Really switching to Intel!!??

[Tap]

Software may be the soul of Apple, but it's a business like any other, it's survival and success based on profit.

Most of their core software comes free on new computers, some simple math for you:

OS Upgrade : Tiger $129
iLife: $79

vs.

iMac: $1300-$1800
Power Mac: $1500-3000

Hardware may not define Apple (arguably), but it certainly sustains it, and fuels creativity. This corporate reality can not be underestimated. Apple is in the business of selling systems, of which there is a hardware and software component. This is their niche and they're quite successful at it.

There is no chance OS X will end up on a Dell. Apple didn't expand into retail around the world so they could sell iPods, Tiger and Final Cut Pro.

Ok i get where you're going with that but you realize that switching to Intel chips doesnt mean those numbers would change at all?? Apple would still sell systems with OSX. Will Apple let OSX run on other x86 machines besides its own?? I dunno, kinda doubt it in the short-term. Also I think Microsoft would de-nut Dell if they tried to sell machines pre-installed with OSX. j/k. If Apple could build machines cheaper using Intel cpus and other pc type parts while maintaining current system prices, that supports your point that they survive on profit.

Tap

 

[greenstork]

EXACTLY Someone besides just me (j/k) gets it. Who is to say the chip is optimized for Apple's architecture and OSX?? Why not OSX being optimized to run on existing chips?

Tap
**being a forum whore tonight, this is pretty fun**

As long as not ANY existing chip can run OS X. As long as Dell won't run a copy of OS X, that's just never going to happen, not if Apple is to stay in business. I'm not saying it might not be hacked, but OS X will never be sold and marketed to existing PC users. Apple doesn't want to compete head to head with the likes of Dell and HP on hardware, both companies do it cheaper, that would destroy Apple's hardware sales. It would destroy Apple altogether because they would have sunk billions into an expansive retail network the only sells consumer electronics and software, since very few would buy their high priced x86 boxes. You can bet any hardware produced with Intel will be a closed system, with a proprietary OS (X), that's their game.

 

[GeeYouEye]

Actually, after reading that Intel page on the Xscale, I'd be willing to bet that there's an upgraded Xserve and Xserve RAID due on Monday! WiMax is still not out of the realm of possibility, nor is 802.11pre-n, but Xserve could definitely use an update.

 

[jiggie2g]

They don't call them Chipzilla for Nothing.

Lets ge this right ok.

1. Intel is not nor ever will make some stupid PPC chip it goes against everything Intel stands for. Thats like Dell shipping OSX boxes(scary ). they already have multiple road maps that go into 2007. can't say that about IBM.

2. 2006 is going to be a huge year for the Pentium M(yonah) and Pentium D as both will be low cost dual core solutions. Both will get DDR2 667-DDR2 800. Intel will have it's 802.11n chipset ready and USB 3.0. Not to mention ATI Crossfire + Nvidia SLI 2.

3. Frankly I believe 100% that IBM is getting 2nd thoughts about it's Apple partner ship ...c'mon really whats in it for IBM. Apple gets saved and IBM gets chump change back for it's multi-billion dollor investment in the PPC970. Apple simply doesn't sell the volume that is required for IBM to consider it worth wild not when u got Sony , M$ and Nintendo trowing money at them for chips.

Simple Math People ...IBM can sell a few million chips to apple or sell 100M+ chips to Sony , Nintendo and M$. when u look at it this way the choice wasn't really that difficult . It just Apple catching a raw deal , but that's big business. One thing is certain Apple cannot continue this trend with IBM.

4.A Dual boot WIndos OSX machine would Rule. If Apple want to capitalize on M$ delays with Longhorn they better do it ASAP b4 M$ gets back on its feet or Linux becomes a real threat. They will never get a better chance then now. I hear Longhorn may not even ship till Spring 2007 now.

