Apple and Intel?

Tom thinks that now is the time for Apple to embrace Intel.

Now is the time to strike for Apple. They're running a FreeBSD core (designed for Intel architecture) and had to work to block Intel compatibility. Embrace Intel's architecture and reap the rewards... now is the time if Apple wants a piece of MS' pie. I would buy the OS if I could run it on my PC; I am not going to pay for over-priced Mac hardware. Sculley laments.

Tom might be right, but should we be listening to Sculley? John Sculley was, is and always will be a salesman. RISC, CISC, Intel, Motorola, the AIM group; they were just ingredients in the soda pop he was responsible for selling. His moment in the sun happened with the Knowledge Navigator, an interesting company vision. He failed to make the first version successful (Newton needed more time, he rushed it).

The core of the todays system is Darwin; based on a Mach kernel, with generous doses of FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD code added. There is an x86 version of this code which a group of people keep up to date. The magic of the Mac (and the OS) has always been in the handling of the edge cases (the secret sauce). A lot of secret sauce. The downside has always been the ability of Apple to ignore anything they don't want to hear.

It's not just the system and applications. It's also the drivers, the custom ASICs and for the last few years, very focused adoption of interesting technology. Every new OS revision has a new wrinkle. Since the introduction of the G3, Apple has been driving forward a lot faster than they had been for most of the previous ten years.

Like it or not, Apple is pushing forward MacOS X as fast as it is by owning the environment. They still stumble from time to time even in the closed world they have created.