Psystar Open Computer unboxing and hands-on
By Nilay Patel 
posted Apr 30th 2008 12:24PM
posted Apr 30th 2008 12:24PM
Update: We've done some preliminary testing and benchmarks, check 'em out.
Pimp! I may actually order one of these now.. Thanks for taking the risk Engadget!
what do you mean taking the risk, they got this for free I am sure
wow, really, until PC or MAC hardware revolutionize the tower case or bring a whole new design to the motherboard or something... nothing special here, just a faster rectangular block with all the usual suspects in it - i really don't need to see an unboxing of a stupid tower case, no offense, but nothing cool here, just because its a new apple computer you have to show the unboxing...? do that to every PC that comes out why don't you, o wait its a Mac.. oooooooo.....even alienware towers look better, but still.... boring!
Mex you clearly have no idea what's going on here.
mex, go to the corner. Pay attention before posting drivel.
@Moburkhardt
Most review sites get their stuff free of charge but ship it back right after they are done testing it. They don't get to 'keep' anything.
In fact, it is policy at many review sites that everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, has to go back... otherwise it would look like manuf are bribing review sites.
Of course, some times the sites will get the stuff donated so they can give it to users in 'give aways', but they are almost NEVER given to employees or used as test benches for future reviews unless they are purchased from the company outright
BUT Does it play time machine?
I really hope you guys took the plastic off the front. It annoys the hell out of me when people leave those ugly plastic sheets on.
Apple aren't stopping these guys, for all we know Apple "is" these guys. If you get me.
@ Raptor007
If Apple licensed companies like Dell and Asus to sell Macs, then consumers wouldn't have to deal with activation. It'd be the same as buying a PC that already had Windows preinstalled from any distributor.
Apple isn't monopolizing the Mac market in order to "ensure quality," they're doing it to make their lives easier. Writing drivers and dealing with compatibility are simple when a company only releases four or five products a year.
Apple is actively trying to stay out of the mass-dictribution market because of the baggage that comes along with it. They make enough money and don't feel like they need more. That's why Apple Fanboys need to support the OSX86 project. It does nothing but help them. In the end, Mac loyalists will get a better spec'd machine for a lower price, while still being able to run their favorite OS. Mac will have to lower prices/open their policies in order to keep up with the OSX86ers.
Dagnabit. Wrong reply button.
I'm so getting one for my Final Cut Studio set up. Anybody knows how to hook up a P2 camera to that printer port?
Cool, but about the only perk you get over building it yourself is them hacking OSX into it for you (and an hour of building). Still, not a bad price all things considered.
true....
However, good things will come out of this...
We need to keep pushing Apple towards an open model, and the only way they will budge is when they take a hit in the pocket.
Getting Leopard on a normal x86 PC isn't that hard...I have it running...
@Nabil
Do you really want OS X to cost $300 and be full of online activation DRM? Microsoft has to do it because they don't make their money selling the hardware to run Windows.
@Raptor
@ Raptor007
If Apple licensed companies like Dell and Asus to sell Macs, then consumers wouldn't have to deal with activation. It'd be the same as buying a PC that already had Windows preinstalled from any distributor.
Apple isn't monopolizing the Mac market in order to "ensure quality," they're doing it to make their lives easier. Writing drivers and dealing with compatibility are simple when a company only releases four or five products a year.
Apple is actively trying to stay out of the mass-dictribution market because of the baggage that comes along with it. They make enough money and don't feel like they need more. That's why Apple Fanboys need to support the OSX86 project. It does nothing but help them. In the end, Mac loyalists will get a better spec'd machine for a lower price, while still being able to run their favorite OS. Mac will have to lower prices/open their policies in order to keep up with the OSX86ers.
So lt me get this straight. It ships with a boxed copy of Leopard but you can not use it to reinstall on the computer they ship should you need to because it's not the hacked version. I thought Paystar said they were going to ship the proper software that would allow you reinstall their version of the OS X if you need to?
So what happens if you need to reinstall? do you ship it back to Psystar?
Or you can image your hard drive when you receive it.
u send back ur hdd
psystar said specifically that the vanilla kernel would be installable on their open computers.
Weak...this guy is profiting from all the hard work the OSx86 people have done, and risking the whole community on top of it.
Welcome to America! He found a niche and is exploiting it. He will get shut down by Apple eventually though.
Leopard is just a cosmetic improvement over Tiger. The same can be said about Leopard Server over Tiger Server.