5. Why Intel Over AMD ? Simple from a fanboys perspective Intel is on the ropes but from a busines stand point they still own over 87% of the CPU market. They have Unlimited Manufaturing resources , they have the Perfect Mobile CPU and a cheap Dual Core Solution. A company like AMD is simple not big enough to Supply Apple at the rediculious rate Jobs will demand plus supply the rest of the Industry. Look at Dell , Dell wants shiny new Pentium whatever , Intel sends it to them Limited quantity or not ASAP , no questions asked .. that's Chipzilla. They do it cuz they can. Try that with IBM or AMD. Intel Spent over 2 billion dollors on just marketing the Pentium 4 and P-M. While AMD only had 200million to blow why spend all that money ,cuz they can. thats why Apple chose Intel.

6. How long do u think Intel is gonna stay down and let AMD pound them. this crap heppened b4 with the PIII , it was dying and getting killed by original T-Bird Athlon. Then Bam comes the P4 and it's bye bye Athlon and Athlon XP.
not rooting for Intel but i am a realist and my love for AMD does not bilnd me to the fact that Intel is still a sleeping Giant as is M$(Apple will learn this again soon). When they wake you'd have better be at your best or else u will get Crushed.

 

[Eric5h5]

Whew...rarely have I ever read such a concentrated amount of misinformation and ignorance. It's not even possible to try to correct all of the nonsense posted so far, so I'll just confine myself to pointing out that "all you have to do is hit the x86 switch and recompile" is obviously written by someone who has never ported software, or even run a compiler. Do you know anything at all about "big endian" (PPC) and "little endian" (x86)? Clearly not. And that's just one potential showstopper...there are lots of performance "gotchas" that require writing routines in different ways for the best speed. So even if your program does work, it probably isn't going to be as fast on x86 as it was on PPC unless you spend a lot of time optimizing it.

Ideally, "hitting x86 and recompiling" would work, but the world is far from ideal. It works for your basic "hello world" program, and increasingly does not work the more complex your program becomes. Writing a truly architecture-independent program is not as simple as you think, and you can bet that since most developers just assumed (I guess) that PPC was going to be used indefinitely, their code would take work to port.

As to the truth of this rumor? Intel chips in general aren't particularly faster or cheaper, or better. Macs aren't "expensive" because of PPC. Switching over would cause a great deal of fuss for marginal or no gains at this time. However, it's entirely possible that something is going on that I don't know about. It's also possible that I'm right, and Apple is making a big mistake. Things WERE going along a little too well lately, eh? Or it's just a rumor. Who knows....

--Eric

 

[artifex]

EXACTLY Someone besides just me (j/k) gets it. Who is to say the chip is optimized for Apple's architecture and OSX?? Why not OSX being optimized to run on existing chips?

Tap
**being a forum whore tonight, this is pretty fun**

I have class/labs in 5 hours. I'm getting my "macrumors lack of sleep headache" now.

 

[greenstork]

Lets ge this right ok.

1. Intel is not nor ever will make some stupid PPC chip it goes against everything Intel stands for. Thats like Dell shipping OSX boxes(scary ). they already have multiple road maps that go into 2007. can't say that about IBM.

2. 2006 is going to be a huge year for the Pentium M(yonah) and Pentium D as both will be low cost dual core solutions. Both will get DDR2 667-DDR2 800. Intel will have it's 802.11n chipset ready and USB 3.0. Not to mention ATI Crossfire + Nvidia SLI 2.

3. Frankly I believe 100% that IBM is getting 2nd thoughts about it's Apple partner ship ...c'mon really whats in it for IBM. Apple gets saved and IBM gets chump change back for it's multi-billion dollor investment in the PPC970. Apple simply doesn't sell the volume that is required for IBM to consider it worth wild not when u got Sony , M$ and Nintendo trowing money at them for chips.

Simple Math People ...IBM can sell a few million chips to apple or sell 100M+ chips to Sony , Nintendo and M$. when u look at it this way the choice wasn't really that difficult . It just Apple catching a raw deal , but that's big business. One thing is certain Apple cannot continue this trend with IBM.

4.A Dual boot WIndos OSX machine would Rule. If Apple want to capitalize on M$ delays with Longhorn they better do it ASAP b4 M$ gets back on its feet or Linux becomes a real threat. They will never get a better chance then now. I hear Longhorn may not even ship till Spring 2007 now.

