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I'm in the same boat as Joe. I'll most likely never buy a genuine mac to run OS X. No amount of guilt tripping is going to make me change my mind. As a consumer I don't owe Apple or any other company anything. Companies will adapt to a market or they will expire. Then again, Apple is the kind of company that will always have a few thousand self administered guilt trippers propping them up. I did buy a copy of OS X Tiger though (I know I still have to use a Jas release or similar but that's the best I can do without shelling out thousands on hardware when it runs fine on my own modest rig). I'm always amused that Apple hasn't caught on to the fact that you can release an Operating System into the wild and still control what kind of Hardware it runs on ....

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Apple is expected to sell 9 million copies of Leopard in the first 90 days after it goes on sale. Last I heard there were around 26 million Mac users currently.So I think that is a bit more then a few thousand and I doubt Apple will miss your money ;-)

I'm on my 6th Mac and still have all but the first one though it was replaced with a Mac SE so still have 6 Macs plus my HacIntosh. I expect my HacIntosh to become my main machine as soon as next week. I don't feel a bit guilty as Apple doesn't currently sell a machine that I want and can afford. I don't want a machine I can't upgrade from time to time and the Mac Pro isn't in my budget . I may however buy a Macbook in the future . My Pismo G3 Power book still works fine but's seems a bit slow compaired to what I use most of the time.

Edited by Schwinn555
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Lots of people like you started with the hack boxes and then bought real macs.

 

I'm not one of those people ;) If it makes you fell any better I haven't given any money to M$ either :P

Edited by joe75
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I'm in the same boat as Joe. I'll most likely never buy a genuine mac to run OS X. No amount of guilt tripping is going to make me change my mind. As a consumer I don't owe Apple or any other company anything. Companies will adapt to a market or they will expire. Then again, Apple is the kind of company that will always have a few thousand self administered guilt trippers propping them up. I did buy a copy of OS X Tiger though (I know I still have to use a Jas release or similar but that's the best I can do without shelling out thousands on hardware when it runs fine on my own modest rig). I'm always amused that Apple hasn't caught on to the fact that you can release an Operating System into the wild and still control what kind of Hardware it runs on ....

 

Funny.... I never mentioned guilt. And this was another gem "I did buy a copy of OS X Tiger though"

 

Apple is expected to sell 9 million copies of Leopard in the first 90 days after it goes on sale. Last I heard there were around 26 million Mac users currently.So I think that is a bit more then a few thousand and I doubt Apple will miss your money ;-)

I'm on my 6th Mac and still have all but the first one though it was replaced with a Mac SE so still have 6 Macs plus my HacIntosh. I expect my HacIntosh to become my main machine as soon as next week. I don't feel a bit guilty as Apple doesn't currently sell a machine that I want and can afford. I don't want a machine I can't upgrade from time to time and the Mac Pro isn't in my budget . I may however buy a Macbook in the future . My Pismo G3 Power book still works fine but's seems a bit slow compaired to what I use most of the time.

 

Once again, I never mentioned guilt. And this is your gem " I don't feel a bit guilty as Apple".

 

And I love your intellectualization of your... not guilt.!! Here's a few examples of your... not guilt. (BTW, intellectualization is a type of defense mechanism by which we try to rationalize a discomforting feeling.)

"Apple is expected to sell 9 million copies of Leopard in the first 90 days...I don't want a machine I can't upgrade from time to time and the Mac Pro isn't in my budget . I may however buy a Macbook in the future . My Pismo G3 Power book still works fine but's seems a bit slow compaired to what I use most of the time."

 

An analogy, I realize... So under your philosophy, since there are so many Fords, Chevys, Renaults, Nissans and other cars out there... you shouldn't have to pay for your car since so many of them are sold? WTF???

Edited by moonislune
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Funny.... I never mentioned guilt. And this was another gem "I did buy a copy of OS X Tiger though"
I'm glad you appreciated it.

 

Sorry to ruin your parade, but next time you don't get paid at your job, don't complain. By never running OSX on an Apple product, you're not paying your dues to some people and of course a corporation that spent lots of time and $$$ to get such a nice product out

 

Sounds like a guilt trip to me. I could almost see poor Apple Empoyee's children knocking on doors and (Ironically) asking for spare Apples. Then again you were probably just being your cheery old self.

