'Intel Based Mac' Rumor Roundup...

[OSXcellent]

will all those Windows users who are accustomed to using warez, cracks and the like actually cough up and pay for OS X, assuming it could indeed run on any beige box? i have to say that i doubt it. the pessimist in me is having visions of spyware, hacks, cracks, and virii becoming an actual concern in the future.

I'll guesstimate an answer on this by adding a few things. First, no one can steal OS X if Apple decides not to sell it for the x86 platform without buying a computer from Apple to stick it on, OR, if they decide to sell it a la carte like they did at the recent 10.4 release, they could require online activation a la Windows XP. Yes, some dedicated people could steal it, but for the other 95% of the public, the hassle isn't worth it. In short, any program can be hacked with enough effort, but if they make it enough of a pain in the patooty to do so, people will be happier to shell out.

Also, it's wonderful to see this news. I just bought a new AMD64 PC with 1GB RAM, Win XP Pro, 1600mhz front side bus, a GeForce 6800GT + lots of other goodies, a very nice 19" LCD monitor, and a 30gb iPod Photo for $2000. I /really/ wanted to get a Powermac, but couldn't justify spending $2000 before Applecare on a single box when that same $2000 could buy all the cool stuff above. I hope the increased volume of sales that Apple will get by supporting x86 translates to more affordable hardware. To be honest, given a choice between buying an Intel laptop for $1500, and Windows XP Pro for $150, or OS X for $100-399, I'd buy OS X without a second thought.

The only reason why people have used Windows so much on x86 is because it's a lot easier to use than Linux/BSD, and there was no other competition.

 

[MacTruck]

The WSJ said that they had independently confirmed it as well.

Are you sure? I can't view it as I don't have a membership. I thought it was a rehash though.

 

[madmaxmedia]

First of all, why can't Apple just design a motherboard that takes 4 PowerPCs, then uses dual-core PowerPCs? Add to that SLI-capable dual graphics cards. You will then have something faster than most PCs which are dual CPU or dual-Core.

If that's a valid possibility, then why stop at 4?

The more CPU's you add the less the increase in general performance, unless you're doing something that requires massively parallel instructions.

Reminds me of '7 Minute Abs'.

 

[sjl]

Steve's so going to get booed at WWDC if this is true -- angry programmers with pitchforks, faced with a major productivity setback in the form of having to port everything, come to mind.

There wouldn't be much porting needed -- a lot of testing, yes, but the APIs would be the same. All the programmers would need to do is fix up the PPC assembler (AltiVec) to have equivalent code for the x86, and check for endian issues.

The problem would be testing, not the porting itself.

First of all, why can't Apple just design a motherboard that takes 4 PowerPCs, then uses dual-core PowerPCs? Add to that SLI-capable dual graphics cards. You will then have something faster than most PCs which are dual CPU or dual-Core.

And which generates plenty of heat. And which costs a hell of a lot of money -- multi processor systems are no cakewalk to design, and the problems ramp with the number of CPUs supported. The market for such a system is unlikely to be big enough to justify the R&D costs.

 

[Phinius]

Custom parts

For those of you who do not see an advantage for Apple switching to Intel, consider the costs of Apple developing several PPC motherboards for all of their Macs. This has effectively raised the cost of each Mac by several hundred dollars compared to their X86 counterparts, which, except for the Mini Mac, has effectively locked Apple out of selling Macs in most discount stores. As the average prices for personal computers keep tumbling, Apple is under increasing pressure to lower prices and so the move to more off the shelf parts is inevitable if Apple is to stay price competitive.

As an example, look at the the personal computer models that are advertised in the Sunday newspaper. The vast majority of them use graphic chips built onto the motherboard instead of graphics cards. Apple simply cannot compete on price with these models. The lowest price desktop model Apple makes sells for $499 without a monitor, keyboard or mouse. Compare that to the model that Dell recently advertised for under $400 that comes with a keyboard, mouse AND a 15" flat panel monitor. The cheapest fully equiped desktop model Apple sells is the eMac is twice the price of this Dell and it comes with a 17" CRT monitor. Part of this price difference can be attributed to Dell's higher volume sales and direct sales, but not all of it. Notebook computers are another example, Apple's lowest priced model is $1,000 and comes with a 12" screen. Compare that to various X86 manufactures that routinely sell notebooks with 15" screens for 600-700 dollars.

It's inevitable that Apple would switch to the standard in the PC industry for motherboards to keep growing in sales volume.

