But, I have no doubt that speed and optimization is Apple's big focus with this right now. So I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Well they have their terminology wrong for starters. fork() creates a new process not a new thread. It is known that forking a new process is about 8-10x slower than creating a new mach thread within the same process. So by choosing the wrong tool and then munging the terminology you take a speed advantage and make it look like a benchmark loss. There is no reason for a server to create more separate processes, lots of reasons to create new threads. I wouldn't worry quite so much except that when places like this get the facts bollixed up it takes a lot of effort to get them straightened out again.
Lots of talk about dual-boot and not much about virtualization. Makes one wonder. Why dual-boot when you can run both OS's concurrently? I believe Intel has already announced that they are building virtualization into their entire CPU line.
Here is my take on the whole processor switch. What it basically boils down to is Apple got backed into a corner and had no choice. The Xbox 360 has the new triple core power pc chip from IBM. My guess is Micro$oft got some sort of exclusive deal for all of these chips for say a year's time. Similarly, the PS3 probably got an exclusive deal with IBM et al for the Cell chip for a year's time.
Well since the PPE is part of library of parts we really aren't sure what Apple got offered. It oculd have been a cell variant, a MS variant or a chip built specifically for Apple. I'm not sure what the issue with IBM was, maybe IBM got tired of having Steve for a customer
I do know that IBM has gotten their low power 90nm process up and running with their partner Chartered also. At this point it is hard to say if they meet thermal goals or not.
Quote:
This left Apple with what they have now, the 7450s and 970s, for the forseeable future.
This simply isn't accurate, atleast not based information I believe is correct. One is that Freescale is shipping the 7448 now and things are loooking good for the rest of the E600 family. Apple has a significant upgrade path available for things like the Mini and ibook for the comming year. They don't appear to be willing to follow that upgrade path though.
As to the 970 it looks like the MP was a reality. The question now is if it was canceled or not. As expressed in the past I've never been all that excited about the 970 series. It will be interesting to see if the MP addressed many of the 970's shortcomings.
Quote:
With no real upward mobility as things sit today, Apple was almost forced to switch to Intel. I am a believer in Apple and I know that in the long run this will prove to be a wise move. Necessity breeds adaptation.
Well I come ot the opposite conclusion, in the end I think it will be a very bad move for Apple. Apple just gave potential buyers one more reason to avoid its hardware.
Steve said in the Keynote that they are along a far way, but not quite done. I imagine most of all, more thorough testing is needed, something apple labs can't do completely.
I don't know about this. What I could see was that they were going to let people switch their programs over at WWDC. That would be difficult if not impossible if the OS was not finished since any program could call just about any part of the OS. I think that he was talking about the apps , not Apples' apps but the other apps thrid party apps. I imagine that there may be some stuff that Apple has not done, like FCP and Motion due to the heavy use of Altivec, but those will switch when Apple gets MBs from Intel for development. Also Steve mentioned that Widgets will just work, and they could call and do call the OS and every aspect of the OS to do the Widget stuff that they do.
Posted in another thread but seems relevant here too.
Is there any chance that Apple have said to Intel, we'll take your latest and greatest stuff, advertise the hell out of it for you, showcase your new technology on the best platform, which we can completely control, AS LONG AS we can have it first, exculsively, for say 3-4 months. That would help keep Apple's Intel products ahead of the other x86 rabble, whom Apple cant really compete with on price anyway.
My take on the difference between OS/2, BeOS and NeXT compared to the current Mac OS X/Intel strategy is that Apple is making and selling boxes while IBM, Be and NeXT just sold operating systems for x86 systems.
That's probably the one thing Jobs learned from those failures. To be successful, Apple will need to continue to sell boxes, and the difference between Apple's boxes and x86 OEM boxes will be Mac OS X and Apple industrial design.
That's the primary difference.
Also, quite possibility the most important factor, we can't forget that in 2005, the killer app is the Internet while in 1995, the killer app was Microsoft Office. That means Apple just needs to maintain browser, IM, and media app parity to be able to compete and survive. Having Mac Office on x86 is also really important as well, but I don't think it is as important as it was in 1995.
I think you are correct there and I also think that we will also see the fruits of the open-source community when the conversion takes place. Everything from X11 to the renewed vigor in KHTML debates and so on.
Moving to Intel makes me sad ('a la Samwise Gamgee), but I can see how this streamlines alot of disparate areas and allows for more convergence. I was hoping with the gaming consoles that the convergence was on the PPC, but maybe consoles and PC's will never really converge.