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I'm glad you appreciated it.

Sounds like a guilt trip to me. I could almost see poor Apple Empoyee's children knocking on doors and (Ironically) asking for spare Apples. Then again you were probably just being your cheery old self.

 

That's one of the best things I like about this site...a lot of members like you are active and will shoot some ideas around. Perhaps this whole legit or non legit Mac hardware issue will be irrelevant in the next few years, maybe not. Despite our differences of opinion, I'd still sit down and have a beer with you at the end of the day :rolleyes:

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Hi Folks.

 

I finally did it. I bought myself an 24'' iMac, and I did it after testing the new OS X on a hackintosh for about a year because I didn't wanted to repeat my Mac experience. Back in the 90th I worked a lot with Macs and it was a complete disaster. OS 7 showed up the infamous bomb every now and then. When I started to print I had to get myself a long coffee break. The same job on my Windows machines worked smoothly. OS 8 wasn't really better. But I always loved the Mac flavor. I even own a 20th anniversary Mac and a G3 Powerbook but for the real work I used Windows over the last years, and I still have to but with the nearly seamless integration with Parallels I can work with the two worlds now. In the context of this discussion:

 

Who would seriously recommend a hackintosh to somebody who's not able to open up a computer case? Hackintoshs like other homebuild systems are for computer enthusiastics. I loved the experience and I appreciated the help I found here to get things working. And I guess that's even interesting for Apple itself, plus the multiplier effect it has; but when it comes to recommendations I tell my friends and colleagues to stick on their Windows machines or to buy a real Mac: I would be crazy to do anything else: I'm neither Apple nor Microsoft nor a hardware seller and I don't want to be held responsible for actions like updating a hackintosh with an update that isn't suitable for a hackintosh.

 

When it comes to piracy - I'm working in a lot of companies and administrations, so I'm not only talking of home users: I guess there are few computers all over the world that are free of pirated software. I guess that even Apple employees install now and than copies of "stolen", copied software. That's partly wanted. Back in the 90th there was a big discussion about the poor anti-piracy efforts made by a lot of companies like Microsoft, Adobe, etc. and the conclusion was that they wanted to be pirated to achieve high market shares. And it worked. I wouldn't wonder if the same goes for Apple, maybe they were worried about the hackintosh phenomena in the beginning, but the publicity we give them is worth leaving things as they are. Formerly only real Macies defended poor Macs, now there are a lot of retail and pump-my-ride freaks playing with Macs. I love my new one and I loved my hackintosh, but I'm working equally with Windows, doing lots of my programming stuff in the Windows world and why not. That's the real big point for me, on Mac right now I can have the best of both worlds and that's not available on a "regular", commercial Windows machine. Apple would be crazy to open up their OS system completely. If you could run OS X on a freely available computer they would loose one of their biggest marketing claims. Once again hackintoshs are great but you'll have to be a computer enthusiastic to rely on one, for Mr. and Mrs. Smith this is no solution, and that's where Apple goes in. And really another fact: Apple is design either, and it's a pleasure, a stupid one I know, but it's a pleasure to "introduce" my Mac to friends, that's part of the Mac flavor, and afterwards it isn't that expensive. Leaving the hackintosh behind you start enjoying your computer again. Three days ago I just picked my 24'' screen, the mouse and the keyboard, placed it on top of a chair in front of my bed and voilà: watching a movie with my wife in bed. One has to stop hackin arround from time to time as well.

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Hi Folks.

 

I finally did it. I bought myself an 24'' iMac, and I did it after testing the new OS X on a hackintosh for about a year because I didn't wanted to repeat my Mac experience.

 

Congratulations

 

That's the real big point for me, on Mac right now I can have the best of both worlds and that's not available on a "regular", commercial Windows machine.

 

Yes you can. That's what the Hackintoshes proove.

 

Apple would be crazy to open up their OS system completely. If you could run OS X on a freely available computer they would loose one of their biggest marketing claims.

