You probably know it by now: Apple unleashed its first Intel-based computers yesterday during Steve Jobs' keynote. The PowerBook has been replaced by a completely new model, named MacBook Pro. It features a Yonah dual core processor plus a lot of other hardware updates and additions (some removals, too!); it won't be ready until February, but can be already ordered. As regards desktop machines, the iMac has been updated; contrary to the laptop, this machine has suffered "less" updates, which include the processor (also dual-core) and the graphics card. Otherwise, it's similar to the PPC model; externally, both seem to be the same.

I've been looking forward to this announcement for a while &mdash this is why I'm posting it here. I had expected (as many other people) that the first models to be converted could be the iBooks. Frankly, I'm glad they didn't do it, because I won't feel bad for having bougth this G4 just a month and a half ago. Don't get me wrong; it's working great ;-)

Other news include the update of Mac OS X to 10.4.4 (which I'm already running :-) and the release of iLife'06 and iWork'06.

I hope that NetBSD gets ported to these new machines and that it works as well as the i386 port. If that's the case, I'll seriously consider a Mac as my next desktop machine (which is still some years away... and who knows what will happen in this time frame).

Edit (17:07): I'm now wondering why the hell on earth many people seems to assume that Windows will run on these machines... All they have done is change the microprocessor (OK, plus other things), but this does not mean it becomes an IBM-compatible system — just consider Amiga-based and Mac-based 68k systems. I'm sure somebody will get it working, but it hasn't to be easy.

Edit (20:14, 12th January): I stand corrected. These Intel-based machines come with regular hardware as found on PC systems; i.e., they run standard Intel microprocessors and chipsets. The major difference is that they use EFI (the Extensible Firmware Interface) instead of the obsolete BIOS. Looks like Windows Vista will run on them directly (and Apple won't forbid it :-). As regards NetBSD, support for EFI will be needed as well as (possibly) some new drivers.