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The operating system itself isn't the problem, it's all the applications. And the PowerPC transition was both easier and more worth it because the x86 processor

by zrm 7y ago

The operating system itself isn't the problem, it's all the applications. And the PowerPC transition was both easier and more worth it because the x86 processors were so much faster than the PowerPC processors of the time that they were competitive even when emulating PowerPC code, which wouldn't be the case this time.

scarface74 7y ago
“All the applications” don’t matter. Once you have the OS, Apple’s first party applications, Microsoft, Adobe, and a few Mac only niche apps, you cover most of your bases. During the 680x0 to PPC transition, almost all of the applications that needed performance were already ported. The same was true for the x86 transition. But more than likely, this time it will be the low end that would go ARM to optimize for battery life and the high end would stay x86. Also the difference this time is that the two largest commercial vendors - Adobe and Microsoft already have ARM versions and Apple has Catalyst to make porting iPad apps to MacOS easier. Also, during the last two translations, there was a lot more assembly code optimizations in third party apps than now. Especially going from 68K to PPC. And sadly, there are a lot more Electron apps out there that would be easy to port. Microsoft has struggled to get Windows ARM laptops because they also thought the performance/power ratio made it worth it.
- zrm 7y ago
  > “All the applications” don’t matter. Getting the most popular applications is the easy part, the hard part is the long tail. Only 1% of people may use a particular obscure application, but when there are a thousand such applications, the average person uses ten of them. You also have to deal with a period of people wanting to run the applications they already own, not the newer version they have to pay to upgrade to or which isn't the same version the rest of their family or company uses on their existing hardware. There are a lot of people who need nothing more than a web browser, but that's the target market for Chromebooks rather than MacBooks.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    That 1% of applications is probably not performance critical and would work fine under emulation. But really, do you know the Mac scene? This isn’t Windows with thousands of line of business apps that have been running without upgrades for a couple of decades. Apple has already killed a lot of old apps when they dropped PPC compatibility and later 32 bit compatibility. There are two existence proofs that Apple knows how to do this. They’ve done this twice and took customers with them both times. What are the Mac users who don’t like the transition going to do? Buy PCs and lose all compatibility with their apps? The last thing that’s different this time is that Apple had a lot more to lose in 1994 when the Mac was all of their business and 2006 when the Mac was half of their business (the iPod was the other half). This time the Mac is only 10% of their business. Also, many apps are going subscription. The upgrade would be “free”. As far as performance. The most popular Mac has been the MacBook Air. The people buying those aren’t doing performance critical tasks using niche applications that won’t be ported.
    - zrm 7y ago
      > That 1% of applications is probably not performance critical and would work fine under emulation. Each application having 1% of the users doesn't mean it's 1% when you add them all together. And they're all different applications. Why would you expect these to be less likely to be performance critical than any other? Even for applications that aren't performance-critical, if the point is to save battery, emulation does the opposite. > This isn’t Windows with thousands of line of business apps that have been running without upgrades for a couple of decades. Apple has already killed a lot of old apps when they dropped PPC compatibility and later 32 bit compatibility. MacOS X 10.5 supported 64-bit Intel applications in 2007. That's more than a decade for old applications to accumulate. I doubt even most of the legacy Windows cruft is older than that anymore. > There are two existence proofs that Apple knows how to do this. They’ve done this twice and took customers with them both times. What are the Mac users who don’t like the transition going to do? Buy PCs and lose all compatibility with their apps? When they did it before, the new processors were a lot faster. There was a large benefit to offset the transition cost. Existing Mac users don't immediately have to buy a PC, all they have to do is not buy a new Mac. > The last thing that’s different this time is that Apple had a lot more to lose in 1994 when the Mac was all of their business and 2006 when the Mac was half of their business (the iPod was the other half). This time the Mac is only 10% of their business. If the argument is can Apple stop making x86 Macs without going out of business, sure they can. If the argument is that Mac users should want to buy the first ARM model that comes out instead of holding onto their existing MacBook, not so much. It would have to be a real upgrade from what they already have, not just something equivalent but worse because it has to emulate some of their applications. > As far as performance. The most popular Mac has been the MacBook Air. The people buying those aren’t doing performance critical tasks using niche applications that won’t be ported. The MacBook Air has a Core i5. It's not exactly slow. I'm also not sure what you mean by performance critical. Maybe they're not doing 3D rendering where you care quite a lot about the difference between three hours and five, but when people upgrade their hardware they still want it to go from responding in 500ms to 300ms instead of the other way around. And in that sense basically everything is performance critical.
duskwuff 7y ago
The most likely possibility there is that Apple will release the system with some form of dynamic binary translation, much like they did for the PPC/x86 transition. It's also possible that Apple might make some customizations to their ARM core to accelerate the translation process, or even to allow some x86 code to be run directly.

