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Apple and IBM's PowerPC Potential

MongoTheGeek said:
There would be issues with developers not doing stuff for both. They would need to spend a lot of effort to get Rosetta to work both ways.

Steve is pissed at IBM. 2 WWDCs without the promised 3GHz machines makes him and the promise look *REALLY* bad. IBM will have to pull 3.5GHz DC processors out with the same power characteristics as the current chips and some G5's that run at 2.5 or so GHz (I'll give you 1.75 dual core) that are powerbook suitable for Steve to even think of going back. That and some price guarantees.
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I think that there is (sadly) no possbility of going back. That seems like it would be a bordering-on-insane manoevre for Jobs, especially after singing the praise for Intel at the WWDC.

Like it or not, it's time to sigh and accept the fact that the PowerPC is nearing the end of its life, and the difference between Macs and PCs that Mac owners seems so proud of is about to get much smaller.
 
Even if IBM pulled some rabbits out of the hat Apple will not go back to them at least not for a good few years. Having announced the Intel switch and effectively slating IBM for not delivering any reverse move would make Apple look indecisive, negatively effect the all important stock price and cause even more confusion for buyers.

The Intel move will go ahead. The best chip they currently have is the Pentium M, when there desktop chips move to using similar technology they will have a solid line up. Intel have had a lot of bad press because they drove up a blind dead end alley searching only for high clock speeds. The Pentium M when clocked high enough will beat any chip including (although I hate to say it) offerings from AMD. We will all just have to be patient and wait and pay more attention to PC tech sites to see how Intel are doing. I was a big fan of PPC but if Intel can deliver then the mac platform needs to evolve, I just hope this is part of a well thought out long term strategy and not a knee jerk reaction to the current PPC climate.
 
i'm still a little bummed that it didn't work out w/ IBM. i had HIGH hopes when they switched to Big Blue and for a while it seemed like they were really jumping out there w/ some cool s#!+, but it really fizzled out, huh?

it is too bad that they supposedly didn't learn about Jobs jumping ship until they read the rumors. unless Jobs has something big up his sleeve w/ Intel (very possible), it would have been nice to let IBM have one last chance to wow him.
 
Lacero said:
I hate IBM and I hate their idiotic PowerPC chips. Long live Intel!!!
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Well, not a productive comment, or a well-informed one. Let's see... The top two supercomputers in the world are PPC-based. Six of the top ten systems are PPC. IBM has over half of the top 500.

Hardly "idiotic". Not that I'm a huge IBM fan (far from, as I used to work for Sun), but credit where credit is due. The POWER / POWERPC line is seriously robust.
 
Ja Di ksw said:
...why would anyone buy a PPC Mac now unless they absolutely HAD to, or they normally upgrade their Mac every couple of years? No one is going to be making new programs for PPC in a couple years. So why still put out PPC Mac's? Obviously they can't go 2 years without any new Mac's, who is going to buy those?
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Um, because of Apple's Universal Binaries, the option to compile programs for both PPC and Intel chips will be available to developers. The same program, presumably with the same installer, on the same CD/DVD will be able to be installed and run on either PPC or Intel machines.

The more this is discussed, I think the less of a big deal it actually will become. I think folks are creating a myth about PPC support before developers have had any time to respond to the Intel switch, I suggest checking out the other threads on this where it's being talked to death.
 
I still think it's a volume issue for IBM. They could develop ppc chips for Apples needs, but with a market share well under 5%, it's just not worth the effort for IBM at this time.

To stay with IBM, Apple would have had to guarantee a larger market or pay more per chip then Mr Jobs wanted. So the businessman went with a new supplier.
 
Per cycle

shompa said:
the problem is that Intel is slower.
The chips we are talking about from Intel is dual core 2.13ghz Yonath (sp) Pentium M.

A dual core G5 will beat them.

