3 ms·

Not so long ago, we had this at HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5587283 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5587283 ("The rise and fall of AMD...")

by yyyk 6y ago

Not so long ago, we had this at HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5587283 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5587283 ("The rise and fall of AMD...") With comments like these: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5588069 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5588069 ("I could go on and on about all the reasons I believe AMD went down the tubes... but I think a lot of it reduces to the disfunctional corporate culture alluded to in this piece.") Guess what happened with AMD? So I suggest waiting with the obituaries, at least until Apple actually has a working system a normal person can buy, and until Intel/AMD shows us their response. The entire idea behind the obituaries is that Apple's whatever will be so performant that ordinary PCs will switch on mass. This misses a few things: A) Where will the PCs get their ARM chips from? Not Apple, and non-Apple ARM is still obviously inferior to x86. Intel/AMD will rather keep their x86 monopoly, so it's in their interests to keep producing x86 as long as it's competitive even just against non-Apple ARMs. B) The typical Desktop/Laptop user doesn't care that much about performance anymore - not as much as they care about running their favourite apps. x86 has a huge lead here. All it takes is for Intel/AMD to stay/become slightly competitive with whatever Apple put out, and Apple will stay in their silo - which actually wouldn't bother Apple Inc. at all; They always ran their own ecosystem. C) Really, CISC/RISC doesn't matter that much. Apple's advantage (if there's one) would be a result of other architectural decisions, we should ask ourselves if there's anything preventing Intel/AMD from copying those decisions.

tonyedgecombe 6y ago
The entire idea behind the obituaries is that Apple's whatever will be so performant that ordinary PCs will switch on mass It doesn't need to and is unlikely to happen en masse. Apple creaming off the most valuable consumers is a problem for everyone else. You can see that in the smartphone market where Apple dominates the profits.
- yyyk 6y ago
  PC makers switching to ARM was the thesis of the linked post. Regarding your thesis: 'Creaming off most valuable consumers' somehow didn't stop Huawei, Samsung, etc. from being huge profitable enterprises. Partly because it's not quite true (Apple has a position in some countries, in others it might as well not exist), partly because there's more to things than a benchmark comparison (Apple survived for a long time when Mac processors were inferior), and partly because we'll see a response from Intel and AMD. It's going to be an interesting few years in this sector.

by yyyk 6y ago

tonyedgecombe 6y ago

The entire idea behind the obituaries is that Apple's whatever will be so performant that ordinary PCs will switch on mass It doesn't need to and is unlikely to happen en masse. Apple creaming off the most valuable consumers is a problem for everyone else. You can see that in the smartphone market where Apple dominates the profits.

yyyk 6y ago
PC makers switching to ARM was the thesis of the linked post. Regarding your thesis: 'Creaming off most valuable consumers' somehow didn't stop Huawei, Samsung, etc. from being huge profitable enterprises. Partly because it's not quite true (Apple has a position in some countries, in others it might as well not exist), partly because there's more to things than a benchmark comparison (Apple survived for a long time when Mac processors were inferior), and partly because we'll see a response from Intel and AMD. It's going to be an interesting few years in this sector.