 

First of all. I (personally) wasn't talking about "freely" available computers. The Hacks currently in use follow certain definitions because not all "freely" availabe hardware is compatible. If Apple was smart to make deals with these component vendors they could even make money no matter what PC you're building but more about that below. If Apple just tell us what main components are required to build a OSX system and would consequently stick with it as far as support inside the OS goes, that would be enough for most ppl in here. Because most functionality is derived from a few basic components (chipset, GPU and aditional controllers). They would make more money by selling OSX copies than with the hardware+OS combination. For instance they wouldn't require an expensive after sales service (RMA, repair, dispatching etc...) no matter how good their current service record is.

 

On another point. I fail to see why selling the OS as a standalone product ruins Apple's hardware market. Because the ppl technically knowledgeable to build "Mac PC's" are very few. I think this website is a good representation of this scale. Most Apple clients buy Apple out of convenience or for their job and are not the hobbyists that we are. So I seriously doubt that this hackintosh adventure has any serious impact on their "market share". The same is true for the PC world where majority o/t ppl buy HP, packard Bell, Dell or other "brand" systems. I am NOT saying that Apple should sell to Dell or HP because THEN they would indeed loose their own hardware sales as these target the same market. But sell it to the generic public with a big sticker on "NOT for computer illiterate".

 

I also stated in another post if Apple was smart and had bought ATI they would have gained control of one more aspect for generic PC's and hence make money no matter whether you buy a Mac with an ATI-card or buy an ATI-card for your windows-box. In this respect Apple should attempt to buy AMD in which case they get ATI in the bargain. That way the control 2 major parts o/t PC-industry. Again it wouldn't matter then if you're a PC user or a Mac user they'd win anyway (provided you're shopping for either an AMD system and/or ATI gfx card).

 

The future will show us how smart Apple is. In my own case I am willing to invest in hardware and software but I choose which platform.

 

In this case both the "industry leaders" and indirectly govermental and other instances destroyed that platform commercially. So I was indirectly forced to utilise PC's. In fact even Apple systems have been neglected for several years (and by several even non-computer instances) and now slowly gain acceptance. For example: It's since late 2006 finally possible to do homebanking on a Mac in Belgium (though request have been made previously by a lot of mac-users to support the Mac-platform too, this was allways been denied until recently.) I don't like this (and I still use my prefered non-OSX and non-Windows) platform as much as possible. But I'm definitly NOT going to support those 2 bulldogs that destroyed my prefered platform.

 

Regards,

 

EPDM

Edited by EPDM
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I too just became a new Intel Mac owner.. My path was a bit shorter but none the less I now own a 20" iMac.. I went from OSX86 in VMware on Linux to a a used iBook to an iMac.. This in the span of about 4 or 5 months.. I doubt I would have ever followed the path I did if it were not for OSX86, this site and of corse all the people who made it possible..

 

Price was not an issue with me stability was and I gave up on windows years ago and never looked back.. I don't play games so I have no need for Windows.. Linux is awesome and I have been using it for years now, but I was tired of havng to tweak and tweak everytime you made any sort of above normal change.. I was impressed with OSX more than anything else in my years in IT and wonder why I never gave it a look before now.. Strange how things work out..

 

I believe OSX86 is a good thing for apple and I agree with EPDM's idea on how Apple could pick and choose a default set of supported hardware and allow OSX onto machines for people who want to build em themselves etc.. Someday I believe they just might..

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Yes you can. That's what the Hackintoshes proove.

True, it's what I said, but talking about general marketing strategies Hackintoshs are for computer freaks, able to choose and build up there computers from scratch, as you stated, you'll have to know exactly what hardware to buy, etc.

 

But sell it to the generic public with a big sticker on "NOT for computer illiterate".

That's not serious. There's not one company in the world that will do that. And this forum offers all the necessary information. So all the information is already available.

 

 

The future will show us how smart Apple is. In my own case I am willing to invest in hardware and software but I choose which platform.

 

Actually it's smart what they are doing. Everybody with a bit of knowledge is able to build his own Hackintosh and the multiplier effect is enormous. I doubt that they would achieve the same labeling their products with "NOT for computer illiterate". Sounds destructive.