I just worry about M$ and Apple switching places so quickly. What will the killer app be in 5 years? Probably not the internet. I hope it ain't something that runs first and best on an XBox.
Point 1: How does Apple keep Intel from giving Dell its innovative ideas? Virus protection can't be the only selling point between the two.
My Answer: I'm sure there are alot of things in that contract about which we will never know, but if there is to be a seperate and secret co-development at Intel, just for the Mac, there is also lines in the contract about Apple being restricted from pulling up stakes and going to AMD after the transition is complete. For instance, I hope Firewire 800 gets on Intel chipsets only for the Mac, etc.
Point 2: How does Apple continue to make the cheapest, best servers w/o the PPC? Can it really beat Dell in that market?
My Answer: I don't know, but I think this might be one reason why this announcement was made so far ahead of time (see Cringley's pulpit), because now, unlike the past, Apple has a whole group of enterprise tech people to retrain. The software will have to carry the day here, just as it does in the consumer arena, but that will be a far harder sell. Will Apple come up with eApps (enterpriseApps) much like the iApps for consumers?
Point 3: How does Apple invade the Home/Living room without a games console that is now the PPC battleground?
My Answer: This is almost the bigger issue since Apples halo is directly above the iPod and the beginning of the PC-less division at Apple. I sure hope Steve has some insanely great products coming out in the next 6 months (not just 12 months) to keep momentum going. And I bet those will run off of PPC chips and embedded processors like the iPods. Remember it is WWDC and MacWorld, not just AppleWorld. I hope that Apple grows to be able to open up the iPod or rather its successor to 3rd parties more. It is just beginning already now that the iPod ecosystem is maturing. Hopefully that means there will be PodWorlds along with MacWorlds on a platform that using the Mac as the hub, but creating many more products, like we have been promised. Where the h@ll is that dang phone anyway!?!?!?
I hope we get some cool annoucements soon. Speculation is fun, but as I do my own emotional, intellectual transition to Intel, I need some candy.
I can just see my IT director (the guy in charge of buying and running all computers in the largest education institution in my country - and a mac hater) rubbing his hands in glee.
he'll argue that macs are now just glorified over expensive PCs and as such we should only consider wintel machines in future. I can see a lot of IT boneheads taking this line. personally I think mactels spell the end of the mac platform at my instituion.
I can just see my IT director (the guy in charge of buying and running all computers in the largest education institution in my country - and a mac hater) rubbing his hands in glee.
he'll argue that macs are now just glorified over expensive PCs and as such we should only consider wintel machines in future. I can see a lot of IT boneheads taking this line. personally I think mactels spell the end of the mac platform at my instituion.
I think the guy is basically a prime example of the severe entrenched wintel attitude whereby even if xserves were being given away free he would try to argue that a wintel solution was STILL somehow cheaper!!!
Hell emacs are way cheaper than the no name pcs we buy already!
A lot of the pro-windows guys here at the college have been asking me questions along the lines of:
"so what are you going to do now that macs and pcs are going to be the same?"
I think this is the big danger in this "transition" that if apple don't market this properly a lot of people will assume such things becuase they have only half bits of info to work on. It worries me that pc people (and they are not stupid guys) will get this all wrong and apple will fail once again to tempt the potential switchers. After all, if you think macs and pcs are now the same (and where will the average joe find out anything different?) why buy the mac? why not go safe and get the dell? or the no name brand pc with the "free" printer, scanner and camera?
I found this on Apple's Developer site. Interesting...
Quote:
Hyper-Threading Technology (HT Technology) is the Intel implementation of a technique referred to as simultaneous multithreading (SMT). Processors that are enabled for HT Technology duplicate the architectural state to support two logical processors while sharing execution resources within a single processor core. Dual core technology further improves performance by providing two physical cores within a single physical processor package. Multiprocessor, Hyper-Threading, and dual core technology all exploit thread-level parallelism (TLP) to improve application and system responsiveness and to boost processor throughput.
I think the guy is basically a prime example of the severe entrenched wintel attitude whereby even if xserves were being given away free he would try to argue that a wintel solution was STILL somehow cheaper!!!
Hell emacs are way cheaper than the no name pcs we buy already!
A lot of the pro-windows guys here at the college have been asking me questions along the lines of:
"so what are you going to do now that macs and pcs are going to be the same?"
