I don't think this is a near-term thing. I think Apple will start using its A processors in the Macbook Air and possibly Mac mini only when they can use exactly the same A processor as in the iPhone and iPad. It wouldn't make sense to have a new line of A processors just for the Air range. But if they can cut costs by using the same processor they do in the iPad, it makes sense. That's probably a few years off though. But it'd make sense for them to have prototypes and to have OS X running on ARM right now. Just like they had OS X running on Intel long before they switched.
Noticed how most people really cares about what runs inside their iPhone and iPads....
Of course not. (Even though I see smartphone commerctials on TV that mentions Dual Core processor as a selling point) so I do think users are more aware what's in their devices now more than ever.
What I'm sure people will notice is that you may have to download two different versions of the same software, and that some software will only be available for specific types of Macs.
It might work, it might not work. Just from my personal standpoint, I've had my MBP late 2008 for almost 3 years now. Next laptop will prob. be MBA just because of the Core i5 speed.
I would be dissapointed if I found a much slower ARM as only choice in the future.
Apple has some really talented people that can probably produce a laptop class processor with the power performances of a mobile processor.
You're joking right? Apple isn't a processor company and if you think that can outperform Intel who's been in the buesness for over 40 years, think again. They took on AMD who also only does processors and beat them back. But you think Apple will succeed with the ARM chip that's at least 4-5 years behind Intel chips in speed. I'm as big an Apple fan boy as they get but get your head out of the clouds.
You know Windows 8 will have an ARM version. I know a lot of apps won't run at least to start off with but clearly if it takes off in the Windows world Apple must be ready as well. ARM chips might not be as fast but they are probably fast enough for browsing, writing documents, email, etc. They'll have the advantage of better battery life. So Apple cannot afford for MS laptops to have that kind of advantage over them.
Also mean bootcamp can still hang around.
These are the ARM partners for Windows 8: Qualcomm, Nvidia & Texas Instruments.
No Rockchips, no Telechips...no APPLE!
Where do you see Apple with the A5 being supported by Windows 8?
and...Intel is bringing their new Atom to the fry.
Microsoft has no history of developing an operating system on something other than Intel. Even NT was given to them by DEC on the Alpha platform and MS got Intel to recode NT for x86 then let the Alpha version die.
So, who's writing Windows 8 for Microsoft then? Someone else wrote DOS, someone else wrote NT...
They wrote it for PPC, MIPS and others architectures back in the 90s.
Of course not. (Even though I see smartphone commerctials on TV that mentions Dual Core processor as a selling point) so I do think users are more aware what's in their devices now more than ever.
What I'm sure people will notice is that you may have to download two different versions of the same software, and that some software will only be available for specific types of Macs.
It might work, it might not work. Just from my personal standpoint, I've had my MBP late 2008 for almost 3 years now. Next laptop will prob. be MBA just because of the Core i5 speed.
I would be dissapointed if I found a much slower ARM as only choice in the future.
That would be a great Business Plan, lets release slower and slower machines...sigh
I hope Apple can succeed in creating their own chips, only if the performance of the machines are better than if they used chips from other manufacturers. Without better performance the Apple products will start to lag behind other manufacturers, which wouldn't be good for the future of Apple.
I hope they decide to build their chips in the USA.
They may be... but right now they use Samsung, so they would be built in South Korea. Otherwise, some of the big fab countries are the USA, Germany, Japan, and South Korea. There may be significant fabs in other countries too, I'm not that up-to-speed on this. CPUs are one of the few electronics that are actually built in the USA. The best fabs kinda drift around as they are upgraded. That would most likely determine where they are built. This is highly skilled labor, so they tend to build fabs where there is a workforce that is educated in this area.
An "iBook", an iPad with a keyboard in a MacBook Air form factor (running iOS), could find a niche between the iPad and the Air for light use with phenomenal battery longevity, think journalists and casual web and email only users.
Calling it a Mac would seriously dilute the Mac image, certainly now that the MacBook Airs have been brought up to speed, performance-wise.
