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To be honest, I've never quite understood the argument that says that PowerPC Macs have character and style while Intel Macs simply don't. After all, when Apple swapped over all of their machines to Intel in 2006, they basically continued the same designs for the whole line besides the MacBook, right? The Core Duo MacBook Pro looked pretty much exactly like the Aluminum PowerBook G4, the Core Duo iMac looked exactly same as the iSight iMac G5 that it replaced, the Mac Pro used the same exact cheese grater case as the PowerMac G5, etc. The only thing that separated these early Intel Macs from their PowerPC predecessors is their processor architecture, but that's not something that can convey character is it?
Perhaps it was the idea that Macs were now built with regular PC parts that everyone else was using, so they lost some of what made them special? And even though the designs were the same, you know that on the inside they are completely different and have little in common with Macs of the past?
I get the argument and even agree with you, I just think things get kind of hazy when compare the character and style of the late PPC era with early Intel. I still think that the rainbow Macs of the late 90's and the Power Mac G4 line (including the Cube, of course!) had more style than the white polycarbonate and aluminum Mac's ever had, though. To be honest, I'm getting extremely tired of aluminum, too. Apple made it popular and now everyone and their grandma's are making their products in it.
Obviously, you haven't been watching Computerphile.
Besides the Acorn, the brits had ZX-81, BBC Micro, Amstrad, and Spectrum.
I think it's the psychology of perception - users had spent years investing considerable amounts of money in a brand that made a selling point of not being Intel based and floating on an advertising campaign ridiculing X86 architecture. To jump ship to X86 and sing it's praises was too much for some users and manifested in a perception of PPC Macs being of good character and the new Intel machines being soulless corporate devices.
Also, some of the first wave Intels used integrated graphics that in some respects were inferior to earlier dedicated GPUs - on my machines, this gave an impression of a clunky PC like GUI - another reason to think PPC had better character.
Of course the majority of Apple's computer market couldn't have cared less, some were oblivious to the change, some simply bought the next upgrade without question and now, even PPC stalwarts are happy to trade nostalgic loyalty for astronomical CPU performance and compatibility with the here and now.
The character PPC retains now is enhanced every year whilst the machines are still being used because in addition to everything else their continued use confirms their instrinsic quality and the robust nature of the PPC architecture.
I have a few quads and 1 2.7ghz. All have the Delphi but our 2.7ghz has the Panasonic. All of them where refurbished in 2006. So far none have leaked but they all have a less of a month of use on themexcept my PowerMac G5 2.7Ghz has the Rare Panasonic LCS thats much less known for leaking then their Delphi Brothers
.
C1
Also, my mac pro, is some sort of crazy early dev machine:
Attachments
Yeah, my 8,1 is a C1 too and appears as unknown... However, the C1 factory code resides somewhere in China
Yay! Archimedes! Awesome machines, way ahead of their time. Shame they never got any traction outside of education.
I don't know how others see it, but this is my take.
For me, the transition from PowerPC to Intel coincided with the acknowledgement that "Apple Computer, Inc." had publicly transitioned to "Apple, Inc." no longer a computer company but a consumer products company. There were a lot of changes between 2006-2009 including radical changes to iLife and Final Cut, incompatibility with older software and data (even their own), introduction of the Mac App Store, and changes to OS X that felt more arbitrary than progressive.
By itself, the PPC to Intel transition meant little. Taken with everything else, it represented a different Apple that disrupted my world as a long time Apple computer user. My PPC Macs running Tiger were the last time computers meant that much to me as a secure and trusted platform in hardware, software, and environment.
My contemporary computers are nice and I comfortably use OS X, Linux Mint, and Windows 10 -- but the Apple ecosystem with PPCs and OS X before Leopard made me feel something that this newer stuff doesn't.
In a way it is like a classic car. On paper even a reasonably priced modern car is faster, safer, more comfortable, reliable, and efficient. But there's something special about driving that old Alfa. I don't want to trade my modern car for it, but I still love the old one and want to take it out for a spin when I'm in the mood
2013 Mac Pro?
[doublepost=1463429440][/doublepost]
Totally. My first Mac was an Intel but even my highly modern looking G5 Quad has that extra "character" that the MBP seems to lack.
Even in terms of look, think how much the iMac (or any Mac for that matter) changed from 1998-2006. And how little it's changed from 2007-present. Different shape of the same design...
Here's something to chew on with that:
A G5 Quad could-at the time of its introduction-run every single piece of Macintosh software ever written from 1984 on up to 2006 out of the box. Of course, getting the software ONTO the Quad isn't always the easiest thing, but once there it will run(as long as you are running Tiger, which was the shipping OS).
The first Intel Macs cut off everything that was not OS X compatible, which takes you back to roughly the year 2000(give or take a few years for some companies). That was 16 years of software gone in one fell swoop.
Then, OS X Lion made another cut and got rid of everything that was not either Intel-only or a universal binary. That pushed the cut off up to roughly 2005 or 2006 depending on how quickly the software companies transitioned to UBs.
Granted, things are "stable" now and we have built back up a software library of about 11 years. Apple has also been kind enough to keep system requirements the same for the past four OSs, although I'm not crazy about the new 1-year update cycle. I have computers(several) running El Capitan, but my main Macbook Pro and my Mac Pro are both still running Mavericks.
In a way it is like a classic car. On paper even a reasonably priced modern car is faster, safer, more comfortable, reliable, and efficient. But there's something special about driving that old Alfa. I don't want to trade my modern car for it, but I still love the old one and want to take it out for a spin when I'm in the mood
I feel much the same way about my MG. Quirks and all, on a sunny day it's a lot of fun to take out on a twisty road and drive it like it was meant to be driven. That's true even if I have to stop and file the points or top up the oil
I even enjoy driving it to work, but then when I get stuck in traffic I start to get irritated by the amount of heat pouring onto my feet from the poor(i.e. not existent) insulation in the footwell and around the transmission tunnel, the number of times my left leg has to step on the clutch, the times I have to "blip" the throttle to keep the engine from dying, constantly watching the temperature gauge to make sure it's not going to overheat, and then hoping I don't get rained on
. On days like that, I'm happy to be in a modern car where I can stay a comfortable temperature and know that the car is just going to keep going along like I want it to. Similarly, I love sitting in front of a PPC Mac and running software it was meant to run or playing games it was meant to play(include a lot that I grew up with). I even get some real work done on several of my PPC computers, particularly my Quicksilver.
But, at the end of the day, the Macbook Pro is what I'm usually using, including now as I type this post.
I was playing with some Powerbooks a few minutes ago and had the thought to look at where they were made.
These were just two I had at hand...
Unfortunately, my main MBP also says "unknown" like some of the above. The SN starts with C2, which I'm also guessing is somewhere in China.
These were just two I had at hand...
Unfortunately, my main MBP also says "unknown" like some of the above. The SN starts with C2, which I'm also guessing is somewhere in China.
The first thing that I noticed about the first picture you posted is that, for some reason, the "Inc." is missing. It just says "Apple Computer,"
(That would bug the crap out of me for some reason.)
Thanks everyone for telling me their reasons for thinking that PowerPC Mac's have more character and style than their Intel counterparts. It was very interesting to read all of your reasonings, and I think I understand now.
I think I might pick up a PowerPC Mac of my own and see what I think of it, though since I never experienced the pre-Intel era, perhaps I might feel completely different than the rest of you.