[itistoday]

I hope this isn't locked, but this has not been brought up before (to my knowledge) and to post this in the "are you jumping ship" thread wouldn't make sense context wise, so here goes:

I was just thinking today, that this whole situation is really convenient for Apple; it's a good time to be an Apple customer. But several things have been nagging at me lately... and it all depends on if Steve's long term goal is to really beat Microsoft or not. I think it is. If we look, for example, at Pages, Mail, and iCal, and Apple's recent trademarking of the word "Numbers", it seems like Apple is quietly developing, for all intents and purposes, an Office replacement. In fact, it seems as if Apple is preparing for the day when Microsoft says, "No more Office". Not only that, but I think Apple actually wants that to occur, but according to its own time schedule.

Then there's IBM. Steve Jobs said that one of the main reasons we're switching to Intel is that IBM was unable to come up with the goods, "I promised you a 3 Ghz G5 in one year, but was unable to keep that promise. I know many of you want a G5 in your powerbooks as well." He also stated that he forsees Intel having more "Power Per Watt" than IBM in the future. However, OS X has been compiled to work on Intel since 10.0, when I believe we were still with Motorola.

My guess is that Apple is using this whole lack of a G5 thing as an excuse to make the switch to Intel. I think Apple was just waiting for a good excuse to make this annoucement, and were secretly planning on switching long ago, and that part of the secret goals for Mac OS X, was a switch to Intel in the future.

Now, if I'm correct, then why would Apple go to such lengths to cover up their intentions for entering the x86 market? It should be obvious that the main reason is to throw Microsoft off. Steve even had the MBU spokesperson attend the keynote where this was announced, and definitely made it seem that Apple had no intent on licensing OS X to PC manufacturers.

However, why then all this preparation? Why were they building OS X on Intel from day one? Why create the iWork Suite: Keynote, Pages, and soon-to-be-introduced Numbers? All these programs are compatable with Microsoft documents, and aren't really that much "better" than the current Microsoft Office Suite for OS X. To me it seems that Apple is preparing to go head-on with Microsoft, while doing its best to appear not to.

We will have more of an indication if any of this is true in one year, when the first Intel based macs are released. Then we will see what will happen to Tiger. If at that time some "hacker" got Tiger to run on his Dell machine, and Apple doesn't do anything about it, then we will know for sure, I think.

[FulcrumPilot]

[goMac]

I'd believe it. Steve Jobs has always been an Intel guy after he left Apple.

I don't think it's a bad choice though. Steve stuck with PowerPC as long as he could have. PowerPC is slowly suffering and becoming a gaming chip, but not a general use chip. Maybe thats the best direction for PowerPC, but not for Apple.

I also think Intel is very excited to be in bed with Apple. They won't fail us. I wouldn't be surprised to see them favor Apple over other partners, and become extremely strong partners themselves.

Remember, Pixar has been using Intel for big iron work for quite a while.

Edit: Also remember that NeXTStep, which OS X was based on, was Intel only for a long time. The original developers previews were for both Intel and PowerPC. All Apple did was stop publicly issuing the Intel version. They still maintained it.

[analogika]

Originally Posted by goMac

I'd believe it. Steve Jobs has always been an Intel guy after he left Apple.

Really now?

All the hardware NeXT built was Motorola-based.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by analogika

Really now?

All the hardware NeXT built was Motorola-based.

After NeXT dumped the 68000 based hardware they made, they simply became a software vendor. They did various things like team up with Dell to offer NeXTStep on Dell PC's. Interesting, eh?

[RAILhead]

Originally Posted by FulcrumPilot

Classic -- I'm stealing that and adding it my jackarsenal!

Maury

[analogika]

NeXT didn't "dump the 68000 based hardware they made", they dropped out of the hardware business altogether.

They were about to team with Sun just before Apple bought them up.

[osxisfun]

if by excuse you mean "ibm had no laptop chip them and therefore where about to be forked." then yes.. maybe its an excuse. not.

intel has a better roadmap for desktops and laptops in the future.

and IBM failed them and they got sick of their failings...

simple.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by analogika

NeXT didn't "dump the 68000 based hardware they made", they dropped out of the hardware business altogether.