I don't know how fast the G5 MPs are. But they should be arround 3 ghz. That is quite faster than Intels 2.13ghz. (yeah, I know. Clockspeed isnt all, but everyone knowes that PPC are as fast or faster than X86 per clock cykle)
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What "everyone knows" is wrong in this case. The Pentium M is dramatically faster per clock cycle than the Pentium 4, and probably the G5. The Pentium M branched from the Pentium 3 in a separate development path from the Pentium 4, and the two, when comparing clock frequencies, are pretty much like comparing across processor families. So saying the G5 is faster per cycle than the P4 says nothing about the Pentium M.

As for IBM... I think their statement can be summarized as a spin on what everyone already knows... if Apple had paid them a lot of money, they could have done all sorts of special development, but it didn't really work as a business case for IBM (and Apple.) With Intel, Apple simply has to buy product that Intel is already building, and get a nice chipset in the bargain, which will probably end up being faster, cheaper, and better.
 
Switching Back

As someone stated before, Apple is not going back to IBM/PPC -(at least not for some time). After this year's WWDC and essentially telling developers to adjust/re-compile their programs for use on Intel based Macs, to switch back to IBM/PPC, I think, would almost gaurantee that in the future, developers would consider not producing for the Mac platform, regardless of what kind of processor it runs. If they [Apple] can't decided what's driving the computer, why write for it anymore.

Just my view on this.........
 
Wow, a rumor

Wow, a decent rumor. :p

This must have some merit to it. Apple switching to Intel is a huge move, a huge risk, and utterly mind boggling. Apple doesn't do this kind of thing unless they have something BIG up their sleeve.

So, if it isn't a secret conspiracy to eventually allow OEM OS X, then there is something up.

Or maybe Jobs was pissed! Who knows. :rolleyes:
 
roadapple said:
I still think it's a volume issue for IBM. They could develop ppc chips for Apples needs, but with a market share well under 5%, it's just not worth the effort for IBM at this time.
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A fact which IBM has made abundantly clear, to the point where, surprise, it drove Apple to another chip supplier.

This is really all IBM's blunder and trying to save face after losing a small, but highly visible buyer of their PPCs. They're trying to hedge against future losses of their other PPC clients by spinning the Apple departure as a, "hey, we coulda done it, but Apple didn't ask for it," routine. Especially since Steve cited a bunch of techno mumbo jumbo at his keynote about the shortcomings of the PPC chip when he announced the Intel switch. IBM doesn't want its other PPC chip clients asking questions like, "why did Apple really stop using you folks?" I thin IBM assumed that since Apple had so much apparently invested in PPCs, both in hardware and PR spin, that they were safe jerking Apple's chain. Basically, it seems to me they played this game and lost.
 
Funny how we seemed to be all anti Intel and now we are all anti IBM. Baaah, baaah, baaaaaaah. Anyway what on earth are IBM talking about? We have everything that Apple needs - we just aren't giving them to them because uhhh well um... If they have what Apple needs where is it??? I'd hate to see Apple switch to Intel though and then all of a sudden IBM shines with a processor that is way better than what Intel is producing. I hope for Apple's sake that 2-3 years down the road they are able to say look at where we are with Intel and look at where IBM got stuck 4-5 years ago. Or else we may be hearing about a switch back or something. I just want my Mac to be absolutely the fastest highest performing and most feature rich computer on earth. I don't care who makes what.
 
Macrumors said:
There is also some speculation amongst analysts that perhaps Jobs was given non-public information about Intel's roadmap which may have swayed his decision.
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Shocking, I never would have guessed that possible.

Skill is required in order to cram the words ``speculation,'' ``perhaps,'' and ``may have'' into one sentence about such an enlightening fact--that Jobs knows things we don't.
 
shompa said:
The problem is that Intel is slower.
The chips we are talking about from Intel is dual core 2.13ghz Yonath (sp) Pentium M.

