Everybody is in business to make money, or they aren't in business at all.
Apple wasn't being run by Steve Jobs when the PPC project began, and he wasn't running it when the cloning experiment was started. When he shut it down, this was a fete accomplie, since it was already a complete disaster for Apple. This had nothing to do with anyone's willingness to do anything except save Apple from destruction.
That said, IBM and especially Motorola were always weak partners for Apple.
why would it cost 1billion? this article just didn't give me any explanation.
Reticles for chip manufacture are now frighteningly expensive (and getting more so all the time, as transistor sizes get smaller and smaller). Given you need a lot of reticles per chip, and if you will go through a couple of design iterations before you settle on the released part, the costs involved are enormous.
It always *has* been independent of any particular processor type.
Remember, NeXtStep started out on a 68K. Moved to Intel. Then PowerPC. Then back to Intel. And OSX *is* the kernel for the iPhone and iPod Touch (and iPad) running on an ARM.
What makes you think it isn't running on ARM chips today?
Bottom line, though, is that ARM chips don't have the processing power of the x86. They have lots of other advantages (e.g., power and integration), but they don't have the brute power. Even if they did, being able to run Windows on a Mac is a HUGE advantage, one that wouldn't be easily eliminated. The Mac has enjoyed a modicum of success since switching to Intel. Being able to run Windows has had a *lot* to do with that.
NeXTStep started on 68k, then moved to x86, then added SPARC and HP PA-RISC, to then move to PowerPC [a dual processor predecessor to the PowerPC never released with NS3.3 called the Brick], to the PowerPC G3 with the merger and later back to x86 [the latter two obviously becoming OS X], only to then extend to ARM.
NeXtStep brings back fond memories. I was thinking of moving up to the NeXt computer as my Mac Plus was aging and I was looking at the Mac iici. The greatest selling point was the unix based OS.
It always *has* been independent of any particular processor type.
Remember, NeXtStep started out on a 68K. Moved to Intel. Then PowerPC. Then back to Intel. And OSX *is* the kernel for the iPhone and iPod Touch (and iPad) running on an ARM.
NeXTSTEP also run in HP PA and Sun Sparc. Some say that NeXT ported it to IBM POWER. What is now Cocoa (OPENSTEP or OpenStep, check this for the possible spellings), also run on top of Windows and Solaris (possibly HP-UX). And the GNU implementation of OpenStep runs currently on top of most UNIX and lookalikes. So, I think Apple has the most portable modern commercial operating system ever. Am I forgetting anything?
If something goes wrong with *any* (major) chip on the iPad, the iPad is toast. What's your point?
Keep in mind, that having a single point of failure in this case is actually good. Fewer interconnects on the circuit board, fewer traces, fewer solder joints, and so on (the stuff that often fails).
Why point had nothing to do with the iPad but more so with this kind of technology in a notebook. A single point of failure could be either good or bad depending on the cost to replace that single point.
Well I am not sure what the numbers are on Mac users that use bootcamp but it was reported here and other places on the web that 85% of Mac users also have a Windows system.
Being able to install Windows on your Mac is always part of the Apple sales pitch in any Apple store I have walked into.
10hour battery life on a tablet with a mobile phone processor is not *that* impressive. After all a large LiPo battery can be molded into the thing due to the large footprint
According to its specs, the iPad has a 25 Watt-Hour battery. The battery in the iPod touch is only 1 Watt Hour (not in the spec, but people have looked inside). That's a big difference: the iPad battery has about 25 times as much volume as the touch's. Somehow, though, the iPad only weighs six times as much as the touch.
Using its 1WH battery, the iPod touch is spec'ed to show video for 6 hours. I would guess that most of the power goes just to running the screen. Since the iPad screen has almost 7 times the area of the touch, and is spec'ed to run for 10 hours vs 6, you'd need about 11 times as much power for the display if you were using the same technology. Since the iPad has 25 times as much power available overall, I can believe that it should be able to get the battery life quoted.
Upgraded a long time ago and again several times in between last year when I got a MBP. If you read the post you would see that it was fond memories of the NeXt. Back then, the NeXt OS was ahead of its time and beat Apple's System 7 and Windows "whatever" it was back then.
It currently has 1Ghz Pentium-class CPU. I think the iPad's base HW is ideal for the next AppleTV, though a much better GPU may be required (or at least upping the clock speed) to get high-profile 1080p content without stuttering. It would run much cooler, too.
