Stop Microsoft
Operating Systems => macOS => Topic started by: toadlife on 4 June 2005, 05:45
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Oh the irony!
June 2004 - Apple: "Intel chips are inferior to our PowerPC chips."
June 2005 - Apple: "We're switching over our computers to Intel chips."
Apple to ditch IBM, switch to Intel chips (http://news.com.com/Apple+to+ditch+IBM%2C+switch+to+Intel+chips/2100-1006_3-5731398.html?tag=nefd.lede)
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Makes me wonder if this has something to do with the whole Xbox 360 deal.
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100% Certifiable, Grade A Bullshit.
This article is pure speculation, It is NOT NEWS.
IBM, Intel and Apple declined to comment for this story.
Star Trek is dead, give it up!
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100% Certifiable, Grade A Bullshit.
This article is pure speculation, It is NOT NEWS.
So will you come back and eat crow on Monday after Apple makes the official announcment?
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IF
I highly doubt Apple will announce the switch, Steve killed the Star Trek project when he took the reigns, and the development of Rhapsody on x86, and the rumors of "project Marklar" were BS. Why is this any different?
How many people thought apple was going to be announcing a G5 Powerbook, but I don't see one anywhere, do you?
This whole article is a John C. Dvorak wet dream.
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Here are the possibilities:
1) Apple will use an Intel chip alongside PPC so that certain Macs can run x86 code natively, with no emulation. This is somewhat reminiscent of the old PC compatibility card of the 90s.
2) The PowerPC specs are open. Intel could be developing a clone. Way too much of OS X relies upon AltiVec to totally ditch it. AltiVec specs, however, are not open; there's no reason they couldn't be reverse engineered though.
3) Apple really is switching to x86 as a primary CPU, but PPC will remain alongside x86 to ease the transition.
4) This is bullshit.
5) It's a misinformed rumor. Apple is releasing a PDA, tablet, or some other device utilizing an Intel CPU.
Notice the article said that they were considering it for low end machines. That would mean, if there's any truth to it at all, we'll be returning to fat binaries. Or consider this: Intel would develop a PPC CPU for low end machines like the mini with no altivec optimization. They could basically design souped up G3s at a lower price.
The likelihood of a complete architectural change is so slim. Granted, this wouldn't be quite as bad as when developers had to rewrite for OS X, recompiling for x86 and PPC would still be an annoyance, even if it were only a minor task.
And really, why would CNET have the latest Mac rumors ahead of all the other Mac sites who live for nothing else but this kind of stuff?
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I highly doubt Apple would do it. Reasons:
1. That would throw out all the AltiVec and such optimization, and (I would guess) convert that to SSE2 or whatever. Forget that AltiVec is better for what Apple's customers typically do - it would take forever to accomplish.
2. The switch from 680x0 to PowerPC involved transparent emulation, which worked damn well between those two. But as PearPC has shown, emulating PPC on x86 is almost unusably slow. Everything worth a damn would have to be recompiled and distributed - and I bet there's about four people that would want to do that.
3. Intel's chips (bar the Pentium M) run hotter than PowerPC. You'd have those nine G5 tower fans spinning all the faster - I'm sure you'd really like that, eh? (Sidenote: P-M is slower than the G5s, hence it can't be done.)
Regardless, I shall be watching Lord Steve's keynote as soon as I can get my grubby little hands on it. (For the record, my hands are quite small.)
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4 is the most likely option, followed by 5 and then 2 far behind.
C|Net is full of shit.
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Very well could be bullshit, considering the way Apple has played the media in the past.
About Intel manufacturing PPC clones...that's an interesting theory, but would Intel even have the right to do that? IBM developed the PPC chip along with Apple, and I imagine they have some rights to it.
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The PPC is an open architechture. the AltiVec area's are NOT, and Apple owns them. There is no way to run OS X on a straight PPC arch. (Kiss your wet dreams of putting OS X on an Xbox 360 goodbye). OS X NEEDS AltiVec to run, and Intel has a snowballs chance in hell of getting access to the AltiVec Specs/Designs, and x86 has NO equivalent to it, not MMX, not SSE, and not 3DNow! (And their numbered variants) come close to AltiVec.
