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Another Theory on Apple's Move To Intel
Posted by
Zonk
on Sat Jul 16, 2005 05:26 PM
from the got-to-love-theories dept.
from the got-to-love-theories dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Why did Apple really switch to Intel? Larry Loeb thinks that it has everything to do with the Trusted Computing Group's TNC (Trusted Network Connect)." From the article: "The Trusted Computer Group is a multivendor association that grew out of Microsoft's pre-emptive Trusted Computing Platform effort. Microsoft realized it couldn't force this down the manufacturers' throats, so it formed the TCG to give it the veneer of respectability and 'open standards.'"
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Risky Business (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Risky Business (Score:5, Insightful)
1. G5s are slow. really slow. OK, not in an absolute sense but there are very few areas where they excel in speed over x86 chips. PPC vs x86 ISA design notwithstanding, the actual speed of the real products at any one moment in time reveals the intels to be quicker.
2. Apple want quicker machines.
So what's with all the conspiracy theories? It's like a guy going out to pick up, and chasing the red-hot sexy young thing instead of the fat 35 year old in the corner who doesn't wash, and having all his friends go "whoa. wonder why he's going for the hot one?"
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Re:Risky Business (Score:3, Interesting)
But I think the truth is obvious and was given to us by Apple: The ROADMAP for intel is superior for thier needs, possibly including DRM or other features.
People look at IBMs recent announcements of processors and assume Apple was making a decision about the next 10 months, not the next 10 years.
Even with IBM releasing chips significantly faster than intel, what the next 10 years holds is more important for
Re:Risky Business (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes and no. The G5 is competitive in desktop Macs. But for laptops, the Pentium-M slaughters the G4 today, and Intel's upcoming dual-core Yonah will do the same to the "low power" 1.6GHz 970FX. Because the market is moving towards portables that's a big problem for Apple, and moving to Intel solves it.
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Re:Risky Business (Score:5, Insightful)
This is especially an issue with Apple, because they are, and have been for more than a decade, a computer company who relies on the notebook market.
There are precious few people out there who chose Macs over desktop PC's, but an informal walk through your local "Free Wi-Fi" coffee shop reveals quite another story when it comes to laptop systems. Apple lives and dies by the PowerBook & iBook, and the way the G4/G5 roadmap was going, they would have died if they had not done something soon.
(Disclaimer: Current iBook user. I don't give a fuck what CPU is inside as long as it's fast enough, it's cheap enough, the battery lasts long enough, and it runs OS X. If Intel gets it done better than IBM, then so be it.)
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Trusted computing (Score:5, Insightful)
But then explain to me why Apple has been so against 3rd party extenders to iTunes. For example, try to get your Pocket PC with iTunes. Until recently, you haven't been able to. Why? Companies that provide the apps get sued by Apple. How does this fit the "protect the musicians" model? It doesn't.
Suing folks who scoop them on news. Embracing trusted computing (misnomer if I ever heard of one). Sorry folks, this ain't the apple of the 80's.
Re:Trusted computing (Score:5, Insightful)
G5s are fine
G5s cannot go into laptops
Laptops use G4
G4 delevopment stalled
Laptops account for MORE THAN HALF of apple computer sales.
going intel takes the risk out of competition with wintel, as they will never be greatly faster or slower.
so stop it with the conspiracy theories ok, it's pretty simple reason to change when more than half of your product line is stalled. Do you see a mobile G5 in thinkpads? Do you see motorola improving the clock on the G4?
STFU you troll journalists who make up these STUPID stories to get slashdot-driven ad revenue.
Next up "Linux performance sucked, so steve jobs engineered the intel switch with the help of darl mcbride, a beowulf cluster of the new PCs will be used to render the newst Lucas movie in the star wars series in which Jar jar binks returns!!!1" or maybe a dupe.
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Laptop Percentage of Sales (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Windows compatibility.. the real hidden reason. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Trusted computing (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Trusted computing (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Trusted computing (Score:4, Insightful)
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Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you realize that your whole point is based on this nonsensical sentence? What do you mean by "try to get your Pocket PC with iTunes"? Are you castigating Apple for not releasing iTunes for Pocket PCs? Or is your problem that you can't buy a Pocket PC with iTunes preinstalled? Or were you not able to sync iTunes with your Pocket PC? Or what? And who exactly got sued by Apple? I don't know of any Pocket PC sof
Re:Trusted computing (Score:4, Interesting)
Those folks aside though, I think Apple is focused more on becoming a "media company" than a "computer company" these days. That's the biggest difference between the Apple of today, and the Apple of the 80's.