 

In this case both the "industry leaders" and indirectly govermental and other instances destroyed that platform commercially. So I was indirectly forced to utilise PC's. In fact even Apple systems have been neglected for several years (and by several even non-computer instances) and now slowly gain acceptance. For example: It's since late 2006 finally possible to do homebanking on a Mac in Belgium (though request have been made previously by a lot of mac-users to support the Mac-platform too, this was allways been denied until recently.) I don't like this (and I still use my prefered non-OSX and non-Windows) platform as much as possible. But I'm definitly NOT going to support those 2 bulldogs that destroyed my prefered platform.

 

Yeah, that's true, but with Frank Zappa: Don't kid yourself, everybody in this room is wearing a uniform. That's the annoying part, we cannot avoid politics, we are part of it, and everybody contributes. But I agree with you, if you can choose to not support the bulldogs it's good for everybody, opening up space for alternatives.

 

Ciao.

uidetiger

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You can buy anything, my friend.. you just have to know where to look. :)

 

Won't be long before a MacPro gets written off in an insurance claim and it's parts sold off on eBay.. or a repair center will order a logic board only to find out that wasn't the problem.

 

Stuff like that happens all the time.. and as time progresses, will happen with more frequency.

While eBay might be legal, it voids Apple's warentee agreement and they wont support the box . It can happen as often as it likes, Apple still wont support it :thumbsup_anim:

 

 

Or let's say in a year or so my MacPro goes out of warranty and the power supply decides to go belly up. As opposed to buying an expensive original part, I just transfer everything to an ATX case, and use a modified ATX power supply.. while i'm at it, I replace the hard drive, and bump up the processors a notch or two.

 

Would I be breaking the EULA by installing the copy of OSX that shipped originally with my MacPro on the resulting 'Frankentosh'?

 

I'm not concerned with service/support.. what i'm asking is, since it's my understanding that the Apple EULA prohibits the running of OSX on 'non Apple' hardware, what exactly constitutes 'Apple' hardware, and could, technically, Apple 'forbid' you to run their OS on such a machine?

 

Over the years i've owned and built many such 'cobbled together' Macs.. usually taking a G4 or G5 system board and stuffing them in ATX cases, flashing PC video cards to work with MacOS, using garden variety PC RAM, Hard Drives, and CD/DVD drives, and modified PC power supplies to run them.

 

I've bought several copies of MacOS over the years to run on them, never once bothering to read the EULA.. but now with all the x86 'legality' being discussed, and it mentioned the EULA actually prohibits use of the OS on 'non Apple' hardware, I start to wonder.

 

Sure, I know overclocking a chip in a G3 iMac, or even replacing a G4 tower CPU with a faster chip voids any warranty it may have had, but does that modification and changing of the hardware make the system, as a whole, 'non Apple' and subsequently mean running OSX is prohibited by the EULA?

Yup, breaks either the EULA or warentee agreement each time.

 

I say OS X on clone boxes is not a bad thing it itself if it offers you the opportunity to get a taste of what OS X brings to the table and you eventually do the right thing and support Apple and the continuation of OS X by purchasing atleast one of the workstations (atleast the Mini for 499)

Thing is, the average person isnt a geek and will get it wherever its cheapest - and if (company A) offers clones for $300 that 'run' and $100 for support from the company instead of Apple, then the person will get that instead of going to Apple.

 

As for the drivers? I call BS on that one.. Look at the driver pool that they can use in darwin the hax forcedeth drivers and the lot show that Linux drivers work and being based on freebsd come on man the drivers are easy.

Fine, go port me wireless drivers so i get full support 100% for all my cards, so all my graphic cards - old and new - work perfectly, so i have SSE support, and so on. There's nowhere near the amount of support your saying exists.

 

TPM chips, EFI, Graphics Card limitations, proprietery harddrive holders that are overpriced, crippled hardware thats what their MO is now.. Look at the AppleTV, iPhone they are crippleware. If anything their R&D is how to screw the consumer with lockin hardware. Given this is why they never gain hardly any marketshare.

TPM chips have legitimate uses in cryptographic protocol's. You know, like the 'encrypt the entire hard drive' feature or for PGP, and so on. Likewise, EFI is a step forward from the BIOS, a 20+ year old piece of software that's outdated. 'Proprietery harddrive holders' ? That's BS as well, If you're apple-certified then you can buy a drive and stick it in your mac pro like any other computer. And 'apple-certification' is a decent idea as well - keeps the idiots from opening their computer, breaking something and not realizing it and going 'why wont this work?'