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The PPC is an open architechture. the AltiVec area's are NOT, and Apple owns them. There is no way to run OS X on a straight PPC arch. (Kiss your wet dreams of putting OS X on an Xbox 360 goodbye). OS X NEEDS AltiVec to run, and Intel has a snowballs chance in hell of getting access to the AltiVec Specs/Designs, and x86 has NO equivalent to it, not MMX, not SSE, and not 3DNow! (And their numbered variants) come close to AltiVec.
Really? I've read differing opinions (http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=151621&cid=12720579) about this.
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On the other hand, I have a G3 iBook and don't notice a huge difference between it and my G4 that runs at the same exact clock speed. Maybe AltiVec isn't that important after all.
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Why are we assuming that because they say Intel, that it must be x86?
Intel make RISC lines, perhaps we will be seeing something new and interesting.
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4 is the most likely option, followed by 5 and then 2 far behind.
C|Net is full of shit.
I agree with you on 4 and 5 but not on 2 since I think 1 is fare more likely. The Acorn Risc computers used to have the option of a pentium PC card to run 86x software without emulation like bedouin said. It was great there was a program like WINE (if I remember rightly it needed Windows files though) that would allow you to run Windows programs under Risc OS what was really cool was the Windows programs took on the style in in some respect the interface of Risc OS it was amazing.
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I think Apple has their hands full enough right now trying to get their customers switched over to 64-bit computing with the G5. We are not going to see another major architecture shift for a while.
In other news, Apple is doomed to die, Netcraft confirmed it just the other day....
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I think Apple has their hands full enough right now trying to get their customers switched over to 64-bit computing with the G5. We are not going to see another major architecture shift for a while.
I agree.
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man, pass me a puff or two of whatever divine herb your smoking.....cusae ain't no way in hell apple is going to switch from ppc to x86......
lets think about it for a while, current x86 chips are nothing more then a translater connected to a very fast risc chip. micro ops and all. my wet dream would be to bypass the x86 core and directly interface with risc engine behind most modern x86 implamentations....then agian, im not nearly a good enough asm hacker to do such.
now, ppc is straight risc, not to mention, the g5 implemantion has a short pipeline, like 6 steps, unlike the pentium 4s 20 step pipeline.....
the pentium 4s only purpose in life is not performance per say....but a physics experiment of howmany times we can get the fucker to tick
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the g5 implemantion has a short pipeline, like 6 steps,
You forgot the "1" in front of the 6. That's right. 16 steps. The G4 was 9.
Current Pentium 4s are 31.
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You forgot the "1" in front of the 6. That's right. 16 steps. The G4 was 9.
Current Pentium 4s are 31.
Athlons were 10 and Athon64's are 12.
If this is in fact true (we will find out VERY shortly), there is no way Apple would use the P4 line. The P4 line was doomed from the start to fail. Something along the line of Intel's Pentium M's would be a more feasable choice.
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MacWorld:
The rumors are true: Intel will be inside
Jobs talked about the major transitions in the Mac's life -- starting from the Mac's Motorola 68000-series processor to PowerPC. "The PowerPC set Apple up fro the next decade. It was a good move," he said.
"The second transition was even better -- the transition from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X that we just did," he continued. "This was a brain transplant. And even though these operating systems (9 and x) vary only by one in name, they are very different, and this has set Apple up for the next 20 years."
As the Intel logo lowered on the stage screen, Jobs said, "We are going to make the transition from PowerPC to Intel processors, and we are going to do it for you now, and for our customers next year. Why? Because we want to be making the best computer for our customers looking forward."
"I stood up here two years ago and promised you 3.0 GHz. I think a lot of you would like a G5 in your PowerBook, and we haven't been able to deliver that to you," said Jobs. "But as we look ahead, and though we've got great products now, and great PowerPC products still to come, we can envision great products we want to build, and we can't envision how to build them with the current PowerPC roadmap," said Jobs.
