The infamous narf2006 has made good on
his earlier promise to provide a video of Windows XP booting on an Intel-based iMac. While the video looks fairly
convincing, we'll continue to reserve judgment at least until Colin Nederkoorn hands narf a check. Speaking of which,
Colin, sponsor of the XP on Mac contest that started this whole thing, had to switch hosts after
yesterday's frenzy, and is now hosting only the
contest page, rather than the forums where narf had earlier posted pics of his supposed XP solution. Colin expects to
have narf's solution in by the end of the week for testing, so we should know pretty soon whether this is the Holy
Grail or a just another tin cup.
Update: Narf has
sent his
solution to Colin for testing, so this does indeed seem real. Now let's see if it's reproducible!
Watch
the video (7.7MB MOV)
Read about
the contest[Thanks, Rob and Joseph]
posted Mar 15th 2006 11:09AM
This looks legit to me.
Not that i'd wanna run Windows on a Mac.. but i guess it's good for the people that don't know any better.
OSX all the way baby! :)
looks pretty legit to me
I have to say I'm convinced. I've never seen a fake video that was so convincing. He was constatnly shaking and going to different angles of the screen.
There's no way he could use a video editor to do that in 1 day
Kudos to narf. It looks real to me. The final test though is to find out how he did it.
Wauw, looks like I'm gonna have to find the money somewhere for a MacIntel...
Not much more to say than ... wow. Watched the entire vid, and it'd take a LOT of effort to fake that. It would take someone with a fair experience level of hacking to get WXP on that machine, and looks to be the case. Hats off, golf clap.
I wanna see BF2 running on an iMac now. :)
thinking of mortal kombat:
" IT HAS BEGUN!!!! "
".... Wauw, looks like I'm gonna have to find the money somewhere for a MacIntel... ."
You know, seriously .... its a "just because" effort. To waste 1300-1600 after taxes depending on setup on a Mac just because you can install XP on it.. is a COMPLETE waste of time from the end user perspective. Spend 1/2 half the money to get a decent machine with a dual-core, and a Mac mini and a switch box.
Alternate link:
http://clips1.vimeo.com/video_files/2006/03/15/vimeo.74487.mov
A Mac Mini IS a MacIntel...
I think he need a "DUAL-BOOT" startup to win he big 12-15k prize....
#9, by the time you buy a cheap crap PC for 400$ + the Dual core Mac mini for 800$ which is by the way INTEL BASED, a keyboard, a display and a good KVM switch, you are past the 1500$ mark.
Just get the mac mini and save yourself the cheapo PC and the KVM switch.
I can do all that using virtual PC. There is so he shows his hand back there turning it on. He could of hit a key on the keyboard to power on vitural pc and load it up. He never shows how he got it to load into windows or how he got past the boot method. Doesn't prove anything. And why is it that all of these has a million cords and its so dark in there to really see whats going on. Heck he could be using vnc for all we know. Its fake!!!!!!
Show everything from start to finish!!!!!! until then it doesn't prove a thing.
Looks like Virtual PC on a G5, or maybe some cleaver skinning of OS X... Or it's real, hard to say :P
another mirror:
http://www.visualmagician.com/vimeo.74487.mov
it is still possible that it could be a fake. Take a video screening app, and play it back full screen on a mac.
Doesn't the iMac usually have a white light in the front when restarting? (I didn't see that in the video)
I also wish he focused on the system specs because I couldn't read them at all.
I'm just throwing out a possibility if it was a fake.
Although I indeed hope it's real.
narf must have successfully done this.
two things tell me that it's real.
One, in order for him to have successfully installed windows onto his iMac, he would have to do extensive EFI hacking/workarounds, which is apparent in the boot sequence of windows, with the logo (any windows user would know that the traditional windows boot is the ugly black bar loadng with Starting Windows across the top, then the fade in logo and progress bar). Then again, he could have installed a program, such as bootskin XP, to skin the boot interface (i used to use it with a faux-OS X boot, looked real nice actually), or he himself rewrote the boot code in the MBR.
