my biggest problem with the switch to date is all of the future talk released from intel. i seem quad core and octuple-core coming down the pipe and i hesitate to buy new. this may sound trite, but with the PPC chips the updates seemed more significant because they took longer. with the persistent mini-GHz updates i keep feeling that once i buy a new laptop i'll be left in the dust.
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Did Apple Do The Right Thing in Moving To Intel From PowerPC???
- Thread starter rashdown_online
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This was my thought too...and there was no "Not Applicable" button on the vote.
Who said anything about current products? The ability to run OS X on a SuperMini with all the Ponies ... and probably clustered ... would be quite interesting. I actually ran XServe benchmarks against some SGI and other 6-digit iron when doing a product comparison a couple of years ago. Bottom line is that the project did NOT go to Windows because of their RAM limitations at the time.
Businesses change. People change. Time will tell. However, if at the WWDC Steve starts to say "Remember when Virginia Tech took a bunch of first generation G5's and made a super-computnig cluster...", don't say that you weren't warned!
-hh
Someone may have already said this, but the problem with POWER5 was it was running way too hot and using too much power. A CPU that offers better performance for the SAME power usage and heat generation isn't a big improvement from Apple's standpoint, as they still couldn't put it into a laptop without it bursting into flames.
Did apple make the right move?
Can't believe they anyone would actually ask that question. We'd still be using G4 Powerbooks if it weren't for Intel. Oh wait - I guess I am....
Hmm - maybe it was the wrong move after all!
Can't believe they anyone would actually ask that question. We'd still be using G4 Powerbooks if it weren't for Intel. Oh wait - I guess I am....
Hmm - maybe it was the wrong move after all!
Personal I don't care about running Windows on a Mac...but yes its good for Apple, and Mac(the hardware) but the speed boost for OS X from Intel was worth the move alone IMO....the running Windows/Linux is an added bonus!
Yes because unless you want to have a desktop in a bathtub full of liquid oxygen then you ain't putting POWER 6 in a desktop and not a chance in heck in a laptop.
Ignorant to think at all computer users have all the power they need...it was both ignorant, and selfish. To keep the market going , we need to improve speed on all level of the market. Not to mention I like App to open fast, never to slow down. Also it be nice to see low end computer be fast so even poor(er) family could do things. And people in 3rd world countries need speed to the OLPC needs as much bang for its buck as it cna get.
Yes...if computers had stop evloving at any point in time, we'd be able to do less. I'm not sure why you'd want that to happen...even if it mean opeing apps a little faster, why not? Plus no one is forcing you to upgrade..only giving people choices
Your 14..... you havn't been alive for that long. Lets assume you were a few years off....then u should be using you first computer, and your not because you have 3. You have an iBook, Mac Mini, and iMac G3. You upgraded with in past 2 years...when the Mac Mini came out.
I honestly think your just saying things to get peoples attention...crazy things...if not I'm not sure what your thinking
More like sink or swim now, no more reality distortion fields of psuedo 'supercomputer' Mac desktops, no more Intel 'snail' commercials
*snif* *snif*...I miss those the most . No more excuses for lower performing iCandy, perceived 'more expensive' cooler looking design---Jessica Simpson scenario ---pretty, but only a shell? Which is what most Apple detractors will point out *besides* the never ending debate over which OS is better. With identical CPU's Apple is forced to differential in other ways. Will they eventually sink (iPod sales slowing, going out of fashion in 10yrs?) when there is less and less to differentiate btw M$'s next gen OS in 5-10yrs?
Yes because unless you want to have a desktop in a bathtub full of liquid oxygen then you ain't putting POWER 6 in a desktop and not a chance in heck in a laptop.
Yes you could put a POWER6 in a laptop.
With a laptop battery and about 2GB of RAM, it could probably run at about 700MHZ and have the performance of an early P4 or Athlon XP.
Fantastic!
Nah it's not really logical. What's logical is that they will switch to something else if Intel aren't able to produce the product that Apple needs to move their brand forward.
We'd still be using G4 Powerbooks if it weren't for Intel. Oh wait - I guess I am....
Hmm - maybe it was the wrong move after all!
i guess my little G3-Pismo is OK after all!
So this may have been mentioned before in this tread but I thoroughly disagree with what would was written on the front page.