I think your price is quite low for a media extender appliance with gigabit ethernet, a HDD and 802.11n.
I don't think Apple can let the living room go, but they also can't wait too much longer if they want to recapture it. They've done well with integrating multiple devices into one, but the console and DVR market has them beat there. Unless they decide to create an SDK for the AppleTV I don't think they'll ever get a substantial share of that market, even though it's likely the most popular media extender appliance to date.
Agreed. Apple needs to do something more to capture the living room. They cannot ignore this and continue to put it on the back burner. Time is running and may run out fairly soon. Microsoft from what I can tell is making a push with their new windows phone to integrate with their 360 console. This is a huge advantage that MS has because of the installed base of the 360. I think MS has finally got their heads out of the sand. They have had all of the pieces in place for some time but have been unable to put the pieces together.
Apple needs an SDK for AppleTV. Integrate this with the iPhone and Touch, maybe even be able to use the iPhone and Touch as a controller for games and apps on the Apple TV.
Everyone seems to be forgetting that Apple co-founded ARM (then called Advanced RISC Machines)> The started it way back in 1990, in partnership with Acorn Computers (a British company that at the time was a major supplier of home and school computers in the UK) and VLSI Technology, a Silicon Valley chip design and manufacturing company directly descended from Fairchild Semiconductors, the first semiconductor outfit in Silicon Valley. Acorn had an early RISC chip, and Apple apparently wanted to develop the technology and use it for the Newton, in addition to licensing it to other companies to help cover the (large) costs of development.
In that sense, with the iPad, history has just come around again to where it all began.
For years after the founding of ARM, Apple owned a large share of it. In the mid--to-late 199s, when Apple wasn't doing well, they gradually sold off most of their ARM stock, at a very large profit, to raise money. By the year 2000 Apple's stake was down to 6 percent. I'm not sure whether they finally sold all of it or still retain a little.
Another interesting bit of history: the former Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), which used to make minicomputers and workstations, acquired a design license from ARM sometime in the 90s, and together with ARM they developed a really fast (for the time) variant called the StrongARM, which was used in the last version of the Newton. In 1997 Intel acquired DEC's chip division, including the StrongARM license, design team, and fab, as part of the settlement of a lawsuit between them. So for a while Intel actually owned the best ARM design on the market. Though all or nearly all of the DEC people left, Intel later developed a derivative of the StrongARM called XScale, but they apparently still had to pay some royalties to ARM, and there were always internal tensions within Intel about competing with their own bread-and-butter x86 architecture. In 2006, as part of a restructuring and consolidation campaign, they finally sold off the XScale, and with it their rights to ARM technology.
Agreed. Apple needs to do something more to capture the living room. They cannot ignore this and continue to put it on the back burner. Time is running and may run out fairly soon. Microsoft from what I can tell is making a push with their new windows phone to integrate with their 360 console. This is a huge advantage that MS has because of the installed base of the 360. I think MS has finally got their heads out of the sand. They have had all of the pieces in place for some time but have been unable to put the pieces together.
Apple needs an SDK for AppleTV. Integrate this with the iPhone and Touch, maybe even be able to use the iPhone and Touch as a controller for games and apps on the Apple TV.
If Apple moves to an ARM-based AppleTV, which I think they will, I think that would mean that the next AppleTV OS is based off of iPhone OS, not Mac OS. I think the latest version of the AppleTV OS is likely the last changes they'll make outside of bug/security fixes.
Unless they decide to create an SDK for the AppleTV I don't think they'll ever get a substantial share of that market, even though it's likely the most popular media extender appliance to date.
Just to digress about the living room for a second, that is exactly the point: "developers, developers, developers, developers..." you get the joke.
I don't know whether it will be worth putting a mobile chip in an ATV costwise (besides, what would heat my house then?) but the idea of iphone OS in Apple TV running apps means now we're talking about yet another screensize for the iphone (iPad being the second).
Look at the developer goldrush about to happen to the ipad.
Can the Apple TV be far behind?
This exactly the kind of sudden and overwhelming force it will take to win the living room. It is the killer app for the living room. Who would be able to counter it? Google, maybe, depending on how Android does.
(The only other killer app for a settop box that could compete with it is the DVR which sadly apple will probably never do).
I mean What jackass wouldn't port their iphone/ipad app over to the Apple TV if it were that easy? (the remote / game controller would of course be the ipod touch / iphone / ipad. Brilliant.
