Freescale CEO: Jobs wanted to move to Intel 5 years ago

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Comments

  • Reply 61 of 88
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Big Mac

    NeXTStep did run on those other hardware platforms, but according to Wikipedia that was only when it became NEXTSTEP (version 3.3), released in 1995 - at the end of its life-cycle.



    Yes, that is correct. And "Next Computer, Inc." became "Next Software, Inc."







    This may be the road Apple is heading down (though I doubt it. Steve likes his hardware). But Apple is a very different company than Next was. Far more diverse...and well...they are making money too...lots of it.
  • Reply 62 of 88
    fahlmanfahlman Posts: 740member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Catman4d2

    what concerns me is the velocity engines?



    One word: Coprocessor?



    Edit: Added Question Mark.
  • Reply 63 of 88
    Quote:

    Originally posted by melgross

    You nailed that!



    i.e., you didn't.



    Words. They're powerful tools.
  • Reply 64 of 88
    big macbig mac Posts: 480member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by fahlman

    One word: Coprocessor.



    Eh? An Altivec coprocessor? These are going to be standard Intel PCs. Besides, they say Rosetta can recompile Altivec instructions now, and a lot of people in the Mac community have hard-ons for SSE3.
  • Reply 65 of 88
    Quote:

    Originally posted by sunilraman

    Originally posted by Big Mac

    Yes, and Marklar is related is related to Star Trek in a sense: Star Trek, aliens, South Park aliens. . . Apple really should have called the project Death Star, though, because it is to bring death to our platform.






    heh. well, here's someone still having personal issues with the transition god help us all though if we see a frickin' 1990s BIOS screen when starting up the first mactels....



    btw, as it stands right now, AMD does very well on desktops and servers. for desktops, the value-for-money you get with single and dual core on socket939, even palermo/paris on socket754, is nothing short of spectacular. second-tier as we've discussed, is not quite a label you could put on AMD. in terms of mobile though, Intel's pentium M is unmatched, Turion64, SempronMobile and AthlonMobile are okay but not as good as pentium M.



    so for apple, yeah, they need 1. one-stop-shop for platform, mobile and wireless :: bingo :: intel. 2. a pipeline with enough stuff that steve just couldn't refuse. unfortunately, the g5 is more than capable on the desktop line so even though this is AMD's core strength right now, not enticing enough for apple to go amd.



    so anyway my two cents there.



    edit: also with intel steve probably had a crack team of consultants(the useful kind, they're out there somewhere) look in depth at their manufacturing capabilities, ramping to meet demands, etc, etc and definitely saw something very promising there... no doubt he was informed of the 45nm* stuff as well that is just hitting the news now.



    *http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2005/dec/1216179.htm




    I think it would be a good choice for aple to go AMD, they are for superior and cheaper. Also run musch cooler. I have the FX-57 over clocked, it would burn any quadra core mac on the planet. I think Intel is on the down swing until the first mactel rolls off the line.
  • Reply 66 of 88
    sunilramansunilraman Posts: 8,133member
    Originally posted by Jpsilvashy

    I think it would be a good choice for aple to go AMD, they are for superior and cheaper. Also run musch cooler. I have the FX-57 over clocked, it would burn any quadra core mac on the planet. I think Intel is on the down swing until the first mactel rolls off the line.




    heh. i'm a big AMD fan, but i think you're stretching it a bit. you'll have to come up with some specific comparable benchmarks to say your single core beast can take on a four-core-G5



    btw Sandrasoft recons my Venice 3000+ overclocked to 2.4ghz can compare with a stock athlonFX-55
  • Reply 67 of 88
    tenobelltenobell Posts: 7,014member
    Quote:

    One of my biggest concerns is that the ability to dual-boot into Windows will seal Apple's fate as a box maker. As I wrote recently on MacNN, ease of dual-boot is the nightmare scenario.



    I've thoght about this too. I'm not so sure this will become a big problem.



    Its difficult for me to see many people buying a Macintosh just to end up running Vista most of the time.



    That could possibly happen in small isolated instances.



    I think it more likely if Vista is deemed good enough or better than OS X, most people just won't buy the Macintosh at all.
  • Reply 68 of 88
    i think y'all have some valid concerns, but i strongly believe once someone buys a Macintel, dualbooting to xp/vista would only be for 1 or 2 particular things they are scared about not being able to do on a mac, and playing games. eventually, most people will end up figuring out an alternative to accomplish that task in mac os x, so that they only have to deal with windows when playing games that's my prediction anyway.



