If that was with the G4
apple: 2nd to the last generation of PowerPC's) than why did they drop PowerPC for intel? Someone said something about the Pentium M. Also does PowerPC still have so much leverage over x86 today?
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Does Anyone Wish that Apple Still Used a Unique Architecture for their Computers?
- Thread starter gunraidan
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If that was with the G4
apple: 2nd to the last generation of PowerPC's) than why did they drop PowerPC for intel? Someone said something about the Pentium M. Also does PowerPC still have so much leverage over x86 today?
Try a little over 3% of the global market, and Intel is a global corporation. Apple would need to be bigger than every other computer manufacturer combined in order to have that sort of barganing power over Intel.Talk about dreaming big!
As of Q1 this year Intel had ~ 77% market share for desktop / laptop. Apple has I think ~ 10% of that market.
Intel doesn't care if their chip goes into a Mac, a Dell, a HP, a Asus, a whatever, all they care about is getting a chip out the door.
Becides, Apple never had any sort of exclusive agreement to be the sole user of POWER. All the while when Apple was using PowerPC chips, they were being used by many other groups, and IBM had no problem selling them. For example, Apple might have called it the G5, but to everyone else it was known as the PPC970, and was used in many non-Apple servers and workstations.
If that was with the G4
Also does PowerPC still have so much leverage over x86 today?
They dropped it for mobile processing. The G4 was powerful, and the G5 even more so. There was one problem, though: The G5 ran hot. The G5 in under my desk at work makes a handy space heater in a cold server room.
Seriously, though, the G5 was very powerful and very hot, and they never could get it to work in a mobile platform. This is why you see the jokes around here about the Powerbook G5. Apple saw that the market was moving toward a majority of sales being laptops, and wanted a good processor for their lineup. IBM seemed to be dragging their feet in coming up with a good PowerPC chip for laptops, so Apple dumped them.The Pentium M is an interesting case. As others have pointed out, Intel actually went backwards with this design. The Pentium 4 ran hot and was fairly inefficient. They went back, and based the Pentium M on the Pentium III design, since it ran cooler and was more efficient per clock cycle. It must have been a very good design, since even the Core 2 procs are based on this design. I'm not sure about the Core i series. (i7, i5, i3)
In another interesting twist, Microsoft actually chose the PowerPC chip for their Xbox 360 rather than an Intel chip.
Anyway, I do kind of wish Apple still used unique architecture. It's getting harder for me to justify the extra expense of their hardware when it's the same stuff I can buy for much cheaper from other vendors. With the rise of the Hackintosh, I can get OSX on a much cheaper platform. I love the Intel Core architecture, but it's getting tough for me to justify paying for Apple's version of it.
The first thing that we need to do is to define "different." Apple's New World PPC-based Macs were based on an open published standard named Common Hardware Reference Platform (CHRP) aka the PowerPC Platform (PPCP). This platform featured Open Firmware. Sun and IBM both used Open Firmware in their workstations. IBM used CHRP.
Intel developed EFI in response to Open Firmware. When Apple switched from PPC to Intel, it also switched from Open Firmware to EFI. AFAIK, no Wintel OEM uses EFI. They all continue to use a clone of the old IBM PC BIOS. Apple computers are still "different," but they are built to published standards.
There can be no question that Apple's switch from PPC to Intel x86 was the necessary and correct decision at the time. However, it was like trading in the Corvette for a minivan. With the migration from 680x0 to the PPC 601 and to each subsequent generation of PPC, the Mac community waited with bated breath. Now that Macs are based on the x86 processor family, it is really hard to get excited about adding another core and 0.48 GHz of clock speed the next release of the processor.
Curse you IBM for turning your back on the personal computer user. I am still happily using my 2003 dual 2.0 GHz Power Mac G5 at home and my 2005 dual 2.5 GHz Power Mac G5 at work. Earlier this year, I bought a 17" 2.93 GHz MacBook Pro. I love my new laptop, but would have much preferred to be running a 4.0 GHz PowerBook G6. If I had the option of a quad 5.0 GHz Power Mac G7, then I would retire one of my old towers in a New York minute.
Curse you IBM!
Too bad the switch to Intel didn't actually cause Apple to refresh their computers any more frequently, eh? If anything, it's less frequent.
--Eric
Okay, so there's EFI... To be honest, I don't know the exact benefits of it, but if it helped keep the gray bootup screen, I'm on board
. Thanks for breaking all that down, btw.I guess that by "different", I was referring to a whole range of things, the PPC processors being only one of them. And with PPC in specific, there was a general consensus at the time that they were snappier, things worked more smoothly, we had the AltiVec pride going on... The approach at Apple at least seemed to be "if it means providing a better user experience than the rest, we'll use a completely different architecture for the processors in our computers, even if we lose money". Which is why I agree about the switch to Intel as well. They made the right decision and didn't cling to the past just for the sake of staying "different". But I can't help but feel nostalgic.
Thanks, that makes perfect sense. So there's that. Additionally, if I might add, I get a feeling that people who buy their products are a bit more entitled in a way, nowadays (no offense meant to anyone, it was inevitable I guess). In the beginning, we were disappointed with the status quo, and we had Steve who understood all of that, and saved the day by giving us those amazing computers, that everyone seemed to appreciate. Steve always pushed the company to outdo itself in terms of design and engineering, there was a stronger sense of dedication at Apple, and the community was smaller and more... enthusiastic, I guess.
Powerbook G6 sounds incredible. If for nothing else than the fact that it sounds and looks much better than MacBook Pro.
