More Details on Apple's Intel Mac

[dashiel]

anyone who thinks that the mac experience 18 months from now is going to be anything other than exactly what it is now doesn't know what they're talking about.

intel macs will start up exactly like ppc macs. there will be no crappy beep-beep BIOS screens. period.

in 18 months boot a brand new intel mac and a ppc mac running the same OS. you will have the exact same experience.

in 18 months run any native application on an intel mac and ppc mac. you will have an identical experience.

you guys can pour over specs and theories and rumors all you want; it means absolutely nothing. all you have to consider is we're talking about steve jobs here, the guy who had the robots in the NeXT factory re-painted 9 times because the color wasn't right; the guy who scrapped imac2 development 12 months in because it wasn't right; the guy who spent 2 months researching what type of washing machine to buy. that's all i need to know.

 

[Peace]

where are the photo's i could not find them

Scroll up a few posts or look here :
http://www.powerpage.org/cgi-bin/WebObjects/powerpage.woa/wa/story?newsID=14643

 

[stcanard]

NOT IN 500 LIFETIMES! That's the most stupid thing ever, running windows (also known as (*&*&%(^*&()#$#%) on a perfectly good mac.

Actually there's a very good reason, that it gives those borderline switchers a safety net. They are far more likely to take the plunge if the know they can just get a usb2 drive and reboot to windows if necessary.

 

[CrazySteve]

Not alway, remember the PowerMac G5 is the development platform for the XBox 360 -- and it's going to be vastly different from a PowerMac.

The "blueprints (target)" is the new Instruction Set Architecture ... not the motherboard.

You are quite wrong in that. Consoles have traditionaly used PC-alike
systems for development (cross-compiling). You cant really develop XBOX
games on an XBOX do you ? You need a PC-like development kit (same as Dreamcast-Katana, PS2 and so on)

My point is that these "dev kits" are clearly pee-cees in pretty clothing.
The final design will have to be compatible with them which means:

1) No custom x86 processor just for Apple. The shipping new Mac proc
will have to be compatible with the P4 that the dev kits use
2) Current OSX runs with no problem at every PC that meets the dev kit
specs out there
3) If it leaks, you can be pretty ****ing sure every pc geek is going to be
running it well before we do.

 

[age234]

anyone who thinks that the mac experience 18 months from now is going to be anything other than exactly what it is now doesn't know what they're talking about.

intel macs will start up exactly like ppc macs. there will be no crappy beep-beep BIOS screens. period.

in 18 months boot a brand new intel mac and a ppc mac running the same OS. you will have the exact same experience.

in 18 months run any native application on an intel mac and ppc mac. you will have an identical experience.

you guys can pour over specs and theories and rumors all you want; it means absolutely nothing. all you have to consider is we're talking about steve jobs here, the guy who had the robots in the NeXT factory re-painted 9 times because the color wasn't right; the guy who scrapped imac2 development 12 months in because it wasn't right; the guy who spent 2 months researching what type of washing machine to buy. that's all i need to know.

Finally, someone who's sane. Thank you.

 

[benja55]

Yes. Exactly. They are dev kits. Which means they are blueprints (targets)
for the developers to develop for. Once you do that, you don't go
and make radical changes in the shipping models. *This* is the problem.
The final macs will have to be similar/compatible to the dev kits.

Wrong. Similar maybe, compatible yes. The dev kits for XBox 360 were PowerMacs. Do you think the shipping XBOX 360 IS a PowerMac running OSX?!

A dev kit does NOT accurately reflect the shipping system. It only needs to be a stable platform to run the OS and apps on.

Regardless, all this chatter is moot. Wait a year and see. And really, if people are so freaked, go to Linux! Or better yet, Windows.

So much drama.

 

[sushi]

Except that OF will not allow windows to boot.....

Not according to Phill Shiller of Apple.

According to him:

- Mac OS X will only boot on Mactel computers.

- Mactel computers can boot into Windows, but you will need drivers and Apple will not Windows. Which makes sense.

Sushi

 

[allanallanallan]

Real reason for switch

I wonder if the real reason for the switch to Intel is soley that someone at IBM pissed off Steve Jobs. He is known to be notoriously touchy (e.g. that spat he had with ATI a few years ago when they pre-announced that their latest-and-greatest would be in the new powermacs). I seem to remember in that previous incident we were stuck with crappy NVidias for like a year afterwards. I bet that's what it is - I haven't seen any compelling financial or technical reasons for the switch, and have heard many compelling arguments against it.

