On Jun 10, 2009, at 9:23 PM, tortoise wrote:
> Also, the POWER architecture is not going away in the least despite > Apple being against it. Apple did not abandon the PowerPC...the PowerPC makers abandoned Apple, in favor of those game consoles and high end servers (IBM) and automobiles (The Chipmaker Formerly Known As Motorola). Macs stagnated performance-wise in the early 00's BECAUSE neither IBM or Motorola could (or would) produce the kind of high performance, low power chips that Intel was making by the boatload. Apple didn't put Dual CPU's into powerPC's because the technology was cool, or at the time, even all that greater performance...it was because Moto and IBM WOULD NOT MAKE the faster parts for Apple. Macs never got beyond a G4 in laptops because IBM WOULD NOT MAKE a low power G5. Neither company cared for Apple's business. The figured that since Apple had tied themselves to the PPC, they could let it become a boat anchor. What did THEY care that the personal computer business was mainly Intel-based. Apple was stuck right? No way would Apple dump all their existing code and customers to switch! Phaw! (Apple certainly fooled me! I was stuck eating crow sandwiches, crow tetrazzini, crow pot pies, and crow hash for a long time after their Intel announcement. I was sure they wouldn't switch, too.) Bluntly Apple's business for both companies was at best a hobby, not linked to their main line of business. Computer CPU chips are Intel's bread, butter and mortgage payment. Apple's done a hell of a lot better by Intel than they EVER did by Moto. Apple's just the kind of computer company that Intel can expect for early adoption of their new CPU's. Apple's also the ONLY major customer of Intel that Intel doesn't have to pay for advertising...no 'Dong ding dong DING' in Apple advertising. This is a win-win for Intel AND Apple. > Nearly every game console uses it , most of > the world's fastest computers, and most automobiles, and nearly all > the unmanned space missions > (the last two are just moving up to the G3). That's got nothing to do with them being PowerPC and everything to do with their ability to be radiation hardened. And space probes are still pretty evenly split between the PPC and 80486 and early Pentium classes (I've got a friend whose done programming for multiple space probes, including the oven code for the Mars Polar Lander. A constant headache is switching Endians, even between parts of the same probe.) -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