 

The only limitation the AppleTV has is a 40gb hdd. Other then that, it's fine. As for the iPhone? It's main pitfall is it's price, not it's features.

 

Not everybody is content with Apple's hardware. I'd rather have the higher end components that i can buy from assorted shops then Apple's mediocre hardware with horrible QC.

Yes, a C2D is mediocre. Xeon's are {censored} as well. The X1900 sucks, as does the Quattro FX 512. You're an idiot if you seriously think that.

 

If Apple just tell us what main components are required to build a OSX system and would consequently stick with it as far as support inside the OS goes, that would be enough for most ppl in here.

Laptop? GMA950 + Apple Logic Board + C2D + a stick of ram and a hard drive. It's like you buy a TV from Sony and a Universal remote from Zenith, why should Sony have to support you and help you set the remote up? Likewise, why should Zenith help you set up the tv the first time you turn it on?

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  • 3 months later...
The other facet to the moral argument is that OSx86 is actually helping Apple. After running this site for a year and seeing it grow to over 40,000 members, I've determined that there are generally 3 kinds of people interested in OSx86.

 

1. Current (or former) Mac owners who have a PC they'd like to say "Bonjour" to.

2. PC owners who mostly loathe (or may kinda like) Apple but will never own a Mac.

3. PC owners who have used OSx86, fell it love with it, and have bought (or plan to buy) a Mac.

Im not in that group. I did not buy a Apple machine because they are not powerful enough, and the Mac Pro is too powerful. I really think the iMac should have the option for high end graphics cards. I only want high end cards. I also do not want to have just Mac, as even through it definately is superior to Windows, I am a gamer, and there aren't really many games for Mac. (in comparison) I think even though Apple isn't really into games, (probably isn't true, Woz loved games) shouldn't Mac come out with its own graphical API instead of completely relying on OpenGL, like Windows does with DirectX? I am not entirely certain why there are so many less games for Mac. If Macs were more powerful (graphics wise) and had a much wider variety of games, then I would be running on a Mac. So add this group:

4. The Apple hardware dosen't really suit the user's interests, but the OS does, so they OSx86.

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I was thinking about what AppleLegal said about the mac pro parts on Ebay... It confused me.

 

Apple won't support a logic board by itself regardless of where you got it.

If you don't have a mac pro, then you'll never get mac pro repair support.

If you do own a mac pro under warranty, why would you buy a replacement on ebay instead of getting one from Apple?

If you do own a mac pro that's not under warranty and don't want to shell out $8,000,000 (or whatever they're charging now) for a new motherboard, you aren't going to get any support from Apple whether you buy a logic board on ebay or not...

 

I think AppleLegal was trying to say that if you buy a used logic board, you are therefore committing a crime/tort against Apple by trying to install OS X on it. This is untrue (assuming that's what he meant). Apple's unenforceable EULA states that their operating system must be run on Official Apple Hardware. Unless the logic board was manufactured through some sort of counterfeit process, it's Official Apple Hardware.

 

However, what might be an interesting experiment is to take your legitimate mac pro and a broken logic board, swap the logic boards and send the legitimate mac pro in for repair. Apple probably knows exactly which logic board is in what mac pro... but it's doubtful that they check it before replacing.

 

I don't own a mac and I never will (I refuse to give a cent to Steve "Father of Lies" Jobs), so I don't know if the mac pro has anti-intrusion technology. So find out before trying it at home.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Im not in that group. I did not buy a Apple machine because they are not powerful enough, and the Mac Pro is too powerful. I really think the iMac should have the option for high end graphics cards. I only want high end cards. I also do not want to have just Mac, as even through it definately is superior to Windows, I am a gamer, and there aren't really many games for Mac. (in comparison) I think even though Apple isn't really into games, (probably isn't true, Woz loved games) shouldn't Mac come out with its own graphical API instead of completely relying on OpenGL, like Windows does with DirectX? I am not entirely certain why there are so many less games for Mac. If Macs were more powerful (graphics wise) and had a much wider variety of games, then I would be running on a Mac. So add this group:

4. The Apple hardware dosen't really suit the user's interests, but the OS does, so they OSx86.

 

Completely agreed. I don't like the all-in-one construction of the iMac, nor do I like the power. However, the system I have on my desktop is MUCH more powerful than any iMac I could buy, and it cost me a fraction of the cost. One reason it cost so much less is that I am using a $25 21" Trinitron I picked up on eBay. You can't do that with an iMac - it comes with a display built in, like it or not. Then the Mac Pros are just way more machine than I need or want, as is the cost.

