Passing thought on Apple

[ChipNOW]

Hey all,

I was just gandering over the Apple website last night with the release of the new Ti Powerbooks, and it got me thinking. Where would Apple stand if they somehow were able to get their RISC CPU's to run Windows natively??

Moreover, what would eventuate from them opening up their mobo manufacture and the like, so that, in reality, we could build a G4-based system, with, say, an Iwill mobo, a Santa Cruz and a Herc GF3 Ti500.

I'm sure none of us can doubt Apple have some interesting products and I really do wonder what sort of impact Apple would have if they attempted to crack the x86 market.

Thoughts?

 

[imgod2u]

First of all, Apple is a computer maker, like Gateway or Dell. They make the fancy cases and the configurations. The processors, graphics subsystems and memory and all the underlying technology are made by other corporations. Apple, like any other manufacturer, simply puts them together. What you should really be asking is what if Motorola allowed companies to build chipsets for their PowerPC processor and systems based on that would become an open standard. Also, what would happen if the compatibility issues are solved, including Windows being written for the PowerPC architecture. Well, since the current PC market isn't being dominated, we pretty much know. Instead of Intel vs. AMD, it'll be Intel vs. AMD vs. Motorola. All apple does is make colorful doorstops and tissue boxes. And yes, as far as designing computer systems, they've done some pretty wild and innovative things, some things I wished I could do to my computer myself if only manufacturers went with it, such as loosing the legacy PS2/parallel/serials, an pull open case where everything is accessable simply by pulling down on a lever, the 22" Cinema View LCD (which btw, is currently the best LCD out there), etc. However, they have made a lot of stupid things as well, iMacs, iBooks, stupid commercials that lie out of their ass and rediculous PR.
I'd say that if Motorola truely allowed their microprocessor systems to be open to manufacturers, Apple would loose a lot of business, because they'll no longer have the PowerPC processor to boast about, all they'll have is the pretty colors and the occational good leap in technology.

 

[ChipNOW]

Well said imgod2u, and pardon my ignorance about PowerPC being made by Motorola rather than Apple - I was aware it was made by Motorola but I thought it was Apple technology.

Incedentally, I remember my copy of NT4 mentioned something about compatibility of PowerPC as well as the main x86 processors... is that still the case?

 

[FrustratedUser]

There were Apple compatible systems on the market for a while but Apple discontinued licencing partly because of bad quality clones which would give Apple a bad name.
There were other reasons to.
Would be fun to have a windows version for Motorola processors. Are the aplha still out there running NT?

 

[Jejunum]

motorola / ibm developed processors right?
(not just motorola)