Why Apple shouldn't be using these chips.
IBM just announced the seemingly-mythical 970MP chips. As mentioned, we may never know exactly why the decision was made to move to Intel. Was it truly that IBM couldn't get a faster chip out? Is it really that we wouldn't ever see a faster, cooler laptop? It doesn't matter.
That's right - Apple has announced the change, and we have to deal with it, whatever that means to us. End users should really never notice. Developers, depending on your choice of development environment, you either have no additional work, up through re-architechting just about everything you do.
This is not a path that we can make a U-turn on. We need to see Intel-ville in the distance, and just keep taking steps towards it. While other OSes have made a play at a multi-platform strategy, I can't call any of them wildly successful. Sure, Linux runs on multiple platforms, but wouldn't you say there's a dominant platform associated with Linux? There is: x86. I can go grab PPC Linux, of course. But that doesn't mean that I can blindly grab any source and have it up and running. Especially drivers. And there's the rub.
Supporting multiple platforms puts driver and other HAL developers in pain. These are the people that will have to make a choice which platform to really concentrate on. More importantly, this is the Mac. Long term, no one wants to have to choose which Mac platform a particular piece of hardware will have drivers, and which may not. Other manufacturers may not care. But this is Apple. And providing that great user experience is what they're all about. They can't risk the confusion that this could cause.
There have been transitions before, but they've been just that: a transition, with some goal on the other side. We don't worry about 680x0 vs. PPC anymore. Fewer of us worry about OS 9 'Classic Apps' vs. OS X native apps too much these days (hopefully - I can vouch that all of my clients have made the switch). This is another transition that we need to get through, and leave the 'old' behind.
PPC lovers, I feel your pain. The PPC is a wonderful architecture. If, though, you concentrate on OS X development, or as a platform at all, think Intel. Move in that direction, even if only in small steps at a time. When this transition is 'complete', you'll be back on solid ground, and have an audience to keep developing for.
Graphic designers, e-mail mavens, Daylite people, and other Mac generalists: Sit back and enjoy OS X.
