Leaked, cracked OS X dev kit image running
posted Aug 11th 2005 9:20AM
The reports of whether Apple had integrated a Trusted Computing countermeasures into their Intel dev kit boxes (and OS X for x86, as well) have been firing back and forth—we heard last week from Open for Business that someone on the developer end firmly denied Apple's DRM implementation, while another Apple Developer Connection member confirmed its existence to Cnet. Thus far it's been our understanding that Apple has in fact implemented the TPM chip in their dev kits, which in conjunction with SSE3 was used to enforce Rosetta from not running—which stops a vital service from activating Quartz and Aqua, enabling the UI. (This is not necessarily indicative of their future plans for the platform, however.) We know this is complicated, but stay the course—it appears as though those VMware shots from before are in fact real, since in some h.264 videos released today (torrent available here and here—not that most of you at work will be able to do much with 'em) one can fairly plainly see a powered down laptop boot into OS X. And it boots, fast, friends. Yes, we'll admit that it is technically possible to have faked these, but it's honestly far more likely from what we know of the communities out there working on this that they've managed to actually get it running.
[Thanks, snac]
Why not just use the recommended hardware? I understand doing something for the sake of doing it but this sounds like people have too much free time.
Oh great.
I hope this doesn't mean every snotty nosed teenager will be running OS X on their (parent's) PC soon. Can't wait for the first virus for OS X being created by one of these teenagers with too much time on their hands.
Also take note:
For running ppc apps (not universal binaries) in osx86 you NEED (at this moment, though it may change in a near future) an SSE3 capable CPU. If you have only an SSE2 machine it will only run universal binaries.
SSE3 capable CPUs:
- Athlon64 939 socket
- Pentium D
- Celeron D
- Pentium 4 (Prescott core)
Any older CPUs will not support SSE3.
Also, if you happen to have an intel 815 chipset, you are very likely to get network, sound etc. Graphic adapters do not run in other mode than VESA, but an intel GMA900 should work flawlessly.
Installations of OSX86 have been proven to work under VMware and native enviroments with many different configurations and also different results (best ones, follow above's guidelines).
Again Like I said before this has all been predicated -- http://www.spymac.com/gallery/show_photo.php?picid=420891
Just as we had always suspected.... lol
I love you apple... just release the O.S. on the PC side already... it's what everyone wants.
I just timed the one video then timed my 1.5ghz powerbook. it booted only 4 seconds faster, thats not very impressive, Tiger just boots really fast over all.
It certinally boots faster than windows; looks like about 19 seconds from apple logo to login screen.
My theory on why Macs boot faster than PC's?
PC's tend to load more crap at startup than Macs.
Modern antivirus software is the biggest culprit here. How many Macs have you seen running any kind of AV?
Norton AV '05 has a huuge footprint -a necessary evil...
#3, not all socket 939 AMD cpus are SSE3 capable - as far as I know only the Venice, San Diego, Manchester and Toledo have SSE3 (The AMD Athlon 64 3500+, for example). See: http://www.a1-electronics.net/AMD_Section/CPUs/2005/AMD_CPU-guide_May.shtml
I have a free copy of Norton AV from work on my powerbook at home and it does slow it down a little. Of course having taken the time to learn a few terminal commands I can juggle it's cpu priority once I log in.
"PC's tend to load more crap at startup than Macs."
You're kidding, right? Have you ever actually used a Mac?
I'm using one right now - I just checked and I have 54 processes running and the only two apps I have open are FireFox and Adium. I also only have 18MB out of 512MB free.
OSX has various tricks that make it seem faster than it is - like never really closing programs unless you manually quit them, and pre-loading all sorts of stuff in the background after you get to the desktop (something Windows Vista is supposedly gonna do too). I would honestly rather it did not do these things, because it's the main reason why OSX requires so much dang memory to work properly.
All that said, I have a PC and a Mac side by side here, both 512MB machines, and the PC still feels faster. (The Mac is a dual-G5 2ghz, the PC is a single P4 2.4.) The only thing the Mac is really faster at OS-wise is booting. If I did video production on this thing then I'd probably feel different - watching h.264 videos is like a whole other world on the Mac vs. the PC right now - but as far as common office tasks, OSX is really not that fast relative to Windows (it's only fast relative to older Mac OS's) and it is very, very bloated.