That is exactly the strategy. Start writing your business school case study.
Everyone seems to be forgetting that Apple co-founded ARM (then called Advanced RISC Machines)> The started it way back in 1990, in partnership with Acorn Computers (a British company that at the time was a major supplier of home and school computers in the UK) and VLSI Technology, a Silicon Valley chip design and manufacturing company directly descended from Fairchild Semiconductors, the first semiconductor outfit in Silicon Valley. Acorn had an early RISC chip, and Apple apparently wanted to develop the technology and use it for the Newton, in addition to licensing it to other companies to help cover the (large) costs of development.
In that sense, with the iPad, history has just come around again to where it all began.
For years after the founding of ARM, Apple owned a large share of it. In the mid--to-late 199s, when Apple wasn't doing well, they gradually sold off most of their ARM stock, at a very large profit, to raise money. By the year 2000 Apple's stake was down to 6 percent. I'm not sure whether they finally sold all of it or still retain a little.
Another interesting bit of history: the former Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), which used to make minicomputers and workstations, acquired a design license from ARM sometime in the 90s, and together with ARM they developed a really fast (for the time) variant called the StrongARM, which was used in the last version of the Newton. In 1997 Intel acquired DEC's chip division, including the StrongARM license, design team, and fab, as part of the settlement of a lawsuit between them. So for a while Intel actually owned the best ARM design on the market. Though all or nearly all of the DEC people left, Intel later developed a derivative of the StrongARM called XScale, but they apparently still had to pay some royalties to ARM, and there were always internal tensions within Intel about competing with their own bread-and-butter x86 architecture. In 2006, as part of a restructuring and consolidation campaign, they finally sold off the XScale, and with it their rights to ARM technology.
Not everyone is forgetting. I mentioned Apple's investment in ARM earlier. But good history, thanks for filling in so much detail.
Comments
That said, IBM and especially Motorola were always weak partners for Apple.
They certainly had different objectives.
Everybody is in business to make money, or they aren't in business at all.
Apple wasn't being run by Steve Jobs when the PPC project began, and he wasn't running it when the cloning experiment was started. When he shut it down, this was a fete accomplie, since it was already a complete disaster for Apple. This had nothing to do with anyone's willingness to do anything except save Apple from destruction.
That said, IBM and especially Motorola were always weak partners for Apple.
Agreed.
fait accompli, btw.
why would it cost 1billion? this article just didn't give me any explanation.
Reticles for chip manufacture are now frighteningly expensive (and getting more so all the time, as transistor sizes get smaller and smaller). Given you need a lot of reticles per chip, and if you will go through a couple of design iterations before you settle on the released part, the costs involved are enormous.
Uhhh...
It always *has* been independent of any particular processor type.
Remember, NeXtStep started out on a 68K. Moved to Intel. Then PowerPC. Then back to Intel. And OSX *is* the kernel for the iPhone and iPod Touch (and iPad) running on an ARM.
What makes you think it isn't running on ARM chips today?
Bottom line, though, is that ARM chips don't have the processing power of the x86. They have lots of other advantages (e.g., power and integration), but they don't have the brute power. Even if they did, being able to run Windows on a Mac is a HUGE advantage, one that wouldn't be easily eliminated. The Mac has enjoyed a modicum of success since switching to Intel. Being able to run Windows has had a *lot* to do with that.
NeXTStep started on 68k, then moved to x86, then added SPARC and HP PA-RISC, to then move to PowerPC [a dual processor predecessor to the PowerPC never released with NS3.3 called the Brick], to the PowerPC G3 with the merger and later back to x86 [the latter two obviously becoming OS X], only to then extend to ARM.
NeXtStep brings back fond memories. I was thinking of moving up to the NeXt computer as my Mac Plus was aging and I was looking at the Mac iici. The greatest selling point was the unix based OS.
Upgrade to G4 already
Ray
Uhhh...
It always *has* been independent of any particular processor type.
Remember, NeXtStep started out on a 68K. Moved to Intel. Then PowerPC. Then back to Intel. And OSX *is* the kernel for the iPhone and iPod Touch (and iPad) running on an ARM.
NeXTSTEP also run in HP PA and Sun Sparc. Some say that NeXT ported it to IBM POWER. What is now Cocoa (OPENSTEP or OpenStep, check this for the possible spellings), also run on top of Windows and Solaris (possibly HP-UX). And the GNU implementation of OpenStep runs currently on top of most UNIX and lookalikes. So, I think Apple has the most portable modern commercial operating system ever. Am I forgetting anything?
