Hello there

It's going to be interesting seeing Intel based Macs for years to come. Obviously I can't predict when/if Apple will shift processors again(I don't remember the early days, but I remember Motorola to PowerPC and now to Intel), but in a way it's kind of like history repeating itself. I remember when PowerPC based Macs came out not only was there a huge awe about it: I remember IBM taking out a huge one page advertisement in the Wall Street Journal congratulating Apple on the start of a new PowerPC relationship; but there's also the usual transition phase for customers. Emulators and cross platform versions of applications so customers can run them on old and new Macs. With Intel though, the interesting thing is Intel chips are also used by PCs whereas the previous chips, PCs never used them. If history really will repeat itself, I'd say in about 10+ years, Apple will shift to another CPU. And having already gone through the big companies: Motorola, IBM and now Intel; the remaining ones are AMD, Texas Intruments, National Semiconductor, Sun, maybe even Transmeta(if they're still around) or some smaller company. But seeing that Apple having worked with CPU companies with a long record, I don't think it will be with a small company. But who knows, maybe Apple will shift back to Motorola or IBM.
So back to the interesting thing with Intel, it now opens possible doors for Apple to move into the operating system software business like Microsoft. But with Steve Jobs in control of Apple, that won't happen anytime soon. Still, I think it would be nice. If Apple still wants some control(ie quality), then they can at least institute a program to hardware vendors to say this hardware is Apple compatible. Apple already has support for ATI and Nvidia graphics hardware, so I don't see any difficulties. Yeah this will take some market share from Apple produced computers but in the end business will always happen. Some folks will buy Apple, some will buy others, but in the end Apple still makes money and is able to convince customers the power of Mac software and hardware!
Ok, good luck Apple!