are up 
So....is there going to be a Mac OSX RT then? I see people getting mad their current programs won't run.
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Isn't Windows RT the ARM version of Windows?
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Isn't Windows RT the ARM version of Windows?
I guess it's just the next step in merging iDevices and Macs together. I reckon this transition will be happening before the 2010's are up
This is what I was thinking.