 

Apple makes their money on the hardware - that is true. Therein lies the beef that many people have about OSX. There's no budget way into Apple if you want a powerful machine. And, there's no way to be a hardware enthusiast either. You can't choose your components outside of a very limited selection (such as how many hard drives you want in your Pro's RAID). You also have a very limited selection when it comes to upgrading.

 

If I could buy OSX to run on my own hardware, I WOULD BUY IT. I pirated Windows for years, and with Vista, I finally bought it - because I had the money and felt that if I was going to use it I should buy it. But I'm not about to pay for OSX to have to turn around and use a hacked copy anyway.

 

Would I buy a real Mac? Probably not. They're grossly overpriced on the lowend, and the highend is way more machine than any home user needs. If Apple were to lock down OSX to the level where it would no longer work, even with hacking, on non-blessed hardware, I'd use the last working edition until it was no longer viable, and switch back to Windows.

 

Am I ripping Apple off by running OSX? Hardly. There's no A or B here. I would NOT buy a real Mac, so if OSX didn't work on my Hackintosh, I simply wouldn't use it. The ONLY way they would make money off of me, is if they offered OSX on non-Apple machines.

 

What I'd love to see would be an OSX "Enthusiast Edition". They could charge twice as much for it - make the price equivalent to Vista, for example. They could sell it only through direct sales to avoid "edition confusion" in the general public. They could then put in the Terms of Service that it is not allowed to be preinstalled by an OEM. The advantage? It would include basic hardware support for non-Apple machines. Thing such as AMD processors, and such. You could LEGALLY install it on a non Apple machine. I think a lot of people would buy it. I would.

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I would like a legal version of OSx86, however as has been previously stated Apple is a hardware firm and as such it doesn't make business sense to allow a software product designed for their systems only to be released on a general x86 platform. Why? Well people would want OSX and not the pricey hardware it's installed on so people would buy just the OS instead and not use the hardware. This would equal problems for Apple's books as hardware sales drop while software sales will rise. But it's probably not going to make enough of a difference in the extra software income to overcome the loss of hardware income. However Apple as we have seen can be very shrewd and I'm sure with some creative rules Apple, with the help of this site could get an offciail OSx86 running with a marginal profit. Even if they have to sell it through this site with a limited quota.

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Would I buy a real Mac? Probably not. They're grossly overpriced on the lowend, and the highend is way more machine than any home user needs. If Apple were to lock down OSX to the level where it would no longer work, even with hacking, on non-blessed hardware, I'd use the last working edition until it was no longer viable, and switch back to Windows.

 

Am I ripping Apple off by running OSX? Hardly. There's no A or B here. I would NOT buy a real Mac, so if OSX didn't work on my Hackintosh, I simply wouldn't use it. The ONLY way they would make money off of me, is if they offered OSX on non-Apple machines.

 

What I'd love to see would be an OSX "Enthusiast Edition". They could charge twice as much for it - make the price equivalent to Vista, for example. They could sell it only through direct sales to avoid "edition confusion" in the general public. They could then put in the Terms of Service that it is not allowed to be preinstalled by an OEM. The advantage? It would include basic hardware support for non-Apple machines. Thing such as AMD processors, and such. You could LEGALLY install it on a non Apple machine. I think a lot of people would buy it. I would.

 

Very good points. However I would buy a Mac Pro if I could afford it and if I could buy it with a good GeForce.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Since the Mac OS X torrents have been for many months without Apple doing anything about it

tells me that they know they are gaining hardware sales out of this gig.

Lets face it, the number of geeks able to install Tiger on a pc is VERY limited and therefore no

threat to Apple in any way. Thanks Steve for your "live and let live" attitude. We have taken

NOTHING from your inventory.

