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It is over for all purposes. The only thing going on trial now is Apple claims. Even if Psystar wins against them all, they will still lose.
It is over for all purposes. The only thing going on trial now is Apple claims. Even if Psystar wins against them all, they will still lose.
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I make my own Hackintosh at home. Well, I don't, but I have a friend who did. It's not too hard.
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@Applekid: No, at most they're a tortfeasor (unless they never bought a copy of OSX and just pirated it).
Modifying your own copy for your own use wasn't what this ruling was about. Pystar's process was to use the same copy on all the macs, and just buy a box retail version which sat on a shelf. The court ruled that this method was a tort against Apple.
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@katstermonster: I doubt they'll go after the basement hacker that does this. Unless they try selling them.
SUCKS, macs are good computers but just too over priced. come on hackers you can beat the system.
@yoni242: Go to apple.com and look up the hardware specs for a macbook. Now go to dell.com and put together a system with those specs. Exactly how badly are macs' overpriced again? Just because they don't sell a laptop for $500, it doesn't mean that what they are selling is overpriced.
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@yoni242: Acuras cost more than the Ford Taurus as well. So be satisfied with your Ford, or upgrade to an Acura. Hotwiring your neighbor's RSX isn't really kosher, is it?
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Works for me if Firefox. Check your javascript settings.
Another OT: 4pm EASTERN is comment cut-off?
My question with Apple is, whats going on with all the patent issues for their iPhone?
Good. Apple has every right to decide what machines their software runs on. They spent millions designing it, it's their hard work, not Pystar.
And besides, Apple doesn't even consider themselves a software firm. They make hardware, and that hardware needs software to run on it. If they were forced to let OS X run on any piece of hardware, they'd go out of business. Remember the Mac clone program of the 1990's? Nearly killed Apple (along with other problems).
F*ck Pystar. Nothing but leeches.
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@seanhcalgary: Yeah, f*ck Compaq too for leeching off IBM by reverse engineering the PC BIOS. The computer industry does not tolerate leeches! /sarcasm
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@AirIntake: Yeah, and f*ck Microsoft AND Apple for leeching off of Xerox to steal their idea for the graphical user interface and pointing device. Those bastages need to rot in jail.
Oh wait... aren't we defending CrApple?
@Jaynor: ...Except Jobs gave Xerox $1,000,000 in Apple stock for the rights to commercialize their concepts, then spend untold millions more to make what PARC had into the 128K Macintosh. Let alone all the innovation that's happened since.
So, not a very good comparison, no?
@Jaynor: If you knew anything about history, Apple didnt leech off Xerox, they purchased the technology and personnel for stock options in Apple. Xerox had the tech and couldn't make it work.
Microsoft reversed engineered the Mac OS though, they DID leech off Apple.
@Falcon5768: If you knew anything about history you'd read up on the Xerox Star and Xerox's lawsuit against Apple regarding GUI technology.
You could then take that data and create an informed post.
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@seanhcalgary: My inner geek does not want to agree with your comment, but every other part of me does.
However, the sanctioned clones were not instrumental in nearly killing Apple. It was those other problems that were destroying the company from the inside out. I would argue that the clone program actually helped them maintain enough market share to do something with once they rebooted with Jobs + iMac.
@seanhcalgary: Well, they could have used DOS/Windows like any other computer manufacturer.
But I have to give them points for that; they were a hardware company who tried software. They kicked rear. Microsoft is a software company that tried hardware. Let's just say that there isn't going to be an X360 in my future.
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@seanhcalgary: I'd argue that Apple is an assembly company. All of the memory, hard drive, and the rest are made by other manufacturers and are assembled into the Mac's shiny shell. The same internal components can be found in many a PC. The configuration may be unique, and I do like the no dust gathering attributes of their G5 (or are they onto a G6 by now? Been so long). But in the end, they don't have anything that's unique.
What you do get for the higher price, however, is excellent customer service. That's what you're paying for.
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@quail: They're not on G-anything anymore, it's all Intel chips. They just call them Mac Pro's, same case, though.
