The
Macintosh version was a lot more
satisfying. Holding down the
control and
command keys, you hit the
power key (also on the
keyboard) and your
computer's current state would instantly become a
thing of the past, and a
new dawn would be heralded by the lovely
Macintosh startup chime. Of course, everything in
memory was utterly
obliterated, but you would normally be performing this key combination to get you out of a
fatal system freeze anyway.
With the transition to USB keyboards, this key combination has become a lot less satisfying, in that it's not always guaranteed to work. If I understand it correctly, certain processes need to be operational to interpret the input from the USB keyboard, whereas the old ADB keyboard could transmit a restart even to the most paralysed system. You can still restart the machine using the control+command+power key combination, but only if the system is more or less fully operational, and why would you want to do that? Also, the power key on the USB keyboard is flush with the keypad surround, so the salute is that little bit trickier to perform.
Oh, and you can use control+command+esc to force the current application to quit. Except that this will not work if your computer is even slightly angry at you.
Update: As generic-man reminds me, the Apple Pro Keyboard doesn't even have a power key. Truly the three-finger salute is a thing of the past.