“When Apple abandoned its long-standing use of PowerPC chips in favor of those from Intel, Steve Jobs said, ‘It’s been 10 years since our transition to the PowerPC, and we think Intel’s technology will help us create the best personal computers for the next 10 years,'” Topher Kessler writes for CNET.
“Eight years have now passed since that moment, and recent developments suggest that Apple may abide by this statement and move to a new architecture within a few years,” Kessler writes. “But not only is Apple looking to new hardware, it is also preparing plans for its operating systems.”
Kessler writes, “Bloomberg is reporting that Bob Mansfield, Apple’s recently announced VP of Technologies, has been exploring new chip options in the wake of ‘ambitious plans for the future’ by Apple’s semiconductor teams… In addition to future hardware, Mansfeld is pursuing ‘melding iOS with the Mac OS to create a more uniform experience for all Apple devices,’ which, beyond hardware changes, suggests that more radical adjustments to the Mac OS are on their way.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Carl H.” for the heads up.]
A new MacPro and a new Pages and Numbers are more important. No need to fix an OS and a processor if it is not broken.
Improving or updating something does not equal “fixing” it.
When you stop improving your product, your competition passes you.
+1
Hope they don’t blend the 2 os’s
+1
+1 gadzillion
As I write this my Mac Pro is recording 2 HD streams from EyeTV, transcoding some FLV video to h264, playing a streaming radio program while recording another, an iPad and an iPhone syncing with iTunes over USB and I’ve got probably a dozen or so web pages open. PDF Pro, Postbox, Safari, EyeTV, TruPhone, Read Later, iTunes and Dragon Dictate all open and running-at the same time.
Got an ARM CPU that will do all that? My QuadCore Xeon does that easily.
Show-off.
Just the difference between a real computer and an iToy.
Wow! You’re a geek. Get outside and get a life, loser.
You don’t get it. Being super productive lets him take half the day off!
It’s election day, dude. It’s also damp, cold and cloudy outside.
Words are cheap. I don’t believe you. Show me a video of you doing this stuff. This should be no problem since you
purport yourself to be such an expert.
Some of us use our Macs for a living. I have three Mac Pros running now. Should I show you? Here look at this! And I can’t wait for the new Mac pro. Can’t come soon enough. And they’re not toys!
I somewhat agree, but I also think Apple is going to move towards a more consumer friendly version of the OS concentrating on the App Launcher and full screen mode. This would be a slimmed down version of the OS that doesn’t require the horsepower a more pro-sumer system might need.
Will they be touch-screen? No. More than likely will still require keyboard and trackpad. Will it be ARM? Who knows? They’ll start with 2 low priced models; a laptop and an all-in-one. Will they be called Macs, who knows? These are the computer “appliances” that Steve Jobs always wanted to build and deliver to people.
I also think that apps designed for these new systems will run on iPads and “Pro” Macs as well.
Forget touch screens.
Lets leap ahead (behind) and fulfill the REAL unrealized potential offered when the Mac uttered its first words…
I’m talking full on voice control. Thats a user interface for the future that I’ve waited for since 1987. 1966 with Star Trek TOS actually
And it shall be called:
iOSOSx
Or, since it is so revolutionary, SOx
We know best, the designers at Apple know nothing…..in 1, 2, 3……
It’s actually been only 7 years as the move to Intel was announced in June 2005.
Well, lets hope they fix lion by implementing the things in snow leopard which made it a favorite of many users. Don’t fix what’s not broken. Go back to what people tell you they loved. Porsche did it with the 997 headlights and their sales went up. The trash can should stay! I love the sound of trash ringing the aluminum can!
Topher is Trolling. Got to write something on a slow tech day.
Apple is ALWAYS looking at OS improvements and appl. improvements; nothing new there.
Hardware gets improved every time a screen, chip or storage or networking capability is upgraded.
So there is nothing new here. Just the improvements we have seen and expect from Apple as it intends to keep steamrolling its competition who wait for MicroSloth to dribble out changes.
“Topher is Trolling.” Sounds like “Topher” is looking for his “Chris.” Tell him to look at Ruth – she found Chris and look how successful she’s been: http://tinyurl.com/ahl47d5
Question: Are we on the way to a time when serious computer buyers will lose the Macintosh option? Seems that way to me. But, I understand. Why make MacPros if you became (used to be?) the wealthiest company on the planet selling pads, pods and phones. Too bad for pro customers but here we are.
like I said before Apple has treated its mac line (except for maybe some laptops) as unwanted step children in the last few years.
I have NEVER seen a mac mini TV ad ever in my area.