And I'm not interested in the mac vs pc argument, so I won't touch that, but you're right about paying for the customer service. I have two macs and am on my second ipod (a touch), and I've had nothing but stellar service from Apple.
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@quail: \" I'd argue that Apple is an assembly company.....But in the end, they don't have anything that's unique.\"
+1/10
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This case in no way prevents people from selling Mac Clones. It just tells you what processes for installation you can't do. Also, if you read the ruling the judge ignored a very important part of the copyright law that allows for minor modifications of copyrighted content. The reason the judge did not allow this defense was only because the Psystar lawyers did not bring it up a year ago.
We will have to wait to another court case where they review the entire copyright law before we know if you can do what Psystar did.
One thing for sure it does look like copyright law does not include common sense so they can't clone the OS to save time and would have to install each computer from the original DVD to be legal.
@qwerty001984:
The bootloader and kernel extensions added by Psystar were seperate files than the OS no different than using a virtual machine to run an OS.
This was theft, plain and simple. Leveraging off the shoulders of thousands from some Florida strip mall.
Apple's model is based on splitting their development costs on both their hardware and software sales, unlike Microsoft's (which is why OS X costs $20 versus W7's $200). So Psystar's moral argument is a sham.
Apple's value proposition is simple: if you want reliable, functional, beautiful, secure computing, go with them. If you don't, if you're blind or if your time has little value, go for the other guys.
I hope Apple goes for damages to provide a woeful disincentive unseen since the Old Testament to pilfering thieves like this.
@Trai_Dep:
Apple does not develop hardware or mafacture anything. They use common PC hardware and sell it for more than market price.
@Trai_Dep:
You're making a joke, right?
What's next, I'm a thief because I throw away ink jet printers I get for next-to-nothing when the starter cartridges run out?
Reliable? Not in my experience.
Functional? Have you ever tried repairing a mac?
Beautiful? Yes, I have to give you that.
Secure? Does OS X offer full disk encryption yet? I know all the OSes I've used on my PC do.
My time is of high value. That's why I can't risk being without a computer for days on end while I find specialized parts for a Mac. When something goes wrong on my PC (I managed to blow up the DVD drive the other day, for example) I just throw in off the shelf parts (In fact, in my place I literally have enough spare parts to build several computers beside the one I regularly use) and it keeps on trucking.
@shepd: Macs aren't meant for people who do their own repairs or build their own machines. They're meant for people who can't be bothered and would rather have someone else install a new drive or motherboard or whatever else is in there.
And how on earth did you manage to blow up a DVD drive?
@shepd: What's complicated about repairing a Mac? The G5 and MacPro towers are extremely easy to open and are amazingly spacious to work in. It's extremely easy to swap out any part in those bad boys. The laptops are a little tougher to get apart, but I generally expect to spend about 30 minutes disassembling a laptop and 15 minutes putting it back together if I'm doing a complete teardown no matter what the brand is. RAM swaps on a MacBook only require removing the battery and 2 or 3 screws. The hard drives aren't as accessible as some PC laptops, but I've worked on Toshiba laptops that require complete disassembly just to get to the RAM.
As far as finding parts, ifixit.com has pretty well everything you could need. Sure, you might not be able to walk into a store and find a part to repair a Mac (though you can use off the shelf RAM or HDDs), but I'd rather order from Newegg if I need something for one of my PCs anyway.
@secret_curse and zentec:
The last macs I have dealt with were an eMac (Exposing 20,000 volts to anyone who wants to change more than the ram, nevermind being a ridiculous nightmare hooking the power switch back up), an iMac, and a mac Mini. All of which were ridiculous contraptions from a servicability standpoint.
New macs use relatively normal hardware now, yes. However, they tend to use more expensive versions of the same hardware that I don't have on hand (Firewire if you want to install from an HDD, 2.5\" drives, in the old days Apple branded DVD drives if you wanted the burning capability to work). Furthermore, the \"everything built on board, no PCI sockets\" approach that many macs take makes for an unpleasant experience when you want to replace items.
