Apple Switch To Intel From Ibm?

CNET | News

Apple plans to give up the partner relationship with IBM.
They will switch to using Intel CPU and phase out its current chip that supplied by IBM.

IBM's PowerPC microprocessor have been used since 1994.
After about 11 years, the architecture of MAC will be changed again.
This significant changes may require all software is written to rewiter.

what do you guy think about this change??
I am not sure if this is real...
But this is a news for c|net news.com
http://news.a.com.com/

I don't have a clue what this all means but all I care about is:Does this mean that we will be able to use Mac OS with all x86 machines?

Does this mean that we will be able to use Mac OS with all x86 machines?

I doubt it, Apple's main source of income is its hardware.
But most of Mac customers are attracted to the company by the Operating System.

This is why the x86 port of MacOS was scrapped (in my opinion)

MacOSX is based on BSD, which runs fine on x86. i doublt it would be much trouble to port current MacOSX to x86.

If the Operating system could run on people's current PC hardware, there would be little incentive to buy the Mac computer.

just my 2p. LOL.

If the Operating system could run on people's current PC hardware, there would be little incentive to buy the Mac computer.

i agree with you 100%.

I thing porting darwin to x86 platform is that difficult for aplle.
Although I am really happy to use MAC OS X in my PC, I still don;t
want to see apple become a software company.

http://www.osnews.com/story/10757

I think this editorial is really good in explaining somewhat perhaps the reasons that Apple should switch. It's worth it to read through some of the comments too.

Now that not only CNet, but also Wall Street Journal and now The Inquirer has confirmed CNet's story (and added that Apple is also talking with AMD), one wonders what kind of fantastical thing would be revealed at WWDC this time around. Considering it's less than one day away... *waits patiently for the keynote address*

Considering that Microsoft has own a sizable chunk of Apple for many years now and it hasn't become a software company, I don't see this changing things. Its too bad that all of the things that Mac users like to use their iMacs for PC's do better. For example, everyone says that Mac is the way to go for computer imaging but the number one imaging software runs slower on iMacs than comparable Win machines.iMacs are nice, don't get me wrong but they tend to talk about their top of the line Mac models a lot to get users to but the lesser iMac when for the same price a better widows computer could have been bought.I must say, most Mac users are very happy with teir computers and would never switch. I have no problem with that kind of loyalty. I hope that Apple will continue to provide quality products in the future to help stablize the computer industry. I think that a switch to Intel chip will ultimatly push the performance level of Mac computers up a notch or two.Just my opinion, :Dvujsa

Are you nuts? This is a step backwards! They would have had done better if they had decided to bring back the 68000. Apple's hardware always has been better, and their hardware alone is why I own three macs, specifically because they use PowerPC technology. Now, I will not buy any apple products. Not even an iPod. So what to do for hardware now? When Jobs announced the intel switch, I decided right then that the next computer I build will use a Pegasos motherboard and a G4 processor. And actually, this switch might be good...Well, if my hopes for a new PowerPC computer from IBM ever become anything more than a wish. Soon, the time will be good for IBM to release a new personal computer..if they decide to. The PowerPC market is open to whoever decides to step up to the plate and who would be better off to be the new main supplier of PowerPC-equipped machines than IBM? I feel strongly that IBM is not to be messed with. Microsoft used IBM to push MS-DOS and later Windows, and then they burnt IBM for it. Then IBM teamed up with Apple to offer it's POWER line of RISC processors to the common user, only now, to be burnt by Apple. So what's left? IBM, it's superior technology, and people out there who want a better computer. I'm going to write a letter to IBM with my suggestion. Besides....I would rather have a computer that says "IBM" on it than Apple any day. Just not anything with Intel hardware....disgusting.

The irony is that now that Apple is moving to Intel, Microsoft is moving to IBM for it's Xbox360 chips..Anyway, am in the middle of watching the Keynote, stayed up last night just to follow the live updating on several news sites. I've been reading commentaries and editorials at OSNews, (like the one I just posted up), and I don't know, am I the only one excited about all this? If Apple does this right, I'll still get my lovely mac machine, have the capability to run my lovely mac os on it (since ppc applications, if not yet ported, is to be run on an emulation layer called roseatta), and still have the option to dual or even triple boot windows and linux on it. Run Mac OS X Leopard, Windows Longhorn, and whatever flavour of linux I want (since I'm now no longer restricted to the PPC flavours of linux). That's my "Triple boot on a mac mini" topic come true. I think what Apple is going to do is to have locked down Mac PCs, where only Mac PCs can run the Mac OS X. That's fine with me. Releasing at least one part of the restrictions is going to lose some customers, like the people who hate intel, but we're also going to gain a lot more switchers this way. People have been tempted to buy a Mac for ages, but put off by the price, the speed, and the O_O of a new operating system. Now they have the choice to buy a (probably) cheaper Mac PC, which has specs they can understand (no more G5 ghz are faster than intel ghz), and they know if they don't like the Mac OS, they can always install Windows or Linux on it. Whoa, but won't this put Virtual PC out of business? But anyway, I'm excited at least...

As far as I'm concerned ,whether they want it or not mac OS will be able to be run on most normal system soon after the switch happens. I mean people have been trying to get OSX running on intel hardware as it is and have done so, even if it is insanely poorly done and horribly slow. If the OS is already optimized for the hardware it wouldn't take people long to alter it to either run on other system or be easily emulated on another system. I don't know about you guys, but I wouldn't mind having a system running windows, linux, and mac OS. Seems like it'd be an awesome setup giving you the best of everything you'd need.

There's little that users should care about in all of this, unless you have a personal love for anything IBM and will be sad to see it continue to be sectioned off, sold, discontinued, shutdown, etc. The old company will probably be gone within a few years. Intel is merely providing replacement chips to Apple because IBM is gradually going away, as evidenced by IBM's selling off their PC hardware division to a Chinese company not long ago.

 

And by the way, despite what Intel's hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising tells you, they are running scared of lil' ol' AMD. It will take them several years to catch up in the 64-bit market - the future of computing - so they're trying to make all kinds of deals and shouting them to the public in the hopes of maintaining the appearance of strength. (Remember all the crowing last year ago about Intel providing chips for Dell's mobile devices??? Never materialized.) Yes, they still have much more market share than AMD ON EXISTING SYSTEMS, but as old machines come out of server rooms, off of desktops and replaced in laps, it shall dwindle.

 

Apple doesn't NEED Intel. Intel NEEDS Apple. Intel provided the low bid with a high production estimate. Any chip maker can take on the task nowadays. Apple merely gets to benefit from a widely known name of Intel, not some major advance in technology.

 

This is no major advance or setback in the world of computing. This is marketeers trying to make stock prices go up, not make our lives easier.

May I remind people that Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony are all buying HUGE numbers of CPUs from IBM for their consoles. That said, while IBM isn't in any trouble, Apple users are, since all their software is now officially useless.