Did Apple shaft PA Semi to go Intel?
Saturday, May 20th, 2006
Apple went back on a verbal agreement to source processors from Start-up manufacturer PA Semi in order to take up Intel processors, according to a report on The Register 
.
PA Semi makes low-power chips that are compatible with PowerPC software, fast, and use considerably less power than Intel’s. Its first chip, PA6T-1682M, which is due to launch in the third quarter of 2006, has a 2GHz clock speed on a dual-core processor with two DDR2 memory controllers, 2MB of L2 cache and PCI Express support.
These chips would have given Apple the grunt it wanted for its notebook chips and low power consumption (7 watts with PA Semi vs. 21-25 watts with Intel, apparently) without the pain of transitioning software to a new architecture. The only problem: PA Semi would not have been ready to produce the chips until 2007.
The article claims that high-level conversations between PA Semi and Apple had given PA Semi a very strong sense (maybe even an “understanding”) that Apple would take its chips:
“PA Semi was counting on that deal. They had lots of guys walking around in a daze when Apple went to Intel. They had no idea that would actually happen.”
If you are intrigued by Apple’s Dr Jekyll and My Hyde behaviour or simply follow the company’s choices for the future, you will find this article very interesting.
Tags: Apple, chips, intel, pa semi, PowerPC, what might have been