5. Why Intel Over AMD ? Simple from a fanboys perspective Intel is on the ropes but from a busines stand point they still own over 87% of the CPU market. They have Unlimited Manufaturing resources , they have the Perfect Mobile CPU and a cheap Dual Core Solution. A company like AMD is simple not big enough to Supply Apple at the rediculious rate Jobs will demand plus supply the rest of the Industry. Look at Dell , Dell wants shiny new Pentium whatever , Intel sends it to them Limited quantity or not ASAP , no questions asked .. that's Chipzilla. They do it cuz they can. Try that with IBM or AMD. Intel Spent over 2 billion dollors on just marketing the Pentium 4 and P-M. While AMD only had 200million to blow why spend all that money ,cuz they can. thats why Apple chose Intel.

6. How long do u think Intel is gonna stay down and let AMD pound them. this crap heppened b4 with the PIII , it was dying and getting killed by original T-Bird Athlon. Then Bam comes the P4 and it's bye bye Athlon and Athlon XP.
not rooting for Intel but i am a realist and my love for AMD does not bilnd me to the fact that Intel is still a sleeping Giant as is M$(Apple will learn this again soon). When they wake you'd have better be at your best or else u will get Crushed.

Spot on, it's a dog-eat-dog world out there

You still don't explain what's in it for Intel. Apple has to gain significant market share to make it worthwhile for them, otherwise they're just a small fish in a big pond that is Intel's chip business. I'm an Apple fan and all, but that's a pretty ballsy bet on a company (Apple) that hasn't gained any market share in quite some time.

 

[Tap]

Lets ge this right ok.

not rooting for Intel but i am a realist and my love for AMD does not bilnd me to the fact that Intel is still a sleeping Giant as is M$(Apple will learn this again soon). When they wake you'd have better be at your best or else u will get Crushed.

Yeah I love AMD from the performance side of things but their capacity is lacking. I read that their second Dresden fab will be online at the end of 05, start of 06. That will help a bit but more expansion is needed in the future. In due time.....Athlon/Opteron success didnt happen overnight....they are growing just not as fast as some of us wish at times

Tap

 

[Tap]

I have class/labs in 5 hours. I'm getting my "macrumors lack of sleep headache" now.

Oh snap its 4:20am....where has the time gone? For someone that doesnt even own a mac (just an ipod) i sure am spending a lot of time in here

Tap

 

[panphage]

This doesn't add any credibility to the story, because Reuters (and Yahoo), are just re-reporting the CNet story.

So in other words, Yahoo says that Reuters says that CNets says Apple will use Intel in '06.

EDIT: Wait! My girlfriend's cousin just sent me a link to the Yahoo story, so now my girlfriend's cousin says Yahoo says Reuters says CNet says Apple will use Intel! This is getting more credible by the second!

She told me that yahoo said reuters said cnet said intel told IBM that apple passed out at baskin robbins last nite.

 

[Sun Baked]

One word... "marketing".

Example: Remember when the Playstation 2 was about to come out and you heard something like "able to render Toy Story in real-time" ?? Yeah, that really happened. Same at this years E3 and the PS3 videos of games that were pre-rendered/CG vs in-game footage. People are eatting up the numbers again, obviously they didnt learn last time. Its all in how you say/present something.

To make my point......isnt it funny they left out game benchmarks?? say Doom 3? Apple gets HAMMERED in performance on much lesser PCs running lower quality video cards. There are other things i'm sure the PC will do "faster" than an Apple but this example just sticks out in my mind because it was such a whooping.

Marketing....gotta love it....thats why i have my degree in it

Tap

If Apple switches to x86, then Apple would get hammered on the same H/W.

It's not all architecture, most games are Direct-X with optimizations tossed in.

Run Mac OS X on x86, and we'd still get hammered because we run Open-GL and lack most of the original games optimizations for the Windows APIs.

