Macintosh Moving to Intel Processors [Updated]

[tokevino]

What was the issue with Win32 support on OS/2? I'm not familiar with it (I do know what OS/2 is).

IBM's OS/2 died due to its native Windows program support... because developers end up writing Win32 only code, and then nobody ever used OS/2.

OS X is not in the same situation as OS/2 at that time, but the risk is there with the native Win32 support.

 

[gugy]

Usually if Steve Jobs announces something at WWDC 95-100% of the people would be in his favor. With this announcement he only got 50% positive with a clear 20% negative. Usually the negative is very understated on these types of polls. With 442 Negatives in less than 1,000 answer rating, it looks as if the initial Mac User answer is the most negative since Steve Jobs has come back. The one failure that was credited to him was the Mac G4 Cube. That probably revolved more about the price than anything else.

Everybody needs to make a big NO vote by not purchasing any Apple products. But knowing Steve Jobs he'll just think that no sales means that he was correct rather than he was eliminating a product that people liked, but was replacing it with something that has stood for anti-Mac. Either Steve Jobs was lying to us when he said than the PPC was better than the Intel processors, or he's lying to us now when he says that the Intel processor is better than the PPC. You can't have it both ways. There must be more than me that has a memory that lasts this long.

Rember to email Apple. Vote Terrible on this Web Site. Boycott Apple products.

Bill the TaxMan

Grow up dude! get out of your hole!

 

[MontyZ]

Usually if Steve Jobs announces something at WWDC 95-100% of the people would be in his favor. With this announcement he only got 50% positive with a clear 20% negative. Usually the negative is very understated on these types of polls. With 442 Negatives in less than 1,000 answer rating, it looks as if the initial Mac User answer is the most negative since Steve Jobs has come back.

Uh, what are you talking about? The poll on this forum? If so, I wouldn't exactly call it scientific or representative. And if you are talking about the polls here, how would you know?

Rember to email Apple. Vote Terrible on this Web Site. Boycott Apple products.

Yea, right. And do what, start buying Dells? I highly doubt it.

 

[maxvamp]

Usually if Steve Jobs announces something at WWDC 95-100% of the people would be in his favor. With this announcement he only got 50% positive with a clear 20% negative. Usually the negative is very understated on these types of polls. With 442 Negatives in less than 1,000 answer rating, it looks as if the initial Mac User answer is the most negative since Steve Jobs has come back. The one failure that was credited to him was the Mac G4 Cube. That probably revolved more about the price than anything else.

Everybody needs to make a big NO vote by not purchasing any Apple products. But knowing Steve Jobs he'll just think that no sales means that he was correct rather than he was eliminating a product that people liked, but was replacing it with something that has stood for anti-Mac. Either Steve Jobs was lying to us when he said than the PPC was better than the Intel processors, or he's lying to us now when he says that the Intel processor is better than the PPC. You can't have it both ways. There must be more than me that has a memory that lasts this long.

Rember to email Apple. Vote Terrible on this Web Site. Boycott Apple products.

Bill the TaxMan

I don't think Steve said that the x86 is better than power, but basically admitted that every time a chip manufacturer gets in a bind, it cuts into Apple's bottom line. Apple needs to ship the best machine out there without wonder if there will be a next revision of it's proc.

In short, Steve admitted that he needed to go with a company that can deliver the technologies. That is AMD and Intel. Intel has a faster Vector unit, so I could see where they would go with Intel. It just sucks that we have to give up all those hand optimized Altivec programs, or for that matter, Altivec, which is the best SIMD by far.

As far as the boycott goes, I would stay with Apple even if today's announcement was that Apple was going with Zilog and the Z80. OS X is a mature, and rather full featured OS that can easily compete with Windows ( the biggest, most complete of all ) and Linux ( not quite there as a destop OS ).

Max.

 

[admanimal]

IBM's OS/2 died due to its native Windows program support... because developers end up writing Win32 only code, and then nobody ever used OS/2.

OS X is not in the same situation as OS/2 at that time, but the risk is there with the native Win32 support.

Oh ok. I can see how that could potentially be an issue

 

[PCM]

well...we might finally get our dual 3ghz desktops. Just not in the way we expected....

 

[jjd]

Now Powerbooks for 2 years

This may already have been covered but I gave up reading after 300 posts... as I read the announcement, we aren't going to see a Powerbook replacement for 2 years. I am all for the move away from IBM but if Apple is a non-player in the portable market for the next 2 years this is going to be a big deal for the company. I hope they are being wildly conservative with their estimates. If not my next laptop will be a Vaio . I cannot wait 2 years for a new laptop.