Intel processors provide more performance per watt than PowerPC processors do, said Jobs. "When we look at future roadmaps, mid-2006 and beyond, we see PoweRPC gives us 15 units of perfomance per watt, but Intel's roadmap gives us 70. And so this tells us what we have to do," he explained.
Transition to Intel by 2007, and yes, Marklar exists
"Starting next year, we will introduce Macs with Intel processors," said Jobs. "This time next year, we plan to ship Macs with Intel processors. In two years, our plan is that the transition will be mostly complete, and will be complete by end of 2007."
Jobs then confirmed a long-held belief that Apple was working on an Intel-compatible version of Mac OS X that some have termed "Marklar."
Mac OS X has been "leading a secret double life" for the past five years, said Jobs. "So today for the first time, I can confirm the rumors that every release of Mac OS X has been compiled for PowerPC and Intel. This has been going on for the last five years."
Jobs demonstrated a version of Mac OS X running on a 3.6GHz Pentium 4-processor equipped system, running a build of Mac OS X v10.4.1. He showed Dashboard widgets, Spotlight, iCal, Apple's Mail, Safari and iPhoto all working on the Intel-based system.
Apple needs developers' help to complete the transition
"We are very far along on this, but we're not done," said Jobs. "Which is why we're going to put it in your hands very soon, so you can help us finish it."
Widget, scripts and Java applications should work in the new environment without any conversion, said Jobs. Cocoa-based applications will require "a few minor tweaks and a recompile." Carbon-based applications require "a few more tweaks," recompiling, and "they'll work," said Jobs. And projects built using Metrowerks' CodeWarrior need to be moved to Xcode.
The future of Mac OS X development is moving to Xcode, said Jobs. Of Apple's top 100 developers, more than half -- 56 percent -- are already using Xcode, and 25 percent are in the process of switching to Xcode. "Less than 20 percent are not on board yet. Now is a good time to get on board," said Jobs.
A new build of Xcode, version 2.1, is being released today. This new release enables developers to specify PowerPC or Intel architectures. "... and you're going to build what's called a universal binary. It contains all the bits for both architectures," said Jobs. "One binary, works on both PowerPC and Intel architecture. So you can ship one CD that supports both processors."
Jobs is retarded now.
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I think Jobs is counting on Windows Longhorn to fail miserably.
For this, Apple needs to get their marketing straight for once and bring out their Mac OS X for x86 version with realistic system requirements for it to have somewhat larger market share at all.
Overall, I'm positive about these developments. This could turn out very nicely.
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whoa.
So would I be able to run Mac OS X on this PC or will they not make the drivers for non-Macs, and make it impossible for someone else to make them?
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Once again Apple have given IBM the boot. The first boot was in 1984, now it may be a real boot. If IBM had made the chips for PowerMac G5 as fast as Apple would have wanted we should have reached G5 3,5 GHz by now. Now, it seems that Intel is going to do that instead. I wonder what that processor will look like. We can call it X86 but it won
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whoa.
So would I be able to run Mac OS X on this PC or will they not make the drivers for non-Macs, and make it impossible for someone else to make them?
Wait, hold on. Forget everything I said in the last post.
Something is somewhat unclear to me. Is Apple switching to the same CPU architecture as Windows or another architecture that happens to be created by Intel?
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Jobs demonstrated a P4 3.6GHz machine running OS X. So, yeah, x86.
But they may not let the OS run on typical PCs, via using a different BIOS or something.
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Come eat your CROW skyman8081!!
:p
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Jobs demonstrated a P4 3.6GHz machine running OS X. So, yeah, x86.
But they may not let the OS run on typical PCs, via using a different BIOS or something.
Yes. jobs said he won't let people run OSX on non apple computers.
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Apparently they have a PPC emulator that runs at near-native speed on x86. Given the efforts of PearPC, I don't see how they did/can do this.
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The BIOS will probably be Open Firmware like in Mac's today, but it is just that.... what is the point of using x86 if people cannot use commodity PC's? I thought the point was removing the issue of "overpriced hardware" even more than what they are trying with the Mac mini. Isn't PowerPC 970 supposed to be better than x86-64?