Mac-only people love OSX, and some PC people probably will too if they manage to get their hands on it. And there are some things OSX really is better at, like updating and installing apps. But this euphoria about being able to run OSX on a PC really is not justified - OSX really does feel like Linux with a slightly nicer UI (which is basically all it is).
Re #4, let's review history with a quick 'where are they now?':
1. NeXTstep - proprietary hardware, then ported to SPARC, and x86. Company bought out by Apple.
2. BeOS - proprietary hardware, then ported to x86. Company bought out by Palm.
In both cases, once they stopped their own hardware and were just trying to sell software they withered away.
If Apple wants to remain in the computing business they can't afford to release a general version of MacOS for PCs: there's not enough money to be made. I doubt iPods are making enough money to subsidise OS development yet.
#2: Because OS X now runs on x86 doesn't mean there will be more viruses for it. OS X has less viruses because of the fundamental system it's based on, UNIX, which is the same underlying system of Linux. UNIX in itself implements far better security than Windows (for example, one 'administrator' account and the others only normal, better permissions etc).
This isn't fake - look at http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Vmware_how_to for the method how to. That's on VMWare - this guy must just have installed it properly on his machine rather than a virtual drive.
And don't call us teenagers snotty-nosed :P
i thought Rosetta can indeed be run on non-SSE3 processors with a patch:
"Users with such a motherboard and a Pentium 4 will be able to install MacOSX x86 with the patch for Rosetta (without the patch if you choose a SSE3-enable Pentium4)."
Jeff,
You're kidding, right? "OSX has various tricks that make it seem faster than it is - like never really closing programs unless you manually quit them..."
uhh...why would you want the OS to automatically quit programs for you? Especially ones you opened? How would it tell you were done using them? Sounds to me that this is a comment from a Windows user who thinks closing all windows in a program will quit it on a mac, instead of choosing Quit from the application's menu.
"uhh...why would you want the OS to automatically quit programs for you? Especially ones you opened? How would it tell you were done using them?"
yeah really, i mean how would the computer interpret closing the program window out as you being done with the program, i always close programs that i'm not done using.
I love it! If Steve won't do it someone else will. Maybe I'm dreaming but this is a great development for consumers showing that if the market wants in enough and a company doesn't deliver the market will. Keep it up everyone.
http://www.concretesurf.co.nz/osx86/viewforum.php?f=10
I think it would be great if there were a way to run Mac OS X on Intel machines which are non-Apple. Then, eventually, Apple will be forced to (unless Steve chooses to repeat an idiotice cycle) market the OS to generic PCs and nation-wide vendors. Personally, I would rather have a VAIO notebook dualbooting OSX and Vista when the time is ready, over a PowerBook doing the same thing. I prefer the design.
Then again, it would depend on which vendor would be bundling the most (or best) software with its system.
if Steve opens up OS X, developers will flock to OS X, and guess what? People may just go "hey, since it's got such rave reviews, maybe i'll just spend $100 and try it out on my PC". If Apple ever wants to be a dominant force in the OS market, opening OS X up is the only way to do it. and lets say OS X gains 10~20% marketshare, hardware sales will go up, because OS X runs best on Apple built machines (plus they're some of the best designed computers out there). This is the type of business opportunity Apple needs to take advantage instead of having Micro$oft bully them with their 90+% marketshare.
Apple gaining a huge ground in terms of marketshare is realistic too considering the iPod halo effect.
Thge only thing that would make that movie swwm fake is the fact that you can see a mouse cursor while the BIOS is running. You never see the cursor during BIOS on a PC. They could have just faked a video to do all that and run it off the laptop. Other than that it looks legit.
EDIT: The only thing that would make that movie seem fake is the fact that you can see a mouse cursor while the BIOS is running. You never see the cursor during BIOS on a PC. They could have just faked a video to do all that and run it off the laptop. Other than that it looks legit.
Its real, look around a bit on major torrent sites (hint: its 1.36gb, try searching for vmware) and you'll find it. Have it running right now, and I still dont like OSX... Nice to see I have the option though.
I downloaded the videos off of bit torrent, but I can't play them...do I need another codec or something? Any help would be nice, thanks.