Basically it would turn an architecture war into an OS war... which Apple really hasn't fought yet. Since it's been a GUI war up to now.

 

[VanNess]

To make my point......isnt it funny they left out game benchmarks?? say Doom 3? Apple gets HAMMERED in performance on much lesser PCs running lower quality video cards. There are other things i'm sure the PC will do "faster" than an Apple but this example just sticks out in my mind because it was such a whooping.

Marketing....gotta love it....thats why i have my degree in it

Tap

lol

Ahh yes, performance. How quickly Virginia Tech's achievement building a supercomputer using off the shelf consumer G5 powermacs has been forgotten. Taking the world by surprise, it ranked as the third fastest supercomputer in the world at the time it was built. All in all, it was the ultimate performance "benchmark" and certainly gave the wintel propellerheads in the industry a deer-caught-in-the-headlights moment.

But the VT supercomputer team must have failed to disclose that they only got 35 fps on Doom 3 at the time. lol

 

[jiggie2g]

Spot on, it's a dog-eat-dog world out there

You still don't explain what's in it for Intel. Apple has to gain significant market share to make it worthwhile for them, otherwise they're just a small fish in a big pond that is Intel's chip business. I'm an Apple fan and all, but that's a pretty ballsy bet on a company (Apple) that hasn't gained any market share in quite some time.

Intel get to sell CPU , but in reality they get to show off a pretty new Pony called Apple because all the other Pony's(M$, Sony, Nintendo) went PPC this time. Intel will have a field day braggin about being in with a cool company as Apple. Wi-Fi Intel chipset iPod anyone? Shiny Apple PC's in Intel Commercials what better way to sell chips then that.

Intel is very much like M$. in athe sense that they are complete publicity Whores they will induldge in every second of this.

 

[Anarcho-Commie]

"Steve Jobs hates the reds (communists) thats why he made the video 1984. IBM is in bed with them. They are partners with Lenovo which is owned partly by the chinese govt. Steve will be damned if he is going to let the new Russia (China) make chips for his systems. He is going all american here and going with intel."

Are you high?

CHINA ISNT COMMUNIST.

 

[ethernet76]

Lets ge this right ok.

1. Intel is not nor ever will make some stupid PPC chip it goes against everything Intel stands for. Thats like Dell shipping OSX boxes(scary ). they already have multiple road maps that go into 2007. can't say that about IBM.

2. 2006 is going to be a huge year for the Pentium M(yonah) and Pentium D as both will be low cost dual core solutions. Both will get DDR2 667-DDR2 800. Intel will have it's 802.11n chipset ready and USB 3.0. Not to mention ATI Crossfire + Nvidia SLI 2.

3. Frankly I believe 100% that IBM is getting 2nd thoughts about it's Apple partner ship ...c'mon really whats in it for IBM. Apple gets saved and IBM gets chump change back for it's multi-billion dollor investment in the PPC970. Apple simply doesn't sell the volume that is required for IBM to consider it worth wild not when u got Sony , M$ and Nintendo trowing money at them for chips.

Simple Math People ...IBM can sell a few million chips to apple or sell 100M+ chips to Sony , Nintendo and M$. when u look at it this way the choice wasn't really that difficult . It just Apple catching a raw deal , but that's big business. One thing is certain Apple cannot continue this trend with IBM.

4.A Dual boot WIndos OSX machine would Rule. If Apple want to capitalize on M$ delays with Longhorn they better do it ASAP b4 M$ gets back on its feet or Linux becomes a real threat. They will never get a better chance then now. I hear Longhorn may not even ship till Spring 2007 now.

5. Why Intel Over AMD ? Simple from a fanboys perspective Intel is on the ropes but from a busines stand point they still own over 87% of the CPU market. They have Unlimited Manufaturing resources , they have the Perfect Mobile CPU and a cheap Dual Core Solution. A company like AMD is simple not big enough to Supply Apple at the rediculious rate Jobs will demand plus supply the rest of the Industry. Look at Dell , Dell wants shiny new Pentium whatever , Intel sends it to them Limited quantity or not ASAP , no questions asked .. that's Chipzilla. They do it cuz they can. Try that with IBM or AMD. Intel Spent over 2 billion dollors on just marketing the Pentium 4 and P-M. While AMD only had 200million to blow why spend all that money ,cuz they can. thats why Apple chose Intel.