After all, when your C.E.O. also happens to run a major motion picture studio, and when your "flagship software applications" include such things as Final Cut Pro, Motion, DVD Studio Pro and Shake - you have to think this is a company with a primary goal of being a big player in media production and editing.
Computers go hand-in-hand with all of that, of course, but success in offering the "whole package" includes such concepts as retaining control and big market-share of your music downloads and playback mechanisms, tools to ensure your products "play nicely" with copyright restrictions on the use of commercial media, and so on.
I don't say any of this as an "excuse" for Apple's behavior. Rather, it's just important to understand that they *are* looking at things differently than they used to. And not doing so would leave them in a much more place, financially speaking - since they'd be in the exact same marketspace as the rest of the PC clone builders (HP, IBM, Dell, Sony, etc. etc.).
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Re:Trusted computing (Score:4, Insightful)
Ever get a Dell catalog in the mail? (I haven't bought one since 1997, and I still get catalogs.) Dell sells TELEVISIONS. No company can be pinned down today simply a "computer maker" anymore. Even though Dell isn't even in the same league as Apple, I use them as an example of how companies across the board are no longer only about the grey boxes.
IBM farmed out their home computers. Sony has a computer division, but is much more of a "media company" than Apple will ever be. HP sells printers too. So the "clone" builders are more like your vision of Apple than even Apple. (Sony's got their own online music store too...)
Apple never wanted to compete in the "clone" sector. They tried, and nearly went under. Nowadays, their computers aren't priced to the lowest common denominator Wal-Mart shoppers, but are made for a different audience. ("fanatics" you might say...)
Apple's business is still computers, but it encompasses what a computer has become more than a transition AWAY from them. Don't kid yourself, EVERY commercial hardware vendor is going to make their equipment "play nice" wit the media companies. Not just Apple. It's the fault of bought politcians, judges, and everyone who continues to feed the fat fucking bastards known as "commercial media companies." The entire industrialized world has put a higher importance upon entertainment above everything else. Apple, Sony, IBM, Dell, HP, Gateway, Toshiba, etc. are just reflecting and perpetuating that idiotic notion.
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Re:Trusted computing (Score:3, Insightful)
Ummm, the Apple of the 80's was one of the most litigious computer companies in the business.
All those Apple II clone companies didn't just up and go out of business on their own. And Apple was the bad guy in the Look-n-feel lawsuits. If they had won, there wouldn't be a non-Apple GUI in existence, save by their good graces.
Re:Trusted computing (Score:3, Interesting)
Temporary alliances (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree. One of the problems with these conspiracy theories is that they ignore the realities of give and take in a competitive environment. Apple had to get in bed with the RIAA in order to get the ball rolling with the iTunes store, which was a critical component of their iPod strategy. Apple seems to have figured that there's money to be made in a legal download market that doesn't include draconian DRM.
Apple may or may not like the RIAA, but that's beside the point. Their goal is to grow the digital music market and take a slice of that growing market. The only way for them to do that was to come up with a compromise solution, and they only way to protect that compromise is to keep iTunes from becoming a Trojan Horse for pirating.
You can look at Apple's use of DRM as the first step on the road to further restrictions on fair use rights, or you can look at it as the first step toward getting the RIAA to see that there's middle ground between totally unlimited sharing and no sharing at all.
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Re:Temporary alliances (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Temporary alliances (Score:3, Insightful)
iTunes DRM is draconian
Draconian: Exceedingly harsh; very severe.
Given that most users don't hit the limits of Apple's DRM often and that it is lenient compared with competitors, on what basis are you calling iTunes DRM "exceedingly harsh and very severe"? It's not nice, and I think it's wrong, but it's not draconian.
Re:Trusted computing (Score:5, Insightful)
Pet Rocks, wearing pants around your knees and sticking safety pins through your nose are trends, not the iPod.
It's too functional to be trendy, and it's evolving too fast to simply fade away any time soon.