No, I do NOT want an external drive umbilical-ed to my machine because that's the \"way\" to fix a Mac. USB and Firewire are slow and unreliable compared to SATA. I also don't want to screw with the external power supplies required if I want to hook up off-the-shelf hardware externally. Yes, I could use a laptop HDD and DVD drive, and there's some possibility it'll work if I plug it in to multiple USB ports. That's a hack, slow, unreliable, and, quite frankly, sucks.
My DVD issue cost me $0 to repair with my PC (off the shelf stuff) and I fixed it in 5 minutes *internally*. The drive itself, when I choose to upgrade it, will cost me $29.99 and will be from the same reliable manufacturers Apple uses.
As far as reliability goes, PC server hardware is still cheaper than top-of-the-line Apple consumer hardware, and this same server hardware has redundancy in it that the Apple lacks. It also provides higher speed, immediate on-site support, and proven multi-9 reliability. If one choses to run a server grade OS on the same hardware, one can also experience the same reliability from the software, as well. I'm even including server-oriented windows in that. I regularly deal with PC systems at work with multi-year uptime. I'd lose my job if I couldn't keep that up.
@Nicole: Burning a cheap-n-nasty DVD-R dual layer that managed to lock up the DVD drive firmware. I didn't want to reboot at the time, so I decided to unhook the molex connector, and reconnect it to reset the drive. Silly me, I did it without actually looking at the connector (Hey, I've done this for 10 years, I know what I'm doing) and rather than risking the PC PSU shutting down due to the IDE problems this causes, I actually managed to jam the connector in upside down close enough it arced, after I dropped it, of course. 12 volts on the 5 volt rail = :(
People don't care because Apple isn't big enough to do any damage.
If they somehow got as big as MS, they'd have to deal with the same bullshit. Bundling itunes as an unfair competitive advantage, etc. MS had to separate WMP not because it was bundled, but because it was bundled AND they dominate the computer industry.
Apple is just lucky enough to not be subject to the responsibility that comes with actually being a player in the market. They advertise all day and night and still run what, 5% of the market?
If you can only hit 5% even with a massive propaganda machine paving the way, you're probably not ever going to be a competitor.
@shepd: Since those were the last Macs you dealt with, I'd honestly encourage you to check out some of the newer hardware and software.
Back when eMacs were around, I was a hardcore Mac hater. I just couldn't stand OS9, and my college upgraded to 10.0 my freshman year. 10.0 was as bad as Vista at launch IMHO. 10.1 came out pretty quickly and made things a lot better, and now OSX is a brilliant operating system.
I also think Win7, Ubuntu, and Solaris are great operating systems. They're all just different tools to assist you in working or playing. I'm not trying to go all Mac fanboy on you, but if you take a look at the latest offerings from Cupertino, you might be pleasantly suprised.
@shepd: You're the guy who enjoys spending an entire weekend making a superb Marinara sauce with delicious meatballs and homemade, from-scratch linguini. Which is great.
Until someone takes you to a four-star Northern Italian restaurant, where you complain loudly for hours how horrible it is that the chef doesn't let you commandeer his kitchen to make yourself dinner, and how for this reason, the restaurant serves awful food.
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@secret_curse: Indeed. Replacing RAM on my Macbook took about 15 minutes, and most of that was spent fighting the packaging on the RAM.
@shepd:
Waiting for \"specialized\" parts is a lot more common on the PC end these days; ever look for a Dell power supply? How about HP? Any computer that isn't made from beige-box parts is pretty much going to contain some element of manufacturer specific components.
A blown DVD drive isn't necessarily a crisis on a Mac nor a PC considering I can buy an USB DVD writer for $80.
Apple grants you a right-to-run license for OS X when you buy their hardware. No different than what Sun, SGI, Coherent and many other manufacturers have done for years.
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@Trai_Dep: So it is thievery because Apple chose a business model that was based on the selling of hardware, and sought to make little or no profit from the selling of an operating system?
