dongmin said:
What a troll. Do you honestly believe that people've been buying PowerBooks/iBooks the last 2-3 years because of the superiority of the G4 architecture? You've got to be joking. The processor is the single biggest thing that's been holding Apple back. People buy PowerBooks because of 1) OS X, 2) the stylish design, and 3) the iApps and pro apps only available on a Mac. We've been paying a premium for inferior hardware for a few years now. At least with the Intel move, we'll be paying a premium for equivalent hardware.
(Yes, the G5 is a good architecture. But it too has stalled. Apple is simply not a big enough customer for IBM to really push the architecture. Sorry for the rant. I know it's been said a million times before, but it really annoys me when I read posts like the above.)
While I agree with most of what you say, I think it might be quite a different thing when you can compare Apples to Dells directly.
Previously, Apple had a unique OS, unique software, and unique hardware. Some of that hardware was clearly superior because of the good points of the PPC chip, such as Alti-Vec, and low-power, long battery life. It is only recently that Intel went down this same road with the Pentium-M design.
However when Apple goes Intel, being a smaller customer, Dell will get better pricing and newer chips first. Plus Dell is much faster at releasing new hardware and will allow Built-to-Order.
Apple will be slower with releases and will offer fixed units of their own design. The jury is still out on whether or not Apples will sell when cheaper, more current identical architectural equipment is available through Dell.
Apples principle market separation from the competition will be OS X and the iLife apps. It will be interesting to see how much the consumer will pay above Dell hardware price for those extras from Apple.
I think a lot of Apple's success will actually be hinged on Microsoft. If Vista is well accepted, makes a big splash, and is loved by users, Apple may have a hard time selling in the Intel world. Luckily for us Mac users Microsoft will most likely fail in this attempt.