And with the steps taken to make Lion ever more user-friendly for non-power users, I doubt the market for such an under-powered device would be very large.
.tsooJ
I'm going to seriously disagree with you here. A heftier tablet design reminds me more of windows tablet designs in the past that never truly caught on. I think if anything you'd see them nudge the power up a bit and stick them in the macbook air. After all even if they scale back the size of the macbook pro the air is still the model designed around form factor more than power. They've demonstrated before that power isn't their top priority (neither is IO bandwidth).
It makes no sense to me that Apple would make processor decisions based on a very small percentage of their customers. My guess is that nowhere near 10% of Mac users are running Windows. And not only is a cheap PC very easy to come by for next to nothing, but installing Windows on a Mac is not a foolproof operation nor a trouble-free decision. The whole system becomes that much more complicated when you add Windows to the mix.
So, yes, it's a neat trick that Macs can run Windows; but the world will keep on turning if this feature goes away. And anyone who buys a new Intel-equipped Mac just prior to the switch (if it ever happens) can expect that machine to keep running for quite a few years before it's ready to retire.
What he said: "We endeavor to innovate so they'll continue to look to us as a supplier."
What he thought: "F*ck. Apple is going to crush us in consumer laptop SoCs like they did with iPhone and iPad."
So Intel has been served notice. "Attention Intel: get your mobile chip technology together or we'll dump your power-hog Core chips in our consumer line of MacBooks. This is your last warning."
Sure, no more boot camp. No more Adobe "professional" bloatware. 99% of the consumer market won't even notice they're gone.
The release of new MacBook Airs and the Mac OS X Lion operating system last month helped spur double-digit growth for Apple, which is now estimated to sell a record 4.5 million systems during the ongoing September quarter.
Quote:
Performing his own extrapolation and analysis of the NPD data, Munster estimates that Apple is pacing to sell 4.4 million to 4.6 million Macs during the September quarter -- both of which would represent a quarterly best.
DARN!
-- Steve Jobs
*(Obviously satirical and not actually said by Steve Jobs....publicly...)
Did Apple learn from the PowerPC fiasco? We need x86 compatibility with the 97% of the world, and that means Intel chips inside Macs!
Exactly which PowerPC fiasco would that be? The Mac was introduced in 1984 running Motorola 68000 processors. At the time, this was a workstation-class chip. It is what SUN used before the SPARC. HP used it. It enabled the Radio Shack Model 12 to become the world's largest selling Unix-based computer. IBM's Scientific PC was based on it. IBM recoded and joined two 68000s to create a PC that ran System 360 code.
Workstation developers migrated from the 68000 to the 68020, and some to the 68040. Intel chips were not in the same league. Workstation manufacturers migrated from 680x0 to RISC. Unlike the merchant 680x0, RISC processors were largely proprietary. SUN has the SPARC. Silicon Graphics had its own. Motorola's RISC was the merchant 88000. NeXT was considering going to this processor when it abandoned the hardware business. A book was written about Data General's development of its 88000-based AViiON midrange. IBM had invented RISC. The Power PC was a one-chip implementation of its POWER architecture. Apple chose it because it was designed for emulation.
At the time that Apple brought out its 68020-based Macintosh II, the extant Intel chip was the 386. The 386 ran so hot that clone-makers had to reengineer their cases to dissipate the heat.
Apple's first PPC-based Macs ran on the PPC 601. The second generation Power Macs were based on the PPC 604. The fastest installation of WordPerfect 5.1 that I ever saw was an installation of WP 5.1 on SoftWindows running on a Power Macintosh 9500. The extant Intel chip of the era was the Pentium. At the time, the Pentium's inability to correctly perform floating point math was the joke of the technical field. Long after Apple abandoned the PPC 604, IBM continued to sell PPC 604-based AIX workstations.
The PPC 750 was one of the processors at the heart of the Power Mac G3. A G3 emulated 680x0 faster than any 680x0 could run the same code natively. The G3 was also ran as cool as a cucumber. Extant Intel processors of the era were blast furnaces.
