when apple moved to an open standard operating system, BSD UNIX, most developers and users saw the potential of using GNU license open source software on the mac. slowly, the same transition is happening on the hardware side, as apple will be moving the entire mac line, including powermac, imac, powerbook, and ibook to intel chipsets.
today, apple announced the latest imac, and aside from the wonderful home technology hub, the most significant move in my mind is the retirement of the accelerated graphics port( AGP graphics). most high end graphics subsystems require not AGP 4X or 8X, but higher end PCI-express (PCIe), and now the fall 2005 imac includes a radeon PCIe for access to next generation GPU’s.
sometimes apple surprises the mac community by launching newer technology into the imac in advance of the workstations like the powermac or servers like the xserve. i hope PCIe makes it to xserve and powermac lines very soon, so anyone can access highest ATI or NVIDIA technology.