I was having one of my sleepless episodes last night and working on the new 17" aircraft carrier (17" PowerBook) and thinking about the question of why or why not Apple should move to the ix86 processor line. I've heard arguments as to why the x86 processor is better than the PowerPC line (DJ Bernstein has some articles on this subject: PowerPC speed, x86 speed & Advice for computer buyers) and I have read the infamous article from John Dvorak at PC Magazine about Apple needing to move to the 64-bit x86 processor. I still don't know up from down, however. The PowerPC chips are indeed slower than the newest Intel and AMD chips, but I don't really care because I'm not running Windows. In the case that I do use the x86 processor, I run FreeBSD or RedHat Linux - and there I see a definite improvement over the same-machine performance running Windows. That, however, is not due to the CPU, but due to the OS. The complaint I have with the PowerPC is simply one of price. Apple is out of their minds if they think they can continue to lag behind Intel - megahertz myth or no myth (in my opinion, myth, but that's another story). So, what should Apple do and will IBM or Motorola ever be able to catch up? Is the market for their chips even worth the catch-up? Forget the infantile religious arguments as to why one way is better than the other, I want to know if we are ever going to see sound statistics to back up Apple's consistent backing of PPC (other than to create a proprietary hardware line). Will this work in the long run? I really don't know. These are only the late night rantings of a sleepless Mac & FreeBSD geek...
Why not 64/32-bit i86?
Categories:
Search
About this Entry
This page contains a single entry by steven n fettig published on April 23, 2003 12:50 PM.
IBM - ThinkPad G Series was the previous entry in this blog.
Hiatus Over: Thoughts to Begin with: is the next entry in this blog.
Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.
Subscribe to this blog's feed (Atom)
Subscribe to this blog's feed (RSS 2.0)
Contact
Steven N. Fettig
Delavan, WI - somewhere between Delavan & Darien: map link
Phone: +1 262 432 1704
Email: snfettig AT gmail.com
AIM/Yahoo/MSN/GoogleTalk-
Skype/twitter: snfettig
Delavan, WI - somewhere between Delavan & Darien: map link
Phone: +1 262 432 1704
Email: snfettig AT gmail.com
AIM/Yahoo/MSN/GoogleTalk-
Skype/twitter: snfettig
Categories
- *nix
- OS X/Mac (55)
- Philosophy, Politics & etc. (15)
- Thoughts 'n Rants (48)
- about (1)
- archived{OutdatedDocs} (3)
- business (16)
- fitness (1)
- biking
- running
- swimming
- {tri}Training (3)
- guestbook (1)
- lifeGeneral (9)
- links-of-interest (28)
- miscellanea (13)
- notes (17)
- qmail (15)
- shortStory (3)
- techGeneral (115)
- travel (5)
- weblogging (27)
Monthly Archives
- July 2009 (1)
- June 2009 (2)
- May 2009 (1)
- April 2009 (2)
- December 2008 (4)
- November 2008 (1)
- October 2008 (2)
- September 2008 (14)
- August 2008 (3)
- July 2008 (2)
- May 2008 (1)
- April 2008 (3)
- January 2008 (4)
- December 2007 (6)
- November 2007 (23)
- October 2007 (12)
- August 2007 (4)
- April 2007 (2)
- March 2007 (7)
- February 2007 (2)
- January 2007 (2)
- December 2006 (5)
- November 2006 (4)
- October 2006 (3)
- September 2006 (4)
- August 2006 (1)
- July 2006 (1)
- June 2006 (3)
- May 2006 (4)
- April 2006 (3)
- March 2006 (6)
- February 2006 (3)
- January 2006 (7)
- December 2005 (3)
- November 2005 (1)
- September 2005 (2)
- August 2005 (1)
- July 2005 (1)
- June 2005 (2)
- May 2005 (5)
- April 2005 (1)
- March 2005 (1)
- February 2005 (1)
- January 2005 (5)
- December 2004 (1)
- October 2004 (3)
- August 2004 (7)
- July 2004 (4)
- May 2004 (2)
- April 2004 (5)
- March 2004 (4)
- February 2004 (2)
- January 2004 (5)
- December 2003 (3)
- November 2003 (7)
- October 2003 (1)
- September 2003 (2)
- August 2003 (5)
- July 2003 (3)
- June 2003 (6)
- May 2003 (12)
- April 2003 (15)
- March 2003 (36)
- February 2003 (10)
- December 2002 (18)
- November 2002 (27)
- October 2002 (7)

Leave a comment