 

[yinyang]

I just watched the whole keynote via the QuickTime link.

Like every other Mac fanboy who has ever bragged on the inherent superiority of the PPC chip over x86 designs, I, too, was completely floored by this news at first. It made no sense.

But now I get it.

This isn't about how great Intel is or how bad IBM or Freescale are at delivering better technologies. It is about exactly one thing: never getting burned by another chipmaker again.

you can bet apple will keep compiling OSX on a PPC even after the transition to intel...in fact how do we know they haven't compiled onto AMD, Sun, etc...!?

 

[tokevino]

well...we might finally get our dual 3ghz desktops. Just not in the way we expected....

I guess we will skip the 3 GHz and are going to get a 4GHz with dule core. Remember it's 2006, not this year. And Intel just released Pentium D ... So I think it is a good bet.

 

[MacTruck]

Lets dispell some hype here.

Apple states that the G5 is 98% faster than a 3.6ghz pentium 4 and 81% faster than a dual xeon 3.6ghz system. Now in 2 years I would expect that intels processors will be about twice as fast as todays processors (being optimistic here) so basicall in 2 yrs the G5 will be the same speed as the newly released Intel Macitosh. Is that what I am hearing?

This is a load of bull from day 1. First of all that G5 performance chart on apples website is a bold faced lie. Now if they lied about that what makes everyone believe that a smooth transition will be possible and also what makes you believe that the pc will be faster than the G5 now because that is what apple says.

So you see apple is lying somewhere. Either the G5 is not fast at all compared to windows pcs now or that it is faster and in 2 yrs there will be no speed difference. 2 = 2 = 3 here folks. You really think jobs will come on stage and tell everyone it will be painful and when its all done there will be no speed differnce? Comon.

Now I don't want to hear its faster because the pc has windows. No way XP slows down the system 98% and another thing, windows is snappier but everyone knows that.

 

[leekohler]

You're crazy!

But seriously, it's written in Apple's developer documents that they will in fact be using the current x86 architecture.

Wow-then I don't know what to think. Other than I hope OS X really takes advantage of that processor in a good way.

 

[thogs_cave]

I've seen Apple come up with some pretty amazing innovations over the past few years, and they always seem to be on the leading edge of style and performance. I'm not so sure we should automatically assume that we know that much about the chip that Intel and Apple plan to stick into the next generation of Macs. It's pretty safe to say that it will be compatible with x86 architecture, but what else are we certain of? Do we know if it's 32-bit or 64-bit?

See my earlier post. We now know that there will be no Open Firmware (this is a bad thing), and that Rosetta is not all that Steve's bragging it will be. Intel's 64-bit chips are a joke - you have the pseudo-64 Pentium, or the Itanium2, well-labeled the "Itanic".

Say goodbye to HyperTransport. Say goodbye to elegant system design. Say goodbye to Macs having better performance than PeeCees, or even a chance to.

My experience so far with Apple, since switching from Windows, forces me to have a little faith in their ability to make something great out of this situation. I wouldn't declare that the world is ending before even seeing the end product.

Well, I've been a Mac user since day one. I've owned many macs new, and collected many more (I have over 100 in my collection now). I stuck with Apple through the dark years, and even the killing off of my beloved Newton. But, as I wrote Mr. Jobs, I think that when my lovely dual G5 (1st-gen dual 2.0 that I spent every spare penny on) goes off AppleCare, so do I. Had they done Opteron, I would've stuck it out, as that is at least an innovative (and fast!) chip. But, this is not a transition, it's a capitulation. Intel's technology is sometimes brilliant, but more often than not it's less than stellar. Not to mention the x86 designs still carry baggage from the 1970's.

It's not really about x86 one way or another for me. It's about taking steps backwards. I hope for the industry's sake that Apple pulls it off, but I no longer care. The $SUITS are running the show, and it's no longer about building the best product.

 

[MontyZ]

My biggest concern with this announcement is how will the news be spun by the press and Apple's competitors, including IBM. If those considering buying new Apple equipment suddenly decide to wait until the dust settles, it could mean a big slowdown in Mac sales. That would really hurt Apple and OSX overall, but probably have no bearing on the iPod.

Maybe this doesn't really register with the general, everyday computer user who doesn't really know the difference between x86 or PPC or Intel or AMD.

