The Place to Post all things Intel v AMD

Posted:
in Future Apple Hardware edited January 2014
Apple is going to switch to Intel. We all know that now after the keynote. What are the possibilities that they are also going to implement AMD processors into their computers as well. This would give them 2 huge chip suppliers and could choose from many different processors.



Macaddict16
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 49
    vinney57vinney57 Posts: 1,162member
    Not a chance. There's no money in this deal for Intel, its a PR and Branding play. Apple will be locked into a five year exclusive deal similar to the Dell deal.
  • Reply 2 of 49
    kwsanderskwsanders Posts: 327member
    I agree. I bet Intel setup the deal such that Apple gets their chips at bargain basement prices as long as Apple agreed to a multiyear, exclusive deal.
  • Reply 3 of 49
    auroraaurora Posts: 1,142member
    Steve and the Intel Chairman are golf buddies, Lots of business gets done on the course I doubt we will see a AMD Mac.
  • Reply 4 of 49
    kwsanderskwsanders Posts: 327member
    I agree. I bet Intel setup the deal such that Apple gets their chips at bargain basement prices as long as Apple agreed to a multiyear, exclusive deal.
  • Reply 5 of 49
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    What does it matter? OSX is locked to the hardware configs that Apple ships.



    We might see none of the benefits of moving to Intel architecture.



    Can I run OSX on my own homebuilt---NO



    Then I don't really have any benefit other than Steve blustering about Roadmaps. Yeah I'm going to believe that. I'll never trust a damn thing that comes out Steve's mouth. No more snake oil.
  • Reply 6 of 49
    A) Once the transistion takes place, how easily could Apple switch to AMD processors if Intel starts flaking out?



    B) Could Apple release Intel and AMD machines simultaniously to provide users with more choices?



    C) What are the advantages of Intel? What are the advantages of AMD?



    D) What is your opinion? (Not about Intel vs. PPC please, I'm talking Intel vs. AMD here)
  • Reply 7 of 49
    onlookeronlooker Posts: 5,252member
    I think you'll be able to run the OS on an AMD system sooner rather than later.
  • Reply 8 of 49
    thttht Posts: 5,420member
    Intel was the right decision. It's very simple. Ask yourself the following questions:



    Which company will ship a 65 nm CPU first?



    Which company will ship a 45 nm CPU first?



    The answer is Intel. They were the first to 130 nm, the first to 90 nm, and maybe even the first to 180 nm, but I don't quite remember that one.
  • Reply 9 of 49
    Will they stick to 64-bit?
  • Reply 10 of 49
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    THT is correct.



    I just read the Tom's Hardware Guide story on Yonah. Today AMD is competitive with Intel but I doubt that by 2007 AMD is going to be able to keep up with Intel.



    Hell I must admit Dual Cores, 2MB shared L2 cache $ 25watts or less has to appeal to just about any road warrior.



    Less is known about the nextgen Conroe/Merom desktop CPU but evidently Intel has figured out how to contain leakage at 65nm thus they should be efficient as well comparitively.



    I've put enough vitriolic responses on these boards and honestly I missed probably the biggest point. 10.5 or Leopard is going to be on the ground floor of a new Intel core that will blow Netburst away. I expect many of my complaints about P4 to go away then.
  • Reply 11 of 49
    xoolxool Posts: 2,460member
    I think its better press to announce a transition to intel, even if really the transition is to x86. This helps keep things simple for the suits as well as your average Mom and Pop.



    This was probably the only way to get the Intel CEO on stage and since Apple will likely be only shipping Intel processors at first, its not a bad idea. Besides, the checkbox in XCode could easily be update to read "x86" or even add other checkboxes for future architectures.