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Re:Trusted computing (Score:3, Informative)
Apple sold more iPods during the last quarter than ever.
6.1 million iPods in three months.
I'm glad you have a PowerBook, and while you may not be trolling, it would be prudent to check your facts next time.
Nice theory (Score:5, Insightful)
Intel is far from alone (Score:4, Informative)
From http://www.intel.com/technology/magazine/standards /st01041.pdf [intel.com]:
In other words, there are other vendors producing TPM silicon. Intel is one of the late-comers for sample hardware, not the sole driving vendor that Larry Loeb seems to think they are.
I'd file Larry's theory under "Tinfoil/Paranoia."
Parent
Or for the slightly less paranoid... (Score:5, Informative)
Personally, I think the Cringe is on target, as the "iFlicks" version of iTunes has been on the radar for years now.
Of course, being on /., I suppose we have to support the conspiracy theorists...
Seems obvious enough... (Score:4, Insightful)
Laptop CPUs were one key area where IBM just could not seem to get their act together. When it came to mobile G5 CPUs, Jobs probably just got tired of hearing one empty promise after another from IBM. You can't blame him.
I doubt the conspiracy goes any deeper than that. Laptops == the only PCs that still have any meaningful profit margins. Any computer vendor that wants to prosper has to have its laptop act together, and IBM was holding Apple back big-time.
Re:Seems obvious enough... (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, according to their quarterly earning's report [thinksecret.com], Apple laptops were 42% of there Mac sales, so just about even with your quoted industry average. Now, I agree laptops are a huge reason for Apple jumping ship to Intel, and they're probably hoping th
You serious??? (Score:4, Insightful)
Seriously, every reason beyond simple economics is complete nonsence. Apple switches to Intel x86 because thus they will get very, very cheap CPUs, which are just as fast as everybody else's, without investing huge sums in R&D, and geting nice chipsets as a bonus. That's it, period!
Right... so (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, and furthermore-- Apple did this by way of a cunning plan which keeps their developers totally in the dark about their Palladium plans, even after developers begin using receiving their developer transition kits? Great plan, that. Implement a major hardware change, go to great effort to get prototype hardware in the hands of developers so they can port their apps BEFORE the hardware change hits consumers, then suddenly spring "Hey guys, guess what? Here's ANOTHER major hardware change [Palladium] that your programs may or may not need to take advantage/caution of!" on the developers at the last minute.
Even if any of this made sense, why would Apple need to switch instruction sets? AMD is part of the Trusted Computing Group, and Apple's been using AMD technology (HyperTransport) since the G5. I see no reason treacherous computing and the PPC would be inherently incompatible.
I hate "analysts".
If It's An Open Standard (Score:5, Insightful)
Free Shackles! Getcha Free Shackles Here! (Score:3, Funny)
'Open standards' for closed computing?
I've been a Mac user for almost twenty years. But I'm not inclined to sign over control of my own computer. If that means I don't get the newest and coolest toys, I suppose I'll just have to suffer.
Long live Linux.
Brilliant, except ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Another Theory on Apple's Move To Intel (Score:5, Funny)
I have my own theory on why Apple fell.
Gravity.
F) All of the Above (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure I've missed one, but we've heard, A) Faster CPUs, B) Less power consumption, C) Cheaper CPUs (preferred vendor prices), D) Cheaper iPod CPUs (XScale is an Intel), E) Trusted Computing Platform.
I think Apple weighed several factors before switching. In short, F) All of the Above.
OT: Apple's best ever quarter (Score:3, Interesting)
Apple has announced their Q3 2005 Financial Results today:
Apple said net income for its third fiscal quarter ended June 25 rose to $320 million, or 37 cents per share, from $61 million, or 8 cents a share, a year ago, on a split-adjusted basis.
Revenue rose 75 percent to $3.52 billion from $2.01 billion.
Highlights ;-)
- 1.182 Million Macs shipped for quarter (35% growth)
- 687,00 desktops; 495,000 portables shipped
- 6.155 million iPods shipped for quarter (616% growth)
- iTunes Music Store market share 80% according to Neilsen
- Tiger revenue $100 million in quarter; installed base of Mac OS X is close to 16 million
- Still planning on Intel based Macs to be available at this time next year.
