What effect will "Macintel" systems have on the computer market?

It's extremely difficult to speculate regarding the effect that "Macintel" systems could have on the computer market as a whole. If everything goes as planned, the "Macintel" systems could provide an opportunity for Apple to dramatically increase market share, while giving consumers more choice and greater compatibility than ever before. If everything goes badly, innovation could slow in both the operating system and microprocessor markets and leave consumers with fewer choices than are available now.

One columnist in PC Magazine, John Dvorak, wrote an article on March 18, 2003, more than two years prior to Apple's announced decision, predicting that Apple would switch to Intel processors within eighteen months. Granted, he makes numerous predictions and many probably can be dismissed with little thought, but he followed up with a second article entitled "How MacIntel Will Change the Market" on April 7, 2003. This article provided a very positive analysis, particularly unusual for Dvorak, of how he thinks the switch will help Apple's future. Although he also is envisioning licensing of MacOS X for Intel to PC compatible manufacturers, which Apple has stated they will not do at this time, Dvorak concludes that:

There is no doubt that a Macintel machine could supplant the Wintel platform. And most likely, the entire hungry Linux community could port all the x86 Linux code to the Macintel OS within weeks, creating a huge flood of good products. Adobe and other Mac products already run x86 code. This whole ploy is not like starting from scratch. Everything is already geared for success. The ducks are in a row.

Right now, all things being equal, Apple should be able to grab half the market for operating systems. If it's as aggressive as Microsoft was with Netscape and essentially gives away the OS to the installed base, Apple could possibly knock Microsoft out of the box completely.

Wouldn't that be something? Only time will tell.

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