Re:Firmware Purgatory! (Score 1)

An Intel port does indeed depend upon firmware issues. But contrary to AC's assertion, it is entirely plausible to imagine x86 firmware that fits into a rational business model for Apple. The firmware used on PowerPC motherboards is called OpenFirware. OpenFirmware (based on Sun technology) is a really elegant & very powerful bootime environment for what is called BIOS in Inteland. It actually runs its own, full-fledged OS-independent interpreter (in Forth, which is a stack-based language ideally suited for creating device-drivers). Indeed, just to show the power of OpenFirmware, some guy hacked up a version of the game PONG which runs entirely in the OpenFirware console! (ie no "OS" is loaded). Try getting the measely, brittle Intel BIOS to be a programmable environment!! Anyways, "all" that is required for an Intel-based product (not just a "port") from Apple is to create x86 bindings for OpenFirware (along with re-bindings for the standard Apple control logic chipset, aka UMA). Because OpenFirmware isolates hardware dependencies, Apple could -if it wanted to- have its own Intel motherboard without being dragged down into the mire of supporting all the low-quality motherboards which proliferate in Inteland. Moreover, it could chose to license this motherboard implementation to AMD (who is emerging a key, stealth partner in manfacturing G4's). As to the ability of a UMA/x86 motherboard to boot an "alternate" OS (eg native Windows instead of Darwin), it would be just be a business model decision - not a technical decsion- as to whether UMA/x86 drivers for Windoze would be created ... which gives Apple some interesting leverage with Microsoft in the post-DOJ world ;) Since OpenFirware *per se* is not proprietary (just the bindings, ie implementation, to particular chipsets), it is entirely conceivable that other charter OpenFirmware OEM's (ie SUN & IBM) may also decide that OpenFirmware/x86 might be a controlled way of supporting/differentiating OpenSource on x86. And because Darwin is based on a modern microkernel, it can support other (unix) personalities besides BSD ... yup, that means Linux. So OpenFirware/x86 kills two birds with one stone - it offers tremendous OEM finesse in the business model. In conslusion: firware is not an "obstacle" for Darwin; it is an opportunity for Apple.