6. How long do u think Intel is gonna stay down and let AMD pound them. this crap heppened b4 with the PIII , it was dying and getting killed by original T-Bird Athlon. Then Bam comes the P4 and it's bye bye Athlon and Athlon XP.
not rooting for Intel but i am a realist and my love for AMD does not bilnd me to the fact that Intel is still a sleeping Giant as is M$(Apple will learn this again soon). When they wake you'd have better be at your best or else u will get Crushed.

Point 3 is completely invalid. The xBox 360 is based on the 970 architecture. I would bet IBM has sold as many G5s as they have Power4 chips.

Point 4 is stupid. If I have an x86 system with Windows, why would I also want to dual-boot OS X? I wouldn't. A more likely situation would be a Virtual PC application that allows me to run Windows inside OS X at close to 100 percent speed. Secondly, if every PC except for those made by Apple were to ship to windows, what's really the point? I think for Apple to remain successful, they'll need to figure out a way to run Windows applications inside of any x86 OS X they create.

Point 5 is ludacris, yes like the artist. AMD just doesn't have the capacity to output as many chips as Intel. I think everyone who's built a computer in the last year knows AMD's offerings are better and usually cheaper than Intel. Personally I'd take a 2.6 64bit athlon over the ***** that is Intel any day.

Maybe this explains the lack of 64-bit Tiger. Why build a 64-bit version if a switch to a different architecture is just around the corner.

 

[greenstork]

Intel get to sell CPU , but in reality they get to show off a pretty new Pony called Apple because all the other Pony's(M$, Sony, Nintendo) went PPC this time. Intel will have a field day braggin about being in with a cool company as Apple. Wi-Fi Intel chipset iPod anyone? Shiny Apple PC's in Intel Commercials what better way to sell chips then that.

And Apple has proven itself a super hip company, with an effective marketing strategy. The marketing synergy could be impressive... I think you're on to something.

 

[alexeismertin]

SMOKESCREEN !!

SMOKESCREEN !!


Dual Cores monday - whippeee.....



(mac community breathes out)

 

[Panoctopi]

Toyota plants can build Fords if they lay them out to do so whether they know anything about the design behind the Ford product or not. Intel has the capacity and ability to fab large volumes of chips. You don't have to understand something to produce it. You only need to be able to mirror, copy, match, or reproduce what is already in existence. I think that was my point. And I believe Intel knows a whole lot more about PowerPC than anyone gives them credit for. They just are unable to utilize the patented technologies and designs in their own chips and are forced to try to create their own things to compete.

wow what a great story and beautiful analogy. btw, is understanding really that unrelated to the capacity to produce anything?

 

[jiggie2g]

Point 3 is completely invalid. The xBox 360 is based on the 970 architecture. I would bet IBM has sold as many G5s as they have Power4 chips.

Point 4 is stupid. If I have an x86 system with Windows, why would I also want to dual-boot OS X? I wouldn't. A more likely situation would be a Virtual PC application that allows me to run Windows inside OS X at close to 100 percent speed. Secondly, if every PC except for those made by Apple were to ship to windows, what's really the point? I think for Apple to remain successful, they'll need to figure out a way to run Windows applications inside of any x86 OS X they create.

Point 5 is ludacris, yes like the artist. AMD just doesn't have the capacity to output as many chips as Intel. I think everyone who's built a computer in the last year knows AMD's offerings are better and usually cheaper than Intel. Personally I'd take a 2.6 64bit athlon over the ***** that is Intel any day.

Maybe this explains the lack of 64-bit Tiger. Why build a 64-bit version if a switch to a different architecture is just around the corner.

Face the Future Apple is simply out of options as IBM seems more then willing to let them shribble up and die. Also if u know anything about the History behind the PPC970 M$ was a HUGH factor in it's development. they were always in the shadows because of thier interest for a PPC chip for the Xbox360.

