Intel Based Macs

The sky isn’t falling, Hell hasn’t frozen over.

I’ve already received many e-mails that have asked the same question: “What does this mean, and how does it affect my business?” Don’t worry, it doesn’t.

I took a night to sleep on this before posting anything, to step back and let the news soak in*. I’m not going to write about the hard-core technical differences between the PowerPC and Intel chip arcitectures. There are already many sites that will do this by going into the upsides and downsides, chip specifications, relative die sizes, etc. I’m here for one thing: how does it affect your business?

Like anything in life, you should approach this with an open mind. Before the official announcement, I really avoided reading anything about the potential switch. I like facts over rumors, so, let’s look at the facts:

- The G4 and G5 chips are very powerful. They will not stop working when the first Intel based machine from Apple ships, and will be supported for some time to come.

- Developers were just told about this and will need to make the transition as well. Traditional Mac developers understand traditional Mac development very well, and will continue to produce software that runs on the current systems - much like during the transition from the 68000 chips to PPC, or from OS X to OS 9 (and I still know some people that run software in OS 9), there were always versions available for 68000 and OS 9.

- Any software that uses x86 assembly code just got easier to port the Mac. x86 assembly code is bountiful and well understood.

- During the keynote, Steve Jobs mentioned that a design goal of OS X is to be processor independent(emphasis mine). This certainly means that IBM could come out with a 4GHz G6, and Apple could easily use it. In fact, some new, up and coming company could produce a processor that beats both IBM and Intel and Apple could use it.

If you need a new machine for a job that’s coming up, go buy it without remorse. The whole reason you make that investment is because there’s some ROI associated with it. If it’s paying you back, that’s really all you need worry about. Also, this transition takes about the same amount of time as a new G5 will depreciate. A G5 purchased today will get replaced in about two to three years anyway, and will still be viable for longer. Anything purchased today will run Leopard (the next OS from Apple) and all of the associated applications.

There are two items to add to the bottom line: a) Intel will get us to the next step. Despite how good the PPC architecture is Intel’s is good also - they’re not mutually exclusive. b) This train is rolling, and Steve Jobs is the engineer. You can’t stop it, I can’t stop it. But we can hop aboard and go for the ride.

There is a room full of Intel-based Macs running at WWDC this week. They are Macs. They are fast. And if no-one told you that there was an Intel chip running the show, you’d never know. The Mac experience is largely predicated on the operating system. If it looks like OS X, smells like OS X and acts like OS X, it’s OS X.

So, does this affect your business? Well, if you’re a developer, yes! Get developing! If you are a ‘power user’ (Adobe apps, web developer, sound studio), no. You can act like nothing ever happened. Same goes for people using their Macs for basic e-mail and web browsing. There is one group of people that this will affect: people who still use OS 9 apps (Publishing, I’m looking squarely in your direction). OS 9 app users are now frozen in time, as the new machines will not run Classic! So, those people either need to get the fastest machine possible before the switch, or upgrade the app that they’re using. Naturally, I advocate the latter if at all possible.

So, by all means, forge ahead. If your plans included purchasing the biggest, fastest G5 machines, do so. Hop on board and go for the ride.

* I also needed the night of sleep - I’m still on NY time.