Apparently we are doomed to listen to people yammer on about Apple's moral obligation to port Mac OS X to Intel iron until hamsters sprout wings or we plunge meat thermometers straight through both ears. This is fine; we have long since accepted this fate. It's just one of a long list of inevitabilities in this life, like death, taxes, and getting one's fingers caught in the toaster while trying to pry out a stubborn bagel half and suffering second degree burns, electrical shock, and then blunt head trauma when crashing screaming into the edge of the sink. (Oh, like it's never happened to you.)

Well, faithful viewer Mark Hamilton informs us that the age-old "OS X for Intel" subject is the latest grist for Robert X. Cringely's weekly mill. Based on what we've heard, Bob's statement that "there simply is no technical problem with porting OS X to alternate hardware" is an entirely true one, and he's right; everyone knows that Mac OS X's core technologies ran just fine commercially on Intel hardware long before a reasonable PowerPC port was done, and Apple even fully expected to ship an Intel-compatible version of its new operating system back when it was still called Rhapsody. With a little work and maybe some technology licensed from ARDI, Apple might even be able to get those icky beige Xtels running honest-to-goodness Mac software in a sort of emulation layer.

The real question, of course, is why? It seems that ol' Bob wants Apple to release an x86 version of Mac OS X primarily so that Microsoft will be able to point to a viable competitor in the operating system market and pry the Justice Department off its back once and for all. Well, now that's an incentive! As for what's in it for Apple, well, there's certainly the possibility of doubling its OS market share percentage in fairly short order, but then there's the tricky fact that at least some people who now buy Macs would buy cheaper Wintels instead, thus sending Apple's hardware revenues hurtling towards the earth's core. No, we don't necessarily buy Bob's argument that "Macintosh users will always buy Macs"; granted, the hardware's much nicer today than it was in 1996, but we still remember faithful Mac users by the thousands buying Mac clones instead of Apple products-- ourselves included. Besides, Steve's really into this "we make the whole widget" thing; his company's having enough trouble supporting its own hardware (old ATI chips, anybody?), so we doubt Apple's all that keen on trying to support every heinous Wintel config lurking in every dark corner. Basically, market share yadda yadda yadda, but we just don't see a whole lot of point.

But wherever you stand on the whole "Mac OS X for Intel" thing (frankly, Bob's scenario of Dell boxes preloaded with Aqua-y goodness has us asking for volunteers to hold our hair as we sprint heaving for the toilet bowl), there's an interesting thread over on SlashDot about the subject; one gentleman who claims to have spent "four years as a senior software engineer on Apple's OS teams" insists that Apple already has all of Mac OS X (well, everything but Classic, obviously) up and running on x86-- Cocoa, Carbon, Quartz, Aqua, the whole shebang. As the story goes, Apple has no intention of releasing this wonder as a shrinkwrapped Cringely Special; instead, the company maintains the Intel version entirely as an emergency measure in case the PowerPC goes up in smoke. And if Apple ever has to use it, you can bet that it's still going to require a proprietary Mac ROM to prevent it from being used on anything but Apple's Intel-based Macs. Still, anything's possible, right? (Hygiene note: a few showers may be necessary to restore your sense of well-being after exposure to the concept of "Intel-based Macs." Act accordingly.)