The Intel factor seems to make more and more sense as time goes by and the mac keeps following the trend from its Moto days.

 

[FelixDerKater]

Why would they switch when the future of the PPC processor is just starting to look really promising for the first time in years?

 

[nagromme]

Re emulation of PPC by x86 during a transition phase: if the time frame is 2006 and 2007, then Intel chips will be faster then than now--plus the article reports starting with consumer Macs. That's some elbow room to POSSIBLY allow Macs to be faster than now despite the overhead of many things being emulated (for a time).

Remember how the first PowerMacs didn't have much native PPC software--but even running 680x0 apps, they were still a bit faster than the preceding Quadras. That made buying a PowerMac not be a step back--and as more PPC apps came out, the full benefits were realized.

I'm not saying this article is true--I don't know. But I do think emulation could make such a thing conceivable--IF we're talking years down the road.

(Similarly, 2006-2007 might give Intel plenty of time to get making PPC chips, if that's the way this comes out.)

I suspect Apple has some very big things up their sleeve, and they are still burned about the leak over the Mac mini, so they are doing some misdirection at the expense of Cnet. (Cnet has never been very pro-Apple.)

Evil. But I like it

Simple Math People ...IBM can sell a few million chips to apple or sell 100M+ chips to Sony , Nintendo and M$.

Or they could do both. (Plus Apple could benefit from both the construction of more facilities and from the general expertise gained by IBM.)

OSX is so "secure" because most of the above are targeted at the other 95% (or whatever) of computers in the world. Switch it around with OSX being on 95% of the computer in the world and Windows would look "secure".

Don't feel bad--I used to believe that myth myself! But as many security experts have written about many times in the last year, the Mac is NOT secure just because of its small market share. Windows has real, serious flaws in its design. And Mac OS X has far superior design. In specific, vital ways that are relevant to security. (A lot of that is OS X being UNIX.)

OS X is secure by DESIGN. Look into it and you'll find all the details. Being a smaller target is great too, but it's NOT the only factor. And the prestige of making the first Mac virus--not to mention high-profile Mac targets like the US Army web site--is incentive to virus-writers anyway.

Also, by the % argument, Macs should have 5% of the viruses, instead of zero

 

[jiggie2g]

Or they could do both. (Plus Apple could benefit from both the construction of more facilities and from the general expertise gained by IBM.)

Did u ever think that maybe 4 make it a crowd, maybe IBM cannot supply 4 vendor with such a high volume of cpu's on a consistent basis so it goes with who makes them more money. like any other business.

 

[nagromme]

Did u ever think that maybe 4 make it a crowd, maybe IBM cannot supply 4 vendor with such a high volume of cpu's on a consistent basis so it goes with who makes them more money. like any other business.

IBM makes money from Apple now. How is building production for 3... or even 10 additional customers going to make G5 production MORE expensive than it is now.

It could make G5s cheaper, but it can't make them more expensive.

There's no reason IBM can't sell to game-makers and to Apple both.

 

[artifex]

Oh snap its 4:20am....where has the time gone? For someone that doesnt even own a mac (just an ipod) i sure am spending a lot of time in here

Tap

Me, too. Mine's black Actually, I got it for that more than the U2 business. And now that I've started losing some of my m4ps to data corruption, back before I made backups, I've realized how lame not having CDs really is, when they're just as cheap

Still... it's black Now if I could just make a label to cover the stupid red dial...

(Wasn't there a company that sold powerbooks and ipods with other colors powder-coated on? I wish I could remember who they were. This was cheaper than buying one of those would have been, anyway)
edit: someone sent me the link to the company's website.

 

[jiggie2g]

IBM makes money from Apple now. How is building production for 3... or even 10 additional customers going to make G5 production MORE expensive than it is now.

It could make G5s cheaper, but it can't make them more expensive.

There's no reason IBM can't sell to game-makers and to Apple both.

I never said more expensive , maybe they just can't make enough resources to go around.