A dual core G5 will beat them.
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Yeah but Yonah isn't going into the PowerMacs. The iMac maybe but not the PowerMacs. There is a reason why the PowerMacs will be the last to go Intel. It's because the Intel chips destined for the PowerMacs will not be available until late 2006 to early 2007. Also, I really wouldn't expect a G5 MP at 3.0 GHz. It will likely start out at around 2.3 to 2.5 GHz, a bit slower than what we have now. It will be difficult enough for IBM to hit 3.0 GHz with a single dedicated processor. It will be that much harder to have two cores running at that speed on a single chip. Remember, this is IBM we're talking about here, not Intel.
 
FoxyKaye said:
Um, because of Apple's Universal Binaries, the option to compile programs for both PPC and Intel chips will be available to developers. The same program, presumably with the same installer, on the same CD/DVD will be able to be installed and run on either PPC or Intel machines.

The more this is discussed, I think the less of a big deal it actually will become. I think folks are creating a myth about PPC support before developers have had any time to respond to the Intel switch, I suggest checking out the other threads on this where it's being talked to death.
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Thanks, I'll have to find / read more on this in other threads
 
swissmann said:
Funny how we seemed to be all anti Intel and now we are all anti IBM. Baaah, baaah, baaaaaaah. Anyway what on earth are IBM talking about? We have everything that Apple needs - we just aren't giving them to them because uhhh well um... If they have what Apple needs where is it???
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Yeah, two years later I don't see any 3.0 GHz G5 PowerMacs or G5 PowerBooks at any speed.
 
was this the plan all along?

Has it occurred to anyone that since this is so close to the Mac OS X transition, that it might have been the plan all along. Seriously.

Whether or not the 3Ghz promise-fallthrough fiasco was planned I don't know. But this whole thing seems a little too much of a coincidence.

Apple has always struggled with trying to inform consumers that their computers really are as fast or faster as the windows counterparts. Apple has had to deal with pimplefaced teens working for BestBuy that say Macs are slow based on Mhz/Ghz.

SO when Steve got back at the helm of Apple, one of the decisions must have been along the lines of this thought pattern.

-Windows is dominating the market due to the Megahertz myth
-Mac OS 8 doesn't have a good road map.
-Let's base the next generation OS off of some concepts developed at NeXT
-Hey while we're at it. if we developed an OS from the ground up for x86 maybe we can compete more head to head with windows.
-Let's continue development on OS 9 and start migrating our hardware to support this new OS 10 thing.
- The new hardware will still be PPC based for a while. who knows how long, but the OS transition will happen first. Then will open the curtain and reveal the x86 version exists.
-Hey let's call the OS 10 system OS X. You know the roman numeral, plus it gives homage to the X in NeXT and the fact that it is base of of Unix. You know Unix has an X in it too.
-Now we need to get developers behind this. Let's also release a public beta for cheap.
-somewhere in here we'll introduce the G4 processor
-Okay our first release out of the gate is doing pretty well. let's offer our first point upgrade for free. Kind of a thankyou for the early adopters.
-10.2 has improved dramatically. Let's charge for this update
-Let's introduce the G5 proc. and promise 3Ghz in a year.
-10.3 is a serious update again.
-Conveniently, we don't have a 3 Ghz G5. Let's start putting heat on IBM.
-10.4 is some retooling of the system, but now groundbreaking user enhancements like 10.2 and 10.3 had. Let's hype this Dashboard thing and Spotlight.
-Announce that we've had an x86 version of OSX since it's inception, and begin to merge over to Intel.
-Now we need to get developers behind this. Let's also release a developer box for cheap. (Deja vu slightly)

So here we are today. um maybe I feel to much conspiracy behind this, but is it that much of a stretch to think that Steve wanted to really go after the computer market and attack windows market share?
 
MacTruck said:
I had a nightmare that Apple switched to intel a few nights ago. Then I woke up an thats when the real horror started, I realized its true.

IBM get off your buts and give us lower power G5 chips in dual core already. Apple please stop this intel nonsense.
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LOL, dude your still in the denial stage? Wow. I too hope for serious G5 cpu's in the next PowerMac iteration, maybe this time IBM will deliver.

