“Apple’s startling announcement that it will begin a transition away from PowerPC chips to Intel-made processors has left Mac fans’ heads spinning, and not just because a former ‘enemy’ of the Mac is now counted among its allies. Many details about the transition are unclear or flat-out missing — after all, Apple said it won’t be shipping any Intel-based Macs until next year. And let’s be honest — computer chips are not exactly the simplest topic under the sun,” Jason Snell writes for Macworld. “To help you sort out this situation, here’s what you need to know about the Apple-Intel announcement — in the form of frequently-asked questions.”
Three of Snell’s Q&A’s have come up often here on MDN recently:
Will any PC be able to run Mac OS X for Intel?
Apple says no. Our guess is that some enterprising hacker may be able to get it to work, but we’d expect that if anyone can get OS X to run on PC hardware, it will be a laborious process, and the end result may not be a particularly stable system. You certainly won’t be able to go out, buy OS X, stick the install DVD in a Dell PC, and have it just work. Apple intends Mac OS X to only run on Apple hardware.
Will my Intel-based Mac be able to run Windows?
It seems likely, although Apple won’t support it. Someone will probably figure a way to install Windows on a Mac system so that you can choose to boot into either OS X or Windows. In addition, consider a future version of Virtual PC that lets you run PC applications at full speed, on a window within your Mac (or on a second monitor). There are some intriguing possibilities here for Mac users who must use Windows applications some of the time.
But if all Macs one day will be able to run Windows, won’t application developers stop creating Mac versions of their programs?
It’s possible, but not very likely. Mac users are Mac users because they want to run software in the Mac interface. The large software companies that publish programs on the Mac understand that, and so do the small Mac developers who are making the coolest OS X apps around. I’d tell you that the middle-range developers with a flagging commitment to the Mac would be the ones most worth worrying about, but honestly, the Mac OS X transition already shook most of them out of the Mac market.
Snell full article is very much worth reading as it answers just about any question you might have about Apple’s Intel move. Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: We’ve come to the conclusion that Apple’s move to Intel could benefit Apple’s hardware business in a major way, especially if new Macs are capable of running both Mac OS X and Windows natively (no emulation like Virtual PC). The average (Windows-only) person would be much more likely to buy a Mac and sample Mac OS X and less likely to buy a box assembled by, say, Dell or Gateway, that would be limited to only running Windows. And, once people sample Mac OS X and can compare it to Windows side-by-side, they usually become Mac users. Apple will not allow Mac OS X to run on generic PCs without a licensing deal in place. In other words, people won’t be able to buy Mac OS X and load it on their generic Dell PCs, but they would be able to buy Windows and load it on their Macs. This is potentially a big problem for the Windows-dependent box assemblers like Dell and the rest. Why buy a Dell when you can get two (or more: Linux, etc.) computers for the price of one with a Mac?
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Why buy a Dell when Apple ‘Macintel’ computers will run both Mac OS X and Windows? – June 08, 2005
Windows users who try Apple’s Mac OS X Tiger might not want to go back – June 07, 2005