Haven’t seen a imac ad for years.
Never seen a mac Pro ad
There has not been a generic mac ad except for the aborted ‘Olympic ads’ since 2009 (last Mac PC guy ad)
Microsoft from last stats I have (2009) spent THREE TIMES apple’s ad budget. Even Dell (apple is now 40 times Dells size) spent more on ads.
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2009/10/28/apples-2009-ad-budget-half-a-billion/
Msft will spend 1 billion to advertise Win 8, I’ve NEVER seen a Mountain Lion TV ad.
99% of mainline journalists, most analysts don’t even know what Mt. Lion is, they think Win 8 is ‘New’ and apple hasn’t come out with a new os since 2008 (or something). Almost all PC users think Win 7 is equal or better than Mt. Lion.
HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A APPLE TV AD TELLING THE GENERAL POPULATION MT. LION IS BETTER? OR THAT IT EVEN EXISTS?
Most of the Big Box sales staff have no clue how to explain Mt. Lion or macs almost none know that there is such a thing as a “Mac Pro”. (by the way I read somewhere ‘apple’ sales staff at a Best Buy did not realize that the iPad in their stores is an iPad 4, that a new ‘big’ iPad came out … )
Mac sales have been growing but after 15 years of Jobs return, many years of osx, Vista fiasco, iPhone halo , Apple store sales etc.. Mac marketshare is still around 5% worldwide and Win still controls 90%.
Even with retina macbooks, Mac sales last quarter only increased 1% from year ago
The last few years apple has been mostly mobile, mobile…
plenty of iphone, iPad ads, but like I said almost no mac desktop and few macbook ads
(they haven’t even updated their top of the line Mac Pro for years).
Hopefully promoting Federighi (a mac guy) to SVP is a sign of changes to come but I’m not hopeful..
with Win 8 launch (i.e Vista 2) I still don’t see a concentrated apple Mac Advertising blitz to take advantage of it …
(I get Dell flyers all the time, yet apple 40 times Dells size doesn’t send flyers advertising macs… )
I understand mobile makes a lot of money, I understand tablets, smartphones are taking Pc marketshare etc but..
there will always be places for PCs and with only 5% world marketshare (10% U.S) there’s plenty of room for Macs to grow and plenty of money on the table.
allowing Msft to have an easy free run to make easy billions every quarter is foolish because they will take those easy profits from Windows and keep bashing at you (like Win Phones and surface tablets). Msft could afford to lose 1 billion on Xbox before making it a success.
Also limiting your products (60% of apple’s profits now from iPhone and iPad) means that any hiccups on them (B.s on maps, supply chain) means stock goes from 700 to 580.
the mac mini was the bestselling P.C in some parts of Europe when launched yet apple treated it for years like an embarrassment…
+1
I love what apple have done with iOS and the iPad, iPhone etc, but my Mac experience is getting me down. They do seem to be ignoring Mac users at the moment!
Get used to it, Marcus… it’s not simply “at the moment” – we are tossed aside permanently. People weren’t listening when Steve said “Apple is a mobile device company” but, especially for a guy who didn’t say anything he didn’t mean and didn’t say anything that could be misunderstood or misinterpreted.
Oh for the love of god do not bring osx and Ios together. MS released the surface for people who want a tablet and desktop os smashed together
Too late, since its inception iOS was a scaled back special function version of Mac OS X. In the ‘Back to the Mac’ event that heralded Lion, the most loved (by iOS users) features of iOS were put into the Mac OS.
Doom sayers like you fail to realize that Mac OS and iOS is ALL OS X.
Let me correct your typo. MS, like usual, botched Win 8/ Surface, failing to provide a decent customer experience on either desktop or mobile/portable. No matter how hard they try to copy Apple and their Mac OS/iOS/ OS X, MS has epic failed to provide a unified, satisfying user experience.
No mac OS X and iOS are not ALL OS X. Unless you define an operating system purely as a kernel and just the foundation pieces. They may both use the Mach kernel and share large underlying parts but they are not the same OS.
The biggest complaints I heard when Lion and then Mtn Lion shipped were that Apple was dumbing down the interface and bringing over iOS elements.
Agreed about MS.
Two words: Save As …
“In addition to future hardware, Mansfeld is pursuing ‘melding iOS with the Mac OS to create a more uniform experience for all Apple devices,’”
PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS!!!! I can’t stand iOS-nish on my computer OS and this is the main reason I’m still running 10.6 on my computer now,
Remember when planned obsolescence was a bad thing?
It’s all about obsolescence. It’s Apple’s way of ensuring they get their mitts on more of your money.