iSpeculation

Just a quick update on the Mac-Intel story. First, Jeff Harrell crawfishes (okay, just a little) regarding OS X running on stock Intel hardware. Second, Bob Cringley (real name Mark Stephens, once one of Apple’s original employees and now a tech writer/reporter) thinks this is all part of a grand plan for Intel to shove Microsoft aside in favor of Apple. Here’s the kicker section:

Intel is fed up with Microsoft. Microsoft has no innovation that drives what Intel must have, which is a use for more processing power. And when they did have one with the Xbox, they went elsewhere.

So Intel buys Apple and works with their OEMs to get products out in the market. The OEMs would love to be able to offer a higher margin product with better reliability than Microsoft. Intel/Apple enters the market just as Microsoft announces yet another delay in their next generation OS. By the way, the new Apple OS for the Intel Architecture has a compatibility mode with Windows (I’m just guessing on this one).

This scenario works well for everyone except Microsoft. If Intel was able to own the Mac OS and make it available to all the OEMs, it could break the back of Microsoft.