Switching to X86 does greatly increase the risk of Mac clones appearing. However, using more standard parts will greatly reduce Apple's costs in building Macs and licensed software sales to any other manufacturers would be almost entirely profit. There is very little added costs to sell software to other box manufactures and this would also enable Apple to lower the price of Macs to compete. Which in turn would boost Apple's overall sales.

 

[jiggie2g]

CAN SOMEONE PLEASE COPY PASTE THAT WSJ ARTICLE FROM TODAY

 

[iMeowbot]

Are you sure? I can't view it as I don't have a membership. I thought it was a rehash though.

Yes. From the first WSJ story, "An industry executive familiar with the matter, contacted Saturday, verified that schedule." The C|Net story ran Friday, so the WSJ confirmed.

 

[oskar]

This's probably been said, but I think if Apple were to switch to an Intel chip, it would only mean that. New Macs based on Intel chips, maybe with PPC technology.
What would Jobs use to make people look the other way and forget all the bad things Apple's said about Intel before? Tiger... and how great it is and how much it's sold after Panther's success to being the last part of the transition to OS X. For the last year he's said nothing that great about Macs, if it isn't mostly about Tiger (or the iPod ).
Apple's biggest card right now is it's software and running on another chip isn't very important, not in a bad way that is. But running on any new or old PC is out of the question in my opinion. They would still be only Macs.

 

[jiggie2g]

This's probably been said, but I think if Apple were to switch to an Intel chip, it would only mean that. New Macs based on Intel chips, maybe with PPC technology.
What would Jobs use to make people look the other way and forget all the bad things Apple's said about Intel before? Tiger... and how great it is and how much it's sold after Panther's success to being the last part of the transition to OS X. For the last year he's said nothing that great about Macs, if it isn't mostly about Tiger (or the iPod ).
Apple's biggest card right now is it's software and running on another chip isn't very important, not in a bad way that is. But running on any new or old PC is out of the question in my opinion. They would still be only Macs.

I can't believe thet after 1300 post on the other thread and 169 already on this one. People are still talkin about an INTEL PPC.


NOT HAPPENING PEOPLE LIVE WITH IT. AND BE HAPPY WITH YOUR PENTIUM M POWERBOOKS.

 

[LaMerVipere]

I'm curious as to how fast OS X would be on an x86. Would it increase the "snappiness" of things? Hmm, time will tell. (maybe)

 

[sunilraman]

enjoy it mate

Finally I bought a mac with perfect timing - no upgrade with a week and by the time the dust all settles in 2007-ish... I'll be ready for an upgrade....my apple care runs out Oct 2007.... perfect!

dude, you will enjoy your 23" 2.5ghz dual g5 for a few years definitely!
its a fast beast. f8ck all this dual-core intel-****, you got da bomb right there, working and delivering NOW. real hardware, not vapourware. remember, it ran the xbox360 demos.

and 6800 nvidia... whoa

 

[Marianco]

Macs won't run faster than PCs when both are Intel

Macs will run SLOWER on Intel than Windows PCs.

First, compilers for Windows are much more highly optimized for x86 CPUs than Mac compilers. Windows compilers have been optimized over the past decade. Thus Mac applications will run slower.

Second, Mac OS X Tiger has problems at the kernal level running threads. This makes it slower overall than Windows. It will take years to optimize the engine for Mac OS X Tiger.

Third, applications on Mac OS X and Windows should run the same speed since they are on the same hardware. Mac Applications have much to lose, however, in speed, since the operating system is not optimized yet for x86 - and thus will be slowed by problems with the system software.

Only by running on superior hardware (i.e. hopefully PowerPC) will Mac applications run faster than Windows applications.

Interestingly, Apple hasn't lately been doing bakeoffs of Macs versus PCs - because IBM has been having problems developing faster PowerPCs - laggin farther and father behind the Intel and AMD offerings.

Maybe Apple has a pair big enough to have portables running on intels and Powermacs running on PPC. Maybe this is the only way to get faster laptops? If they can make it happen they could ween people off PPC by showing us there is no negative difference.


IF Apple goes intel a Mac would still be incompatible with windows unless microsoft wrote drivers to run windows on the mac. And Apple would have hundreds of companies they could contract to make motherboards and such. The cost of creating macs would drop while still giving Apple as much profit as they make now. One of the reasons Macs cost more is because of the price of all that custom hardware. I think if any company can pull this off its Apple. As long as a Mac at 3ghz is faster than a PC at 3ghz with both running on the same hardware, that will be enough to convince PC users that Macs are the ultimate in computing. If they can do that, they will grow their marketshare. The only downside is that Apple still will not provide as many drivers as Windows does, so the new reason not to get a mac is that it will suddenly make much of your hardware incompatible.

