Hi, I started writing this e-mail a little earlier in the day, but had other things to do. In the mean time, some good comments have been raised on this list. However, I still have many unanswered questions. I initially hesitated to pose some of these questions in this forum, since most are better placed elsewhere, but I thought I'd copy them here because some people would like to react to them.
Also, Martin Hill mentioned some reactions being "emotional", rather than "logical". That's entirely true, but my own reactions are rooted in logical problems, too. The contrast between the time I spend with PC-type hardware vs other hardware (BIOS being the obvious show-stopper) means my emotional reactions are based on bitter (perhaps overly) experience. - My first question is: Do you think Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5 will be installable as `fat' operating systems (i.e. a single disk image of OS & Applications will work regardless of which platform it's used with)? Likewise, will installers and updaters always give you the option of installing `fat' (or will they always install fat)? I can't remember the 68k/PPC transition clearly. Images are already massive, so will "Mactels" come with Gigabit Ethernet standard? Will Steve supply vouchers to upgrade everyone's networks? :-P - If we were to buy a set of Macs for a new deployment that would need to last four years minimum, what prospects do we have that if a computer breaks down in two years, we could actually find a drop-in replacement? It is already hard enough to get three-month-old Mac software to work with three-day-old Mac hardware. - Will users' profiles and files works seamlessly regardless of whether the user sits down in front of a PowerPC and Mactel box? In *practice*, I mean. I.e. what is the level of risk that there's a gap between Steve's theory and the real world. (Shock, horror.) - I had a look at the Anantech article and Apple's migration guide. Gems include: Mactel will not use OpenFirmware; Rosetta has a whole heap of limitations in its support. Great, what are the prospects that current Netboot, Office 2004, Adobe CS, and all the smaller apps and utilities, are going to work in future? What is the likelihood that publishers will release cost-free patches for their old apps to enable them to run on Mactel if Rosetta cannot do the job? Won't we just get stuck in two year's time when we can't buy PowerPC? Why not use OpenFirmware so that admins can use their existing skills and tools? - It sounds like we're up for a(nother) software transition for sociological reasons: if you are using a product that works exactly fine for you, and all your files are in its format, but the developer is not releasing new versions, then you'll have find a new programme and then export/import all your data in order for you to make a transition to Mactel. Deja vu times three or four or five! - Also, reading the migration guide, it makes x86 sound like a flakier environment (e.g. its handling of programming errors, undefined conditions, etc.). Obviously, any crashes or exploits via these flaws would be only due to programmers' errors, but that just seems to imply their inevitability! Hardly an argument in any direction or other (everything has its flaws), but I thought I'd mention it for emotional reasons :)