 

[CubaTBird]

how could u dual boot os x with win xp if os x uses the hfs file system while xp uses ntfs? u would have to have to separate hard drives.. using one and partitioning it would not work.. at least i don't think..

just a thought.

 

[tdar]

Everyone take their pills please. These are dev kits, NOT shipping systems! We are talking about stock Intel mobos bolted into PowerMac boxes, strictly for the purpose of testing apps under development.

Frankly my only gripe thus far is BIOS, but I would bet the shipping systems will either not have BIOS or it will be buried from view. Jobs won't let us look at BIOS on boot .

Modern PC's do not show boot up Bios messages unless someting does not work right....Boot up a new Dell....you'll see the Dell logo and then the Windows XP splash screen.....In fact that is required in the MS OEM agreement....no doubt that Apple will do it on their systems too....

 

[jamesnajera]

So here is how I see it,

give me the:
intel chipset
intel graphics model
and a image of the OSX from the hard drive.

I will have OSX running on a PC in no time.

Maybe the OSX wont be upgradable but it will be good enough for my grandparents to use.

 

[aldo]

You still won't be able to change your standard old Dell box to OS X or anything. Its just like the change to PPC that happened, what, 10 years ago?

I disagree. Because ironically Dell uses almost exactly the same chipsets as Apple is, it could even be a case of just popping your OSX CD into your Dell and booting up.

I suspect they may add some special BIOS feature which the installer will look for, but it would be trivially easy (think put a CD and wait for 5 minutes) to patch the BIOS on a standard PC and have the OSX installer think it was a Mac. Plus, I don't know if Apple want to add loads of added complexity and hassle on an already hard-to-get-working BIOS to block people out - it could very well end up blocking their own machines out if they didn't do it perfectly well which is very hard as Windows Activation proves.

Finally, I think many are under a false pretence if they don't think people will buy Dells and hack them to run OSX to save $700-$1000. You have to remember that a huge growth industry for Apple is Unix geeks at the moment who will be more than willing to spend an afternoon to save $700 on a PowerMac.

 

[CrazySteve]

Wrong. Similar maybe, compatible yes. The dev kits for XBox 360 were PowerMacs. Do you think the shipping XBOX 360 IS a PowerMac running OSX?!

A dev kit does NOT accurately reflect the shipping system. It only needs to be a stable platform to run the OS and apps on.

Regardless, all this chatter is moot. Wait a year and see. And really, if people are so freaked, go to Linux! Or better yet, Windows.

So much drama.

See my previous point about consoles and console dev kits. The Mac
is NOT a console. Your point does not apply.

 

[Peace]

Yes, it is.

Obviously chappie hasn't built many newer P4 systems, since the stock coolers have been of a similair design for ages. Interesting side; do read about the nasty troubles THG are having keeping the Pentium D running...

your right "chappie" I haven't built a PC in a while.I've been a Mac guy for a few years so thanks for the clarification "chap"

 

[jarodsix]

Yeah, but they still may put intergrated graphics in iMacs, eMacs, and Mac Minis. I don't want to have to buy a graphics card for a brand new computer.

In case the integrated graphics could deal with Quartz 2D/3D/Extreme and especially with CoreImage (i.e. would be a programmable GPU) then it might as well happen. But I don't know of any integrated GPU with such power and capabilities.....

Even if it happened, you would probably be able to run down to the store and buy a regular PC graphics card (given that there would be OS X drivers available).....

 

[rdowns]

why anyone would actually want windows running on their mac is beyond me.. dual boot? no way. How many people on this board would want to install XP onto their G5???

I would if I could run it without Virtual PC. I could then get rid of this piece of crap Toshiba laptop my company gave me for home use.

 

[Mechcozmo]

x86, fine. BIOS and Integrated Graphics, BAD!!!

Everyone take their pills please. These are dev kits, NOT shipping systems! We are talking about stock Intel mobos bolted into PowerMac boxes, strictly for the purpose of testing apps under development.

Frankly my only gripe thus far is BIOS, but I would bet the shipping systems will either not have BIOS or it will be buried from view. Jobs won't let us look at BIOS on boot .

BIOS is bad. Very bad. It is limited to 256 kilobytes and VGA-only resolution. No mouse input either. Open Firmware is far more..... better. It allows you to trouble shoot hardware, change preferences, etc. Even use color. Nearly every single PC manufacture wants to get away from the BIOS, but they can't. Windows is too locked into it. I mean, to change the boot order on a Mac with Open Firmware you... don't. OF takes care of it. BIOS is a POS.

