One of the problems Apple faces today is the processors in its
machines, which currently run at less than half the clock speed of
Intel processors.
As Apple itself says, clock speed is not everything. Even
Intel's own processors demonstrate this - the fast Pentium IIIs
were actually faster than the first Pentium 4s, even though the P4
ran at higher clock speeds. However, it has gotten to the point
where a PC is currently faster than a Mac for many tasks.
In most cases, a user won't notice a speed difference between a
PC and a Mac. Email isn't going to be sent faster if you're on a
2.5 GHz PC vs. a 700 MHz Mac, and browsing the Internet and
downloading files won't be much different in speed. Your MP3s
aren't going to sound better on a fast PC, and it won't take you
any less time to type a word processing document than if you were
on a 200 MHz machine.
However, advertising convinces the typical consumer that the
faster the clock speed, the faster they'll be able to get their
work done - even if their work is of the type that doesn't depend
on the computers speed, such as word processing, spreadsheets, and
email.
And that is something that Apple won't easily be able to change.
Instead of spending its money running demonstrations "proving" that
the Mac is faster, Apple needs to start using chips that run at
clock speeds close to those of most PCs.
- They don't need to do this because the current Macs are slow;
they need to do this in order to convince consumers that Macs can
compete with PCs in terms of speed.
How is Apple going to do this? First of all, it has to drop
Motorola. Motorola doesn't seem to consider Apple a big priority
and therefore does not put a great deal of time or money into
supplying Apple with fast G4 processors. After Apple gets rid of
them, it has a couple of options. It can work with IBM, or it can
use AMD or Intel processors.
The problem with using AMD or Intel processors is that it might
enable Windows to run on a Macintosh, reducing the Mac OS's market
share. Apple would need to set up their computers so that only the
Mac OS would install and run on these computers. However, it would
only be a matter of time before someone figured out how to get
Windows running on an Intel or AMD Mac.
But using an Intel/AMD processor would give Apple a huge
marketing advantage - they would be able to offer a 2+ GHz Mac.
If Apple were to work with IBM, though, they would probably be
able to come up with a more efficient processor - whether it would
be able to compete with the clock speeds of Intel/AMD offerings is
the question.
Unfortunately, it seems most people aren't looking for actual
speed when buying a computer, they are looking at clock speed.
Apple needs to gain market share, and one of the best ways to do
this is to offer machines with higher clock speeds that can compete
more directly with Windows PCs.