    <rant>a dumbass IT person i spoke to just a few days ago was almost shaking at the thought of me using Thunderbird, so i asked, well, are you using any of the scheduling or meeting stuff on Outlook (which would be why you would use Outlook specifically for the Exchange features, etc), he just mumbled some rubbish and said, here, use Outlook Express IT WAS FUCKING POP NOT EVEN IMAP AND HE DIDN'T WANT ME USING THUNDERBIRD WHAT A FUCKING LOSERWANKER!!! if this is 99% of the work scenario out there i am afraid (but coming to terms with) i will never ever have a normal job again </rant>
  • Reply 69 of 88
    tenobelltenobell Posts: 7,014member
    Paul Thurrot (Mr. Microsoft himslef) had an interesting article.



    He discussed how the XBox 360 and Playstation 3 will help the Mac. His prediction was that console game systems are becoming powerful enough to rival PC gaming and for a fraction of the price.



    The ability to play PC level gaming on a console will weaken the claim of Windows superiorty in gaming.



    I thought it is was an interesting observation.
  • Reply 70 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Double posted.
  • Reply 71 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Big Mac

    [B]Yeah, Apple did devise that solution, but don't you remember how excruciatingly slow 68K binaries were on the first generation Power Macs? Don't you recall how slow certain parts of the OS were because they were going through many layers of emulation? They had to get a lot faster before it was tolerable, and by that time most programs were native thanks to Metrowerks. Everyone credits Metrowerks with saving Apple at that time, for if people had to rely on 68K binaries long term the situation would have been dire.



    Yes, they ran at 50% of the speed. But then Connectix, I think it was, came up with a way to cache emulated code that made the program run at about 75% of speed, which is about what Rosetta will do on a good day. Apple then put that into their own code.



    Quote:

    Star Trek



    Star Trek was far more or a rumor than anything else. Apple was proported to have looked at x86, shuddered, and then forgot about it. I remember that.



    Quote:

    The PPC version of NT was from the outset viewed as a non-starter by many - I knew M$ would never part ways with Intel and break the Wintel monopoly in favor of the PPC. I don't think that's what "killed the PPC's chances." Most people blame lost PPC market potential on the fact that Apple did not support PREP and dragged its feet on implementing CHRP. If there had been a common reference platform for PPC hardware as was originally intended, Apple could have had a much more vibrant and successful cloning initiative than what it ended up with. But that's neither here nor there.



    As I said, MS abandoned it for political purposes.



    It died because the PC industry never used it, as it was expected to. IF MS had supported PPC, then most, if not all PC's today would be using it, and x86 would be in the position PPC is in today. It had little to do with Apple. No matter what Apple could have done, it would still be only a few percent of the market.



    I still have plenty of articles here about how the PC industry was going to adoopt PPC in droves. From BYTE Aug '93:



    "Power PC Performs for Less



    The Power PC has the performance, low cost, and support for multiple operating systems needed to make that a possibiity come true."



    I'm not going to quote more, but it might be available on BYTE's site.



    Quote:

    Interesting (link is mangled but a copy and paste worked). I think Apple may be underestimating the will of the hacker community. Sony has a closed platform in the PSP but has failed. M$ has failed. A lot of money has been thrown at disabling hardware for additional profit, mostly in vain. It's interesting that the patent reveals dual-booting will be encouraged. Could Apple possibly not understand the destructive implications associated therewith?



    I wasn't making the point about the security, but about the apparent multiple booting Apple might be allowing.



    Oh, in the very same issue is an article about NextStep 3.1 running on the 486. They even have tests showing that it was faster on the 66 MHz 486DX2 than on the NextStation Turbo, despite "all of NextStep's levels of abstraction (which) is minor, if even noticable."



    Don't use Wikipedia. It's often wrong.

    [/QUOTE]
  • Reply 72 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by bikertwin

    i.e., you didn't.



    Words. They're powerful tools.




    And what is that supposed to mean?
  • Reply 73 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Big Mac

    Eh? An Altivec coprocessor? These are going to be standard Intel PCs. Besides, they say Rosetta can recompile Altivec instructions now, and a lot of people in the Mac community have hard-ons for SSE3.