If something goes wrong with *any* (major) chip on the iPad, the iPad is toast. What's your point?
Keep in mind, that having a single point of failure in this case is actually good. Fewer interconnects on the circuit board, fewer traces, fewer solder joints, and so on (the stuff that often fails).
Why point had nothing to do with the iPad but more so with this kind of technology in a notebook. A single point of failure could be either good or bad depending on the cost to replace that single point.
I'll bet it is in the low single digits.
Ray
Well I am not sure what the numbers are on Mac users that use bootcamp but it was reported here and other places on the web that 85% of Mac users also have a Windows system.
Being able to install Windows on your Mac is always part of the Apple sales pitch in any Apple store I have walked into.
10hour battery life on a tablet with a mobile phone processor is not *that* impressive. After all a large LiPo battery can be molded into the thing due to the large footprint
The specs for the latest iPod touch are at "http://support.apple.com/kb/SP570". The specs for the new iPad are at "http://www.apple.com/ipad/specs/".
According to its specs, the iPad has a 25 Watt-Hour battery. The battery in the iPod touch is only 1 Watt Hour (not in the spec, but people have looked inside). That's a big difference: the iPad battery has about 25 times as much volume as the touch's. Somehow, though, the iPad only weighs six times as much as the touch.
Using its 1WH battery, the iPod touch is spec'ed to show video for 6 hours. I would guess that most of the power goes just to running the screen. Since the iPad screen has almost 7 times the area of the touch, and is spec'ed to run for 10 hours vs 6, you'd need about 11 times as much power for the display if you were using the same technology. Since the iPad has 25 times as much power available overall, I can believe that it should be able to get the battery life quoted.
Upgrade to G4 already
Upgraded a long time ago and again several times in between last year when I got a MBP. If you read the post you would see that it was fond memories of the NeXt. Back then, the NeXt OS was ahead of its time and beat Apple's System 7 and Windows "whatever" it was back then.
It currently has 1Ghz Pentium-class CPU. I think the iPad's base HW is ideal for the next AppleTV, though a much better GPU may be required (or at least upping the clock speed) to get high-profile 1080p content without stuttering. It would run much cooler, too.
I think your price is quite low for a media extender appliance with gigabit ethernet, a HDD and 802.11n.
I don't think Apple can let the living room go, but they also can't wait too much longer if they want to recapture it. They've done well with integrating multiple devices into one, but the console and DVR market has them beat there. Unless they decide to create an SDK for the AppleTV I don't think they'll ever get a substantial share of that market, even though it's likely the most popular media extender appliance to date.
Agreed. Apple needs to do something more to capture the living room. They cannot ignore this and continue to put it on the back burner. Time is running and may run out fairly soon. Microsoft from what I can tell is making a push with their new windows phone to integrate with their 360 console. This is a huge advantage that MS has because of the installed base of the 360. I think MS has finally got their heads out of the sand. They have had all of the pieces in place for some time but have been unable to put the pieces together.
Apple needs an SDK for AppleTV. Integrate this with the iPhone and Touch, maybe even be able to use the iPhone and Touch as a controller for games and apps on the Apple TV.
when was the last time that apple did this?
Everyone seems to be forgetting that Apple co-founded ARM (then called Advanced RISC Machines)> The started it way back in 1990, in partnership with Acorn Computers (a British company that at the time was a major supplier of home and school computers in the UK) and VLSI Technology, a Silicon Valley chip design and manufacturing company directly descended from Fairchild Semiconductors, the first semiconductor outfit in Silicon Valley. Acorn had an early RISC chip, and Apple apparently wanted to develop the technology and use it for the Newton, in addition to licensing it to other companies to help cover the (large) costs of development.
In that sense, with the iPad, history has just come around again to where it all began.
For years after the founding of ARM, Apple owned a large share of it. In the mid--to-late 199s, when Apple wasn't doing well, they gradually sold off most of their ARM stock, at a very large profit, to raise money. By the year 2000 Apple's stake was down to 6 percent. I'm not sure whether they finally sold all of it or still retain a little.