The PPC 7400 family was the basis of the Power Mac G4. Its AltiVec unit dramatically improved graphics and floating-point operations. However, this processor ran hotter than the G3. Still, it was not hotter than Intel processors at the time.
The Power Mac G5 and iMac G5 were based on the PPC 970. These processors were very powerful. Some has multiple cores. All ran very hot. Some required water cooling. All required a mated cooling module, whether air-cooled or water-cooled. I am typing this response on a 2005 water-cooled G5.
The heat generated is why we never saw a PowerBook G5. Unfortunately, IBM saw itself as a big-iron manufacturer and rejected Steve Jobs's demand that IBM solve the heat problem. Ironically, at the same time that PPCs became hot plates, Intel had a breakthrough that dramatically reduced the heat generated by its processors. This is why Jobs made the switch from PPC to Intel x86.
However, you do not get something for nothing. All POWER/PowerPC processors are transparently 64-bit/32-bit. Intel processors are not. Intel processors run in 32-bit mode or 64-bit mode.
And another thing, soon after IBM hit a wall with the Power PC, Intel hit a wall with its x86. Look at the clock speed of Intel processors over the last few years. Intel is now adding cores to its high-end processors, but how long with that last?
Without question, the ability to run Windows natively on a Mac has brought some new customers to the platform. However, Windows is now on the decline. The Intel processor is just not that important to Windows because Windows is not that important. We have seen Apple make processor transitions twice now. In both cases, there was nary a hitch. If Apple makes another processor transition, then I am convinced that it will have its ducks in a row before it makes the move. I expect nary a hitch. This is not to say that Apple will make this rumored transition, but if it does....
Yeha I guess it?s a coincidence that Apple was basically dead before they switched over to Intel. Switching to Intel was a HUGE step for apple. They did it for a reason, look at their stock price, oh wait I guess that?s due to the success apple saw with its ?G? series processors. I know about 20 people who DID buy an apple, only because it had an Intel chip, or because you could installed windows with ease.
Apples success directly correlates with them switching to Intel. Think about the bigger picture. Set your appfanboyism ego aside. I love macs. They make great hardware, but shit will go downhill if they ditch Intel. It essentially leveled the playing field for apple. Now they can say ?hey look at our hardware, it has the same shit as your crappy cheap computer, but instead ours don?t break 3 months after you buy it, and it runs Windows just as fast if not faster than ANY piece of crap you can throw at me?" The first Intel mac was a revolutionary laptop. It was the first commercially available dual core laptop. PERIOD. Apple had first dips to the processor.
Apple going Intel opened doors to .. well? the rest of the market?. Like all those windows users. Now that apple has the windows users on their hardware we now see the average windows user with an iphones, ipads etc? Loose the windows base and you are done. All you will be left with is the crazy apple fan boys.
I only run boot camp for games, and I wouldn't be running game on this class of portable.
I think it would be a great upgrade for the MacBook Air - thinner, cooler, longer battery life - I hope they do it! Of all companies, Apple has the experience in changing CPU architectures already booked - it wouldn't be that disruptive. Especially with the Mac App store - just re-downlod your new universal app to your Mac - hopefully, especially with the small SSD sizes out there, the Mac App store or OS could auto-strip the non-ARM/Intel code to keep apps small as possible.
The whole idea of a Mac being able to run Windows is a key, if not the key selling point for purchasing a Mac over a Dell/HP machine, even if one rarely if ever boot into Windows via bootcamp or VM software. Its the idea that you lose nothing by buying into a Mac but you pay for the quality and flexibility.
Three years ago I would have agreed with you. Today? For the vast majority of people I think the importance of running Windows is dramatically overblown.
I only run boot camp for games, and I wouldn't be running game on this class of portable.