 

[OSXcellent]

But running on any new or old PC is out of the question in my opinion. They would still be only Macs.

Assuming Apple is as smart as I think they are, this is VERY easy to resolve. A) They only sell OSX with a PC bought from Apple, or B) if they sell OSX and other Mac software a la carte, they make it clear that they will only be supporting these 2-4 motherboards, 3-10 specific video cards, these 2-5 sound cards, and so on and so forth. If you use anything else, hit the web boards because our support people will not be supporting you. FWIW, Linux and BSD already do this.

Apple's software is the best in the world, so if you take the care to buy it, you're going to also take the care to make sure that you buy components that work with OSX or other software packages.

 

[oskar]

I can't believe thet after 1300 post on the other thread and 169 already on this one. People are still talkin about an INTEL PPC.


NOT HAPPENING PEOPLE LIVE WITH IT. AND BE HAPPY WITH YOUR PENTIUM M POWERBOOKS.

That's why I said "maybe with PPC technology". I think Apple can switch to Intel processors, but that they would be processors to be used only on Macs, like the G5's (IBM processor) are for the PowerMacs now.

 

[neverever]

about developers something has to be explained.

First, assuming you made a program for mac os x, the majority will run when osx hits intel. Performance will be lost if its not recompiled, but recompiling is literally as easy as changing the target processor in xcode and hitting compile.

This is because mac os x abstracts the hardware through a layer of code. Remember the opengl bad drivers/ doom3 debacle?

The only code I see not working is product drivers and scientific programs. Scientific programs because the g5 has higher precision with its two floating point units. Even then they will still "work", the results will just be skewed. Lets look at an example

d = (a+c)*x;

on a g5 both multiply and addition will be done in one step, and the final result rounded, because of 2 fpus.

On a cpu w/o 2fpus(i havent checked intel has one,2,5 or whatever)
it will be split in to two steps, addition then multiplication, and will be rounded each step.

Now drivers, if they were written through IOKit(apples code for writing drivers), I can see them working no problem, because once again, the details are abstracted.

I don't believe apple is switching to intel, their codebase for the ppc is so big, and mature. Unless x86 was co-developed all this time.

 

[admanimal]

Macs will run SLOWER on Intel than Windows PCs.

First, compilers for Windows are much more highly optimized for x86 CPUs than Mac compilers. Windows compilers have been optimized over the past decade. Thus Mac applications will run slower.

Generally there are no such things* as "Windows compilers" or "Mac compilers". There are compilers for different languages for different architectures, i.e. a "C Compiler for x86" or an "Objective-C Compiler for PPC." If OS X exists on x86 and I write a C program to run on it, my program will get the same optimizations that a Windows program will. (Yes I realize that the majority of OS X apps are written in Objective-C...I'm going to take a wild guess and say there is an optimizing Objective-C compiler for x86.)

 

[DeepIn2U]

Somewhere on Earth, Bill Gates is rolling over busting a gut with a Pina-Colada in his hand.

Couple of thoughts (sorry if it was posted before):
Even two years isnt enough to reprogramm all the most powerful apps over to Intel based cpu's - even if their RISCd designed. It took Apple themselves 4 years to get OS X 10.0.1 happening, and up until Jaguar for serious apps from them & others to make the transition. I dont that Apple faithful coders want to do this again - worrying over the existing userbase fleeing.

IF true, will this give Intel rights to advertise the infamous/notorious "intel inside" brand?

IF true, would Apple actually make the hardware themselves this time around or will authorized clones have the duties. Also, what are the chances that Intel themselves doesnt 'leak' these locked-down cpu's to the public as simple drop in chips on existing 3rd party mobos?!! They've had this happen several times before.

Why is it everytime a pro pc user comes around, the general concensus is that Apple doesnt use industry standard parts; what year Macs are they looking at??


Can you imagine the marketing engine of the PC world if this rumor IS true? Denouncing Apple products would be so easy for them this time around. I agree the performance of a cpu isnt enough to derail a PC company like Dell - stuck on Intel Pentiums - and also isnt enough for purchasers to decide which OS their gonna use; but in the Mac world its everything. The way our apps run, the efficiency, the choice of open-source backed OS' (YellowDog based on Fedora Core), may all be gone. Oddly enough, emulation was mentioned to ease the transition, but that doesnt mean current coding tools would work - back to the drawing board there to with Xcode. We all know how poorly emulation works with Virtual PC 7; not everything is capable. Also there isnt any talk of the glue of the G4/G5 cpu's; Altivec (or IBM's derivative).

