20-01-2013, 01:42 PM
(20-01-2013, 12:23 PM)wee Wrote: [ -> ](20-01-2013, 12:06 PM)yeokiwi Wrote: [ -> ]It is possible to run OSX on customised PC or some specific laptops though. With the performance narrowing between arm and intel, apple may shift its desktop to arm based platform one day.Thanks.
The savings to software development and maintenance is immense.
Can you elaborate on the savings and maintenance bit? why would it make a huge difference if one day Apple shifts its desktop to ARMs based platform?
Intel and arm are two different CPU architectures. The software codes for the driver layer to the hardware peripherals are different. The codes that are written for ARM cannot be used for Intel.
For applications like browser and simple games, the codes can be the same and they just need to recompile them for different platform. But, for applications that require performance tuning, they may have to rewrite part of it for each platform.
In short, the company will need more software developers and resources to handle two different CPUs.
By reducing to a single CPU platform for all products, the company can reduce manpower requirements and maintenance requirements. With less code to maintain, there will also be less bugs to resolve and less headache over patching the software codes in two different software branches.