The world is flipping: Apple goes to Intel while MS goes to IBM chips
I’m reading this CNET article “Apple to ditch IBM, switch to Intel chips” and I get the big “whoa”.
Apple is possibly moving to an IBM chip. So what does this mean?
The open-source FreeBSD operating system, of which Mac OS X is a variant, already runs on x86 chips such as Intel’s Pentium. And Jobs has said Mac OS X could easily run on x86 chips.
Us ex-Apple lovers really got pissed off at Jobs back in the ’80s because his religion (against the PC) blinded him to the opportunity of running on the PC and Sculley followed his suit. We all know that Apple would have killed MS if they ported the Mac OS to the PC. Well, here’s their chance.
I still don’t quite understand why Apple hasn’t seriously bonded with the Linux gang. Macs make the ultimate desktop workstation while Linux makes the killer server. I can’t be the only guy seeing this, right?
And now for something completely different:
IBM loses cachet with the end of the Apple partnership, but it can take consolation in that it’s designing and manufacturing the Power family processors for future gaming consoles from Microsoft
What a weird world we live in. Microsoft switches to IBM’s Power PC chip to run their graphics console while Apple drops the PowerPC to run on Intel (Wintel?) machines.