I know this isn't a popular thing to say, but as someone who uses both systems, I think this must be stated:
I think Apple is smart enough to realize that a great many of the PC users who are interested in running OS X on their standard PCs don't ever actually BUY the OS software anyway. Look at the latest market research on PC users vs. Mac users...a far greater percentage of Mac users actually buy their software and keep it upgraded than PC users, a large percentage of which just steal software like crazy.
The only thing Apple would gain by opening their system to generic PCs is more freeloaders stealing their products, and then complaining that their patched-up, hacked-up, [k]racked-up system doesn't work right. Then, all the sudden, it must be Apple's fault.
If you want to know why Apple will try to keep its crown jewel, OS X, as an Apple-only system, rampant PC piracy might explain it.
I mean, wasn't this only a matter of time? I agree with the previous comments that this whole project is interesting and I give props to the guys who figured it out... but I have the fear: I don't want rampant os x piracy, I don't want a plethora of viruses because of so many script kiddies with os x running on intel machines. At the same time, trusted computing scares the crap outta me. Somewhere in there is a balance I hope.
www.tigercompatible.com
I think this was Microsoft's evil ploy all along. They must have know Apple had this x86 version of their OS all along or it never would have survived the anit-trust suits the way it did. Someone knew.
#10: How/why people buy/use dual-G5 Macs with only 512 MB memory is beyond me (especially when memory is quite affordable)! Almost all my Macs and PCs at home/work have between 1 and 2 GB memory (even my old 7500/100 has 256 MB)...
#27 (TNKGRL)
Just because you think having 1GB or 2GB of memory is affordable may not be the case for everyone.
Yes, percentage wise cheaping out on the RAM if you can afford an expensive machine like a MAC seems stupid, but when you can't afford it, you can't afford it.
Also considering that Macs seem to be particularlly picky about memory is an incentive to not buy generic-ram.
I can't wait to get my hands on this copy of osx86. I found a torrent of osx86 on mininova that is an dvd iso. I can't wait to get this thing downloaded and installed on my hp pavilion, yes i said it, HP! All I need is a friend with a dvd burner to make the disc for me. btw, cyberwhore, some people like me have a legitimate want or need for an x86 version of tiger. Yes, I am 17 years old, and you better not be talkin about us teens like that. If you are as old as my parents are, your kids probably taught you how to use a computer at the age of 40 and can barely surf the web and check your email by yourself. most teens are responsible with computers, and my parents trust me with all of our computers, and in fact, my mom is going back to college and she needs her own laptop, she is taking me with her to best buy next week to help her pick it out and sort through all the bs that the best buy people will try to pull over on her.
Call me a mac snob but for me the mac experience isn't running OSX on some crappy put togther wintel box but having it run within superbly designed Apple hardware, it's the look and the feel. I pray that Apple put the DRM to good use to stop this b*st*rdization of a great brand, otherwise it will be as bad as when it let the cloners loose. If people want to use OSX, then you have to buy the hardware that goes with it as the two are interlinked, Apple is not MS. If you want a cheap OS to run on your crappy wintel box then get Linux, planty of choice there.
#29 Someone more savvy should help your mom find a new laptop. Someone at least savvy enough not to let your mom waste money at best buy.
#24: Joel, I agree with you.
I mean look at this situation. That's a stolen copy of a developer build of Mac OS X for x86. At least one NDA was broken to make this possible, and I'm willing to bet that not one of these people have even ponied up the $999 for the developer box to Apple...
If this is how the Mac OS on PC revolution starts... with a flagrant act of piracy and breaking of encryption... that's not good.
And to whoever who said that if Apple just starts selling their OS and continue to sell their own hardware (#19), you need to read up on your history.
In the mid 90s, Apple licensed their OS, and a half a dozen or more 3rd party companies CLONED the Mac. Apple continued to sell their own Premium Macs, but the clones took away A LOT of their hardware business. Clones undercut them in every way and NOONE was buying Apple branded macs. This was in the mid 90s, and it nearly drove Apple bankrupt.
So once again, it's still all about the Mac. It's not a minority of Apple's business right now... It's not straining to survive right now, indeed they are selling more Macs than ever...they make much better margins and bring in more R&D dollars for every Mac sold compared to the iPod.
Put it this way. Every copy of Mac OS X sold today in retail is $129. They sell only to existing Mac customers, who have helped Apple by buying their Macs and allowing for R&D dollars back into the Mac OS X loop.
If you take hardware out of the equation, will $129 per copy cover the costs of R&D? Now you factor in mass piracy... bear in mind that everything we are currently seeing is NDA-breaking stuff, and you are arguing for less restrictions of that type in Apple's OS if they sell it to commitdy PCs... How will they cover the costs of R&D?
Apple's Mac hardware sales fuel R&D for the OS AND the hardware... remember that.
Dear Benson Leung,
Get a grip. Apple loves all the hype amongst people like us that all this h4x0r1ng is giving them.
Sincerely,
Mr. Sapien
Maybe they love the hype, but they're also concerned about how this is going to make them money (or lose them money).
#31
the cloned macs were still a closed architecture. You don't have Dell's or HP's with Mac OS's, but you have some small 3rd party companies make computers which can only run Mac OS. You still need to get a separate machine just to run the Mac OS. It's a different scenario. Plus, if i can recall, you didn't have these awesome looking aluminum Macs back in mid 90's....you had beige boxes. Apple wasn't as highly praised of a company in terms of industrial design comparing to now, when every Mac product released are sleek and attractive. You didn't have the iPod halo effect either.
Let's say Apple gains 20% marketshare, more people are inclined to use the Apple platform. Although Mac's will be slightly more expensive than the Dell, people will spend the money because OS X just works on Apple computers, or maybe they want a iMac because it complements their iPod's in terms of design. College students will get iBooks or PowerBooks because they look cool. With a closed architecture, switchers are reluctant to switch because they worry about whether their favorite games or apps will be compatible with Macs.
#31 switchers do we really need them, if they dont want to switch thats fine with me as we dont really want the penny pinching walmart tyrekickers, let them eat dell or some no name wintel box just keep them away from my beloved Mac OSX as they wouldn't know a quality product if it bit them on the butt! The only time I am for DRM or whatever form it takes is the mac on x86 because if they don't get it right then every wintel flyboy will be running it and with it will go the company and all we'll be left with is the grey grey wintel world!
#12 Ichi.
I know of and do understand your point but another possible reason there are no viruses for OS X is due to the fact that with such a small market share at the moment no one has really taken much time to write a virus yet.
As the number of OS X users increases by legal or illegal means (through hacks like this) then it surely follows as OS X gets more attention that someone will create a virus for it sooner rather than later.
I would bet money that whoever does write the first virus will do it from a hacked x86 machine like the one in the story.
eheehe dear steve jobs, you undervalued pc user's ability to hack things.
I don't think mac-hackers really exits.
"Let's say Apple gains 20% marketshare, more people are inclined to use the Apple platform. Although Mac's will be slightly more expensive than the Dell, people will spend the money because OS X just works on Apple computers, or maybe they want a iMac because it complements their iPod's in terms of design. College students will get iBooks or PowerBooks because they look cool. With a closed architecture, switchers are reluctant to switch because they worry about whether their favorite games or apps will be compatible with Macs."
Except that that 20% increase is going to be at the expcence of average units sold. You seem to assume that growth from 8% to 20% will mean that that core 8% will continue to purchase apple products, but it's not necessarially true. If people were going solely off coolness factor, powerbooks would be sold more often than iBooks, and that isn't true. Let me do a quick number crunch for you. In 2005 second quarter, apple sold 1,070,000. Let's assume that they make $200 on each unit (I suspect this is a lowball number). 1,070,000 units sold is roughly $214 million in profit. Now let's assume that the number of people buying apple units is cut in half (4%) if they just released the OS. 535,000 consumers translates to $107 million in profit. Now, we'll assume for the moment that the other 16% are fine upstanding individuals who purchace Mac OS X. I don't know what the profit margin is on OS X, but I think it's safe to assume about 50% or $65. that means another $107 million in profits, equaling previous revenue. This is assuming a lot of variables in favor of apple. If the numbers drop below 4% buying an apple branded computer, or if people pirate the OS in any number (and we all know they will), you're looking at a slow decine in revinue as the years wear on.
#38: also, factor in that Apple will necessarily have to hire more resources devoted to developing and supporting drivers for every combination of commidity hardware out there... video drivers, hard drive controller drivers, sound cards... just like Microsoft.
The cost of supporting all of the non-Mac hardware Mac OS X users would be large, from a customer support to a development point of view. And all from a company that's a fraction of the size of Microsoft.
The bottom line: there is no overwhelmingly good reason to release the Mac OS for commodity PCs. There are many many risks involved.
It will cannibalize Mac sales, which currently bring in lots of R&D dollars.
It will require much more support staff at Apple.
It will potentially jeopardize the stability on 3rd party systems, and may give Apple a bad image... as bad as Microsoft's perhaps.
Here's the truth... and it's harsh, but I'll say it anyway:
Everyone who is demanding that Apple release their OS for commodity PCs has one thing in mind : They want Mac OS X for free. They are pirates, and they aren't Apple's customers. And they see this event that has happened, the installation of mac OS x on a PC: an example of piracy, broken NDAs, and circumventing of encryption, as something that will ENCOURAGE Apple to open up their OS? Foolish.
All pirates. Ingrates.
I think Benson hit it right on the head.
Opening up OSX for the PC would be one of the silliest things Apple could do. I believe not even a shred of the idea is in the business plans for Apple in the near or distant future. There is no reason for Apple to make it's OS nonproprietary.
-S
Benson, did you ever think I might want to pay for OSX and run it on an IBM T SERIES instead of a powerbook? I'm hardly an ingrate.
Generally speaking the most common business plan followed by computer and software companies is to start by releasing a premium product that their closest competition cant stand up to in quality, price, performance and/or asthetics. Then after everyone who did or can buy one-has one then realize that if everyone already has one that the growth potential is extremely finite. The next step is to try to artificially boost sales by making cosmetic improvements or packaging in features that replace comercial addon products. Then comes giving away an upgrade that improves performance to boost new sales. Then selling upgrades. Then making inferior products and selling them for the same price to cut overhead costs and giving away free upgrades. Then removing support on older more functional products. And then finally subscription services. Because basically any company that sells a product wants to some degree to be a subscription service. If cars ran forever without maintenance and the performance of new cars wasnt better than old ones after a certain point no one would buy a new car because the old ones would still be around. Same with PC hardware, software, and OS's. The trick is in when they dont have a better product for the next year- Convincing you that an inferior product will do and charging you the same amount to boost their margins.
Right now people are infatuated with the idea of trying MAC OSX on an x86 proc because it is a comercial product that x86 people dont have. They are thinking that it is a first cycle thing(premium product,performance,price,ect..). It is a great product but its not first cycle. More like the step before the inferior cycle. The fad probably wont last so dont get your panties in a bunch. Apple will probably start selling OSX x86 in 9 months or so for 300 a license to try and make a buck and it will be big for a while and then everything will go back to normal and everyone running linux will continue to not care because they dont have any of the above developement cycle issues associated with comercial products.
Glad: Are you sure a Mac fanboy that will stand for getting less at a higher price? Or, that you want to get less for a higher price?
Benson Leung, by your analysis the OS can't be sold without hardware and be profitable.
There is a certain OS company in Redmond that would probably argue with you. XP Pro can be had for $129, I'd much rather pay that for OS X than XP.
Apple, if you do it, I'll become a mac geek again and my PowerBook 150 will have something to keep it company.
"Can't wait for the first virus for OS X..."
come on. you're telling us that there ARENT any viri out there for OS/X? isnt that the same crap the Linux folk have said about that OS and the Firefox folks said about their crappy browser?
then it happens and the rest of us chuckle silently. :-)
Ofcourse there can be viruses for Linux. there have been 2 (according to some paper I read about 2 months ago) but both failed cuz the fact you need root passwd to do any damage in linux (or any damage the virus programmer would like to do). Now some nwely introduced linux users think root usage 24/7 are ok, and for them these viruses could do damage, if they are still around somewere, and work with todays updated systems.
Now suppose you really really want to make a virus for Linux that can spread across the net killing alot of machines.
Start by making your virus intelligent, cuz trying to crack the root passwd using brute force would take u a half lifetime for each machine. So what you need to do is make your virus install a keystroke listener, and a parser that will distinct a root passwd typing from all other typings, then it can login as root (or use sudo) and play around. Now imagine it would do this for all computers it spreads to. this would be a slow virus, take space (easier to find it and remove) and it wont kill servers that just are up running, without anyone typing in the root passwd for you.
So actually, you see its not impossible. its probably not as fun for virus programmers as it is to write winblows viruses that they know will kill every comp its copies to.