note: I posted this today on the MacGuild mailing list as well, I figure since I wrote it, I could put it here too. Feel Free to quote me, just give me the credit! 😀 -Judd Spitzer
If anyone here has seen the movie, The gods must be crazy, then you may already know what I’m alluding to. The straight forward synopsis from IMDB.com is, “A Sho in the Kalahari desert encounters technology for the first time–in the shape of a Coke bottle”
Maybe Steve Jobs is getting ready to drop a Coke bottle down on the users of Intel-based computers (Windows users).
I for one was a skeptical about this announcement as any avid MacUser. I like to believe that some of the passion that drives the emotionally attached MacUser is the fact that WE love to understand the architecture behind our product, and can defend in many ways why it is superior to other computers. Hence forth, MacTel or MacIntel, or whatever… does this mean we’re just like them?
Honestly, I don’t think that this really should have come as much of a real big surprise to the Mac Development community. After all, Darwin has been fully supported on x86 based machines since OS X came out for the most part. See: http://www.opendarwin.org/en/downloads/
Occasionally, I’ll glance into my crystal ball and attempt to guess at what those leopards are doing at Apple. Maybe the old adage that leopard can’t change its spots isn’t true, or so Apple is betting on. Yet, what could the future hold?
Some possibilities to consider:
1) Apple plans on releasing Leopard to go head to head with Longhorn, and make it run on a Intel box of opportunity, and directly go for market share as companies look to do corporate refreshes.
2) Apple has seen the Linux community support both x86 and PPC based architectures for years and realizes that it isn’t out of the realm of possibilities to maintain both sides of the house for greater leverage of market share.
3) PPC based computers have traditionally demonstrated better scalability and future growth. Apple may be planning on keeping servers on the PPC based side to garner those better chips that IBM is keeping in the back room, since there is no way IBM can make enough for PC production.
4) Government Conspiracy, They simply don’t want too powerful computers getting into the hands of unfriendly governments. The Apple has leveraging technologies built into the OS. Imagine what Iran could do with 1000 G5 Macs? Maybe they want to stifle competition in the PC processor market for a while.
5) Apple and Intel could be working on a completely new chip based on x86 technology, but is enhanced by Apple’s Engineering team for OS optimization.
Well, I thought I’d throw some theories out there and see if anyone thinks the are worth their weight in LCD pixels.
Rosetta and Leopard sound great, now lets see what that famed Marketing department can do in the damage control department.
Judd Spitzer
(juddspitzer.com)
MacGuild Contributor