And integrated graphics are horrible. I've stuck 6 year old 8 MB graphics cards into systems that used to have 32 MB Intel Integrated graphics and the computer ran so much faster, it was not funny. Just the increase in speed was amazing, let alone the fact that the computer now had an extra 32 MB of RAM to use.

My favorite Mac trick is starting into FireWire target disk mode. I've used it to backup data, save data off of a hard drive (PC hard drive, long story), and install OS X. Also, pressing Option on boot is the only way to get from OS 9 to OS X if your OS X is on an HFSX volume and OS 9 is on an HFS+ volume. Otherwise, you're screwed.
Oh, and the Apple Hardware Test on newer computers. Those do the same Option trick because they are on the SAME DVD as the Software restore! You use Option to choose AHT instead of OS X install.

 

[oingoboingo]

I just don't like the idea of leaving PPC hardware. I don't like the idea that some software starting in two years won't run on my Mac (sure, existing stuff will come with fat binaries, but the new stuff will no more come with fat binaries than new OS X applications that were released 1.0 after 10.1 came out were released with OS 9 implementations),

I'm not sure where this idea comes from. It was demonstrated in the keynote speech that XCode will be able to produce dual-architecture binaries with very little effort required on behalf of the developer. Apple has stated they will be selling PowerPC based hardware for at least another 1-2 years. Are you expecting that in 2 years time Macintosh software developers, already writing software for a niche market, are suddenly going to stop selecting the 'PowerPC' checkbox in XCode, abandon the large installed base of PowerPC Mac systems, and instead release binaries for what will be perhaps only a few hundred thousand Mac/Intel systems in existence at the time?

As for the transition from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X, this will have little in common with the PowerPC to Intel transition. From a software developer's point of view, none of the APIs have changed. None of the languages have changed. The underlying services that the operating system hasn't changed. Even some 'Mac specific' things like AltiVec accelerated sections of code will require little or no reworking if you've used Apple's vector-accelerated maths and graphics libraries.

 

[brap]

your right "chappie" I haven't built a PC in a while.I've been a Mac guy for a few years so thanks for the clarification "chap"

Forgot the username. Wasn't scrolling down to check...

 

[tdar]

Not according to Phill Shiller of Apple.

According to him:

- Mac OS X will only boot on Mactel computers.

- Mactel computers can boot into Windows, but you will need drivers and Apple will not Windows. Which makes sense.

Sushi

No....thats not what he said....He said that Apple would do nothing to make sure that Windows would not be able to run on the new MAC's .......he did not say that you could do it ....although I do agree he did get close to saying it.....

 

[tdar]

I wonder if the real reason for the switch to Intel is soley that someone at IBM pissed off Steve Jobs. He is known to be notoriously touchy (e.g. that spat he had with ATI a few years ago when they pre-announced that their latest-and-greatest would be in the new powermacs). I seem to remember in that previous incident we were stuck with crappy NVidias for like a year afterwards. I bet that's what it is - I haven't seen any compelling financial or technical reasons for the switch, and have heard many compelling arguments against it.

The reason to switch is that in 12 months Intel will offer 5X the processing power per watt....there is no magic here...Steve told you straight up what is going on.....

 

[apple_intel]

Actually there's a very good reason, that it gives those borderline switchers a safety net. They are far more likely to take the plunge if the know they can just get a usb2 drive and reboot to windows if necessary.

..or they could keep the PC they have now and buy a KVM switch... that's what I do.

 

[brap]

BIOS is bad. Very bad. It is limited to 256 kilobytes and VGA-only resolution. No mouse input either.

Not necessarily. In fact, what with it being Intel and all... highly unlikely.

 

[mac15]

How does iTunes run since it is still carbon?

iTunes isn't all Carbon, only the UI is. The underpinnings of the app is cocoa.

 

[alex_ant]

How times change

Anyone remember shortly after the G5 Power Mac was released in 2003, some kid told a story about how he got one as a gift and decided to gut it and put a PC motherboard inside it because he didn't like Macs? And this story (a hoax) was posted to Macrumors and everyone got all red in the face and incredulous and OUTRAGED that such a DISGUSTING person would do this to such a beautiful Mac.

Now a lot of these same people are seeing photos of this developer Mac and saying, "Wow, that's interesting! I'll bet it's fast! Tee hee!"

It must be the reality distortion field... and I must not be affected because I personally think this Mac is a bastard child. It is morally corrupt. I feel dirty just looking at it.