I think it would be a great upgrade for the MacBook Air - thinner, cooler, longer battery life - I hope they do it! Of all companies, Apple has the experience in changing CPU architectures already booked - it wouldn't be that disruptive. Especially with the Mac App store - just re-downlod your new universal app to your Mac - hopefully, especially with the small SSD sizes out there, the Mac App store or OS could auto-strip the non-ARM/Intel code to keep apps small as possible.
Those fat binaries aren't that big in comparison to the rest of the app. Keeping the non-needed binaries from the system code could save a little space, but the comparatively few apps people are likely to load from the MAS tell me that Apple wouldn't even bother.
Comments
Noticed how most people really cares about what runs inside their iPhone and iPads....
Of course not. (Even though I see smartphone commerctials on TV that mentions Dual Core processor as a selling point) so I do think users are more aware what's in their devices now more than ever.
What I'm sure people will notice is that you may have to download two different versions of the same software, and that some software will only be available for specific types of Macs.
It might work, it might not work. Just from my personal standpoint, I've had my MBP late 2008 for almost 3 years now. Next laptop will prob. be MBA just because of the Core i5 speed.
I would be dissapointed if I found a much slower ARM as only choice in the future.
Apple has some really talented people that can probably produce a laptop class processor with the power performances of a mobile processor.
You're joking right? Apple isn't a processor company and if you think that can outperform Intel who's been in the buesness for over 40 years, think again. They took on AMD who also only does processors and beat them back. But you think Apple will succeed with the ARM chip that's at least 4-5 years behind Intel chips in speed. I'm as big an Apple fan boy as they get but get your head out of the clouds.
You know Windows 8 will have an ARM version. I know a lot of apps won't run at least to start off with but clearly if it takes off in the Windows world Apple must be ready as well. ARM chips might not be as fast but they are probably fast enough for browsing, writing documents, email, etc. They'll have the advantage of better battery life. So Apple cannot afford for MS laptops to have that kind of advantage over them.
Also mean bootcamp can still hang around.
These are the ARM partners for Windows 8: Qualcomm, Nvidia & Texas Instruments.
No Rockchips, no Telechips...no APPLE!
Where do you see Apple with the A5 being supported by Windows 8?
and...Intel is bringing their new Atom to the fry.
Microsoft has no history of developing an operating system on something other than Intel. Even NT was given to them by DEC on the Alpha platform and MS got Intel to recode NT for x86 then let the Alpha version die.
So, who's writing Windows 8 for Microsoft then? Someone else wrote DOS, someone else wrote NT...
They wrote it for PPC, MIPS and others architectures back in the 90s.
Of course not. (Even though I see smartphone commerctials on TV that mentions Dual Core processor as a selling point) so I do think users are more aware what's in their devices now more than ever.
What I'm sure people will notice is that you may have to download two different versions of the same software, and that some software will only be available for specific types of Macs.
It might work, it might not work. Just from my personal standpoint, I've had my MBP late 2008 for almost 3 years now. Next laptop will prob. be MBA just because of the Core i5 speed.
I would be dissapointed if I found a much slower ARM as only choice in the future.
That would be a great Business Plan, lets release slower and slower machines...sigh
Why is everyone freaking out? Apple is not going to replace their entire lineup.
Yeah, they would likely call this new line of computers something else.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles...years_end.html
"I probably only spend about 10% of my time using windows"
You should try of 0% as it is so nice to not have to look back.
And in many cases being a fanatical nutcase Apple fanboy may not work well for the career...
I hope Apple can succeed in creating their own chips, only if the performance of the machines are better than if they used chips from other manufacturers. Without better performance the Apple products will start to lag behind other manufacturers, which wouldn't be good for the future of Apple.
I hope they decide to build their chips in the USA.
They may be... but right now they use Samsung, so they would be built in South Korea. Otherwise, some of the big fab countries are the USA, Germany, Japan, and South Korea. There may be significant fabs in other countries too, I'm not that up-to-speed on this. CPUs are one of the few electronics that are actually built in the USA. The best fabs kinda drift around as they are upgraded. That would most likely determine where they are built. This is highly skilled labor, so they tend to build fabs where there is a workforce that is educated in this area.
