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Is OS X 64-bit clean?
- Thread starter MacManiac1224
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Chaszmyr
macrumors 601
Guys for God's sake stop comparing the Power4 and the Itanium. Both the 1.3ghz Power4 and the Itanium chips cost several thousand dollars. This is irrelevant! IBM's new chip is a lite version of the existing Power4 chips, it won't necessarily carry the price tag, but it won't necessarily beat out the itanium either. But who cares about the Itanium? It just needs to beat the Pentium for Apple to use it 🙂
Back on the original topic (64-bit Mac OS X): We'd better not delay too long to make the transition from 32 bits to 64 bits in our software. Here's why:
32-bit Unix-based systems measure time by the number of seconds since January 1, 1970, 00:00:00 UTC. With signed 32-bit values, the time can range from Friday, December 13, 1901 20:45:54 to Tuesday, January 19, 2038 03:14:07. So a lot of existing code will break by the time you get to work or school on January 19, 2038. We could get a little breathing room (a 68-year grace period) by changing to unsigned 32-bit values, but eventually we'll need to use 64-bit time values to stay compatible with the current Unix system of timekeeping!
32-bit Unix-based systems measure time by the number of seconds since January 1, 1970, 00:00:00 UTC. With signed 32-bit values, the time can range from Friday, December 13, 1901 20:45:54 to Tuesday, January 19, 2038 03:14:07. So a lot of existing code will break by the time you get to work or school on January 19, 2038. We could get a little breathing room (a 68-year grace period) by changing to unsigned 32-bit values, but eventually we'll need to use 64-bit time values to stay compatible with the current Unix system of timekeeping!
SPEC's benchmark page lists:
IBM eServer pSeries 690 Turbo (1300 MHz)
That's a POWER4 processor. Which means the POWER4 would be at 1.3GHz, available now as far as I can tell.
Look into the "IBM 970" and "Intel Deerfield" projects. POWER4 and Itanium 3 for the desktop, respectively. Both slated for debut second half of 2003. 1.8GHz and 1.0GHz frequencies, respectively.
Yes, these will be "crippled" versions of the full-glory server flagships, but they will be 64-bit processors on which their respective companies are hinging their futures.
I did spot my error and correct it later in the thread. But, if you're like me, you'd have read that after sending your correction 😛
MacCoaster
macrumors 6502a
Yes I know about those two. I was referring to using the actual POWER4 and Itanium as THE processors powering desktops.
Starting with MacOS 8.6 (IIRC) Apple made the transition to 64-bit signed integer. It can represent -30000 to +30000 (approx.) years, with a millisecond accuracy. The original MacOS (before the transition) used 32 bits, where the default value represented midnight between Dec 31, 1903 and Jan 1, 1904.
After the transition to 64-bit the default date is Jan 1, 1970. They had plenty of time to the new millenium, when they made the transition. And it was made with OS X, in mind (well, Rhapsody. Apple had already planned a transition to a new OS, but I don't remember if the date format changed before or after they bought Next). 🙂
Thanks for the information, Daniel, and welcome to MacRumors (your first post). I'll sleep better knowing that Apple has planned ahead for date-handling.
I see that you live in Stockholm. I had a wonderful vacation there once, staying at a hotel with a great view of the bay, going to a Viking Ship museum, and seeing Millesgarden, a great sculpture garden. What's that got to do with the topic of this forum? Um, er, the vacation cost more than 64 bits and Stockholm is a clean city.
I see that you live in Stockholm. I had a wonderful vacation there once, staying at a hotel with a great view of the bay, going to a Viking Ship museum, and seeing Millesgarden, a great sculpture garden. What's that got to do with the topic of this forum? Um, er, the vacation cost more than 64 bits and Stockholm is a clean city.
No. You are wrong. He's talking about PPC processors not the older 68k processors. The PPC roadmap does indeed specify the transition to 64 bit.
MacCoaster
macrumors 6502a
I'm not wrong. I think you misinterpreted my post. I know the PPC roadmap specified the transition to 64bit. But read:
He said that NeXT ran on 64bit hardware. That was what I was responding to. NeXT ran on M68k and x86 processors; at that time, they weren't 64bit.
FattyMembrane
macrumors 6502a
hop on over to www.netbsd.org and you'll see that for a while now it's been up and running on amd's 64bit processors. darwin is just netbsd with an apple logo on it and will be able to make the transition easily. it sounds like once the system header files are changed, the rest of the os should work flawlessly on the new processors. you also have to keep in mind that while we are just receiving word of the power4 lite, apple must have known about it for a good while and has been preparing for hte 64bit transition for some time now. don't worry about the transition, worry about whether they will be fast enought to beat out the competition.
FattyMembrane
macrumors 6502a
MacCoaster
macrumors 6502a
A couple corrections:
It's not NetBSD. It's a hacked up FreeBSD. Jaguar is based on FreeBSD v4.4, 10.0 and 10.1 were based on FreeBSD v3.2.
Yes, they run on 64 bit chips, but that wasn't in early 1990's when NeXT existed. Motorola 68k and early x86s aren't 64 bit, they are both 32 bit.