Two, There is no way that system was emulated. Anyone who has used an emulator or virtual PC on ANY operating system knows that graphics are not that fluid unless they are native (the virtual PC has to emulate a VESA driver, thus usually causing visual "tears" in the emulated environment.), The windows hardware interface management utility would have also read off a list of emulated, generic hardware names, e.g. the harddrive would have read Generic Virtual Drive or something of the nature.(The harddrive in the video read off "Maxtor 6L160M0")
Also, windows ACPI read off as seeing a multiprocessor PC, which is concurrent with the fact it is running an Intel Core Duo.
Everything about this seems real, I can't spot any discrepancies in the video, therefore, i'd say it's legitimate.
Clearly a photoshop.
Fishes,
narco.
Wow, think of the benchmarks! This will allow direct comparison of the hardware in Apple dual core computers to the XP competition.
haha narco.
you're gonna start a fanboy fight with that.
Why are they trying to make this so hard. Let's face it, there are people out there who need to run Windows for real-world, practical reasons. Secondly, you're not going to be buying MacIntel hardware to just run Windows because there are certainly much cheaper ways of doing that. So I would think that the ability to dual-boot would be something that Apple would want to promote so that they could sell more boxes and get further entrenched in marketshare.
The only way this could be fake would be to crack open the imac and use is as the display of a regular PC.
I doubt this is the case.
Haha, (to me) this is like making a video of someone putting a geo metro engine in a Carrera GT. Of course its possible, but really the only logical reason to do it would be to win a contest.
as this looks pretty legit to me, I am reserving judgement until the instructions are released and others have tried and succeded. I have a PowerBook which I do everything on except play games. I have a PC sitting in the corner that I use ONLY for games. If this turns out to be the real thing, I would love to upgrade to a MacBook Pro (in another revision or 2) and only have one machine. Now That would be cool.
bwah, who the hell needs an xp when u have macos?! :)
I hate to admit it, but I'm with TIMMAH!
I was a mac user back in college (got a brand new blue & white G3 freshman year), maybe even a fanboy... Then I got to the real world, where I have to be able to run real world software, none of which is available on the Mac (unless someone can point me to a good schematic capture & multilayer PCB layout pacakge for OS X?). I haven't owned a Mac since... I'd like to have one for all the sweet hardware they build, but without windows it's simply not practical. Put XP on a mac and I'm on board for sure.
Did anyone else notice what looked like a cable coming out the bottom right hand side of the screen, difficult to see as he never goes round that side with the video, could he have just used a pc and connected it to the imac screen?
its just a movie being played full screen.
kleger, then how do you explain the resolution change flickers and reconfigs? videos don't record that. and videos can't change resolutions in the middle.
I don't see this being used as an external monitor as it only has DVI out, and absolutely no inputs to use it as a monitor alone... unless some crazy mad hardware hacking was going on, this is real.
I can't wait to play CS and Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 on my Mac :)
One thing:
I am reserving judgment until I see video of this guy physically moving the mouse and having the movement onscreen correspond with it. That was not shown in this video.
Umm why would this boot up with a gray background with the windows logo? I didn't know there where any preset windows background upon installation automatically changes the background to grey with the windows logo. Or is that a hack? Anyone?
It's amazing to me how many of the Mac fanboys dont' understand the point of this.
Noone is stupid enough to go out and buy a MAC JUST to run windows on it. The point is, that many of us LIKE MACOS, and want to run it legitimately, but still have a need to run applications in windows that don't run well under emulated environments (DirectX Apps, games, etc). The only way to do this is to get Windows running in dual boot on an intel Mac.
Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 sucks. RCT 1 is better.
I wanna see Mac OS on a 'PC', not Windowze on a Mac
"Why are they trying to make this so hard. Let's face it, there are people out there who need to run Windows for real-world, practical reasons. Secondly, you're not going to be buying MacIntel hardware to just run Windows because there are certainly much cheaper ways of doing that. So I would think that the ability to dual-boot would be something that Apple would want to promote so that they could sell more boxes and get further entrenched in marketshare."
That's not the case though. If Apple machines were capable of dual boot than it would remove incentive to developers to release OSX versions of their software. Why not just release an XP version that will run on everything now that macs can boot XP. This is last thing that apple wants.
mrgreen, I can show you that.