I'm not so sure...do you remember waiting around for the new PowerBook G5s, although each time Apple would up the GHz by a few points. Intel has Quad cores, atom, Extreme Core 2, ULV chips....I think Intel has lots to be excited about, I just don't think Apple is using them
I most certainly wanting a PowerBook G5. However, the G5's processor/cooling module was simply too darned big to accommodate a laptop computer.
In my post, I waxed longingly for the PowerBook G6 because it would have succeeded the PowerBook G5 by now in the alternate universe where IBM gave the PPC the development resources it needed to remain competitive.
I don't know where you get the notion that Intel has some exciting product that Apple isn't using. It is my understanding that Apple is on the bleeding edge of some Intel technologies. It is just that they are not exciting. Intel doesn't do exciting. It tried with the Itanium. Big failure. The last truly innovative Intel processor that that was exciting from a user perspective was the iAPX 432 which was intended to run Ada code. It too was a failure, but I have to give it credit for trying.
Couldn't the PWRficient procs from PA Semi have been used in a G5 laptop?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PWRficient
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PWRficient
I only have one dislike for using the Intel processors and that's the fact that the x86 architecture itself is build on years and years of bad design decisions. The main redeeming factor is that Intel is doing well to overcome those design flaws.
What can I say? Apple likes working with the best, and that's why Apple is working with Intel.
What can I say? Apple likes working with the best, and that's why Apple is working with Intel.
Yes, I'd wish they'd go back to a unique architecture. I want my Macs to be more expensive, updated less frequently, and unable to run Windows for the occasional time I need it for something.
Applications that only ran on PowerPC platform, those creative types had no real choice but to buy a Mac. Eventually Apple realised that the non creative types are a much larger market and that x86 was the best entry point.
I see. But I'm just curious though how much more powerful was/is PowerPC architecture to x86?
Depends on who you want to listen to. here is Apple's explanation of the difference between the old P4 and Apple's G4 processors. I personally believe that the G4 IS that much better after having used both in real life application.
And that was the end of PPC.
I haven't see Apple's dual core Atom machine. I haven't see Apple laptop with an atom chip. I haven't see Apple's Quad based iMac. No i7 Macs either. Those would all be exciting to me. And those new Core i3 and i5 chips coming on rumored sept 8....exciting stuff!
what you seek (different architecture) is happening, not in Macs but in the iPhone platform. With PA Semi acquisition, I think you'll see some custom ARM processors (similar to PowerPC) that only Apple has access to use, and that have significant power, speed, performance/watt, etc advantages over what is available to their rivals.
you make a good point there.
i personally felt that PowerPC macs seemed more reliable and stable than intel macs
Intel was a "good move" but at the same time terrible. It opened up the world to easy hackintoshes. I spent $550, and mine could kill most mac pro's. Everything runs just fine too. So, now I truly feel apple's only difference is in the os. Because pc's and mac's are made of a lot of the same parts now. As you can see by running a hackintosh. It works just as great, but you pay the low price of a cheap pc.
Also, ever since the switch to intel, it seems like quality has gone down a lot. Since when is 3 years (as stated by another forum member) a good life for a laptop?! My ibook has been running for what, like 7 years now? And it's still good. Been through 2 intel macbooks in two years already. All of them are treated the same too. And mac pro's failing within first 3 years? Really?? My G5 is still running strong. My G4 is still running strong. Heck, I leave the G4 running for weeks straight without shutting down, and it still has had not one problem. Now maybe this doesnt have to do with the switch to intel, but it definitely has to do with whatever else they did when they switched to intel.
Also, ever since the switch to intel, it seems like quality has gone down a lot. Since when is 3 years (as stated by another forum member) a good life for a laptop?! My ibook has been running for what, like 7 years now? And it's still good. Been through 2 intel macbooks in two years already. All of them are treated the same too. And mac pro's failing within first 3 years? Really?? My G5 is still running strong. My G4 is still running strong. Heck, I leave the G4 running for weeks straight without shutting down, and it still has had not one problem. Now maybe this doesnt have to do with the switch to intel, but it definitely has to do with whatever else they did when they switched to intel.
It was a trade off between # of instructions in the pipeline vs cycles per second. The PPCs generally ran at fewer cycles per second but at times made up the difference by having fewer operations per instruction to execute.
Maybe this is an inadequate analogy, but picture two people writing an exam. One person (PPC) only has to answer 8-12 questions to finish, depending on the app. The other person (x86) has to answer 20 questions, but can write twice as fast.
This is less of a distinction now anyway as Intels are drifting in the same direction these days.
I don't know that I miss it, but my 400Mhz TiBook could should handle a impressive amount of crap thrown at it for only being 400Mhz. Had the PowerPC scaled better to the faster speeds, even if it was behind a little to x86, it would have been interesting.
It was not an issue of scaling, it is was issue heat generation. Apple's decision to transition to Intel followed Intel's development of a manufacturing process that produced processors that generated substantially less heat than Intel's processors of the past. PPCs had been cooler, but the Intel x86 stole the march. At the same time, IBM spurned Apple's request to build cooler-running versions of the G5. It was not until after Apple dropped IBM like a bad habit that IBM realized that Apple was a good customer and partner. By then, it was too late.
And how do you know that exactly? What IBM has done since the Intel transition that makes you think they would want Apple back?
They are now selling more chips than ever by supplying the processors to all three game console manufactures. What they sold to Apple is very small compared to what they sell to Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo