POSTED IN GADGETRY...

April 8, 2006

Crazy (or possibly quite sensible) prediction time!

From the hand-waving madness that is Robert X. Cringely, here's a column on how Apple will soon release OS X to regular old PCs, given that they've already released Boot Camp, which lets you install Windows XP on your Mac. I have my doubts, though of course there's no technical reason why it isn't possible. It's all up to Uncle Steve, and he's a fickle fella when it comes to the hardware. And even less beleivable is the contention that Microsoft will buy Sony. That just makes you go "WTF?", though of course stranger things have happened in video game land, like Sega giving up on hardware and working with arch-rival Nintendo.

5 comment(s) so far (Post your own)

1

On April 8, 2006 2:09 PM, Steven said:

I was talking to someone the other day about this, WWDC is coming up in auagust so who knows?

Now that you can put XP on a Mac has there been an attepmt to put X86 OSX on a generic PC?

2

On April 8, 2006 3:29 PM, cam c. said:

Not just an attempt, there's been a bootable DVD out there for weeks. Actually, OS X was booting on generic PCs weeks before anyone ever got Windows XP running on an Intel Mac. :)

This is my PC a couple days back:
http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=125352512&size=o

I'll put some more shots up on Flickr soon of the actual OS running...

Everything works but widescreen 1920x1200 (it runs 1600x1200 stretched or letterboxed fine), bluetooth, and wifi. I'm sure there will be drivers for all of these coming out over the next month or two.

Honestly, if all the hardware was supported, I'd go buy a copy of it just to give Apple some thanks for putting together a pretty cool OS that runs great on Intel; the thing actually boots to a usable screen in less than 20 seconds, which is half of what XP takes on the same machine. (Granted, my XP install has a ton of software and 1000 or so fonts to load, so they're probably close to on par, boot speed-wise.)

3

On April 8, 2006 4:12 PM, jabberwocky said:

Well I have to say that I think that things are going to bit the macusers that install xp on they mactel system, mainly because they will forget that they are going to be needing to install antimalware on to their mac, and I figure that game development for the mac will all but disapear .
Though I have to say that Boopcamp can explain why MS has been dropping develpoment of a lot of their software that they had been porting in the past.

4

On April 8, 2006 4:43 PM, Steven said:

Thanks Cam that's cool. I want to give this a try.

5

On April 8, 2006 6:28 PM, Warren Frey said:

Cam: yup, seeing that our iChat video session worked was cool...almost as cool as seeing your daughter tear through the living room with a a giant "I'm a toddler!" grin on her face. :)

Jabberwocky: Zuh? What, exactly, are you saying? And who cares if Mac game developers drop ports? Then they can make actual games, and sell to a wider market...

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