I have it on my winbox downstairs.
haha.
i have a friend in Apple corporate, he got me a copy of the intel dev build of OS X that runs on any intel processor with SSE3.
its nothing special, just a mac in an ugly box.
OSX on a PC has been done but will never be supported by apple and will probably stop workiking everytime you update the OS...even for minor updates.
Apple does NOT want OSX on PC, but does not mind Windows on MAc. Microsoft only benefits from windows running on Mac because theyll sell more licenses.
Two things:
1. It's a movie on fullscreen
2. The lcd was attached to a normal PC.
Not too hard to do even in a day
While this is encouraging, I still want to see the dual boot in action where he can choose either OSX or Win... Just being able to run Win on the Mac hardware really doesn't do much for me...
#18 narco, photoshop can't make movies like this
#9 the whole point is that it runs both systems now (or ultimately the idea is that it will run both), not just to replace OS X with Windows
#1 Another reason to run Windows on a Mac is that Macs are quality pieces of hardware! Why not use this is an opportunity to benchmark these machines, e.g. if Photoshop in Windows on said iMac runs operation X in 53 s, operation Y 23 in and Photoshop in OS X on said iMac runs operation X in 52 s and op Y in 21 seconds, then maybe OS X is a faster OS.
Just some thoughts...
Joel, read what I said to kleger.
It's not a video, and I can't say it's not an attached screen, but I highly doubt it.
so once you get it to boot are you home free? or is there still going to a boat load of hardware/driver issues to deal with? Is this ever going to be viable for the average user?
I'm the cynical type so I'll hold off on judgement...BUT...what I actually see is Windows XP install running on a Mac...monitor.
If I was going to fake this...I'd have a PC hidden under the desk connected to the Mac monitor but, as I say, I'm the cynical type.
Good luck to him. It is always fun to solve a difficult problem.
J, all the hardware in the iMac will work in windows, the only obstacle is the EFI. Once you install, you're good to go.
This looks suspiciously like an image projected onto the screen. First of all, there are scenes where in a fairly-lit room, the entire room flickers when the screen changes. Also, it seems like the reflection of the blue onto that monitor in front of the iMac is a little too reflective. Finally, a little before halfway through the video, there's a little white light that moves back and forth once at the top of the iMac, almost like a laser pointer (I don't know if this is an iMac restart feature or what, I'm just pointing it out). A few times during the film it seemed like he zoomed in to keep other areas hidden, or kept moving the camera around to keep detail from showing.
I guess it's convincing enough, but, to play devil's advocate, it's more than easy to code a fake system dialogue in some visual studio app to display hardware and such. Like others, I'm reserving judgement.
So, what exactly is the point? I can see wanting to get OSX to run on Intel because it's better than Windoze, but I just don't get why you'd want to run a crappy OS on MAC hardware.
Ramon, the white light is a iMac feature, and as far as the hardware system dialogue, that was authentic windows. I wll personally vouch for that one.
In Soviet Russia, Windows XP hacks you!
Of course this is fake. If you look carefully when the mouse is moving around during the install, you could obviously tell the cursor moves outside of the filled area on the screen. Last time I checked, Windows XP would not let you do that. Maybe this is a new feature that comes along with EFI on a MacTel but I think not.
On a lesser note, if you wanted to prove you were booting up on a MacTel, wouldn't the first thing you show in Device Manager be the two items listed in the Processor section and not the harddrive and mouse?
'm the cynical type so I'll hold off on judgement...BUT...what I actually see is Windows XP install running on a Mac...monitor.
-----
The Mac Monitor? You mean the iMac? *snickers like a little girl...
Andrew: You can easily film (with a camera) and installation in a real machine and play it back in the mac at full screen.
In the devices it looks like there is a thumb drive device connected (you cannot see one in the mac). When the guy is gonna show the mem and processor type, the data is blur(coincidence?), try to check this part frame by frame, you will notice one cut there.
This is getting ridiculous. It's like when we had OSx86 booting in average PCs for months and I still would read fanboi comments about it being fake... get over it people, it's legit.
The final solution has been submitted to the contest as you can read here:
http://winxponmac.com/index.html
The final guide to reproduce this will be hopefully posted on Friday.
iXPMac?
iMacXP?
iWindozeCrapple?
The screen flicker because of changing video modes - mine generic screen does it too.
