The 68000 and 68010 were 32bit CPUs, released in 1979 and 1982 respectively. Intel didn't have a 32bit x86 CPU until 1985 when it released the 386. At the time

The 68000 and 68010 were 32bit CPUs, released in 1979 and 1982 respectively. Intel didn't have a 32bit x86 CPU until 1985 when it released the 386. At the time though, the 68K was regarded as the best general purpose CPU you could get and was sort of a "default choice" for building any reasonably high performance systems. Unix workstation manufacturers like Sun and SGI originally built their systems on the M68K platforms before their respective RISC architectures developed and matured. With that said, it's totally reasonable to make the hindsight argument that Apple should have developed the IIgs line further, with its 16-bit 65C816, and then reevaluated the CPU landscape in the mid 1980s, where you had more mature 68K chips, 32bit x86 CPUs, and a plethora of RISC options. In that world, I could very easily see the Macintosh make its debute on a RISC or 386/486 platform. Speaking of the IIgs: It's rumored that Steve Jobs requested they downclock the CPU (it only ran at 2.8mhz) to prevent it from seeming faster than the Macintosh.