Wil we see a decline in reliability of Mac OS X running on Intel?

[neildmitchell]

With the news of the switch to Intel...

1)Will the Mac OS become flaky and unreliable during the transition?

2)Will the software we use be Flaky during transition?

3)Prices?

I think this transition to Intel is bad, I love the reliablility and performance of my macs and I dont want any comprimise!

 

[slb]

With the news of the switch to Intel...

1)Will the Mac OS become flaky and unreliable during the transition?

The software is the same. It's just compiled to a different processor, meaning its instructions are translated into a different set of processor instructions than on a PowerPC. There shouldn't be any issues there. I'm sure a few apps might rely on lower-level features specific to the PowerPC, but that should be a minor bit of work, especially with the support the x86 already has in the development world.

It also means the ability to use Intel's very fast compiler in XCode, which means even faster apps.

2)Will the software we use be Flaky during transition?

Recompiling for Intel should be a matter of a few tweaks. The Cocoa/Carbon APIs are still the same, so your code is calling the same functions and objects as before. All that's changed is the chip that the program is being compiled to run on.

3)Prices?

Probably cheaper, given that it's Intel.

I think this transition to Intel is bad, I love the reliablility and performance of my macs and I dont want any comprimise!

Steve Jobs is an anal retentive bastard, and god bless him for it. He will make sure end users never even realize there's a difference, and that fat binaries are invisible to the user no matter which processor you're running on (fat binaries let developers compile multiple processor versions of the same software, so Adobe will just ship one giant app that contains both PPC and Intel versions inside it).

All you should notice is a much faster PowerBook.

 

[bousozoku]

The hardware will be just as cohesive as it is now but it will use different components. We'll probably not see much of a drop in the price either. Expect the same level of quality as there has been because it's the only presentation that Apple wish to make to the world. "It just works" can't be just a phrase that was once used.