I think this is the big danger in this "transition" that if apple don't market this properly a lot of people will assume such things becuase they have only half bits of info to work on. It worries me that pc people (and they are not stupid guys) will get this all wrong and apple will fail once again to tempt the potential switchers. After all, if you think macs and pcs are now the same (and where will the average joe find out anything different?) why buy the mac? why not go safe and get the dell? or the no name brand pc with the "free" printer, scanner and camera?
I have the same cold feeling in my heart, but since they wouldn't buy a PPC Mac if their life depended upon them, I imagine this issue is a wash. I would hope that Apple could demonstrate that buying a Dell is in no way "safe" compared to an Xserve.
Marketing and customer service are going to be even more important.
The one silver lining is that as Xserves evolve more in parallel to the Dells and others, it may make eventual transitions that much easier. Hopefully IT dweebs will feel that the Intel chips ARE safe and that adding an Xserve here or there will give them a hedge on viruses and such.
I think this is the forerunner of what Apple intends to do, have multi-processor, dual-core, hyperthreaded powermacs, which offer 8 processors, 4 real and 4 virtual, to OSX. Imagine what it could do with that!
I think this is the forerunner of what Apple intends to do, have multi-processor, dual-core, hyperthreaded powermacs, which offer 8 processors, 4 real and 4 virtual, to OSX. Imagine what it could do with that!
And can Xcode write those apps for the developers?
Having, unfortunately, worked in retail in the past, I can tell you that many PC users already assume that the Mac uses Intel chips (if they even are able to make the distinction that HP, Compaq, or Microsoft themselves don't make the chips).
A lot of the shaky platform concerns here assume way too much about the average consumer.
Having, unfortunately, worked in retail in the past, I can tell you that many PC users already assume that the Mac uses Intel chips (if they even are able to make the distinction that HP, Compaq, or Microsoft themselves don't make the chips).
A lot of the shaky platform concerns here assume way too much about the average consumer.
'Xactly. And a lot of PC users I know think Macs use Windows. Therefore the constant bitching about price and the refusal to believe that Macs are free of viruses, adware and spyware et al.
Comments
Originally posted by D.J. Adequate
How much control does Apple have over the kernal? I have some performance worries after reading this: http://anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=2436&p=7
But, I have no doubt that speed and optimization is Apple's big focus with this right now. So I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Well they have their terminology wrong for starters. fork() creates a new process not a new thread. It is known that forking a new process is about 8-10x slower than creating a new mach thread within the same process. So by choosing the wrong tool and then munging the terminology you take a speed advantage and make it look like a benchmark loss. There is no reason for a server to create more separate processes, lots of reasons to create new threads. I wouldn't worry quite so much except that when places like this get the facts bollixed up it takes a lot of effort to get them straightened out again.
Originally posted by DanMacMan
Here is my take on the whole processor switch. What it basically boils down to is Apple got backed into a corner and had no choice. The Xbox 360 has the new triple core power pc chip from IBM. My guess is Micro$oft got some sort of exclusive deal for all of these chips for say a year's time. Similarly, the PS3 probably got an exclusive deal with IBM et al for the Cell chip for a year's time.
Well since the PPE is part of library of parts we really aren't sure what Apple got offered. It oculd have been a cell variant, a MS variant or a chip built specifically for Apple. I'm not sure what the issue with IBM was, maybe IBM got tired of having Steve for a customer
I do know that IBM has gotten their low power 90nm process up and running with their partner Chartered also. At this point it is hard to say if they meet thermal goals or not.
Quote:
This left Apple with what they have now, the 7450s and 970s, for the forseeable future.
This simply isn't accurate, atleast not based information I believe is correct. One is that Freescale is shipping the 7448 now and things are loooking good for the rest of the E600 family. Apple has a significant upgrade path available for things like the Mini and ibook for the comming year. They don't appear to be willing to follow that upgrade path though.
As to the 970 it looks like the MP was a reality. The question now is if it was canceled or not. As expressed in the past I've never been all that excited about the 970 series. It will be interesting to see if the MP addressed many of the 970's shortcomings.
Quote:
With no real upward mobility as things sit today, Apple was almost forced to switch to Intel. I am a believer in Apple and I know that in the long run this will prove to be a wise move. Necessity breeds adaptation.
Well I come ot the opposite conclusion, in the end I think it will be a very bad move for Apple. Apple just gave potential buyers one more reason to avoid its hardware.
