What does the prospect of Intel-based Macs mean for me?

[GiantRobot]

So there's been a metric assload of speculation and outright sensationalism with the news that Apple will be switching to Intel chips in Macs over the next few years. While there's been some level-headed discussion on the matter there's also been a lot of ridiculous crap spouted off by reactionaries. The Apple-on-Intel thread sort of blew up quickly and a lot of good points were glossed over and it generally became a bit of a mess. Instead of trying to reopen a locked thread I wanted to post one with some real information that hopefully will not fail as spectacularly as the last.

• Apple is moving to Intel processors in Macs in the future, the proposed roadmap is that the transition to Intel will be essentially completed by around this time in 2007. To this end Apple has maintained x86 ports of not only MacOS X but also their other applications (iLife, FCP, iWork, etc.) for the past five years. This fact is important because it shows a lot of preplanning on Apple's part if sticking with PowerPC would put Apple in a rut in the long term.
• Current PowerPC offerings are by no means obsolete and there's no reason to think a Mac purchased now will be worthless. If you buy any sort of computer there will inevitably be a faster one released later. The iMacs selling today are quite a bit faster than the iMacs of last year just like the iMacs (or qhatever they'll be called) of next year will be faster than today's iMacs. PowerPC support will continue for quite a while.
• Phil Schiller was asked if Windows will run on these systems, all that he said was that Apple wouldn't be doing anything to prevent this. They did not say Windows would be supported in any fashion. This is not a surprise considering Windows runs on so many different chipsets and x86 processors. It was also stated that there's no plans to allow MacOS to run on anything but a Mac. While it might be possible to get OSX running on a generic PC it will be breaking the EULA, not be supported by Apple, and likely break with system updates. So all fifty slashdot readers attempting it aren't going to get any support from Apple.
  
  
• Apple hasn't made any sort of announcements on what Intel Macs might look like, work like, or anything except that they will use Intel processors. The development kits available for lease for ADC members aren't likely to resemble shipping units in any fashion except for the CPU architecture. The only thing Apple's said officially is that Intel Macs won't be using OpenFirmware and won't be using BIOS. Publicly available documentation just says not to rely on OpenFirmware or a BIOS for anything.
• The development kits are available only to paying (Select and Premier) ADC members. They do run an Intel BIOS and are relatively generic PCs stuffed inside G5 cases. They will never be marketed to consumers amd exist only as testing platforms. While Xcode 2.1 will cross-compile, in order to profile x86 code you need to actually run and profile it on an x86 machine. An app that runs fine on the PowerPC might totally crap out on x86 for a variety of odd reasons.
• OSX ships with a slew of frameworks that allow a developer to get accelerated performance without having to worry about what sort of processor the code is running on. If you use the Accelerate.framework your app will automagically be accelerated for AltiVec or SSE/2/3 depending on what processor it is running on. If it's just running on a G3 it will fall back to plain old FP routines. The same goes for Quartz 2D, CoreImage, or any other SIMD friendly framework.
• The Cocoa and Carbon APIs were frozen in Panther. An app sticking to either of these APIs won't have much trouble running on x86 chips. A few instances where a lot of porting work will be involved will be custom memory management implementations (assuming particular word sizes or endianess), hand-tuned AltiVec routines, and assembly written to get around or work with particular PowerPC architectural issues. A huge swath of applications will simply need to be recompiled as Universal Binaries.
• For applications that aren't ported to UBs or ones with minimal developer supporteht re exists Rosetta. Rosetta is an emulator that does caching JIT recompilation of PowerPC code to run on x86. Apps like Office, Daylight, and FileMaker Pro ought to run really well under Rosetta. These sorts of applications spend a good deal of their time waiting for user interaction and as such any performance losses from having their code emulated in not likely to be noticeable. Word can run operations far faster than I can type, even if it were running half as fast it would still be faster than I can type.[/list:u]
  
  Some of this has been summed up nicely by the Apple on Intel FAQ already. There's also quite a bit of information on Apple's Development site and in the Universal Binary programming guidelines. I wanted to cover a few of these things because there's a lot of people on this board who have little interest in keeping up on developer documentation or mailing lists.
  
  Personally I think the transition will be a really important one. I love the PowerPC architecture and am sad to see it go but if moving to Intel means not being stuck at 500MHz for a year and a half (Motorola :x) I'm all for it. Even under IBM's care the PowerPC is only maintaining limited performance leaps over x86 chips. Apple's done a good job in keeping Macs competitive by out engineering Microsoft and PC manufacturers (Quartz Extreme, Core Image) but in the long run sticking with PowerPC chips might be a losing proposition.
  
  As long as Mac developers don't need to trash their existing codebase to support Intel chips I think they'll all readily support Apple. Apple's really going out of their way to make sure developers can get Intel versions of their apps out and ready to go. They also provide a tremendous amount of functionality inside system frameworks that are accessible from a variety of languages. Taking advantage of system frameworks means less work needs to be done porting apps and any performance enhancements to those frameworks are automagically gained by applications using them.
  
  I think Apple's going to position themselves as Intel's technology demonstrator in the coming years. While HP and Dell are content to buy ODM machines from anybody Apple actually spends R&D money. It's exciting to think about the sort of stuff we'll see out of Cupertino with Apple being able to leverage not only their own R&D teams but Intel's as well. Instead of Apple shooting themselves in the foot by going with Intel (as some pundits predict) I think they're going to put a serious hurt on Windows PC makers.
  
