Dell is basically an Intel reference platform. Besides that, there are many other implementations in the marketplace that are available that go beyond the reference, but with gains that largely only matter to enthusiests. The notion that an Apple/Intel alliance would bring about some Intel technological breakthrough that otherwise wouldn't be available is laughable. Apple uses the same OEMs that Dell and other PC vendors/IHVs do for all of their hardware. Besides possibly the BIOS, the Intel Macs will likely largely mirror the Intel reference designs as well. There may be slight differences, but overall nothing revolutionary, and nothing other OEMs in the market couldn't match. Anything too different would just add to costs anyway. Most of the platform hardware innovation Apple has taken advantage of over the years was engineered by companies in the PC industry like Intel, AMD, Compaq, HP, and Microsoft, etc.. If anything, going to Intel should make it easier for Apple to keep parity w/ PC vendors in terms of interconnect standards. They've consistently been behind PC vendors in this area on their PPC platforms. Using a largely reference architecture gets them that support basically for free.
This post was edited by n4cer on Sunday, June 12, 2005 at 15:41.
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