- Apple noticed no significant drop in Mac sales following the Intel announcement, but only have a few weeks of data. Still are being cautious about 4th Quarter predictions/results. (maybe I'm not that much off-topic
- Question asked if Apple has considered advertising the Mac further especially surrounding the iPod "halo" effect, but no real answer was given.
- Question about Apple's thoughts on subscription vs purchased music model. Apple still feels that users was to purchase songs, not rent them and feels the 80% market share reflects this.
Apple also release updates to iPhoto and iSync.
Mod me off-topic if you want. It *is* off-topic. But the financial results are worth the read... well, to me at least! ;-)
YATOASTI (Score:5, Funny)
(x ) technical ( ) corporate-rivalry ( ) market-based ( ) long-term strategic
explanation for Apple's decision to switch to Intel processors. Your reasoning is incorrect. Here is why it is incorrect. (One or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have other flaws which used to vary from state to state before a bad federal law was passed.)
( ) Apple has enough cash to keep it afloat for some time.
( ) Steve Jobs is not the only employee at Apple.
( ) IBM is a large corporation and does not get "upset".
( ) Intel has larger customers than Apple.
(x) Intel does not begrudge Microsoft for using an IBM processor in XBox 360.
( ) Linux is completely unrelated to this decision.
( ) Apple will not reconsider Mac clones, even if it would mean Dell-branded machines.
( ) The next generation Macs will not be Itanium-based.
( ) The next generation iPod will not be x86-based.
( ) Most of Apple's customers don't write Altivec assembly.
( ) XServe machines are not a significant percentage of Mac sales.
(x) Obscure functionality of Intel processors does not drive purchases.
Tired of the misguided conspiracies (Score:5, Interesting)
If the only goal was to go and keep OSX from running on beige x86 boxes they would have kept using open firmware instead of switching to BIOS. (which I still think OF was a better choice).
And clearly Apple doesn't do the bidding of the RIAA, otherwise iTMS would have crippling DRM. Which it doesnt.
I really wish these talking heads would meet the guillotine. Their speculation doesn't fit.
The only speculation i have seen that makes sense is to get a volume discount on doodads for all the products from ipods up.
My personal suspicion is that there may be some connection between apple, who tends to be on the innovation vanguard, and a number of Intel's 'gee whiz' doohickeys. Apple is exactly the kind of company that would grab a new technology and try to use it quickly, whereas intel has to go and try and shop around the stuff to slow moving wintel vendors. For instance, Apple came out with the mac mini, Intel slapped together a x86 look-alike, but it made no waves and the wintel vendors mainly ignored it. I think there is a hot steamy semiconductor romance brewing here.
Re:Tired of the misguided conspiracies (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Tired of the misguided conspiracies (Score:3, Informative)
One thing not mentioned here... (Score:3, Interesting)
You think there's going to be such a thing as a TC-only network in any immediate future? No way; I'd guess 2010 at the earliest.
It's all about $$$.
Switching to Intel to fight malware? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think so.
wrong in the axioms (Score:4, Interesting)
Is there any real reason to assume that Steve Jobs, with his history of making big and frequently unpopular decisions, would refuse to call a switch like this just because he was unhappy with the price/performance numbers IBM was quoting him? Not really. Is there any reason to assume that his decision to call the switch took place in a vacuum? Not really.
One difference between leaders and followers is the willingness to make big changes on small justification. The people capable of thinking farthest outside the standard comfort zone are the ones who see the interesting possibilities first. You can build a retroactive chain of continuity after the fact, but those 'reasons' are *not* the reasons for taking the leap. They're merely reasons the person in charge (in this case Jobs) didn't reject that particular leap out of hand.
FOSS is doing the same thing to the entire software business model. People in the industry who Just Don't Get It (*cough*DarlMcBride*cough*) talk about how FOSS needs to be made 'acceptable to business' if it wants to 'succeed', because they can't think far enough out of their comfort zone to see how 'giving stuff away' works better for everyone.
One hallmark of genius is the ability to bridge the gap between "nobody ever thought of that before" and "totally obvious to anyone who sees it." I don't think this particular change rates as high as 'genius', but there's a similar gap between "unthinkable" and "justifiable after the fact".