 

[tokevino]

This may already have been covered but I gave up reading after 300 posts... as I read the announcement, we aren't going to see a Powerbook replacement for 2 years. I am all for the move away from IBM but if Apple is a non-player in the portable market for the next 2 years this is going to be a big deal for the company. I hope they are being wildly conservative with their estimates. If not my next laptop will be a Vaio . I cannot wait 2 years for a new laptop.

No, no, no, we will see a new "IntBook" in one year. The current Pentium M is already a good process, should the "IntBook" goes out today. So we may well see a dual core Pentium M by mid 2006.

 

[MikeBike]

VPC

Hate to add to this thread but Apple said they wouldn't prevent users from installing Windows which would subsequently mean there is no need for VPC, we run Windows natively. Also, Apple would block users via chips or something from installing OSX onto a non-Apple machine. Get a grip, Apple is way ahead of us.

First Off, the only SAFE way to run Windows is in Virtual PC.
Either on Apple or Intel. The Registry is so fragile in Windows that a Bad install/un-install cycle can really screw the system up. With Virtual PC you can make a FULL System Image Backup, Install some flaky software like MySql beta, let it break, and go back to your Backup. This is extremely easy.

Virtual Pc gives you the ability to run your Mac stuff native, and run a windows application in a WINDOW on your Mac. Very Convienient.

If you run windows natively in this Future Mac-x86, you are dual booting.
Either All Windows OR All Mac, not both together. And you will probably want to run both together.

What's great about a future Mac-86 is since VPC will run natively you could run Apple software, WinXP in one window, Linux in a third and Sun Solaris x86 in a Fourth.

( But a machine with 2 gig of ram )

As a developer an Apple that can run 4 OS's would be great.

But, I'm still T'd off at IBM for Dropping the BALL.
There's got to be some Deep RED FACES at IBM today.

 

[eVolcre]

See my earlier post. We now know that there will be no Open Firmware (this is a bad thing), and that Rosetta is not all that Steve's bragging it will be. Intel's 64-bit chips are a joke - you have the pseudo-64 Pentium, or the Itanium2, well-labeled the "Itanic".

Say goodbye to HyperTransport. Say goodbye to elegant system design. Say goodbye to Macs having better performance than PeeCees, or even a chance to.



Well, I've been a Mac user since day one. I've owned many macs new, and collected many more (I have over 100 in my collection now). I stuck with Apple through the dark years, and even the killing off of my beloved Newton. But, as I wrote Mr. Jobs, I think that when my lovely dual G5 (1st-gen dual 2.0 that I spent every spare penny on) goes off AppleCare, so do I. Had they done Opteron, I would've stuck it out, as that is at least an innovative (and fast!) chip. But, this is not a transition, it's a capitulation. Intel's technology is sometimes brilliant, but more often than not it's less than stellar. Not to mention the x86 designs still carry baggage from the 1970's.

It's not really about x86 one way or another for me. It's about taking steps backwards. I hope for the industry's sake that Apple pulls it off, but I no longer care. The $SUITS are running the show, and it's no longer about building the best product.

WOAH! You have a HUNDRED macs?? All stuff you bought for yourself or did you purchase them on the side? do they all work? Where do you keep them man? Do you have a pic?

 

[crapple33]

"Say goodbye to virus-free OSX people.......as the marketshare for OSX rises so will Malware coding interests.
Jesus this was galactically stupid."

So you're saying Apple shouldn't try and increase its market share because of potential viruses? Apple is a business. A higher market share means more money.

 

[leekohler]

See my earlier post. We now know that there will be no Open Firmware (this is a bad thing), and that Rosetta is not all that Steve's bragging it will be. Intel's 64-bit chips are a joke - you have the pseudo-64 Pentium, or the Itanium2, well-labeled the "Itanic".

Say goodbye to HyperTransport. Say goodbye to elegant system design. Say goodbye to Macs having better performance than PeeCees, or even a chance to.



Well, I've been a Mac user since day one. I've owned many macs new, and collected many more (I have over 100 in my collection now). I stuck with Apple through the dark years, and even the killing off of my beloved Newton. But, as I wrote Mr. Jobs, I think that when my lovely dual G5 (1st-gen dual 2.0 that I spent every spare penny on) goes off AppleCare, so do I. Had they done Opteron, I would've stuck it out, as that is at least an innovative (and fast!) chip. But, this is not a transition, it's a capitulation. Intel's technology is sometimes brilliant, but more often than not it's less than stellar. Not to mention the x86 designs still carry baggage from the 1970's.