An "iBook", an iPad with a keyboard in a MacBook Air form factor (running iOS), could find a niche between the iPad and the Air for light use with phenomenal battery longevity, think journalists and casual web and email only users.
Calling it a Mac would seriously dilute the Mac image, certainly now that the MacBook Airs have been brought up to speed, performance-wise.
And with the steps taken to make Lion ever more user-friendly for non-power users, I doubt the market for such an under-powered device would be very large.
.tsooJ
I'm going to seriously disagree with you here. A heftier tablet design reminds me more of windows tablet designs in the past that never truly caught on. I think if anything you'd see them nudge the power up a bit and stick them in the macbook air. After all even if they scale back the size of the macbook pro the air is still the model designed around form factor more than power. They've demonstrated before that power isn't their top priority (neither is IO bandwidth).
So, yes, it's a neat trick that Macs can run Windows; but the world will keep on turning if this feature goes away. And anyone who buys a new Intel-equipped Mac just prior to the switch (if it ever happens) can expect that machine to keep running for quite a few years before it's ready to retire.
What he thought: "F*ck. Apple is going to crush us in consumer laptop SoCs like they did with iPhone and iPad."
So Intel has been served notice. "Attention Intel: get your mobile chip technology together or we'll dump your power-hog Core chips in our consumer line of MacBooks. This is your last warning."
Sure, no more boot camp. No more Adobe "professional" bloatware. 99% of the consumer market won't even notice they're gone.
The release of new MacBook Airs and the Mac OS X Lion operating system last month helped spur double-digit growth for Apple, which is now estimated to sell a record 4.5 million systems during the ongoing September quarter.
Performing his own extrapolation and analysis of the NPD data, Munster estimates that Apple is pacing to sell 4.4 million to 4.6 million Macs during the September quarter -- both of which would represent a quarterly best.
Did Apple learn from the PowerPC fiasco? We need x86 compatibility with the 97% of the world, and that means Intel chips inside Macs!
Exactly which PowerPC fiasco would that be? The Mac was introduced in 1984 running Motorola 68000 processors. At the time, this was a workstation-class chip. It is what SUN used before the SPARC. HP used it. It enabled the Radio Shack Model 12 to become the world's largest selling Unix-based computer. IBM's Scientific PC was based on it. IBM recoded and joined two 68000s to create a PC that ran System 360 code.
Workstation developers migrated from the 68000 to the 68020, and some to the 68040. Intel chips were not in the same league. Workstation manufacturers migrated from 680x0 to RISC. Unlike the merchant 680x0, RISC processors were largely proprietary. SUN has the SPARC. Silicon Graphics had its own. Motorola's RISC was the merchant 88000. NeXT was considering going to this processor when it abandoned the hardware business. A book was written about Data General's development of its 88000-based AViiON midrange. IBM had invented RISC. The Power PC was a one-chip implementation of its POWER architecture. Apple chose it because it was designed for emulation.
At the time that Apple brought out its 68020-based Macintosh II, the extant Intel chip was the 386. The 386 ran so hot that clone-makers had to reengineer their cases to dissipate the heat.
Apple's first PPC-based Macs ran on the PPC 601. The second generation Power Macs were based on the PPC 604. The fastest installation of WordPerfect 5.1 that I ever saw was an installation of WP 5.1 on SoftWindows running on a Power Macintosh 9500. The extant Intel chip of the era was the Pentium. At the time, the Pentium's inability to correctly perform floating point math was the joke of the technical field. Long after Apple abandoned the PPC 604, IBM continued to sell PPC 604-based AIX workstations.
The PPC 750 was one of the processors at the heart of the Power Mac G3. A G3 emulated 680x0 faster than any 680x0 could run the same code natively. The G3 was also ran as cool as a cucumber. Extant Intel processors of the era were blast furnaces.