I've been saving up for a PowerMac a long long time, maybe not frugally, but here and there when able too. I want great cpu performance, but I dont want to pay for an increase electric bill because of an inefficient cpu is chugging along, I already have that with my Dell P4 2.0Ghz machine. I'm seriously interested to see what Intel will offer Apple in 12months from now, although I dont expect too much for it will be in the consumer lineup.

Just want for the presentation to run things like FCP or whatever compared to revB iMac G5. Oh yeah give me better value as well.
 
FoxyKaye said:
Um, because of Apple's Universal Binaries, the option to compile programs for both PPC and Intel chips will be available to developers. The same program, presumably with the same installer, on the same CD/DVD will be able to be installed and run on either PPC or Intel machines.
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That's what I don't get.

If Apple have the capability to easily allow developers to ship products that are compatible with PPC and Intel, then why did Jobs package this as "Goodbye PPC, so long, we're moving to Intel".

It's scared off potential PPC buyers and annoyed the existing user base who may be looking at obsolescence earlier than they thought, rightly or wrongly.

If Jobs had came out and said they were going to ADD intel based products to the lineup, then almost nobody would have minded.

It just seems a very risky strategy to switch wholesale as it implies no going back. So if IBM does come out with some Power5 derived 8 core beast, Apple have already burnt their bridges there.

The Intel roadmap isn't that great, other than for laptop processors where so far both Freescale and IBM have failed to come up with the goods. So, either IBM/Freescale were asking too much for R&D whereas Intel do it for free or Jobs knows something from Intel we don't. But a full on switch - seems mad.

I also don't get the Intel being cheaper thing. Intel CPUs are much more complex than PowerPC with around 4 times the number of transistors. To compete against a Dual G5 2.7 you're also talking about Xeons and a couple of those costs almost as much as an entire PowerMac G5. Macs cost a little more at some price points because of the construction and Apple's margin, not because the CPU is expensive.
 
Booga said:
As for IBM... I think their statement can be summarized as a spin on what everyone already knows... if Apple had paid them a lot of money, they could have done all sorts of special development, but it didn't really work as a business case for IBM (and Apple.) With Intel, Apple simply has to buy product that Intel is already building, and get a nice chipset in the bargain, which will probably end up being faster, cheaper, and better.
Click to expand...


From my readings this has been a key claim from IBM- Apple didn't give us enough money to develop what they wanted. This seems like an arrogant claim. Implying Apple should pay for IBMs advancements. While there are leveraged situations that may create this scenario - it is a heck of a lot to ask for. It also implies that Apple is stuck with IBM - and Apple is proving they are not.

PPC is a good chip- I hope there are some opportunities in the future for Apple and PPC, but right now IBM is stinking of desperation (in the media) . Constantly trying to defend themselves makes their position weaker.
 
But IBM is talking about today and the near future.

What happens in the 5 years after October 2007?

That could very well have been the pivotal point in Apple's decision.

Especially since the PPC970 branch of the roadmap looked like road kill, c'mon IBM it's a flop in the marketplace.

Why IBM offer to develop the Power5-UL and Power6-UL for such a small niche?

Most likely they didn't, and stalled those projects indefinitely.
 
It's all about the PowerBook

The real growth in the computer market is in the laptop sales. The G5 is nearly three years old and still there is no version that will run cool enough for Apple most important outlet for growth. I don't think there is just one reason for Apple's switch to Intel but I would guess the portable problem was a big part of the decision. Next year is going to be interesting to see what will come from the Apple/Intel move.
 
shompa said:
At least Apple should continue with Power PC for the pro range.
Since they have dual binaries in the software, why not have a dual hardware lineup?

Powermac and Powerbook = PPC (as long its faster then Intel, and it STILL is faster today)

Imac/MacMini/Ibook can play with slow cellerons or other X86 playware.
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Whoa there, i'm sorry but the Powerbook must switch to the Pentium-M to survive, the Pentium-M whips the G4 and will be put into portables ASAP. I say the last two to get Intel will be the iMac when intel puts out there desktop version of the Pentium-M with 64-bit extensions and finally the powermac with something more exotic.
 
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