They were about to team with Sun just before Apple bought them up.

Unless they had other hardware besides their 68000 based hardware, I think saying that they dumped their 68000 would still be accurate.

Sun and Apple weren't teaming up exactly. Sun was going to integrate the Cocoa Java classes in Java and start bundling NeXTStep on some computers. Aside from the Java work, it was a lot like the Dell deal.

Sun was courting a lot of companies at the time. There were even rumors they would acquire Apple.

[analogika]

Originally Posted by goMac

Sun and Apple weren't teaming up exactly. Sun was going to integrate the Cocoa Java classes in Java and start bundling NeXTStep on some computers. Aside from the Java work, it was a lot like the Dell deal.

Except that Sun's machines didn't run on Intel, right?

[goMac]

Originally Posted by analogika

Except that Sun's machines didn't run on Intel, right?

Sun also transitioned to Intel processors. They also attempted to port Solaris to the original Itanium, and currently they are pushing the new open source Solaris on Intel processors.

[Superchicken]

I actually don't think Steve wants to DUMP PPC all together. In fact I would not be surprised to see the PPC in Macs for more than two years if IBM or Freescale does develop a new good desktop chip. I mean the PPC 970 is going to continue development, and if that ever beats Intel again after the switch I'm sure Steve will be willing to say, "We're making this G5 based PowerMac and this is a great thing about us switching Xcode over to only universal binaries, this means we can always be shipping the fastest personal computers".
That said I am very surprised that Xcode even allows you to make apps exclusively for one platform.

That said I think Steve has been frustrated with PPC for a while and has always been a bit frustrated that they had to make Macs soley running on PPC. That said with Classic now not really a big priority Steve can cut reliance on Freescale and IBM. I think the big thing for Stevey boy is that he doesn't trust anyone, and doesn't want to rely on anyone but himself and Apple. A kind of good choice, and an understandable perspective for someone who was an adopted. Steve's always been super independent, it's one of the reasons Apple has been a great company.

[goMac]

Actually there was a part in the WWDC keynote were Steve was talking about all of Apple's past transitions. When he reached the 68000->PPC transition he said something along the lines of "I wasn't here then, but I'm sure Apple's engineers did a good job". It got a bit of a laugh from the crowd, but I thought he said it in a tone that was kind of implying he would have gone Intel instead.

Remember, both of Steve's other ventures, Pixar and NeXT eventually went Intel. Steve was using an Intel based laptop his first few years at Apple. When Steve moved Pixar over to Intel, he even got to keynote an Intel conference. Apple was sort of the odd man out in his ventures for being PowerPC based.

[analogika]

Originally Posted by goMac

Sun also transitioned to Intel processors. They also attempted to port Solaris to the original Itanium, and currently they are pushing the new open source Solaris on Intel processors.

In 1995/96, when the "Intel guy" Steve Jobs was trying to partner with them?

[goMac]

Originally Posted by analogika

In 1995/96, when the "Intel guy" Steve Jobs was trying to partner with them?

OpenStep for Sun ran as a layer within Solaris, similar to Yellow Box for Windows. It was never a full port. In fact, it was the only port of OpenStep that was not a full implementation of the OS.

This was only a deal for Sun to expand it's API's on Solaris. It never really was a deal to move the OS to another platform. At this time, OpenStep was morphing into a run anywhere API.

[Cadaver]

Originally Posted by Superchicken

I actually don't think Steve wants to DUMP PPC all together. In fact I would not be surprised to see the PPC in Macs for more than two years if IBM or Freescale does develop a new good desktop chip. I mean the PPC 970 is going to continue development, and if that ever beats Intel again after the switch I'm sure Steve will be willing to say, "We're making this G5 based PowerMac and this is a great thing about us switching Xcode over to only universal binaries, this means we can always be shipping the fastest personal computers".
That said I am very surprised that Xcode even allows you to make apps exclusively for one platform.

