This 'N That

OK, so yesterday Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs announced that the future macs, starting from sometime 2006, will be using Intel x86 chips. You can read abut it here, here and here, and watch the WWDC keynote here. Is this good or bad?
Well, my first reaction was NO!!!, but thinking about it, why not? If the Intel chips can run cooler and faster, (I hope to get a 3.0ghz PowerBook within the next 2 years) then this is good news for Apple and the users.
As far as users are concerned, they will see no difference (except better performance) with new applications will be compiled in universal (fat) binary for many years, supporting both PPC and X86 (Intel) architectures, and older PPC compiled applications running on the Intel Macs through the Rosetta binary translator. Microsoft and Adobe already promised native support for Intel Macs. So what’s so bad? I know apple have been telling us how bad X86 chips are, and how much better PPC is. But if they admit they were wrong, or that that Intel got better, why not, i don’t want to be stuck with a top speed of 2.7 GHz forever.
- Separate and Conquer
But if Apple have come this far and don’t take it a step further, it would be a huge mistake. What step? this step – Separating the hardware from the software, allowing Mac OS X to run on any Intel powered PC, and Windows to run on the Intel Macs. Why? Well first of all, OS X sales will grow like crazy, its not a secret that Mac OS X is x100 better then Windows, but not every home user would invest in Apple’s pro hardware to get the OS. On the hardware side, its a bit tricky, Apple would be taking a risk, nobody will be buying Macs just for the OS, but on the other hand, Apple would be more comparable with the other high end PC manufacturers like Dell and HP. Until this, If you wanted a mac, you got a mac. And if you wanted a PC you compared the PC’s. But nobody (maybe except magazines) really compared Macs and PC’s. Now the rules change. A professional is looking to but a new computer, he goes out and compares the top brands, and finds that apple are of a better quality, more powerful (hopefully) and more elegant (yes, some people care about that, including myself) and plus he gets Mac OS x for free (he can choose to use it, or install Windows or Linux) what machine will he get? the Mac, of course. the same applies to the lower end macs, which can now be compared to PC’s at their level. but this means that Apple will have to work hard on making the best hardware, and having more competitive prices, now that they’re part of the big market. But I still think it would be a pretty smart move. What do you think?

Update
Unfortunately this probably won’t happen. “After Jobs’ presentation, Apple Senior Vice President Phil Schiller addressed the issue of running Windows on Macs, saying there are no plans to sell or support Windows on an Intel-based Mac. “That doesn’t preclude someone from running it on a Mac. They probably will,” he said. “We won’t do anything to preclude that.” However, Schiller said the company does not plan to let people run Mac OS X on other computer makers’ hardware. “We will not allow running Mac OS X on anything other than an Apple Mac,” he said.” Full article here.
Update 2
John Siracusa, in this article, seems to think it might happen one day: “Q: Would Apple ever do that? You know, sell Mac OS X to current Windows users to install on their existing PCs?
A: Someday, maybe, but not soon, and probably only after Apple is convinced that such a market exists and is big enough to be worth sacrificing their own hardware business. How will Apple be convinced of this? Why, by the number of people “illegally” installing Mac OS X on non-Apple hardware, of course. Multiply that number by the the inverse of the ratio of geeks to “normal” people and you get a rough estimate of the total number of potential software-only Windows-to-Mac OS X switchers. Then comes an awkward call to Michael Dell…”