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Since the Mac OS X torrents have been for many months without Apple doing anything about it

tells me that they know they are gaining hardware sales out of this gig.

Lets face it, the number of geeks able to install Tiger on a pc is VERY limited and therefore no

threat to Apple in any way. Thanks Steve for your "live and let live" attitude. We have taken

NOTHING from your inventory.

theres too many to take down 1, and 2, most torrent sites are out of dcma's reach, such as the pirate bay.... so they dont give a :construction: what apple says to do...... so thats skewed, but man do you idolize that stevie boy..... :D

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Im just "one more" of those that tried OSX on my PC, loved it, and bought a Mac. If it wasn't for this project, I'd still be using only PCs. So, Apple, InsanelyMac is good for you. :huh:

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I would like a legal version of OSx86, however as has been previously stated Apple is a hardware firm and as such it doesn't make business sense to allow a software product designed for their systems only to be released on a general x86 platform. Why? Well people would want OSX and not the pricey hardware it's installed on so people would buy just the OS instead and not use the hardware. This would equal problems for Apple's books as hardware sales drop while software sales will rise. But it's probably not going to make enough of a difference in the extra software income to overcome the loss of hardware income. However Apple as we have seen can be very shrewd and I'm sure with some creative rules Apple, with the help of this site could get an offciail OSx86 running with a marginal profit. Even if they have to sell it through this site with a limited quota.

 

Bollocks!

 

Software has a higher profit margin than hardware. ANY PC OEM could tell you that.

 

Some real figures (I've spend most of my carreer in retail and distribution of PC-parts so I know what I'm talking about). On the generic PC market in Belgium (where I live) the common margins on hardware sales are around 5% while margins on software are 20% and more.

 

Also the costs involved are much less with software (mainly contains man-hours). While on the hardware side there's the cost of the components used that eats a big portion of the total cost of a product. So if Apple would ditch the "pricey hardware" and only live from the software margins it would probably be in much better shape (before the iPod boom) and didn't need that MicroSoft cash injection awhile ago.

 

Also in Apple's case. There are 2 sides. There's the USA where Apple has its own stores. And where they have their margins spread over the entire product-line (from assembling to and including retail) so they have a minimum of 20% margins on the hardware product. In this case Apple would be foolish not to anchor their software to the hardware to generate even bigger total margins. And even then in the US prices for Apple products are significantly cheaper then in the rest o/t world.

 

In europe the situation is slightly different because there are NO apple-funded or Apple-owned Apple stores. So if Apple demands the same overal margin of 20% then the (independant) retailer probably has between 2% to 5% margin on it AND higher retail prices in Europe than in the US! In the case of the iPod (Apple biggest selling product to date) its ridiculous if you see what small/lousy margins the shopkeepers have and yet they are the first line of support if the damn thing breaks down (or the customer has other queries).

 

Nonetheless the margins on software are much higher then on harware even in the European Apple retail-channels. Remember that Apple's reputation of being high-priced mainly comes from non-US retail-channels. The only problem on software is that a portion of your profit is lost due to piracy. But decreasing prices generates a higher volume-sale which compensate for the loss of profit in piracy. The trick is to find the right ballance between retail-price and profit that discourages ppl to make illegal copies. There are several ways to tackle this.

 

1) If your retailprice is too high and you won't lower it then you (the developper) resort to copy-protection or other restricive measures or add insignificant options which don't actually add to the base product to justify the high asking price.

2) if the price is too high and you want to lower it. Lower to the threshold that generates the best volume-sales with good margin.

3) Lower it to generate the max in volume sale (so that the average user won't go through the hassle of hacking and cracking since it's so cheap). Which compensates for the lower profit margins.

 

some examples:

 

1) is what the music and film industry do. Helped with funded organisations like RIAA and SABAM, BAF etc.

2) is what Sony has done with the PS2 and PS3.

3) is what the DELL for example does.

 

I believe (and said it before) that there are other reasons why Apple won't target the generic PC market which probably have nothing to do with our assumptions. I mean it's clear that Apple CAN make OSX run on virtually any piece of hardware. As it runs now on

 

PPC

Intel (or Intel compatible processors)

ARM (or ARM-compatible processors)

 

I firmly believe that we'll sooner see OSX (or should I say iPhone-OS) through non-Apple channels in other applainces then on generic PC's (E.g. via future Motorola RZOR-like products). This in direct competetion with Pocket PC-Windows CE variants.