And I really wanted a Cell processor in my Mac....
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Apparently they have a PPC emulator that runs at near-native speed on x86. Given the efforts of PearPC, I don't see how they did/can do this.
He's probably lying. I bet the performance will be horrid when running through the emulator.
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He's probably lying. I bet the performance will be horrid when running through the emulator.
Performance was not horrible when Apple switched from 68k to PowerPC, maybe this time around it will not be so bad either.
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Performance was not horrible when Apple switched from 68k to PowerPC, maybe this time around it will not be so bad either.
68k = CISC
PPC = RISC
x86 = CISC (essentially)
CISC-on-RISC is easy. RISC-on-CISC isn't.
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what is the point of using x86 if people cannot use commodity PC's? I thought the point was removing the issue of "overpriced hardware" even more than what they are trying with the Mac mini.
I guess because OEMs would be selling PCs with Mac OS X and Apple would probably lose out. And then drivers might be a problem too, I think.
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Just because it was demoed on a vanilla x86 machine doesn't mean Apple will go with ordinary off the shelf x86 chips.
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Jobs demonstrated a P4 3.6GHz machine running OS X. So, yeah, x86.
I can understand going to Intel chips. I'm wondering why they didn't go with the Itanium2 architecture instead of x86.
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He's probably lying. I bet the performance will be horrid when running through the emulator.
Just watched the video...they demoed the emulator using MS Office 2004. It was obviously slower than native, but it wasn't *slow*. This was with a P4 3.6.
BTW, this is odd. For those who watch the video...is it just me, or does the P4 system Steve uses seem faster/more responsive than the G5s? :scared:
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Maybe it is faster and more responsive, when it comes out benchmarks will prevail.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/07/technology/07apple.html?th&emc=th
It is really starting to float around the media.
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http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/jun/06intel.html
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Just because it was demoed on a vanilla x86 machine doesn't mean Apple will go with ordinary off the shelf x86 chips.
I agree. I'm somewhat of a noob when it comes to Apple hardware, but based on my (somewhat) limited knowledge I'd say that Apple wouldn't do away with AltiVec so quickly. Plus you don't have to be a noob to know that Apple has always wanted people to buy their hardware.
My (rather uneducated) guess is that the next generation of Apple hardware will probably be x86 "tricked out" with AltiVec (or some new juice that Apple's been working on secretly)......it's definately not going to be "vanilla x86". And you know what.....this prospect actually excites me. My overriding concern is that Intel will want to include its filthy DRM in these new chips. I guess my idea of a perfect computer would be an Apple running on AMD chips....I suppose with some hacking it maybe viable to run Mac OS X on an Athlon 64 system.
The next question is this - now that Jobs has admitted that he's had an Intel version of Mac OS X up his sleeve for 5 years, will he make it widely available? Personally, I seriously doubt it. Even if he did, Microsoft's proprietary APIs would still make Apple/Windows compatability a pain in the ass (unless MS releases Windows for Apples). However, it seems that the barriers between the two platforms are (slowly) vanishing, which can only mean good things for Apple.
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I saw some details on Mac Rumors (http://macrumors.com/) (yes, real details) people might want to see:
Xlr8yourmac.com provides some detailed comments from one of the developers at WWDC describing the current development Intel-Mac which currently features a 3.6GHz Pentium 4.
Minor highlights:
- "the thing is fast". All iLife apps are already universal binaries
- Pentium 4 660 at 3.6GHz, but will not be used in the shipping product (of course, since the high end Intel-Mac is 2 years away)
- DDR-2 RAM at 533. SATA-2.
- Presently uses the Intel GMA 900 integrated graphics chip set which supports Quartz Extreme.
- Regular video cards will be supported, but need drivers
- No Open Firmware. Uses Phoenix BIOS.
Major highlights:
- "They run Windows fine. All the chipset is standard Intel stuff, so you can download drivers and run XP - on the box."
- Game devs optimistic. "They look forward to the day they don't have to support PPC."
- Cell and AMD were evaluated. Cell not intended for PCs; AMD with supply constraints.
