Re: Apple with it's own Chips....

Paul Russell wrote:

One possibility that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere is that it might be advantageous for Apple to have a proprietary x86 variant so that they could tie OS X to Apple hardware and not have to worry about it being hacked to run on any old x86 junk. However they would then have to put a lot of effort into keeping up with Intel/AMD on cores, clock speed, etc.

Trying to keep up with Intel/AMD doesn't make sense to me when Apple can simply use their chips.
Apple could have added a co-processor chip such as a H264 accelerator when they went over to Intel to keep OSX from running one generic hardware but they didn't so I suspect they don't care too much.
My best guess is that Apple are considering using a version of PA semi's processor for an embedded application like AppleTV where they want a fast-ish processor and some other hardware in a custom device that they couldn't get from Intel.
Arthur
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: 7 Places Where Mac OS X is Still Behind Windows
    ... >> nVidia had this working in hardware around 1997. ... The technology to do that was well within the accelerator vendors ... because Apple didn't think to make even one single request. ... > primitive's outline, overlaid upon the output pixel grid, the line may ...
    (comp.sys.mac.advocacy)
  • Re: A 21st Century Apple II?
    ... effort would be *much* greater than the hardware effort. ... enhancement is already available as a card for existing Apple II ... are a couple of *fully compatible* VGA video cards becoming available. ... then any PC or Mac with an emulator already fills the bill. ...
    (comp.sys.apple2)
  • Re: Why cant Apple repair a newish iMac?
    ... store) has had the machine for five days now. ... Apple should be ashamed to be unable to ... In the hardware end of things, ... Personally, I believe in keeping a spare computer around, because ...
    (comp.sys.mac.hardware.misc)
  • Re: Gates acknowledges Apples lead
    ... Hardware and software is what it is. ... Similarly, no company forces upgrades. ... If they want to continue to support older hardware and software, ... worth it after it was installed, it's not because Microsoft or Apple conned ...
    (comp.sys.mac.advocacy)
  • Re: Saw 10.4.1 Running On a PC Laptop Today
    ... >>> Mac, and Apple would be out of the hardware industry. ... > And the "big deal" is that an X86 Mac is not ...
    (comp.sys.mac.advocacy)