Apple migrating towards x86?
Rumors have been increasing that Apple is about to phase out its current PowerPC platform and move to an x86 platform. I’m sure tons of Mac power users are horrified but Apple seems to think it is the next step in its evolution. Most of Apple’s recent changes have been leaning towards the Wintel world for quite some time. Adopting PATA, SATA, PCI, AGP, USB instead of SCSI, ADB and NuBus to cut costs. Also the latest Intel and AMD mobile CPUs have left Apple notebooks in the dust and support newer standards since Apple has been unable to port the G5 generation of machines to a notebook form due to its greater power consumption than the G4. With OS-X Apple should have a pretty portable platform so migrating to another architecture should not be that bad aside from vendors needing to recompile there apps. Another questions arises though. Will I be able to turn my home PC into a Apple station if I so desire? Also what microprocessor vendor will Apple choose for mass production of desktops and laptops? My bet is AMD for the desktops but for laptops I think it is more of an unknown. The Pentium-M is a pretty good mobile chip though AMD’s Mobile 64 is a good bet too. I think it would be a good idea for Apple to start the ball rolling using everything designed around the AMD64 architecture due to its price, performance and scalability.