    At the end of the day, with Universal binaries, you assured support on two architectures. While I expect x86 will be the focus in 2007 and onward, this now places PPC as a backup plan in case intel/AMD flake.
  • Reply 12 of 49
    objra10objra10 Posts: 679member
    AMD/INTEL threads merged....
  • Reply 13 of 49
    corvettecorvette Posts: 561member
    read this article. it will be good for everyone..



    http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q2...2/index.x?pg=1
  • Reply 14 of 49
    Quote:

    Originally posted by corvette

    read this article. it will be good for everyone..



    http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q2...2/index.x?pg=1




    I wonder what this means for upgrades? Will Mac users finally be able to go out and buy a new CPU and drop it in if the pin counts match? I understand that maybe not everything will be upgradable but even just the CPU would be nice.



    Macaddict16
  • Reply 15 of 49
    onlookeronlooker Posts: 5,252member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Macaddict16

    I wonder what this means for upgrades? Will Mac users finally be able to go out and buy a new CPU and drop it in if the pin counts match? I understand that maybe not everything will be upgradable but even just the CPU would be nice.



    Macaddict16




    That actually is a freaking fantastic realization. I would have to say yes! You should be able to upgrade an intelMac.
  • Reply 16 of 49
    nowayout11nowayout11 Posts: 326member
    AMD and Intel often go back and forth for the very top of the line for performance, but I think Intel is more consistent about their product availability, and they certainly have the capacity to handle a new OEM to supply chips to, and they certainly have the funding to keep pushing ahead.



    A) Switching to AMD wouldn't be hard to do. If you're already x86, or x86-64, you're already over the biggest hurdle by far. Neither one has an "Altivec-like" feature that would tie Apple to one supplier or the other. They each have their own particular strengths, but that's another question I'll answer in a sec.



    B) In theory they could, but this sounds like Apple made an agreement specifically to Intel, and they will probably stick with them for a period of time.



    C) Intel is stronger with media encoding. i.e, MP3, MPEG, DIVX or MPEG4 encoding, etc. AMD is stronger on game performance. All in all they are both pretty competitive, and the new dual-core chips are putting gas on the fire.



    D) My opinion? I for one welcome our new Macintel Overlords. just kidding. Actually I personally don't care too much. The x86 platform is competitive, and if it means more power sooner, then I'm for the switch.
  • Reply 17 of 49
    unixguruunixguru Posts: 49member
    I doubt you'll see anything AMD-based. What Apple is concerned about is power consumption, pure and simple. Their customers are moving to notebooks faster than the Windows world. Intel has the best notebook designs with regard to power consumption. Intel also has a lot of software engineers working on compilers. If Jobs was smart, he struck a deal on compilers. Intel is already planning to deliver the C and C++ compilers, but the best thing would be for Intel to add ObjC support to their compilers too. And if Steve could get Intel to offer it for the Mac for a low price, even better. That way you could get the best possible performance on an Intel machine. Compiling OS X with the Intel compilers would kick ass too. Better performance.



    Really, the main cause of the shift here was R&D $$$. Intel has way more $$$ to put into R&D than anyone else, including AMD. And they're putting it into low power processors and compilers.



    Now I wonder what happened to a guy that told me it was a bad idea for Apple to adopt IBM's compiler for the PowerPC because of all the hard work Apple had invested in the PowerPC version of GCC. Well, he better go shoot Jobs and get the deal with Intel undone.
  • Reply 18 of 49
    placeboplacebo Posts: 5,767member
    I mean, why not? Here are my reasons they should have:



    -Better dual-processor support.

    -Existing dual-core production

    -64-bit processors for both the low- and high-end



    It kind of leaves me wondering about why Apple chose to go with Intel.
  • Reply 19 of 49
    igrantigrant Posts: 180member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Placebo

    I mean, why not? Here are my reasons they should have:



    -Better dual-processor support.

    -Existing dual-core production

    -64-bit processors for both the low- and high-end



    It kind of leaves me wondering about why Apple chose to go with Intel.




    My guess is that Intel offered Apple a better deal to use their processor rather than AMD . . . .
  • Reply 20 of 49
    cosmos 1999cosmos 1999 Posts: 149member
    1/ Laptops are very important for Apple. Intel is better than AMD on this front, thanks to its full-featured/low-power Centrino platform.



    2/ 2007 and post-2007 roadmaps with massively multicore Intel chips.
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