That said I think Steve has been frustrated with PPC for a while and has always been a bit frustrated that they had to make Macs soley running on PPC. That said with Classic now not really a big priority Steve can cut reliance on Freescale and IBM. I think the big thing for Stevey boy is that he doesn't trust anyone, and doesn't want to rely on anyone but himself and Apple. A kind of good choice, and an understandable perspective for someone who was an adopted. Steve's always been super independent, it's one of the reasons Apple has been a great company.

Apple better either make the switch or not. Keeping around two processor platforms for too long will really up software development (especially high-end pro-level apps, hardware drivers and games; perhaps less so with basic apps).

[analogika]

Originally Posted by goMac

OpenStep for Sun ran as a layer within Solaris, similar to Yellow Box for Windows. It was never a full port. In fact, it was the only port of OpenStep that was not a full implementation of the OS.

This was only a deal for Sun to expand it's API's on Solaris. It never really was a deal to move the OS to another platform. At this time, OpenStep was morphing into a run anywhere API.

Ah - that's interesting.

Thanks!

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by FulcrumPilot

I saved that one to disk.

I'll have to edit the size and make it tookified.

[Kevin]

analogika is right. Much like BEOS, NeXT didn't go x86 till much later and after their hardware days.

Having said that, I also too thought the NeXT boxes had Intel chips in them at one time.

So don't feel like a total idiot.

[Hawkeye_a]

It's funny but if you take a step back, and have a look at the industry, the alliances have changed rather drastically in the past 6-8 months.

Apple and Intel ? (hell froze over imo)
Microsoft using an IBM PPC in their console instead of Intel ? shocker to say the least.

There has been quite a fundamental shift, and shake up in partnerships..... i think its good to have something like this to happen every now n then. And so far the products expected are rather outstanding (XBox, OSX performance on 'faster processors' on par with Windows) ....and what i like is the fact that the consumer gains a lot.

Also...i dont think theres been as much criticizm of Microsoft in the past 20 years as there has been in the last 6 months...at least from journalists and technophbes (hence Linux imo(yuck!))

So....finally...... enter Apple. Developer savvy (UNIX for gawd sake). Professional savvy (powerful image, video and audio processing tools... Shake,FCP, etc). Consumer savvy ( user friendly, and a the right price...also things just work). IT/business savvy (Xserve, XSan, OSX Server, QT Streaming). Couple all those characteristics with a rock solid OS that hardly crashes, has almost no viruses, and with monthly security updates, and you have a damn strong competitor to Windows.

The only thing needed now, is for Apple to deliver intel based Macs, at least 6 to 8 months before the release of longhorn, to help the marketing n publicity effort. If they advertize sufficiently...they stand to really make a dent in the universe, and finally capitalize on 'Macintosh'.

Cheers

[Eug Wanker]

Well, it's a pretty damn good excuse.

If we had a dual-core 3.2 GHz 970MP and a single-core 30 Watt 2.1 GHz 970GX today, the prices were reasonable, and there was room for progress, you can be pretty well sure Apple would be sticking with IBM. That's an awful lot of "if"s that didn't come true however.

Originally Posted by Superchicken

I actually don't think Steve wants to DUMP PPC all together. In fact I would not be surprised to see the PPC in Macs for more than two years if IBM or Freescale does develop a new good desktop chip. I mean the PPC 970 is going to continue development, and if that ever beats Intel again after the switch I'm sure Steve will be willing to say, "We're making this G5 based PowerMac and this is a great thing about us switching Xcode over to only universal binaries, this means we can always be shipping the fastest personal computers".
That said I am very surprised that Xcode even allows you to make apps exclusively for one platform.

That said I think Steve has been frustrated with PPC for a while and has always been a bit frustrated that they had to make Macs soley running on PPC. That said with Classic now not really a big priority Steve can cut reliance on Freescale and IBM. I think the big thing for Stevey boy is that he doesn't trust anyone, and doesn't want to rely on anyone but himself and Apple. A kind of good choice, and an understandable perspective for someone who was an adopted. Steve's always been super independent, it's one of the reasons Apple has been a great company.