Dave
Originally posted by the cool gut
Steve said in the Keynote that they are along a far way, but not quite done. I imagine most of all, more thorough testing is needed, something apple labs can't do completely.
I don't know about this. What I could see was that they were going to let people switch their programs over at WWDC. That would be difficult if not impossible if the OS was not finished since any program could call just about any part of the OS. I think that he was talking about the apps , not Apples' apps but the other apps thrid party apps. I imagine that there may be some stuff that Apple has not done, like FCP and Motion due to the heavy use of Altivec, but those will switch when Apple gets MBs from Intel for development. Also Steve mentioned that Widgets will just work, and they could call and do call the OS and every aspect of the OS to do the Widget stuff that they do.
Originally posted by off/lang
Well, I figured what the heck, why not do it myself? http://unibin.blogspot.com/
Very cool indeed. I just added a link to it on my blog.
Originally posted by Thereubster
I believe AutoCad for OSX is coming anyway....
Posted in another thread but seems relevant here too.
Is there any chance that Apple have said to Intel, we'll take your latest and greatest stuff, advertise the hell out of it for you, showcase your new technology on the best platform, which we can completely control, AS LONG AS we can have it first, exculsively, for say 3-4 months. That would help keep Apple's Intel products ahead of the other x86 rabble, whom Apple cant really compete with on price anyway.
What do you think?
Hahahahahahahaha no.
Originally posted by THT
My take on the difference between OS/2, BeOS and NeXT compared to the current Mac OS X/Intel strategy is that Apple is making and selling boxes while IBM, Be and NeXT just sold operating systems for x86 systems.
That's probably the one thing Jobs learned from those failures. To be successful, Apple will need to continue to sell boxes, and the difference between Apple's boxes and x86 OEM boxes will be Mac OS X and Apple industrial design.
That's the primary difference.
Also, quite possibility the most important factor, we can't forget that in 2005, the killer app is the Internet while in 1995, the killer app was Microsoft Office. That means Apple just needs to maintain browser, IM, and media app parity to be able to compete and survive. Having Mac Office on x86 is also really important as well, but I don't think it is as important as it was in 1995.
I think you are correct there and I also think that we will also see the fruits of the open-source community when the conversion takes place. Everything from X11 to the renewed vigor in KHTML debates and so on.
Moving to Intel makes me sad ('a la Samwise Gamgee), but I can see how this streamlines alot of disparate areas and allows for more convergence. I was hoping with the gaming consoles that the convergence was on the PPC, but maybe consoles and PC's will never really converge.
I just worry about M$ and Apple switching places so quickly. What will the killer app be in 5 years? Probably not the internet. I hope it ain't something that runs first and best on an XBox.
My Answer: I'm sure there are alot of things in that contract about which we will never know, but if there is to be a seperate and secret co-development at Intel, just for the Mac, there is also lines in the contract about Apple being restricted from pulling up stakes and going to AMD after the transition is complete. For instance, I hope Firewire 800 gets on Intel chipsets only for the Mac, etc.
Point 2: How does Apple continue to make the cheapest, best servers w/o the PPC? Can it really beat Dell in that market?
My Answer: I don't know, but I think this might be one reason why this announcement was made so far ahead of time (see Cringley's pulpit), because now, unlike the past, Apple has a whole group of enterprise tech people to retrain. The software will have to carry the day here, just as it does in the consumer arena, but that will be a far harder sell. Will Apple come up with eApps (enterpriseApps) much like the iApps for consumers?
Point 3: How does Apple invade the Home/Living room without a games console that is now the PPC battleground?
My Answer: This is almost the bigger issue since Apples halo is directly above the iPod and the beginning of the PC-less division at Apple. I sure hope Steve has some insanely great products coming out in the next 6 months (not just 12 months) to keep momentum going. And I bet those will run off of PPC chips and embedded processors like the iPods. Remember it is WWDC and MacWorld, not just AppleWorld. I hope that Apple grows to be able to open up the iPod or rather its successor to 3rd parties more. It is just beginning already now that the iPod ecosystem is maturing. Hopefully that means there will be PodWorlds along with MacWorlds on a platform that using the Mac as the hub, but creating many more products, like we have been promised. Where the h@ll is that dang phone anyway!?!?!?
I hope we get some cool annoucements soon. Speculation is fun, but as I do my own emotional, intellectual transition to Intel, I need some candy.
he'll argue that macs are now just glorified over expensive PCs and as such we should only consider wintel machines in future. I can see a lot of IT boneheads taking this line. personally I think mactels spell the end of the mac platform at my instituion.