Photos (http://www.powerpage.org/cgi-bin/WebObjects/powerpage.woa/wa/story?newsID=14643) of the Intel PowerMac at WWDC.
Note: It is impossible to tell if final shipping Intel Macs will share features common with this development Mac.... there has been suggestions that the final Intel-Macs will not simply be PC Bios/Motherboards. We'll have to wait and see...
There goes my prediction about Apple sticking with Open Firmware.... why would they switch to Phoenix?
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Price, Price, Price.
They want to compete with PC's on price. I guess they are banking on the hope that people will buy their box for the kick-ass OS with killer app support that comes with it.
I really don't think it will work, but you never know.
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I don't believe this, if Apple really do this it wiil be to their demise, most PC user would rather run Windows I don't see how they can make any money from this.
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I don't believe this, if Apple really do this it wiil be to their demise, most PC user would rather run Windows I don't see how they can make any money from this.
It's easy; Consumers will see a bigger number in front of Ghz, see a familiar name 'Intel', have all the advantages they have heard about MAC, will have faster/cooler/64-bit laptops for added performance, AND the chips will probably cost Apple less than IBM's PPC.
I'm starting to see apple's way
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If I was apple I would be going for AMD64, but im not a retard.
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its ibm's fault......apple was one of there last hopes to stomp MS into the ground. then agian, apple might be trying a new trick, one that ms never pulled off, remember how the old winnt could boot on almost anything? x86, mips, alpha, ppc, and sparc i think? imagine if osx got that kinda multiplatform support, and did it correctly. different processers do different things well, intel chips are great at throughing integers around. alpha used to be able to beat anyting in its path down with its floating point ability. mips is cheap and easy to engineer your own solution and depending on how its built, can be one of the fastest procs out there. sparc is good for throughing data around. and powerpc is my prefered proccessor these days.
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Kinda sucks.
If Mac OS would be to move into PC-architectures, that
would mean Linux would lose it's credibility as a
desktop OS.
I mean, Mac OS has a perfect standard for distributing
binary packages. And of course, it has the base of a BSD
Unix system. Closed software vendors would instantly
abandon Linux for Mac OS = goodbye Linux for big
enterprises.
That would mean that we Linux users couldn't get any COOL
games for our platform anymore. Sucks.
Oh well, life sucks, and so do all Operating Systems, as do
the people who make them -- Neo-Zen Wisdom
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Dude...have you read the thread? Just because Apple is moving to x86, doesn't mean you can take OS X and run it on any old PC. Nothing is changing - Apple software will only run on Apple hardware. Just that the hardware isn't the same as before.
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I'm sure it'll be cracked or something... Someone will find a way.
It would be damn easy for Apple to sell Mac OS X to PC OEMs, even if they do lose alot of money from hardware sales, and need to build some extra drivers. MS would shit their pants.
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Even if they do crack it...who will write the drivers? Certainly not Apple. I mean, look how long it's taken to come up with a decent selection of Linux drivers. By the time there's any number of OS X drivers, there'll be too much new stuff.
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Even if Apple sell OS-X as an option to PC OEMS, Microsoft will do the same thing they did to PC OEMS trying to sell Linux as an option. Microsoft don't shit their pants, they never shit their pants, they just get there giant marketshare foot and kick competition in the arse with it. And don't worry about Antitrust. Microsoft have already turned the USA into a facist state, they control all the resources. Thats the problem with capitalism, it allows the resources and hence the power to flow into the hands of anybody, hence eliminating democracy. This will not change for at least 20 years, and only if people decide to stand up. Given the arrogance of the average american in thinking their facist state is the most advanced democracy in the world, nothing is going to change soon.
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Yea I guess yas are right (to an extent, kintaro :p).
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Even if they do crack it...who will write the drivers? Certainly not Apple. I mean, look how long it's taken to come up with a decent selection of Linux drivers. By the time there's any number of OS X drivers, there'll be too much new stuff.
Look at how many drivers there are for linux. Now, how many of them are from OEM's?
When (*not* if) Mac OS X is cracked for non-apple hardware, drivers *will* be available. It is only a matter of time until people write them