Stevie says they're dumping PPC altogether, and I believe him, cuz it makes a whole lot of sense to do so.

Freescale most definitely isn't going to be a pioneer in chip technology. IBM has demonstrated that they can lead in the high-end server market (in which Apple has no presence), and that they can more or less keep pace in the desktop market, but where are they in the embedded/laptop G5 market? That's right, non-existent. I tried harder than anyone to believe that IBM would come through for us for that new PowerBook G5, but alas, it never came to be.

And don't forget that Apple's contract with IBM ends in October 2007. It's more than likely that at that point, Apple will be exclusively Intel for quite some time. In fact, I would not be surprised if that exclusivity was written right into the contract.

[Randman]

All IBM had to do was hit 3Ghz (not overclocked) and release a mobile G5 chip. They do that, Apple wouldn't have to switch.

As far as the double life, it was a business decision to cover the company's rear in case IBM failed, which it did.

[AKcrab]

Originally Posted by Randman

As far as the double life, it was a business decision to cover the company's rear in case IBM failed, which it did.

Wonder if Apple called their x86 division at apple the "Motorola Division", just to throw people off.

[itistoday]

Originally Posted by Randman

All IBM had to do was hit 3Ghz (not overclocked) and release a mobile G5 chip. They do that, Apple wouldn't have to switch.

As far as the double life, it was a business decision to cover the company's rear in case IBM failed, which it did.

Nah, I don't think so. In fact, I think Steve might have purposefully set too high of a goal for IBM to meet knowing it couldn't. Apple was developing OS X for x86 way before IBM was even in the picture, and Motorola was constantly falling below Apple's expectations, so much so actually, that at a board meeting Steve said to Motorola's CEO (I think it was the CEO), "I can't wait till we don't need you anymore!" They were planning the switch from day one is my guess.

Edit: But I agree with you, had they met those goals, Apple would have stuck with them because it wouldn't have a good enough excuse to switch.

[Randman]

Too high of a goal?

[itistoday]

Originally Posted by Randman

Too high of a goal?

Apparently. Are you an engineer at IBM? It's been much longer than a year since he said it and they still have not met it.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by itistoday

Nah, I don't think so. In fact, I think Steve might have purposefully set too high of a goal for IBM to meet knowing it couldn't.

3 GHz in 12 months might have been too high of a goal, but 3 GHz in 24 months certainly wasn't.

And more importantly, we have seen no laptop G5 whatsoever of course.

Apple was developing OS X for x86 way before IBM was even in the picture, and Motorola was constantly falling below Apple's expectations, so much so actually, that at a board meeting Steve said to Motorola's CEO (I think it was the CEO), "I can't wait till we don't need you anymore!" They were planning the switch from day one is my guess.

I think you should go back and look at the history of OS X. It was based on NeXT, which was designed to be platform independent.

It was no surprise to me that OS X was kept up on x86 right from the beginning. It was a major risk for Apple to rest its entire future on IBM, and they had to have a Plan B. (Motorola/Freescale doesn't count, since they have long since been a semiconductor technology follower, not a design leader in the class of chips Apple is interested in.) Hell, Apple even made Darwin for x86 open source.

What did surprise me was the level of upkeep Jobs enforced for OS X on Intel. Despite the rough areas, and the hardships that will occur with application porting, the WWDC Mac OS X on Intel demonstration was very impressive.

BTW, equally impressive is Microsoft's adoption of PPC for the Xbox 360, with PPC Power Macs being the development boxes.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by AKcrab

Wonder if Apple called their x86 division at apple the "Motorola Division", just to throw people off.

Well, I heard that no one knew about it. Every once in a while someone would get code sent back to them to be made more "Platform Independent" though.

[MindFad]

I'm not sure that it's so much an excuse as it is a very, very convenient timing in terms of roadmaps. IBM's been failings us. Intel won't, and they awesome processors just over the horizon. I'm sure Apple and Intel will make for happy tech bedfellows.