The author has no space on right side...just PC with windows and lot's of ASSEMBLER code :)
Did anybody see the CPU type or speed ?
couldnt you just make a movie of XP being installed on a normal box... and then go in there and touch up a thing here and there to make it look like a Macintel box?
not that i dont see the uses for XP on a mac, i would much rather run OSx on my x86 hardware... but thats just me.
I want EvE Online on a MacBook. Let this be real.
Ok, here's what I don't get...
I've installed XP hundreds of times, and I have never sen that grey background with the Windows flag come up on boot. It's always been the flag, black background, and "Windows XP Professional" screen. That silver screen looks more like Windows Server 2003's boot screen.
Can anybody explain where that screen is coming from? Maybe it's his emulator boot screen or something equally whacky?
I think it is legit.
In the video the show details that are hard if not impossible to fake - while not showing stuff that is easy to fake. On top of that they have hidden the crucial details to duplicate their efforts.
If someone is faking they know an awful lot about the process required to get stuff running.
I'd like to see this machine booting and I'd like to see the XP CPU configuration screen (i.e all relevant Mac hardware devices).
My current opinion:
XP on a (hidden) PC with a Mac TFT panel as output...
Wouldn't the Blue DOS-like install window be running at 640x480 and therefore would appear as a tiny window on the hi-res iMac screen? It certainly wouldn't have an aspect ratio that would complete fill the widescreen iMac display.
That is what you see when the XP splash screen appears. This inconsistency lead me to believe that it is a hoax.
if your on the market for an intel imac amazon has a $150 dollar rebate on the 20" version ;)
sure hope this is dual boot.
Holeeeeeeeeeeeeee crap!
Man, that's pretty convincing. Hopefully it's legit.
I guess I could say......so what....who would want to run it like this anyway? As another posted said, who would spend that much money on a Mac, then stick XP on it?
I wish i had a mac intel powerbook now... i rue the day I bought a powerbook, awesome hardware, but i just can't deal with the poorly designed mac os.
Not to mention that many websites I visit don't display properly or work properly as most developers don't test to make sure their sites work well on the mac. Streaming video support blows unless you are using quicktime which then of course does not support many common formats and won't even do full screen unless you buy an upgrade. Bleh.
I'll never buy a mac again, unless I can run windows xp or vista on it.
Make no mistake. Apple's hardware is first rate. But their software design and UI is goofy. Application menus that aren't connected to the application??? wtf, this isn't still the 80s where you can get away with bad UI like that without people noticing.
You can't use the iMac as a monitor. There's no input to do so. The only way IF this were a fake, is if it was a fullscreen video - which I highly doubt is not.
Whats with the haters anyways... if people want the option to run windows on their mac, why not?
Geez. Somebody get the cameraguy a tripod. Were they taping this on a boat in the middle of some choppy water?
I just have a question::
I do not have a mactel Imac... but I did work with an a g5... I have a g4 on my desk at home and a g5 at work... the whole time the computer is on on ANY of those machines the pwer light shows through....
there is no CONSTANT power light when booting from the XP? It lighs up when he "powers up"...
shoudl it remain consant?
Just throwing it out there... I am not sure of this so a little help.
Um, this footage is fake. Look at the last screen on the device manager, it lists "Batteries" as a device. If it's running on an iMac, there is no battery! I'm running XP on my desktop PC and there is no "Batteries" device listed in the device manager. This is not footage of it running on an iMac. Whatever it is, it's running on a laptop. Don't write that check yet!!!!
I have used windows 100% of my cumputer using life and that gray screen with the flag DOES NOT EXIST in the XP install at anytime, PERIOD.
Someone else notce this?... it looks like the apple logo was replaced with the flag logo in the video. That alone says to me that this is faked.
Now, I want to see this become a reality, I just dont think this is it. Soon...very soon, a real one will come along.
Anyone have a link to a video other than quicktime? QT won't update on my computer!
Couldnt you just capture all of this using Camtasia screen capture software from a PC, and then run the movie full screen on the iMac, in the movie I dont see any mouse or keyboard movements. Seems like an easy fake.