The POWER architecture is a long way from the PowerPC architecture and lets not get them mixed up!
The reason Apple moved was due to IBM's inability to transfer the POWER architecture into any knid of useable desktop or even portable form.
Currently I worry that my G4 Powerbook might make me sterile. If I had a POWER driven notebook I would have third degree burns on my legs!!!
I work for HP and you would not want an Itanium or POWER or Spark processor anywhere near your front room these are industrial chips! IBM have improved the enviromentals for the POWER 6 but we are still talking industrial chips.
The POWER architecture is a long way from the PowerPC architecture and lets not get them mixed up!
The reason Apple moved was due to IBM's inability to transfer the POWER architecture into any knid of useable desktop or even portable form.
Currently I worry that my G4 Powerbook might make me sterile. If I had a POWER driven notebook I would have third degree burns on my legs!!!
I work for HP and you would not want an Itanium or POWER or Spark processor anywhere near your front room these are industrial chips! IBM have improved the enviromentals for the POWER 6 but we are still talking industrial chips.
Please, for the love of God... it's "you're", not "your". You are=you're.
(end of complaint)
Sorry to double post but you can't put POWER 6 into a laptop.
These chips run really really really burn your legs to the bone hot and you would need to carry around a car battery to power it!!!
Yes because unless you want to have a desktop in a bathtub full of liquid oxygen then you ain't putting POWER 6 in a desktop and not a chance in heck in a laptop.
Someone post some TDP figures for 4 or 8 core Power6's (they scale up to 16 IIRC), then you'll know how much heat you have do deal with. BTW, everyone knows that the top of the line GPU's are now so hot they use liquid cooling, and Apple's own TOL desktops have used liquid cooling. Must be that most here are not PC gamers that you don't realize that liquid cooling is quite common on overclocked PC's, even some silly liquid nitrogen systems.
Intel switch was a well considered move given that Apple could see the transition to selling more laptops than desktops, and could not get a CPU on the PPC side that would run cool enough. Who ever does the best job of supplying laptop chips that don't run too hot, based mostly on smaller process (Intel has a slight lead as far as CPU's).
Yeah, to that 14yr old (isn't there supposed to be an age limit?)...when the come out with optical CPU's that fit into an iPhone with a 4k res OLED screen to that I can play 4k HD pr0n anywhere, then I'll say they've gotten to the point where going faster is no longer much of a worthwhile endeavor. Should happen around 2020. Who knows if Apple will still be around then? Yeah, and it would be nice to wirelessly transmit/receive 4k res HD material/edit multiple streams and all on such a future iPhone Extreme device :
I might be wrong...
...but so long as Apple carry on developing for both PPC and Intel achitectures then they have the choice, if they wish to switch back? Admittedly they will have to refine the Power6 to be something that could slip into a nice consumer friendly machine but the option is there. Seems like a win-win situation for the Mac user.
...but so long as Apple carry on developing for both PPC and Intel achitectures then they have the choice, if they wish to switch back? Admittedly they will have to refine the Power6 to be something that could slip into a nice consumer friendly machine but the option is there. Seems like a win-win situation for the Mac user.
Benchmarks are flawed as well as a MHz-number. If a Benchmark is specified and generally recognized as the measure of performance, the chip manufacturers will optimize their CPUs for the best result in the benchmark, even if it costs performance in other places. I am not sure about it, but I think I read somewhere that this has already happened in the past with graphics card benchmarks.
Yes $5k thats so much more reasonable. It makes me feel not so half bad for paying over $2k for a laptop.
Intel has OCD. Love the Core2 architecture thus far, but...
Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up.... Gotta get the clock rates up....
Oh, wait...
Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count... Gotta increase the core count...
UNIX is not the only portable OS, of course
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT#Major_features
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT#Major_features
"A main design goal of NT was hardware and software portability. Versions of NT were available for a variety of processor architectures, namely Intel IA-32, MIPS, Alpha, PowerPC, SPARC, Intel i860, and Intel i960."
I still think people are missing the point, POWER6 CPus are for high end servers and workstations Apple at the moment does not cater for this market yet.
So your saying that you like to keep your computers for 15 to 20 years, but you haven't really experienced 15 to 20 years, so I'm guessing you don't quite understand how long that it. Lets see 15 years.... 1992. Before Windows '95.... Lets take a prime example of a stunning computer from that era.