  Note to Mods/Hawk: I don't mean to skirt the lock on the previous Intel thread, just get some constructive discussion going on.

[Thunderstruck]

This thread needs to be stickified as an info base for all those people who go

"AAAAH!! I NEED A MAC BUT CAN'T BUY ONE TODAY!! APPLE WON'T SUPPORT PPC ANYMORE!!"

 :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

by the way, I'm pretty sure the lock wasn't because of the discussion on Apple going to Intel, but was for derailing that thread to pointless arguments between PPC and x86.

Anyway, as a consumer, the switch to Intel will mean jack shit to me. As long as I can still run Mac OS X on an Apple platform just like I can today, I'd be happy.

[TheLAD]

Damn, missed 2nd post :p

Well it's interesting at the moment. Apple's using a slightly modified Intel 915GUX motherboard in the developer kit. Depending on how Apple plays it, we could see the Motherboard becoming the only true Mac component  (other than the case) rather than the CPU/Motherboard. So it is likely that CPUs and Video Cards will be interchangeable assuming that you can set the clock speed of the CPU and you can get the Video Card's drivers.

Software wise, it doesn't mean much for current OS X apps. Mainly a recompile and maybe some recoding, other than that I doubt that it will be a rough transition. My biggest fear is that some companies may only code for windows and allow an app such as WINE to take over for OS X. But most likely, if Apple implements Yellow Box (remember that back in the Rhapsody days?) then it will be likely that coders will move to OS X/Linus builds and let Yellow Box make their apps work under windows. (Rather than maintaining windows, os x and linux builds)

Still, its a bold move from Apple and I can't wait to get my hands on one of these Mactels. Gona be great!

[Shmi]

What I like about the move is that, regardless of whether or not Intel makes the best processors, the new Macs should be pretty damn fast, and help Apple eat more into the wide world of Microsoft. Additionally, I read about the developer Intel Macs that have been shipped, and apparently Windows XP installed without a hitch and ran fine, save for some resolution issues. Gladly, this means I can hold onto my PB, and finally save up for a beast Mac that will allow me to run both OSes efficiently, without needing two boxes. Not that I particularly WANT to deface my Mac with XP, but hey, sometimes you just need it.

Can't wait.

[GiantRobot]

The developer kits will have very little in common with actual production machines methinks. The CPUs are 6xx series Pentium 4s which are on their way out as far as Intel's longterm roadmap is concerned. The motherboard itself is a pretty standard reference board as well. If past Mac designs are any sort of indication Apple will design and maintain their own boards. Using off the shelf designs tends to inhibit your ability to get creative with your computer's chassis. An iMac or Mac mini isn't going to use some SFF mainboard you can order off NewEgg.

[Thunderstruck]

I wonder about the format of the HD since Macs run on HFS+, Windows run on FAT32/NTFS. Do you just partition your drive? I'd imagine regular Mactels would ship with HFS+ and those wanting dual booting with Windows would partition the drive or run it off a different HD.

[TheLAD]

Thats a good point. I think you might need separate drives as windows might disagree with the HFS (same as it does with the linux format)

[Hawk]

great, here we go again.

[Thunderstruck]

What? You see any heated debate in this thread? :?

We do have the ability to discuss things in a civil manner.

[Knightslugger]

What? You see any heated debate in this thread? :?

We do have the ability to discuss things in a civil manner.

most of us do anyway...

I dont think the drive will have to be used any differently than it is now.  FAT32 and NTFS are used primarilly on machines running windoews, becasue that's what windows wants.

[jabberwocky]

I wonder about the format of the HD since Macs run on HFS+, Windows run on FAT32/NTFS. Do you just partition your drive? I'd imagine regular Mactels would ship with HFS+ and those wanting dual booting with Windows would partition the drive or run it off a different HD.

From what I have read, in order to run Windows on the Mactel you have to put it either on a separate drive or a separate partition that is Fat32/NTFS. At least for now.

[Thunderstruck]

Yeah that's what I expect, which is why I said Apple might (most probably will) ship Macs with HFS+ only, no FAT32, and those who want Windows can either partition or get a new drive.

[rusty]

The developer kits will have very little in common with actual production machines methinks. The CPUs are 6xx series Pentium 4s which are on their way out as far as Intel's longterm roadmap is concerned. The motherboard itself is a pretty standard reference board as well. If past Mac designs are any sort of indication Apple will design and maintain their own boards. Using off the shelf designs tends to inhibit your ability to get creative with your computer's chassis. An iMac or Mac mini isn't going to use some SFF mainboard you can order off NewEgg.

Hopefuly meaning that this will stop anybody at the first hurdle from trying to run x86 Windows.  Since all the disk access runs of the DOS interrupt handlers, and those in turn trun of the BIOS interrupt handlers...even basic video ops are run from the BIOS interrupts at startup.

umm...yay!! No windows on the Mac...shame about the CPU... I'm kidding!! Honest!! There's no need for the hot point stabby things!!!

[zenny]

Just as long they keep the G5 tower in design, ill be happy

mmmmm G5 tower case *hugs it*

[Thunderstruck]

Nah, I'm expecting a complete overhaul of the designs.