[Link]

We could always talk about AMD not having a 3ghz opteron yet, IMHO people who compare G5s to P4s are insane.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by MindFad

I'm not sure that it's so much an excuse as it is a very, very convenient timing in terms of roadmaps.

And contracts. As I said before, IBM's contract is up in 2007.

IBM's been failings us. Intel won't

Well, remember, Intel has effectively been stalled too over the last couple of years, on the desktop chip front. Where Intel has excelled beyond anyone else is on the low power chip front.

Because of Intel's many previous broken promises, I'm definitely not convinced that Intel is going to meet their roadmap goals over the next three years. However, being on Intel in some ways does offer a certain level of stability that IBM/Freescale can't, even through this transition period.

[goMac]

One reason a Intel had to break a lot of promises was because of Microsoft. Intel tries to create a new 64 bit risc architecture. Intel asks Microsoft to port Windows over to it. Microsoft says screw you, we'll go with AMD then. Intel is forced to double back and create an architecture similar to the AMD64.

Microsoft pushed Intel around a lot, and as we know... Microsoft has a habit of squashing innovation.

[Hawkeye_a]

What i find very interesting is the fact that they designed OSX to be 'Processor independant'. They could include support for any other processors they might wish to use in future macs (and that takes the term 'universal binary' to a new level).

It definately encourages competition in processor development, but also aleviates developers and Apple from having to stick to any single processor, be it intel or PPC.

PPC, as far as processors go is still #1 in my book. it hasnt failed to deliver. my 550 Mhz Powerbook runs OSX beautifully (so much so that i havent even bothered buying a new Mac)....compare that to WinXP performance on 1Ghz P4.i know software engineering has something to do with it, but M$ has been on intel for a damn long time.

What id like to see....and compare is OSX running on a 2Ghz P4 vs OSX running on a 2Ghz G5. (that will answer the question....'do Mhzs matter ?')
And then....compare OSX and WInXP on the same intel processors. (thats where we will see the quality of Apple's software engineering)

Cheers

[goMac]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye_a

PPC, as far as processors go is still #1 in my book. it hasnt failed to deliver. my 550 Mhz Powerbook runs OSX beautifully (so much so that i havent even bothered buying a new Mac)....compare that to WinXP performance on 1Ghz P4.i know software engineering has something to do with it, but M$ has been on intel for a damn long time.

OS X probably does run fine on a 550 Mhz Powerbook, but there is a difference between cutting edge and mediocrity. Apple isn't interested in a computer running OS X good enough. They are interested in running OS X as fast as possible. After using a 3.6 ghz Mactel, and comparing against my Win XP 3.6 ghz PC at home, it's fairly obvious Win XP has bad optimization issues. Mac OS X flies faster than I've seen it on any machine on Intel, and Windows XP here at home... well... it sucks. Obviously with no real graphics acceleration, the Intel boxes fall short on games right now, but otherwise, they're freakin fast.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye_a

PPC, as far as processors go is still #1 in my book. it hasnt failed to deliver. my 550 Mhz Powerbook runs OSX beautifully (so much so that i havent even bothered buying a new Mac)....compare that to WinXP performance on 1Ghz P4.i know software engineering has something to do with it, but M$ has been on intel for a damn long time.

OS X is PAINFULLY slow on a G4 450 in my opinion. I don't see a G4 550 being that much better. Indeed, I find OS X on my G4 1 GHz slow too.

It's quite nice on my G5 2.0, but that's a chip with twice the integer speed and three to four times the floating point speed of that G4 1 GHz.

[Randman]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

OS X is PAINFULLY slow on a G4 450 in my opinion.

And how much ram?

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Randman

And how much ram?

1 GB RAM
120 GB 7200 rpm hard drive

The machine in question is a Cube. I am now running a G4 1.7 GHz in it, because the slowness of the G4 450 drove me nuts. I don't like my TiBook 1 GHz on the 667 MHz battery mode either. It feels like I'm trudging thru molasses.