I'm really depressed
Originally posted by spooky
I can just see my IT director (the guy in charge of buying and running all computers in the largest education institution in my country - and a mac hater) rubbing his hands in glee.
he'll argue that macs are now just glorified over expensive PCs and as such we should only consider wintel machines in future. I can see a lot of IT boneheads taking this line. personally I think mactels spell the end of the mac platform at my instituion.
I'm really depressed
What if the new Xservs are cheaper?
Hell emacs are way cheaper than the no name pcs we buy already!
A lot of the pro-windows guys here at the college have been asking me questions along the lines of:
"so what are you going to do now that macs and pcs are going to be the same?"
I think this is the big danger in this "transition" that if apple don't market this properly a lot of people will assume such things becuase they have only half bits of info to work on. It worries me that pc people (and they are not stupid guys) will get this all wrong and apple will fail once again to tempt the potential switchers. After all, if you think macs and pcs are now the same (and where will the average joe find out anything different?) why buy the mac? why not go safe and get the dell? or the no name brand pc with the "free" printer, scanner and camera?
Hyper-Threading Technology (HT Technology) is the Intel implementation of a technique referred to as simultaneous multithreading (SMT). Processors that are enabled for HT Technology duplicate the architectural state to support two logical processors while sharing execution resources within a single processor core. Dual core technology further improves performance by providing two physical cores within a single physical processor package. Multiprocessor, Hyper-Threading, and dual core technology all exploit thread-level parallelism (TLP) to improve application and system responsiveness and to boost processor throughput.
http://developer.apple.com/documenta...7-CH239-292250
Originally posted by spooky
I think the guy is basically a prime example of the severe entrenched wintel attitude whereby even if xserves were being given away free he would try to argue that a wintel solution was STILL somehow cheaper!!!
Hell emacs are way cheaper than the no name pcs we buy already!
A lot of the pro-windows guys here at the college have been asking me questions along the lines of:
"so what are you going to do now that macs and pcs are going to be the same?"
I think this is the big danger in this "transition" that if apple don't market this properly a lot of people will assume such things becuase they have only half bits of info to work on. It worries me that pc people (and they are not stupid guys) will get this all wrong and apple will fail once again to tempt the potential switchers. After all, if you think macs and pcs are now the same (and where will the average joe find out anything different?) why buy the mac? why not go safe and get the dell? or the no name brand pc with the "free" printer, scanner and camera?
I have the same cold feeling in my heart, but since they wouldn't buy a PPC Mac if their life depended upon them, I imagine this issue is a wash. I would hope that Apple could demonstrate that buying a Dell is in no way "safe" compared to an Xserve.
Marketing and customer service are going to be even more important.
The one silver lining is that as Xserves evolve more in parallel to the Dells and others, it may make eventual transitions that much easier. Hopefully IT dweebs will feel that the Intel chips ARE safe and that adding an Xserve here or there will give them a hedge on viruses and such.
Originally posted by DHagan4755
I found this on Apple's Developer site. Interesting...
http://developer.apple.com/documenta...7-CH239-292250 [/B]
I think this is the forerunner of what Apple intends to do, have multi-processor, dual-core, hyperthreaded powermacs, which offer 8 processors, 4 real and 4 virtual, to OSX. Imagine what it could do with that!
Originally posted by Thereubster
I think this is the forerunner of what Apple intends to do, have multi-processor, dual-core, hyperthreaded powermacs, which offer 8 processors, 4 real and 4 virtual, to OSX. Imagine what it could do with that!
And can Xcode write those apps for the developers?
Originally posted by MacGregor
And can Xcode write those apps for the developers?
Xcode has support for multi-threading certainly, but I dont write code so I cant confirm what it could do with an 8-way Mac....
A lot of the shaky platform concerns here assume way too much about the average consumer.
Originally posted by ChevalierMalFet
Having, unfortunately, worked in retail in the past, I can tell you that many PC users already assume that the Mac uses Intel chips (if they even are able to make the distinction that HP, Compaq, or Microsoft themselves don't make the chips).
A lot of the shaky platform concerns here assume way too much about the average consumer.
'Xactly. And a lot of PC users I know think Macs use Windows. Therefore the constant bitching about price and the refusal to believe that Macs are free of viruses, adware and spyware et al.