I want an Apple laptop that gives me the smooth Mac experience, but I have to run Windows XP applications, so I’m locked out of the iLife. I expect that I’ll have one laptop that lets me have the best of both worlds in 2-3 years – all the personal productivity and cool toys of the Mac, along with Windows-only games and development applications. Why am I pretty darn confident I’ll be a happy Minimalist in a few years?
Most articles asking whether Apple will sell the Mac OS for generic Intel boxes or whether the Intel-based Apple machines will also run XP/Longhorn are focusing too much on the current state of technology. Two years is an eternity – we should see Longhorn, 64-bit laptops, multicore CPUs everywhere, and perhaps most importantly, hardware and OS-level virtualization. This is a sea change for the way we’ll think about our computers. What does this mean for Apple and Windows? Consider:
- Virtual PC illustrates that even on a different processor architecture, Windows apps can run on a Mac today.
- VMware already has a strong business allowing you to simultaneously run multiple Intel-based operating systems on the same machine at near-native speeds.
- Macs will (obviously) be using the same processor that XP applications run on.
- Multicore allows much more capability for running multiple applications or operating systems at the same time with minimal performance degradation.
- Hypervisor technology and virtualization will allow multiple operating systems to effectively run at the same time on the same machine. I not only want to run OS X and Longhorn, but possibly Linux as well. All at the same time.
Apple has already stated they will not do anything to prevent running XP/Longhorn on their Intel hardware, although they say they won’t help either. Well, they should help since it would sell their hardware and put OS X in front of more people, but who knows the mind of Steve? Others like VMware will make this smooth, helped by all of the other technology changes that will be hitting the market by the end of next year. I can’t wait – the rough edges of XP irk me constantly, and I’d love to have all of my basic apps running on OS X. If Lenovo screws up the Thinkpad line (please don’t!), I’ll be first in line for a Powerbook as long as it lets me really run Windows apps seamlessly.