[Hawkeye_a]

Oh...im sure OSX screams on the newer machines....i just dont find that increased speed that much of an incentive to spend thousands to upgrade. The reasons i will upgrade are Superdrives, iDVD, and yes a new processor G5 or intel(im strongly considering an iMac G5(before they go intel)).

but yeah goMac, so you used one of the test machines ? were you at WWDC ? thats cool.

Basically you answered my question:
-OSX is faster than windows on the same processor. Therefore Apple has better software engineering than M$ in their respective OSs.

I hate to sound like a PPC fanboy....but i still reckon that the G5 is clock-for-clock better than the P4. But obviously overall performance given the difference in Mhz, the cost of production and heat consumption put the P4 ahead of the G5.

If any of you guys find statitical comparisons of Windows XP vs OSX on the same box, please post em.

Cheers

[Superchicken]

I dono, I honestly don't see OS X flying that much faster on a P4 3.6 than a Dual 2.0 G5. I mean, I could understand a lil bit, but the Dual 3.0 Xeon lost to the Dual 2.0 G5 by a large margin in Photoshop tests and what not. I don't imagine all of that loss in speed could be blamed in Windows...

[osxisfun]

Originally Posted by Superchicken

I dono, I honestly don't see OS X flying that much faster on a P4 3.6 than a Dual 2.0 G5. I mean, I could understand a lil bit, but the Dual 3.0 Xeon lost to the Dual 2.0 G5 by a large margin in Photoshop tests and what not. I don't imagine all of that loss in speed could be blamed in Windows...

i think altivec tests are the only place that the g5s are going to keep up...

the thing is that developers are saying a single 3.6 p4 is feels faster than a dual 2.7 and does not come with all the fan baggage.

and this is not the chip that will be used. I expect the apple to use the new dual core pentium m/d next year so its possible that apple will stick two of these (dual dual ) in the high end machine.

the g5 had about 6-9 months of desktop life in it before it was going to be clobbered.... it has NO life in it as far as laptops go.

apple is switching at a opportune time. apple HW in 2006 is going to fracking rock.

[jamil5454]

Originally Posted by goMac

OS X probably does run fine on a 550 Mhz Powerbook, but there is a difference between cutting edge and mediocrity. Apple isn't interested in a computer running OS X good enough. They are interested in running OS X as fast as possible. After using a 3.6 ghz Mactel, and comparing against my Win XP 3.6 ghz PC at home, it's fairly obvious Win XP has bad optimization issues. Mac OS X flies faster than I've seen it on any machine on Intel, and Windows XP here at home... well... it sucks. Obviously with no real graphics acceleration, the Intel boxes fall short on games right now, but otherwise, they're freakin fast.

Most of that is because the Mactels have 2mb L2 cache, running at 3.6ghz. Compare this to the 512kb L2 cache on current G5s, and you'll see why the Intel feels faster. With Hyperthreading and dual cores, OS X will be a multi-processing beast of an OS, and then you'll see the real speed.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye_a

Basically you answered my question:
-OSX is faster than windows on the same processor. Therefore Apple has better software engineering than M$ in their respective OSs.

Huh? What are you talking about?

I hate to sound like a PPC fanboy....but i still reckon that the G5 is clock-for-clock better than the P4.

Yes, you sound like a PPC fanboy. Of course the G5 is clock-for-clock faster than the P4. However, the P4 has a 33% clock-speed advantage.

But obviously overall performance given the difference in Mhz, the cost of production and heat consumption put the P4 ahead of the G5.

We don't know what the cost of production is. It may be higher for the G5, but then again, it's roughly half the size of the P4. As for heat consumption, I'd bet the G5 2.7 is actually cooler than the P4 3.6, but suffers from higher heat density.

Originally Posted by osxisfun

the thing is that developers are saying a single 3.6 p4 is feels faster than a dual 2.7 and does not come with all the fan baggage.