I think I feel sick with this news, waiting is such sweet sorry; right now it isnt true thats what is sweet about this news, but come Monday .

 

[modernpixel]

What about the developers?

I know most of the focus is on the shock of Apple choosing Intel - a seemingly mundane, run-of-the-mill choice from a company that tends to "think different."

But my real question is - what incentive could Apple possibly offer developers to make them go through another excessive port of their product. OS X was only a few years ago -- it just seems like it is asking too much. Won't most of them just pack up and ship out?

 

[puuukeey]

guaging public reaction

check the fark thread about this... some good links. mostly idiots. some smart idiots too...

 

[iMeowbot]

Macs will run SLOWER on Intel than Windows PCs.

Well there are going to be strengths and weaknesses in each, but...

First, compilers for Windows are much more highly optimized for x86 CPUs than Mac compilers.

Just about the speediest compiler for x86 is Intel's own, and it's already designed to be pretty much a drop-in replacement for GCC on Linux. That's an ideal match for Darwin and the upper layers, which are also built around the GCC.

Second, Mac OS X Tiger has problems at the kernal level running threads.

And Windows has problems at the kernel running processes and dealing with files. It's about a wash.

Third, applications on Mac OS X and Windows should run the same speed since they are on the same hardware. Mac Applications have much to lose, however, in speed, since the operating system is not optimized yet for x86 - and thus will be slowed by problems with the system software.

That the general public wasn't in on this Intel thing in no way at all implies that Apple wouldn't have known. Indeed they would have to have known, since they are the ones who are supposed to be doing this! Isn't it a bit strange to be assuming that Apple haven't already looked into, perhaps already addressed, the optimization issues for their software?

 

[Pedro Estarque]

If Apple goes x86 on monday I'm never buying one again in my life. I've had 9 macs in my life, 7 of which I still use. I'm not gonna deal with fat binary again. And knowing that future software won't run in your current hardware is not a god feeling. They better learn to have some respect for their user/developer.
I'm a "hardcore" mac user, I even have a sticker in my car, but that's as far as I go. We'll see on monday.

 

[Marianco]

It's called a SuperComputer

The natural trend is to use multiple CPUs in one box. This is because the laws of physics have limited how high processor speeds get.

PowerPCs don't use up more energy than the comparible AMD and Intel desktop CPUs.

Thus, Apple should be able to come up with multi-CPU designs just as AMD has. There are AMD boxes with 8 CPUs in them. Why can't Apple do the same?

With Apple's flair for designing coolilng systems, perhaps Apple can design a liquid metal cooling system to bring the noise down for multi-CPU designs.

Throw some steaks on that baby and you've got a party!

 

[aldo]

I can't believe thet after 1300 post on the other thread and 169 already on this one. People are still talkin about an INTEL PPC.


NOT HAPPENING PEOPLE LIVE WITH IT. AND BE HAPPY WITH YOUR PENTIUM M POWERBOOKS.

I agree. The chances of Intel PPC are minutely slim. Please give it up, it's not going to happen.

 

[fulcrum]

In light of the switch to x86 what I want is an agreement with Intel that Apple gets first access to all the newest processors. It's unlikely, but if, for example, Powermacs had 4ghz Pentiums in them for 3 months before Dell could even buy them I'd feel a little better.


PS - that apple/intel hybrid logo is brilliant.

Yeah, like that will happen. What are you smoking? Do you realize just how small Apple is compared to, say, Dell? Intel would be suicidal if it pissed off its major customers like that.

 

[OSXcellent]

I think I feel sick with this news, waiting is such sweet sorry; right now it isnt true thats what is sweet about this news, but come Monday .

Just for fun, let's assume everything you say is right. The problem is still one of perception. Does Apple stick with IBM when they can't provide them with a processor for the laptop, and Freescale that doesn't have the brains to make a processor that's competitive with mobile x86 alternatives? It's Motorola all over again - stuck in a speed ditch with no way to get out, but worse, stuck with a laptop lineup that is so underpowered, it can't even run Apple's famed h.264 HD video - for either consumers or video editors. If your problems above are issues, then these are worse.

My $.02.