TNC is really not "Trusted Computing" (Score:3, Interesting)
Trusted Computing is a technology where user computers can be configured to report what programs the user is running in an unspoofable way, and to keep the user from being able to hack on various programs and data that he has downloaded. Many people object to this because of the need to give up control over their own computers in exchange for being allowed to download certain data. It has many uses for DRM.
I don't think TNC has these properties. It is a way of authenticating on a network. Yes, it can use the same TPM chip that is used in the regular TCG specification, but the protocol is not nearly as all-encompassing and doesn't have those features that are so objectionable, limiting what people can do on their computers.
So the whole conspiracy-theory angle loses one of its key selling points, namely that this is all tied into DRM and restrictions on user actions. TNC is completely different and there is no tie in to the kinds of things that conspiracy theory fans are interested in.
No, no, no ... it's little green men (Score:5, Funny)
OK. So there might not be any evidence to support my theory, but there's at least as much evidence to support mine as there is to support the rest of the theories I've been reading. They're ALL just pure speculation, including my little green men.
could've had this on PPC (Score:3, Insightful)
So I really doubt this had anything to do with the switch to x86.
TFA is BS (Score:4, Informative)
This doesn't mean that we shouldn't be extremely concerned about TNC and its proprietary counterparts. (As well as NAP, there's a Cisco one called "NAC", which isn't entirely vaporware.) The Bush administration has even suggested making something like it mandatory for everyone who wants to access the Internet, which would scare me a lot if I thought the technology would actually work. But none of that has anynthing to do with Apple using Intel.
Apathetic apologies (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Compare (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:I Can Only Laugh (Score:5, Insightful)
"Jobs knows the only growth area for Apple is DRM laden media devices. He'd love to jettison the whole OS X/Mac hardware stuff today if he could get away with it."
Now you see, you just don't get it.
Apple is about providing the "complete widget." With the digital-hub concept, that means Macintoshes. The whole "Apple wants to become a consumer electronics company" thing is totally ridiculous. What Apple wants you to do is buy Macintoshes, iPods, and Airports. Apple will link them all together with software so that the sum is greater than the parts.
What makes me laugh is when Apple releases one piece of the puzzle and everyone decides that is Apple's new aim--they're dropping the Mac and going after such-and-such. Again, the Mac continues to be an important part of Apple because it is the platform that they can control.
"The first full quarter of Mac sales after the WWDC announcement of being forced to turn to Intel is going to be ugly, real ugly. Only an idiot would wasted money on obsolete hardware."
Welcome to the exciting world of FUD!
Well, supposedly Intel is coming out with a whole bunch of really rockin' CPUs. Does this mean that no-one is going to buy an Intel-based PC because it will obviously be obsolete? Do you really expect to get decent performance out of Longhorn on your 3.6 GHz Pentium IV? Only an idiot to buy any kind of Intel-based PC in the next year or so!
And yet, people are doing so.
(Oh, and to you AMD fans, why would you buy an AMD machine when Intel's CPUs are going to be so much better? You'd have to be an idiot to buy an AMD-based PC because when Intel comes out with their stuff, your machine will be obsolete.)
So there's some FUD back-atcha. See how it works?
Now, to refute the FUD. First, those who need machines buy now. That's true even in the PC world. If you need a machine now, you buy it now. "Oh, I'm not going to buy my kid that iBook for college because Apple will have new iBooks in January which use Intel CPUs." I don't hear that one very often.
And, actually, I've met a few people who want to buy now! They want to get the best PowerPC machine before Apple switches them to Intel and Macs end up sucking like PCs do. (These are people who do lots of floating-point calculations)
Second, some of those people will wait and Apple may see a drop in sales. Fair enough. But, from a corporate standpoint, Apple has $7.5 Billion dollars sitting in the bank. I think they'll be able to hold on for a year of declining sales if people decide to wait. And keep in mind that those people are waiting--once Apple does release an Intel-based machine, people will snap them up. And, with Intel providing the CPUs, Apple will finally have a supplier that can keep up with demand. Which means Apple will end up making that money back anyway.
In short, only an idiot would believe the FUD you're trolling.
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You Had Me Until ... (Score:3, Funny)
Mr. Jobs, like President Bush, is a strong leader ...
Bush a leader ...
I suppose you were going for a +5 Funny.
SteveM