Actually no. Maybe you're reading the placebo'd xlr8yourmac reports or whatever, but other developers are saying that a single P4 3.6 on OS X feels noticeably slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average, but is acceptable. That is not surprising at all, because a single P4 3.6 is a lot slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average.

[chris v]

It's all about the portables. This year, portable sales surpassed the 50% mark in total units shipped. The G5 is still competetive in the desktop arena, but there are no PPC chips even on the horizon for portables that will move the iBooks and PowerBooks out of the doldrums they're in speed-wise. If in 2 years, portables are 70% of the market, and the Pentium Ms continue to stomp Freescale's offerings, Apple would have been in a world of hurt, G5 or no G5, since the PPC 970 (fx, gx, mp, whatever) is never going in a portable.

[osxisfun]

>Actually no. Maybe you're reading the placebo'd xlr8yourmac reports or whatever, but other developers are saying that a single P4 3.6 on OS X feels noticeably slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average, but is acceptable. That is not surprising at all, because a single P4 3.6 is a lot slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average.

I think this will be the "did they take the debug code out" of the new macs

http://www.cocoatech.com/weblog/arch.../15/000148.php

A test on the single p4 is not that great though as they will be shipping dual core for the powermac and powerbooks.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Maybe you're reading the placebo'd xlr8yourmac reports or whatever, but other developers are saying that a single P4 3.6 on OS X feels noticeably slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average, but is acceptable. That is not surprising at all, because a single P4 3.6 is a lot slower than a dual G5 2.7 on average.

I would disagree. For application launches and stuff, it was noticeably quicker. For stuff such as QuickTime and anything graphical, it will be slower because it has Intel graphics. That's not the Pentium's fault, that's Apples.

And personally, I don't have a huge problem with it. If Apple wanted, they could throw in two 64 bit versions of the P4 with the same cooling the current G5 has. We know that would stomp all over the G5. And the Pentium Mobile is faster in some cases than the 3.6 ghz P4. A Powerbook that runs faster than a 3.6 ghz P4? Sounds good to me compared to the current lineup.

[mitchell_pgh]

I think Steve didn't use 3GHz as an excuse. He simply sees the writing on the wall.

MY THEORY: I think Steve changed after his brush with cancer. I think he wants to leave a legacy as really changing the computer industry... and he wants the Mac to return to a major player one way or another to solidify his place in computer history [not like he needs any help]. I'm guessing he and Apple are tired of making excuses for IBM and Moto and is tired of swimming upstream against the boheamoth of Intel (and even AMD).

I think Apple has some additional secrets in store for us... I see Apple releasing some compatability layer within the next few years that is going to cause some MAJOR pain to Microsoft... and I think it will tie in with Linux.

[mitchell_pgh]

Originally Posted by goMac

And the Pentium Mobile is faster in some cases than the 3.6 ghz P4. A Powerbook that runs faster than a 3.6 ghz P4? Sounds good to me compared to the current lineup.

The PC side of the fence has portable systems competing with Mac desktop systems... that says volumes IMHO.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by mitchell_pgh

I think Apple has some additional secrets in store for us... I see Apple releasing some compatability layer within the next few years that is going to cause some MAJOR pain to Microsoft... and I think it will tie in with Linux.

If Apple brought back Yellow Box for Windows to run x86 Cocoa programs in Windows, that would displace .Net and bring Mac users a lot more applications.

[Hawkeye_a]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Huh? What are you talking about?


Yes, you sound like a PPC fanboy. Of course the G5 is clock-for-clock faster than the P4. However, the P4 has a 33% clock-speed advantage.

Someone mentioned that they tried out OSX on the Macintel test machines and said they feel faster than WinXP on the same processor/similar configuration. Therefore with OSX and WinXP running on similar configuration, OSX is faster, and therefore Apple's engineering in software is better than Microsoft's (even though we're playing in Microsoft's filed...x86).

Well...i admitted i was PPC fanboy. but i have to admit that thats purely because of number-crunching ability of the processors. Overall, the cooler P4s (P4-M or whatever) do seem better suited for home computing.