It's not really about x86 one way or another for me. It's about taking steps backwards. I hope for the industry's sake that Apple pulls it off, but I no longer care. The $SUITS are running the show, and it's no longer about building the best product.

I think you may be wrong here. Since Mr. Jobs came back, Apple has become a better company. Let's not forget that he also started Pixar. I don't think he would let anyone ruin Apple for him now-he's too much of a control freak. Given his penchant for secrecy, I wouldn't be surprised if he has something else up his sleeve.

 

[tokevino]

Lets dispell some hype here.

Apple states that the G5 is 98% faster than a 3.6ghz pentium 4 and 81% faster than a dual xeon 3.6ghz system...

Biased number...

Marketing numbers, not raw horsepower comparson...


For a long long time, on PeeCee hardcore fans site, you always see Pentium 4 is xx faster than G5 ......

 

[MacTruck]

Marketing numbers, not raw horsepower comparson...


For a long long time, on PeeCee hardcore fans site, you always see Pentium 4 is xx faster than G5 ......

What the hell is a Marketing Number, oh I know its called a LIE.

 

[Laurent]

What the hell is a Marketing Number, oh I know its called a LIE.

Mon père est plus fort que le tiens!

 

[MikeBike]

Tired...

I think it comes down to Tired.
- Tired of Motorola
- Tired of Freescale
- Tired of IBM.

Big promises and no delivery.

So, Apple could go with AMD( better design today ), but small, will they be there tomorrow? or INTEL, big, will be there tomorrow. Best Laptop chips coming out. Will the Intel desktop catch up to AMD, in a year or two.

The other problem with AMD is motherboards.
IF AMD built their own, it would be an easier choice.
But, quality of via mb's? Questionable.

 

[ksz]

Lets dispell some hype here.
...
So you see apple is lying somewhere. Either the G5 is not fast at all compared to windows pcs now or that it is faster and in 2 yrs there will be no speed difference. 2 = 2 = 3 here folks. You really think jobs will come on stage and tell everyone it will be painful and when its all done there will be no speed differnce? Comon.
...

Sidestepping the issue of lying vs creative marketing, I was much more interested in Anandtech's performance analysis of the Macintosh here.

Quoting from their conclusion (boldface added):

First of all, the G5 needs a lower latency access to the memory because right now, the integer performance of the G5 leaves a lot to be desired. The Opteron and Xeon have a better integer engine, and especially the Pentium 4/Xeon has a better Branch predictor too. The Opteron's memory subsystem runs circles around the G5's.

Secondly, it is clear that the G5 FP performance, despite its access to 32 architectural registers, needs good optimisation. Only one of our flops tests was " Altivectorized", which means that the GCC compiler needs to improve quite a bit before it can turn those many open source programs into super fast applications on the Mac. In contrast, the Intel compiler can vectorize all 8 tests.

Altivec or the velocity engine can make the G5 shine in workstation applications. A good example is Lightwave where the G5 takes on the best x86 competition in some situations, and remains behind in others.

The future looks promising in the workstation market for Apple, as the G5 has a lot of unused potential and the increasing market share of the Power Mac should tempt developers to put a little more effort in Mac optimisation.

The server performance of the Apple platform is, however, catastrophic. When we asked Apple for a reaction, they told us that some database vendors, Sybase and Oracle, have found a way around the threading problems. We'll try Sybase later, but frankly, we are very sceptical. The whole "multi-threaded Mach microkernel trapped inside a monolithic FreeBSD cocoon with several threading wrappers and coarse-grained threading access to the kernel", with a "backwards compatibility" millstone around its neck sounds like a bad fusion recipe for performance.

 

[MontyZ]

I think you may be wrong here. Since Mr. Jobs came back, Apple has become a better company.

Very true. He also nearly ran it into the ground, too. But, I think now that he's older and more experienced, he's a lot more wiser.

Given his penchant for secrecy, I wouldn't be surprised if he has something else up his sleeve.

Yes, it's very possible there will be more announcements to follow that will begin to clear up all the questions out there. Who knows, maybe the new Intel chips can be dropped right onto existing Mac motherboards and actually work! You just never know what they'll pull off.

 

[rareflares]

What the hell is a Marketing Number, oh I know its called a LIE.

actually, they probably were able to get those results under specific conditions, with a specific version of a specific program that was optimized for a *ahem* specific Mac OS.