The Macintosh Classic II:
9" B&W screen
16 Mhz (actually it was less they just rounded it up!)
2 MB of RAM!!
40 MB HD upgradeable to 80!!
But you are lucky enough to get a modern floppy drive.
I could live with that. But 20 years, that must be pushing it a bit, lets check:
512 by 342 pixel screen. I think my digital watch has more pixels.
8Mhz. It was a screamer
1MB of Ram.
NO HD. So no worrying about losing your files!
Yes, you are positvely right. The refresh cycle is 15 to 20 years.
Please your speed may be nice and dandy for what you do. But computing has hit a bit of a lull recently for minimum specs. A combination of little overall GUI expercience garnered with a rather less than rapid advance in technology (in comparison, in 5 years between 1987 and 1992, Apple came out with a processor DOUBLE the Mhz. DOUBLE!!!!) But things are changing with the introduction of vista the stakes are being raised for hardware you need to run stuff. Wait for the emergence of multi-touch displays, 3D interfaces. Another mini-revolution or another large leap is coming in the evolution of the GUI (we seem to get them every 7-10 years, and last time I checked we are working almost with the same stuff since Windows 2000 or the release of OS X. You see we are just entering the 7 year window. While expose and widgets were all really nice, the general look and feel of OS X is the same. The dock, advanced window control, pretty GUI. It all started around 1998 and really garnered almost complete ubquity in '01-'02 (That is if you call XP pretty....) But either way it obvious things are acoming. We've heard about multi-touch but its only beginning to make its technological debut in phones, tablets and etc. Expect it to become a lot more mainstream next year when one will be able to relatively easily buy a screen with it. 3D interfaces. Multiple desktops. Touch screens. The GUI is getting more complicated and a more simple way to control it will allow us to deal with it (it sort of works that way, someone only develops Expose once you start running more than one program at a time). You have multiple desktops.... you need some way to play with it. And what does all this take.... computing power. Megahertz are nice but multi-threads are nicer for this sort of task where raw power isn't needed but the ability to do multiple tasks simultaneously quickly. Once we start seeing the norm to be two or four cores in computer (within a year or two) then you will start to see software that takes advantage of it. Then you will start to see advances in GUI that will need it. And thus in 3-5 years, your current iBook/Powerbook/Macbook will be just as useful as this lousy Blue and White G3 I can't seem to get online underneath my desk. Its great for playing music off of and typing. Its just sucks to use if I can't use the internet. So while you feel everything is going well (just as people thought at the height of the DOS-era it can't get much better than this, chips are becoming so fast you can't even notice the wait time. Complicated software to make graphs, spreadsheets you name it! Then came 1984 and people wanted to see what they were doing. Then came the 90s and people wanted to see in color. Then came the end of the 90s and everyone wanted to use these colors to actually look at something nice. And right now it all seems so well. But wait a couple years and you wont merely want to see these colors youll want to be able to control at the tips of your finger. You will want to merely reach up to the screen and open you word document. It seems like something you dont really need! And you dont, it only makes your work easier, more efficeint, faster, and more enjoyable. And thats what has happened every 7-10 years since the emergence of the computer. You'd be suprised in my chem lab we have these computers from the 80s that run solely DOS. We have them cause the school never bothered to buy Excel. It was easier to just keep their heavy investment in this graphing software that they paid steeply at the time. It works. I put my numbers in, I click graph. And I print. But I can't go back if I accidentally messed up a point (i have to start from the beginning). Its in B&W. It works... its just so much easier to whip out my laptop, open excel type it in and see a much more aesthetically pleasing graph. And pretty soon I will want to be able to manipulate the graph with my finger tips, and spin it in 3D.
The world evolves. There is no point in saying we no longer need to move forward because we will. We may not need as much power right now, but we need more battery life. And in a couple years when we do need power we will be lucky enough to be able to get it. And I think when you go off to college in 3-4 years you will be begging your parents for a new laptop to go with you. Probably a laptop. One that you can touch. With OS Lemer and Windows 2010. And you will say its too slow for all this touching, and only 4 years later will you feel like finally, I have a decent computer that is fast enough to handle all my tasks. But wait... there is something around the corner....