The PPC 7400 family was the basis of the Power Mac G4. Its AltiVec unit dramatically improved graphics and floating-point operations. However, this processor ran hotter than the G3. Still, it was not hotter than Intel processors at the time.
The Power Mac G5 and iMac G5 were based on the PPC 970. These processors were very powerful. Some has multiple cores. All ran very hot. Some required water cooling. All required a mated cooling module, whether air-cooled or water-cooled. I am typing this response on a 2005 water-cooled G5.
The heat generated is why we never saw a PowerBook G5. Unfortunately, IBM saw itself as a big-iron manufacturer and rejected Steve Jobs's demand that IBM solve the heat problem. Ironically, at the same time that PPCs became hot plates, Intel had a breakthrough that dramatically reduced the heat generated by its processors. This is why Jobs made the switch from PPC to Intel x86.
However, you do not get something for nothing. All POWER/PowerPC processors are transparently 64-bit/32-bit. Intel processors are not. Intel processors run in 32-bit mode or 64-bit mode.
And another thing, soon after IBM hit a wall with the Power PC, Intel hit a wall with its x86. Look at the clock speed of Intel processors over the last few years. Intel is now adding cores to its high-end processors, but how long with that last?
Without question, the ability to run Windows natively on a Mac has brought some new customers to the platform. However, Windows is now on the decline. The Intel processor is just not that important to Windows because Windows is not that important. We have seen Apple make processor transitions twice now. In both cases, there was nary a hitch. If Apple makes another processor transition, then I am convinced that it will have its ducks in a row before it makes the move. I expect nary a hitch. This is not to say that Apple will make this rumored transition, but if it does....
This is not to say that
Apples success directly correlates with them switching to Intel. Think about the bigger picture. Set your appfanboyism ego aside. I love macs. They make great hardware, but shit will go downhill if they ditch Intel. It essentially leveled the playing field for apple. Now they can say ?hey look at our hardware, it has the same shit as your crappy cheap computer, but instead ours don?t break 3 months after you buy it, and it runs Windows just as fast if not faster than ANY piece of crap you can throw at me?" The first Intel mac was a revolutionary laptop. It was the first commercially available dual core laptop. PERIOD. Apple had first dips to the processor.
Apple going Intel opened doors to .. well? the rest of the market?. Like all those windows users. Now that apple has the windows users on their hardware we now see the average windows user with an iphones, ipads etc? Loose the windows base and you are done. All you will be left with is the crazy apple fan boys.
No more BootCamp ?
I only run boot camp for games, and I wouldn't be running game on this class of portable.
I think it would be a great upgrade for the MacBook Air - thinner, cooler, longer battery life - I hope they do it! Of all companies, Apple has the experience in changing CPU architectures already booked - it wouldn't be that disruptive. Especially with the Mac App store - just re-downlod your new universal app to your Mac - hopefully, especially with the small SSD sizes out there, the Mac App store or OS could auto-strip the non-ARM/Intel code to keep apps small as possible.
The whole idea of a Mac being able to run Windows is a key, if not the key selling point for purchasing a Mac over a Dell/HP machine, even if one rarely if ever boot into Windows via bootcamp or VM software. Its the idea that you lose nothing by buying into a Mac but you pay for the quality and flexibility.
Three years ago I would have agreed with you. Today? For the vast majority of people I think the importance of running Windows is dramatically overblown.
I only run boot camp for games, and I wouldn't be running game on this class of portable.
I think it would be a great upgrade for the MacBook Air - thinner, cooler, longer battery life - I hope they do it! Of all companies, Apple has the experience in changing CPU architectures already booked - it wouldn't be that disruptive. Especially with the Mac App store - just re-downlod your new universal app to your Mac - hopefully, especially with the small SSD sizes out there, the Mac App store or OS could auto-strip the non-ARM/Intel code to keep apps small as possible.
Those fat binaries aren't that big in comparison to the rest of the app. Keeping the non-needed binaries from the system code could save a little space, but the comparatively few apps people are likely to load from the MAS tell me that Apple wouldn't even bother.