NEW YORK (AP) -- In what would be a major shift in the computer world, Apple reportedly is talking with Intel about using its chips in its Macintosh line.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the computer maker has been meeting with Intel, the world's largest chipmaker. The newspaper cited two industry executives with knowledge of recent discussions between the companies as saying that Apple will agree to use Intel chips.

Neither company would discuss the report, which Apple calls speculation.

According to the Journal, it is unclear what a deal would mean to Apple's relationship with IBM. Big Blue is the major chip supplier for Macintosh computers.

The report said talks between Apple and Intel could fail, as they have before, or Apple could be engaging in negotiations with Intel to gain leverage over IBM.

Well the rumor is been around off and on for a few years but this seems to be a bit more then a rumor given the fact its more mainstream media sites.

Actually at one point in time I heard Apple already had an x86 version of their OS but it was pretty only used for interal testing I guess. Apple's Darwin project

Also just to stamp on any suggestions that this would mean OS X on standard x86 hardware, it wouldn't. Were this to go ahead and Apple to suddenly drop IBM in favour of Intel x64 chips, they would be custom chips which would simply remove any compatibility with normal off-the-shelf hardware.

I don't see why (I know it's just crazy rumors right now) they would go with Intel x64 chips when AMD is the clear winner right now in the x64 market. Why would you drop something that works to switch to the lesser of another architecture?

I actually heard about this from two people at WinHEC last month. Apparently, there are Intel machines running OS X in Santa Clara already. Not sure where it's heading though.

Porting the OS itself is not a huge problem. The real challenge is getting all those third-party applications ported over as well...and that will need to happen fast. An OS without solid third-party software support is as good as dead.

Darwin is the BSD backend of the OS and is actively ported to the x86 platform.

Intel can undercut AMD, as Intel has a ****load of money :P.

Was looking at stock prices, they shot up at this news. If only I had the money to buy some Apple shares.

I would hope Apple would aim for quality and not "cheaper". You often get what you pay for.

By this point you’re probably getting immune to/annoyed by all the endless Apple tablet rumors, but if you can handle one more round of unverifiable speculation, Rob Bushway relays a report from a source who claims to have actually played with a prototype. His source says that the Apple tablet prototype he handled had instant on, a touch screen, and was running on a stripped down version of OS X. We’re not even going to pretend that any of this is even close to confirmed, but Rob’s source also says that the report from yesterday about Apple meeting with Intel was (at least in part) about them getting some sort of customized version of Intel’s power-saving Sonoma chipset for use in a new Apple tablet.

Not if it's running an Intel CPU you don't