Not surprising after the earlier news that Intel was going to be fabbing ARM chips. I'm sure that Apple aren't the only ARM designers talking to them, and it might be as early as next year before you start seeing Qualcomm chips in flagship Android phones that were built in Intel foundries.
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Intel and Apple Already in Talks Over ARM-Based Chips for Future iOS Devices
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That stumbling block was kinda a big deal. They couldn't get the G5 into a laptop nor dual processor G4s. The Intel macs were much better than their G4 counter parts, especially once the software was optimized.
Heres a comparison from the times: http://www.anandtech.com/show/1990/7
I can't link to anything as corroboration, but I recall reading Apple had to pay a premium for Intel's chips in order to forego the stickers…
Ah, the PPC mobile years... good times, good times. All that said, my dual processor G5 PowerMac still impresses me with how capable it is versus how fetching old it is! What is it now... 11 years? 12? Remarkable what those chips could do as long as you had nine fans and a heat sink the size of your head.
Interesting how you can be completely out of the game, but just a couple signatures get you right back into it.
My recollection was that all three "arms" of the PowerPC triumvirate were going in different directions and couldn't get their heads of of their asses.
Apple needed chips optimized for Macs and Powerbooks. But couldn't sell enough Macs for Moto or IBM to design and fab chips just for Macs.
Moto needed to be able to use G4 for their own products and they didn't line up with Powerbooks.
IBM was heavy into servers and the G3 was EOL and the G5 was too powerful for Powerbooks. IBM was using their POWER chips for servers and stuff.
In the end, Apple made the right decision and went with Intel. It put Apple on par with Windows in terms of CPU. Ultimately, there was enough differentiation between Macs and PCs just from the OS and design. Apple didn't need a different CPU to separate it from PCs.
Interesting to see where the AIM consortium is today. Moto and IBM are shells or their former selves and Apple is the largest company (by market cap) in the world.
WOW!
Apple needed chips optimized for Macs and Powerbooks. But couldn't sell enough Macs for Moto or IBM to design and fab chips just for Macs.
Moto needed to be able to use G4 for their own products and they didn't line up with Powerbooks.
IBM was heavy into servers and the G3 was EOL and the G5 was too powerful for Powerbooks. IBM was using their POWER chips for servers and stuff.
In the end, Apple made the right decision and went with Intel. It put Apple on par with Windows in terms of CPU. Ultimately, there was enough differentiation between Macs and PCs just from the OS and design. Apple didn't need a different CPU to separate it from PCs.
Interesting to see where the AIM consortium is today. Moto and IBM are shells or their former selves and Apple is the largest company (by market cap) in the world.
WOW!
Intel always had the best manufacturing but they kept it as an extra advantage of their own designs, sometimes in their AMD struggle their only advantage.
It is kind of funny that at the time their x86 offers are so superior to the competition that doesn't matter any more because mobile and ARM is the thing.
Manufacturing is a commodity and this deal will seal the loss of importance for Intel in the current conditions.
It is kind of funny that at the time their x86 offers are so superior to the competition that doesn't matter any more because mobile and ARM is the thing.
Manufacturing is a commodity and this deal will seal the loss of importance for Intel in the current conditions.
Intel isn't making their own chips, but they sure and heck would love to profit off making the chips of others. And there pretty good at making them, too.
i can't see performance going downhill by switching...
If Apple thinks the current A-series is good, then they are also saying they are "better" then Intel...
....also.... don't believe that's true..
Intel was making chips and motherboards
If Apple thinks the current A-series is good, then they are also saying they are "better" then Intel...
....also.... don't believe that's true..
Intel was making chips and motherboards
All of Intel's fabs are in the US. Oregon and Arizona (where I live) have the majority of the latest facilities. They built, and then mothballed their latest fab because they were not in the mobile market and desktop/laptop unit volumes have been making steady declines every year now for quite some time. Talk about a 3 Billion Dollar boner......
It's been restarted and now running material. I've worked at every chip company in Phoenix except Intel so I really don't know the exact particulars of all of their manufacturing but I suspect like everyone else, they run assembly and test out of the far east but the chips are made in the good old US of A.
Why would someone put an "Intel Inside" decal on a phone with an ARM processor? The decal is for devices with Intel architecture processors.
Interesting. I was not aware of that. I did see that there are some fabrication facilities over seas. Too bad Apple doesn't make note of where the processors come from...but who know...Apple might be the user of the Chinese facility.
Yea I forgot about Ireland and Israel. Didn't know about the China one. Fab 42 was the one I was mentioning. What a poor boondoggle for them. At the time they were building Fab 42 here in Az they were also building the new one up in Oregon. They were posting pic's of "Competing Crane Size" as both construction projects were mammoth. Not confirmed but the stories I heard is the base floor concrete where the steppers reside, (this is where the machines that do the actual pattering on the wafers) was something ridiculous like 8' thick. Actually that does not surprise me at all. They got the building all finished.... just in time for the bottom to drop out and there was not the manufacturing demand that justified putting in the equipment so they finished the building, shut the doors and locked it for about 18 months. Ouch. Would have loved to be a fly on the wall on that meeting.....
"So let me get this straight, we just invested 3 BILLION DOLLARS making a fabrication facility that now has zero demand for it's capacity, do I understand this correctly?"
..... talk about pucker factor in the old shorts................
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Tim can't manage the release of Intel processor for Mac as we have seen with the mac line.
He is too busy with it's politics agenda or simply clueless and scared to confront other companies.
If Intel would have delayed the release of processors Steve would have dropped Intel in a second. In fact under Steve Intel was pushed to release custom made processors just for apple, several months in advance then for everyone else.
He is too busy with it's politics agenda or simply clueless and scared to confront other companies.
If Intel would have delayed the release of processors Steve would have dropped Intel in a second. In fact under Steve Intel was pushed to release custom made processors just for apple, several months in advance then for everyone else.
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Not in 10nm, though. They (QCOM) are already going to Samsung for 10nm, and Intel is likely still 2 years away from 10nm production. Intel's 14nm is roughly equivalent to Samsungs 10nm, so there's little reason to redo 14nm designs.
Just because they're manufactured by Intel doesn't mean it'll suddenly magically run "full desktop programs". x86-64 =/= ARM.
You think Tim Cook has control over Intel's processor release schedule?!
Steve Jobs didn't either, however it *was* considerably easier for Intel to meet technology development schedules and yields at 65nm / 45nm nodes.