If I legally purchased the software, I should be able to do what I want with it. I would not expect Apple to provide technical support for Hackintoshes and if Apple pushes out an update to the OS that instructs the OS to not operate on an Atom processor commonly found in netbooks [www.liliputing.com] No problem as I am violating the TOS but not necessarially breaking a law.
All that said, people buy macs becuase they are generally more stable than a PC because apple knows every possible hardware configuration and can test and debug for those configurations. Running a MAC clone I would have to imagine degrades reliability, so if you want a Mac, pay for a Mac to take advantage of the advantages of a Mac.
@Rachacha: 90% of the people who bought a Psystar system would expect it to work just like a machine from Apple. When something in the OS changed and the machine stopped working, Apple would be getting the angry calls.
Hackintoshes are fine for computer savvy people, but selling unauthorized Mac clones to retail customers is something I understand Apple wanting to stop.
@Trai_Dep: Since when did OS X cost $20? And I'd say that most of their sales don't come from computers, hardware or software (well, if you stretch the definition of \"computer\" a bit, maybe).
Oh well. I do it myself.
@jamar0303: Sigh. If you don't know much on a topic, it's generally wiser to listen than blurt out what's residing off the top of your head. (OK, $29, but my point still stands: what's the SRP for the generally available eighteen different versions of Windows?)
@Rachacha: But when you purchase a shrink-wrapped copy of OS X, you're not buying the source code with all attendant rights to modify to your heart's content, then to turn around and sell \"your\" software, are you?
Don't get me wrong, I respect people that like burrowing into the innards of computer OSs, but isn't that what Linux is all about? For that segment, get Linux and have at it: it's made, licensed and distributed for precisely that purpose. :)
@Trai_Dep: You said Apple's model was based off an even split of computer hardware and software. I'm saying that no, it seems to be mostly coming from iPods and iPhones.
(and as for the price, seems like there's a reason it's exponentially cheaper than Windows or even older versions of Mac OS this time around...)
@jamar0303: The newest release, Snow Leopard, retails for about twenty bucks. It's basically a stripped-down (no PowerPC support) re-working of Leopard with very few new \"features\" and lots of under-the-hood optimization of the system.
Even so, full OSX releases are less than $200. I think I paid $129 for Leopard and don't don't have all that nonsense of the ten million different versions of Windows.
Kernel extensions?
Now you really gave me a hankering for bacon flavored popcorn.
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Y'know, if Psystar and others wanting to clone the Mac were smart, they'd take OpenDarwin and write their own OS around it (just like Apple did) that just happens to be OSX compatible. As long as they don't do ANYTHING with OSX and engineer it themselves, they can sell \"Mac clones\" all day long and there would be nothing that Apple could do about it.
@incident_man: ...Which would require some talent, discipline and creativity. Which is sort of Apple's point.
I just wonder why Apple won't sell any drives with Blu-Ray capability? Can one buy a Blu-Ray read-only or read-write drive and hook it up to a Mac?
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Ditto to everyone who had this thought: How can a reasonable person NOT see that Apple is a monopoly? With the exception of Psystar, how many manufacturers of Apple computers are there? Can you get a Dell-branded Apple computer? Can you get an Acer-branded Apple computer? The answer is no.
Because Apple is a monopoly, they can charge more for their computers than what they could charge if they were not a monopoly. Where is the FTC when they should be protecting the public? The FTC and DOJ need to break up the Apple monopoly.
Who says Apple isn't a monopoly?
If Microsoft declared that you had to buy a computer from them in order to get Windows, there would be a shit-storm. Yet, Apple's been doing the same thing for years and no one seems to care.
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Totally off topic but for some reason the stories are not opening in Firefox for me today, only IE. Am I the only one?
@davere: The threads are opening for me in IE, but not on Safari on my iPhone.
@davere: I think GitEmSteveDave was having issues yesterday...I'm using FF 3.5.5 and I'm fine.
@davere:
Works good on my FF
@davere: Works fine on FF for me.