by zrm 7y ago

scarface74 7y ago

“All the applications” don’t matter. Once you have the OS, Apple’s first party applications, Microsoft, Adobe, and a few Mac only niche apps, you cover most of your bases. During the 680x0 to PPC transition, almost all of the applications that needed performance were already ported. The same was true for the x86 transition. But more than likely, this time it will be the low end that would go ARM to optimize for battery life and the high end would stay x86. Also the difference this time is that the two largest commercial vendors - Adobe and Microsoft already have ARM versions and Apple has Catalyst to make porting iPad apps to MacOS easier. Also, during the last two translations, there was a lot more assembly code optimizations in third party apps than now. Especially going from 68K to PPC. And sadly, there are a lot more Electron apps out there that would be easy to port. Microsoft has struggled to get Windows ARM laptops because they also thought the performance/power ratio made it worth it.

zrm 7y ago
> “All the applications” don’t matter. Getting the most popular applications is the easy part, the hard part is the long tail. Only 1% of people may use a particular obscure application, but when there are a thousand such applications, the average person uses ten of them. You also have to deal with a period of people wanting to run the applications they already own, not the newer version they have to pay to upgrade to or which isn't the same version the rest of their family or company uses on their existing hardware. There are a lot of people who need nothing more than a web browser, but that's the target market for Chromebooks rather than MacBooks.
- scarface74 7y ago
  That 1% of applications is probably not performance critical and would work fine under emulation. But really, do you know the Mac scene? This isn’t Windows with thousands of line of business apps that have been running without upgrades for a couple of decades. Apple has already killed a lot of old apps when they dropped PPC compatibility and later 32 bit compatibility. There are two existence proofs that Apple knows how to do this. They’ve done this twice and took customers with them both times. What are the Mac users who don’t like the transition going to do? Buy PCs and lose all compatibility with their apps? The last thing that’s different this time is that Apple had a lot more to lose in 1994 when the Mac was all of their business and 2006 when the Mac was half of their business (the iPod was the other half). This time the Mac is only 10% of their business. Also, many apps are going subscription. The upgrade would be “free”. As far as performance. The most popular Mac has been the MacBook Air. The people buying those aren’t doing performance critical tasks using niche applications that won’t be ported.
  - zrm 7y ago
    > That 1% of applications is probably not performance critical and would work fine under emulation. Each application having 1% of the users doesn't mean it's 1% when you add them all together. And they're all different applications. Why would you expect these to be less likely to be performance critical than any other? Even for applications that aren't performance-critical, if the point is to save battery, emulation does the opposite. > This isn’t Windows with thousands of line of business apps that have been running without upgrades for a couple of decades. Apple has already killed a lot of old apps when they dropped PPC compatibility and later 32 bit compatibility. MacOS X 10.5 supported 64-bit Intel applications in 2007. That's more than a decade for old applications to accumulate. I doubt even most of the legacy Windows cruft is older than that anymore. > There are two existence proofs that Apple knows how to do this. They’ve done this twice and took customers with them both times. What are the Mac users who don’t like the transition going to do? Buy PCs and lose all compatibility with their apps? When they did it before, the new processors were a lot faster. There was a large benefit to offset the transition cost. Existing Mac users don't immediately have to buy a PC, all they have to do is not buy a new Mac. > The last thing that’s different this time is that Apple had a lot more to lose in 1994 when the Mac was all of their business and 2006 when the Mac was half of their business (the iPod was the other half). This time the Mac is only 10% of their business. If the argument is can Apple stop making x86 Macs without going out of business, sure they can. If the argument is that Mac users should want to buy the first ARM model that comes out instead of holding onto their existing MacBook, not so much. It would have to be a real upgrade from what they already have, not just something equivalent but worse because it has to emulate some of their applications. > As far as performance. The most popular Mac has been the MacBook Air. The people buying those aren’t doing performance critical tasks using niche applications that won’t be ported. The MacBook Air has a Core i5. It's not exactly slow. I'm also not sure what you mean by performance critical. Maybe they're not doing 3D rendering where you care quite a lot about the difference between three hours and five, but when people upgrade their hardware they still want it to go from responding in 500ms to 300ms instead of the other way around. And in that sense basically everything is performance critical.

duskwuff 7y ago

The most likely possibility there is that Apple will release the system with some form of dynamic binary translation, much like they did for the PPC/x86 transition. It's also possible that Apple might make some customizations to their ARM core to accelerate the translation process, or even to allow some x86 code to be run directly.