I agree with #49. Surely you would show the processor section first, but notice how the filmer only vaguely concentrates on it, and doesn't let the camera get a focus on the spec. He was all too happy to do it when windows was installing and he was showing the files that were installing, but when it comes to showing the spec in system properties, he doesn't feel it's worth showing clearly? Something dodgy there if you ask me. But all the same, it does look really authentic.
Somewhere there is a short asian woman working at a dry cleaner, cleaning the crap out of Steve Jobs' pants.
#57: That grey screen looks exactly like the Mac booting screen, except with an XP logo instead of an apple, almost like a BIOS if you will. I'm not quite sure either, but I think that narf must've skinned the BIOS.
This looks so awesome; it would be such a letdown if this wasn't legit.
He still has to offer a dual boot option per the contest rules. . . while getting a CSM in place to interface with EFI and getting Windows to Boot is 99.9% of the battle. . .he still has yet to offer a dual boot option which is a requirement per the original contest rules. . . .
Better hurry up and mod your Boot loader again Narf for Dual Booting to Both Windows and Mac OSX!
Omg stfu.
He did it, stop hating idiots.
Ramon: He TURNED the Imac at least 45 degrees at one point...it's NOT A PROJECTED IMAGE.
Did you all NOT read system properties at all? During the booting sequence did you NOT notice the tell tale MAC bootup procedures and screen colors/images? God, you guys dont even HAVE macs and you're spouting like you know something.
Please KEEP PRATCE newbs.
I think this is a huge step for the Mac. Not that Apple really wants people to use anything other than its excellent OSX, but proving that their computers can in fact dual boot would shake things up an awful lot in the PC world.
Most PC users don't dig on the Mac, and most Mac users don't dig on PCs, but having a computer that can dual boot would allow someone to use the best features of both.
Some exciting and scary things could be about to happen in the computer world if narf's solution is reproducible across the entire Apple product line on other people's computers.
I can't wait.
The term 'switcher' will take on a whole new meaning
:)
I really want to salp those who call an iMac a Mac monitor...goddamit if you dont know what youre talking about, dont talk!
And I also qould love to slap those who keep saying Why would you buy a mac and then install Xp on it?? Jesus, it to have BOTH on one machine and have access to ALL software ever created.
Additionally, I would like to slap those who keep saying, why not buy a cheap PC box and a mac? Well, because thats just not cool ok? and in the end you waste space, money and PC look like crap! ok??
SLAAAAP!
I dunno about this.
1.) Like others have pointed out, I too have never seen that grey XP screen during a boot.
2.) Even if that screen is the BIOS splash, it shouldn't stay visible for as long as it does. It should go away as soon as the bootloader kicks in. And you should see the XP progress bar before the install continues.
3.) On minute the install is showing fullscreen, while one screen (the first boot after the install completes) isn't fullscreen. And he's able to move the mouse cursor beyond the windows screen. (correct me if I'm wrong, but you can't do that normally)
4.) The first thing you see after the install, before it asks for the usernames etc., is a screen that asks if you want XP to autoadjust the screen resolution. His didn't do that.
5.) If this is a native XP install on an external drive, shouldn't his internal drive containing his OS X install show up in the device list? If you notice the first drive device list is a 'generic USB storage' device. Where is his internal harddrive?
6.) Why is there a battery device listed? The only time I've seen that is on laptops. Am I missing something?
7.) Why did he move so quickly past the processor specs?
8.) His device list shows 6 USB devices (two not working properly), but the iMac only has 5 USB ports. If anything, he should have 3 USB devices not working because XP doesn't have the drivers for intel USB 2.0 built in. (last I remembered, correct me if I'm wrong)
If this is legit. . . and I think it is. . . Apple should give this guy a job. . .fully dev his solution and MARKET THE CRAP OUT OF IT. . . .
Think about it. . .The ONLY hardware in the WORLD that can run almost every piece of software ever made across linux/windows/OSX platforms without a performance hit or any emulation.
That's a marketing gem IMHO.
Hey #79 don't get caught up on the mac lingo, the iMac is a monitor and a cpu in one, so to shorten it by saying "mac monitor" is not the end of the world, you anal mac terminology freak! Holy crap, it is a monitor, what else would you call the glowing screen with pixels on it?
