What does Apple have up their sleeves?

[sross]

I have this gut feeling that something is brewing within apple but I can't quite put my finger on it. My main feeling is that Windows Vista is going to be met with a counter attack by Apple, and Apple will be making a bid for OS dominance over Microsoft. It seems the window for such a strike is perfect and I suspect Apple could be moving towards a blanket intel release of OSX for non-mac PC's around the end of 2006. The way I see it is Vista will be coming out 2006, so people will have some hard decisions about wether to commit to it, now if at the same moment Vista is coming out all of a sudden a new option appears for all windows users, Mac OSX. Also there are rumors of PS3 supporting OSX. Apple is going intel, apple came out with a 2 button mouse, rumors of ps3 running osx. People say Apple would never release OSX for all platforms because it would hurt their own hardware, but maybe their own hardware with Intel will be highly competitive and still hold it's own. I know if I could buy an OSX Dell for $500 or a similar spec mac box for $600 I'd go with the mac. Anyway, just wondering if anyone thinks Apple is up to something..
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[leftplay]

Well assuming that Apple does have plans for a non-Mac OS release I can't see Apple having much of a dent into Microsoft's dominance in the OS market. Microsoft is just too entrenched with Box makers and consumers. I would be happy to see Apple break the 5% market number maybe go for 10%.

[curt]

I would agree that Apple is getting ready for battle. The giant hurdle for Apple is the Intel transition. The transition better go smooth or they will loose any momentum. Those first machines better be speed demons.

I would love to see Apple get 10% market share by the end of 2007.
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[xforce11]

Check out some interesting speculation here
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XForce11

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[Susurrus]

Releasing OS X for anything beyond beyond computers whose hardware is tightly controlled would be a huge mistake. One of the reasons OS X runs so well is because it only runs a certain selection of hardware. I would say that at least 40% of BSDs are because of bad hardware or hardware support (aka drivers).

Because of this, running it on the PS3 wouldn't be that big of a deal. Of course, the Cell architecture is a weird type of PPC architecture, so some modifications would be required to get OS X using anywhere near all of the PS3's potential. The design of the Cell architecture also isn't conducive to an OS as feature rich as OS X or Windows due to its specific design and inherent shortcomings, though it could easily be done.

As for 10% market share by then end of 2007, I would say this highly improbable, though not out of the question. As of 7/27, Macs had 2.5% market share. Once the Mactels come out and Macs start to finally keep pace with PCs in terms of hardware, this should grow. Being able to run a 7800 series in a Dual 3.0 Pentium M PowerMac M sure would be awesome. More games are being developed for OS X, and with some serious hardware behind it, expect that trend to grow.

I would definitely suggest Apple is planning on going after the Living Room and not the Beige-Box PC.
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