Another interesting bit of history: the former Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), which used to make minicomputers and workstations, acquired a design license from ARM sometime in the 90s, and together with ARM they developed a really fast (for the time) variant called the StrongARM, which was used in the last version of the Newton. In 1997 Intel acquired DEC's chip division, including the StrongARM license, design team, and fab, as part of the settlement of a lawsuit between them. So for a while Intel actually owned the best ARM design on the market. Though all or nearly all of the DEC people left, Intel later developed a derivative of the StrongARM called XScale, but they apparently still had to pay some royalties to ARM, and there were always internal tensions within Intel about competing with their own bread-and-butter x86 architecture. In 2006, as part of a restructuring and consolidation campaign, they finally sold off the XScale, and with it their rights to ARM technology.
Agreed. Apple needs to do something more to capture the living room. They cannot ignore this and continue to put it on the back burner. Time is running and may run out fairly soon. Microsoft from what I can tell is making a push with their new windows phone to integrate with their 360 console. This is a huge advantage that MS has because of the installed base of the 360. I think MS has finally got their heads out of the sand. They have had all of the pieces in place for some time but have been unable to put the pieces together.
Apple needs an SDK for AppleTV. Integrate this with the iPhone and Touch, maybe even be able to use the iPhone and Touch as a controller for games and apps on the Apple TV.
If Apple moves to an ARM-based AppleTV, which I think they will, I think that would mean that the next AppleTV OS is based off of iPhone OS, not Mac OS. I think the latest version of the AppleTV OS is likely the last changes they'll make outside of bug/security fixes.
Unless they decide to create an SDK for the AppleTV I don't think they'll ever get a substantial share of that market, even though it's likely the most popular media extender appliance to date.
Just to digress about the living room for a second, that is exactly the point: "developers, developers, developers, developers..." you get the joke.
I don't know whether it will be worth putting a mobile chip in an ATV costwise (besides, what would heat my house then?) but the idea of iphone OS in Apple TV running apps means now we're talking about yet another screensize for the iphone (iPad being the second).
Look at the developer goldrush about to happen to the ipad.
Can the Apple TV be far behind?
This exactly the kind of sudden and overwhelming force it will take to win the living room. It is the killer app for the living room. Who would be able to counter it? Google, maybe, depending on how Android does.
(The only other killer app for a settop box that could compete with it is the DVR which sadly apple will probably never do).
I mean What jackass wouldn't port their iphone/ipad app over to the Apple TV if it were that easy? (the remote / game controller would of course be the ipod touch / iphone / ipad. Brilliant.
That is exactly the strategy. Start writing your business school case study.
The question is will Apple license the A4 chip to other technology companies for their devices?
Car audio / video companies, maybe? Or actual auto manufacturers? This is another huge, huge market.
Everyone seems to be forgetting that Apple co-founded ARM (then called Advanced RISC Machines)> The started it way back in 1990, in partnership with Acorn Computers (a British company that at the time was a major supplier of home and school computers in the UK) and VLSI Technology, a Silicon Valley chip design and manufacturing company directly descended from Fairchild Semiconductors, the first semiconductor outfit in Silicon Valley. Acorn had an early RISC chip, and Apple apparently wanted to develop the technology and use it for the Newton, in addition to licensing it to other companies to help cover the (large) costs of development.
In that sense, with the iPad, history has just come around again to where it all began.
For years after the founding of ARM, Apple owned a large share of it. In the mid--to-late 199s, when Apple wasn't doing well, they gradually sold off most of their ARM stock, at a very large profit, to raise money. By the year 2000 Apple's stake was down to 6 percent. I'm not sure whether they finally sold all of it or still retain a little.
Another interesting bit of history: the former Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), which used to make minicomputers and workstations, acquired a design license from ARM sometime in the 90s, and together with ARM they developed a really fast (for the time) variant called the StrongARM, which was used in the last version of the Newton. In 1997 Intel acquired DEC's chip division, including the StrongARM license, design team, and fab, as part of the settlement of a lawsuit between them. So for a while Intel actually owned the best ARM design on the market. Though all or nearly all of the DEC people left, Intel later developed a derivative of the StrongARM called XScale, but they apparently still had to pay some royalties to ARM, and there were always internal tensions within Intel about competing with their own bread-and-butter x86 architecture. In 2006, as part of a restructuring and consolidation campaign, they finally sold off the XScale, and with it their rights to ARM technology.
Not everyone is forgetting. I mentioned Apple's investment in ARM earlier. But good history, thanks for filling in so much detail.
Agreed.
fait accompli, btw.
Touché?