Wow! First its MS going back to the Prehistoric BIOS. (Cant make EFI fit)
And now Windows runs on a Mac-
Now if Steve would only break down and make OS X for PCs, the we could sit and watch MS crumble to the ground.
65 you doofus. just install divx and flip4mac codecs for quicktime, they're free, then quicktime plays anything. You're not even trying.
You know what I love? I love watching all the naysayers slither, silently, back under their rocks, or fade back into the shadows, once the thing they're poopooing has been proven true. It's funny how you never hear from these people again.
You realize you are all a joke. Right? I mean, it's laughably pathetic. :D
Why did they not show they mouse moving the cursor or the actual typing of the names?
It could be real, but just being the way I am, I'd have to see it happen in person for me to believe it.
Oh well, in the end, it's only a Mac. They wouldn't be around with 1% market share if Microsoft wasn't propping them up to 'prove' that Bill Gates don't have a monopoly in the computer market.
As other people have predicted, the end of the Mac as a computing platform is in sight and Apple will eventually abandon it and concentrate on selling iPods.
FOR SURE USED A VIDEO SCREENING APP AND PLAYED BACK FULL SCREEN ON MAC. WHY DID HE CONVENIENTLY NOT SHOW THE INITIAL START UP OF THE SYSTEM FROM BEING UNPLUGGED AND THEN PLUGGED IN?
EITHER HES FAKE OR TOO STUPID TO MAKE A CONVINCING ENOUGH VIDEO!
EITHERWAY...SOMEONE FUCKED UP!
kangaorozach
You CHECK if something is correct
But you hand someone a CHEQUE.
Those of you who can't understand why anyone would want XP on a Mac... get a job!! For your info, when you grow up and enter the real world, you'll find that the majority of corporations run Wintel-based environments. As such, MANY of us dedicated Mac users are forced to use (and often own) both platforms, Windows & Mac.
Furthermore, it's a GREAT benefit to web developers to have access to as many platforms as possible for testing purposes. Having a dual-booting Macintel with Mac OS X and Windows will save time (AND money by not having to buy extra hardware) for a lot of people.
Me, I work primarily on Mac OS, but my day job requires me to use Windows. Since I do a lot of work at home, I have both a PC and a Mac. When I'm lazy, the PC is slaved to my Powerbook and I work on it thru Terminal Services. How awesome would it be if I could just choose to boot into Windows on a MacBook instead of having to Terminal into my PC beast? Damn awesome, that's how awesome.
As for the video, it sure smacks of legitimacy to me. As already pointed out, it CAN'T be a rolling video on that Mac since you clearly see screen resolution change during install, and running the iMac's monitor as an external monitor off a PC box, whilst not being impossible, would required some pretty scarily invasive hardware hacking.
Only time will tell.
Torontoguy - That "monitor" was an iMac, which unfortunately DOES NOT have video inputs of any kind.
I wish the iMac DID have video input! Then I could run my Xbox 360 on it!
Why would you ever want to do that to a mac. It kind of defeats the purpose of even buying a mac, right? Now, how does this help anything or anyone? I just fail to see the reasoning behind offering money to do such a thing. Seems like some people have a whole lot of time on their hands.
#49 / Jay:
1) At 4min 35sec into the video, you'll notice he's expands the "Computer" tree, which clearly shows "ACPI Multiprocessor PC". I think this would be the processor section you're looking for.
2) I didn't see anywhere where the mouse moves beyond the available screen bounds.
"Someone else notce this?... it looks like the apple logo was replaced with the flag logo in the video. That alone says to me that this is faked."
Nah, it's just Microsoft trying to be cool by copying the look of OS X, even down to the boot screen. Standard practice for them. Where have you been?
so this might sound stupid, but how bout mac os on a windows (x-windows) rather than the windows on mac?
This looks pretty legit to me, the smoothness in the graphics rule out emulation in my opinion.
to N:
1.) No, he's talking about the 'General' tab on the 'Computer Properties' screen. It tells you what type of processor(Intel or AMD), the CPU speed, and amount of RAM.
2.) Yes the cursor does go beyond the windows screen into the black area. When he's moving between the 'Not right now' radio button and the 'Next' button on the 'Help Protect Your PC' screen. It happens quickly, but it does.