    Yeah, according to Apple SSE2 and 3 are at least equal to Altivec, and have double point precision FP, which has always been a complaint about Altivec.



    http://developer.apple.com/documenta...ion/index.html
  • Reply 74 of 88
    sunilramansunilraman Posts: 8,133member
    all you macheads better get to know SSE2 and SSE3 real good 'coz that is what is going to make universal binaries and rosetta on macintels really sing ...with SSE, SSE2, SSE3, MMX, MMX"2", 3DNOW ~~ all this stuff (not sure which ones exactly) iTunes on my AMD Rig rips through a CD to AAC like a frackin BEAST!!
  • Reply 75 of 88
    big macbig mac Posts: 480member
    LOL
  • Reply 76 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by sunilraman

    all you macheads better get to know SSE2 and SSE3 real good 'coz that is what is going to make universal binaries and rosetta on macintels really sing ...with SSE, SSE2, SSE3, MMX, MMX"2", 3DNOW ~~ all this stuff (not sure which ones exactly) iTunes on my AMD Rig rips through a CD to AAC like a frackin BEAST!!



    What most guys remember is MMX, which was really crappy. You couldn't do floats at the same time. It was either or. MMX 2 solved that problem, but was very limited, and only had specific commands for media operations, plus a few others. SSE was when tyhey adopted the vector analogy that the PPC uses.



    So the story is different today.



    And while AIM (Apple, IBM, Motorola) didn't do much with it once they came out with it, Intel (and MS) have been improving it ever since.
  • Reply 77 of 88
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Ok, going back to a slightly different topic; Intel and Apple.



    I'm bringing that here because the other threads are getting old.



    But we have been talking about what synergy there will be between Apple and Intel that there hasn't been between Apple and IBM/Freescale in the past few years.



    This little article from Forbes is therefore interesting to us here, I think:



    http://www.forbes.com/2005/12/09/int...1209intel.html
  • Reply 78 of 88
    matsumatsu Posts: 6,558member
    This is all just a little too complicated. Older posters may recall that when the PPC970 was announced, and well before it shipped in any Apple product, I repeatedly cautioned that IBM is not your friend (and neither is Moto, or Intel, or Apple for that matter, but that's besides the point).



    IBM showing disinterest in PPC development goes back before the G3, and their reasons are the same as Motorolla's were: they don't make enough money of desktop and laptop customers, period. There's no other politics to it.



    Now, readers with long memories will also recall, that many, including me, didn't think that Apple could survive a switch in architecture (but the Apple of 5-6 years ago is NOT the same Apple as today).



    With that said, with Intel, though they aren't your friend either, Apple is finally free of this politics. Intel makes CPU's for personal computers. Apple makes personal computers. Intel stays alive by selling CPUs to personal computer makers. Apple doesn't need to convince them to do anything that they don't already do in order to survive as a company.



    It's on that measure that they are a better fit, and likely why Jobs would have wanted to go there sooner. Performance/watt, roadmaps, etc etc... are all moot now. Apple will never be further ahead or behind in terms of basic hardware technology (or access to it). They might negotiate better deals/exclusivity/partnerships (like the flash RAM deal) but as far as hardware, they will always be competitive -- and more importantly, be seen to be competitive -- everything else is a function of their ability to design and build attractive/functional/reliable products for their customers.



    They have no disadvantages as far as cost, and in fact, have more buying power/leverage than all but Dell or HP.



    Just to bring back the bad old days. I expect my Intel macs to be fast, and significantly cheaper.
  • Reply 79 of 88
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Matsu

    With that said, with Intel, though they aren't your friend either, Apple is finally free of this politics. Intel makes CPU's for personal computers. Apple makes personal computers. Intel stays alive by selling CPUs to personal computer makers. Apple doesn't need to convince them to do anything that they don't already do in order to survive as a company.





    Good post. That all makes a lot of sense.



    My only concern now is XBox and IBM's chips. Is Microsoft trying to become Apple (integrated hardware and software vendor) and trying to dump Dell & HP by using the Xbox as The New Home Computer?



    Has Apple moved to Intel just as Microsoft moves away?



    Yeah, it's a long shot, but interesting to think about.
  • Reply 80 of 88
    Quote:

    Originally posted by bikertwin

    Has Apple moved to Intel just as Microsoft moves away?



    OS X and applications written for it will be Universal Binaries for the next few years. Apple could put PPC chips in their computers a couple years from now and not miss a beat.
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