 

In the future there might not be a desktop OS-war but it doesn't mean other "markets" are "safe" :-)

The iPhone clearly shows that Apple is willing to get OSX running on something else. And I doubt that Apple would be stupid enough to re-invent the wheel on a market which has far better players with far-superior products (the phone market is not the same as the MP3-player market which was basicly left alone by the major audio-developpers).

Yep, intresting times ahead :-)

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Saying that Apple hardware is too expensive is silly. If you shop even Dell for the same physical configuration, you will find that Apple hardware is even less expensive. Let's just go stock, shall we?

 

Macbook Pro

 

Specifications

 

2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo

 

2GB 667 DDR2 - 2x1GB SO-DIMMs

 

160GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm

 

SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)

 

MacBook Pro 17-inch Widescreen Display

 

8X CD/DVD Burner (DVD+/-RW) with double-layer DVD+R write capability

 

Backlit Keyboard/Mac OS - U.S. English

 

Integrated Audio

 

Total 2799.00USD

 

NEXT IS DELL

 

Dell XPS

 

XPS M1710

 

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7600 (2.33GHz, 4MB L2 Cache, 667 MHz FSB) (not quite 2.4GHz, but close, big upgrade big bucks from Dell)

 

Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium (But you are going to put a crippled copy of OSX on it right?)

 

2GB DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHZ, 2 DIMM (Upgrade Cost a hundred or something)

 

Size: 160GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM) (Again, an Upgrade)

 

8X CD/DVD Burner (DVD+/-RW) with double-layer DVD+R write capability

 

Integrated Audio

 

Total 3413.00USD

 

 

 

Apple hardware is less expensive, and has a fully functional OS capable of handling triple boot configurations and so on.

 

You will find that point for point, Apple hardware is the best value in all comparisons.

 

As for used Intel stuff, comparable used Apple products are easy to find.

 

The bottom line-

 

Apple most certainly does not overcharge for the hardware they build.

 

If you feel this way, then you are just greedy, and want something for free.

 

Case #2

 

PowerMac Pro

 

TWO 2.0GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon

 

1GB (2 x 512MB)

 

250GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s

 

NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB (single-link DVI/dual-link DVI)

 

One 16x SuperDrive

 

Built in Audio and FireWire

 

Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse - U.S. English

 

Mac OS X - U.S. English

 

Total 2,200USD

 

Again, DELL

 

Dell Precision 490

 

Dual Core Intel® Xeon® Processor 5130 2.00GHz, 4MB L2,1333

 

Dual Core Intel® Xeon® Processor 5130 2.00GHz, 4MB L2,1333

 

Genuine Windows® XP Professional, SP2 with Media

 

256MB PCIe x16 ATI FireGL V7200, Dual DVI or Dual VGA or DVI + VGA

 

1GB, DDR2 SDRAM FBD Memory, 667MHz, ECC (2 DIMMS)

 

16X DVD+/-RW w/ Cyberlink PowerDVD™ and Roxio Creator™ Dell Ed

 

C1 All SATA drives, Non-RAID, 1 or 2 drive total configuration

 

250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s,7200 RPM NCQ Hard Drive with 8MB DataBurst Cache™

 

No Monitor

 

2,546.00USD

 

Again, Apple is the best value.

 

If you are complaining that Apple hardware is too expensive, then you are just a bum trying to get something for free.

 

And no, you cannot justify theft of the OS by using hardware prices as your excuse, not even here.

 

You are broke, have no money, want someone to give you a Mac Pro for 300 bucks, and it's not going to happen.

 

If you are messing with OSx86 for the fun of it, or to better understand the OS, or to test drive it prior to buying your next computer, or to make OS X on Intel better in some way, then ok by me (I do not speak for Apple)

 

But if you are trying to excuse yourself from purchasing the real thing by using Apple hardware cost as your excuse, I have to stop you there.

 

But other than that, I am glad to see everyone using Mac software. Welcome to the family.

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