I learned Mac Servers inside and out. While they may be easier to use than Windows Server, the newest Leopard Server is ridiculously confusing compared to Tiger.
Leopard OS uses more memory and higher CPU speed than Tiger - it totally lags up our G5 overwatch computer. In order to make the best use of it, you gotta get the new Intel processors.
Leopard Server is only confusing if you have a limited capacity to learn, or if you're a little weak-minded to begin with. It's really not that difficult (by which I mean it's not difficult at all).
And of course the fact that you think Leopard is simply a cosmetic improvement over Tiger is laughable. I mean you're either just spectacularly stupid, or you're really ignorant. Objective-C runtime including garbage collection, XCode 3, Core Animation, DTrace and Instruments, scripting bridge, Ruby on Rails, LLVM in OpenGL, ZFS implementation, new UDF drivers, latent semantic mapping, kernel level RBAC, Leopard is fully UNIX compliant, library randomization...
These are only some of the improvements in Leopard and obviously this list doesn't include the mind-bogglingly obvious additions like Time Machine, Boot Camp, Spaces, Quick Look, and all the improvements made to the rest of the applications.
Only cosmetic improvements... heh. That would be funny if it weren't so pathetically wrong.
Zak to Flashpoint! Flashpoint are you stil there? Hello? Hello? (hears echoes and crickets in the background)
@Zak:
"ZFS implementation": Hardly. Read only. Not too useful. And HFS+ sucks.
"XCode 3, scripting bridge"... Yay! APIs! Expected stuff! Every OS has APIs and dev tools. No big surprise. Microsoft also has stuff like this you know.
"Core Animation, LLVM in OpenGL" -> Whats this gotta do with servers? Yay, My server has pretty graphics.
"DTrace and Instruments, Ruby on Rails" -> Existing software for similar platforms that was easily ported over. Wow, what an accomplishment!
"Leopard is fully UNIX compliant" Surprising that it took 5 revisions of a UNIX BASED OS to be UNIX COMPLIANT.
In fact, it looks like you probably just copied this list off apples site.
@atrain
your opinion about leopard desktop/server doesn't matter. the point is leopard is vast improvement over tiger, especially for intel based macs. Zac's post established that, we don't care what you think. drop some facts or move on. .... HFS+ sucks ... thats funny.
@atrain
HFS+ sucks? Care to give any reasons? Oh, I guess you wouldn't, because there aren't any. I'll take an alias over a symlink or shortcut any day.
I will say I'm not a huge fan of the move to garbage collection, but maybe that's just because Java's implementation did not impress me.
I don't see why this is 'profiting off the work of OSx'. Technically OSx and the Mac hardware are two separate entities and products. You can buy OSx separately. They are paying Apple for each copy of OSx, which seems fine to me. Apple uses off the shelf parts just like everyone else, even if they do get special consideration on some of them like boosted CPU versions.
The two issues here are that:
1. Apple has a boutique product that works well because they put effort into it to try and make it worth that. Psystar's computers may end up unstable and have problems with updates if they can't put the constant effort into the software end.
2. Apple would have a problem if Psystar copied other things like their Bios or tried to push off modified versions of OSx as their own. If they keep it clear that they are applying patches to the OS, that seems like it would be hard to argue against.
Actually Jason the reason for why it will hurt Apple is because OS X and the Apple hardware is more one entity like than two entities.
Apple makes the hardware and software, it doesn't however profit off the software. It uses OS X as a marketing tool and subsidies it to sell more Macs, which is where it makes it's money.
A good example of this would be that while Apple has 6-7% market share, they are making half of what Microsoft makes.
"'Leopard is fully UNIX compliant' Surprising that it took 5 revisions of a UNIX BASED OS to be UNIX COMPLIANT."
BSD is no more "UNIX based" than Tiger is. How many revisions of Linux did it take before it gained UNIX compliance?
As of now there are only 8 hardware/software combinations that meet the UNIX 03 standard, and of those only 3 Operating Systems are represented.
http://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/
Some how I don't think compliance is as simple as you imply.
atrain: Work harder on keeping your responses within the context of the post that you were responding to. Everything you said is irrelevant because it's your opinion and honestly who cares what you think? The reason I wrote my post is in direct response to Flashpoint's ill-conceived usage of the words "cosmetic improvement".
Now if you can come up with an argument that actually takes the "cosmetic improvement" statement into account and you can think of a way to defend it, then feel free. Otherwise, why are you even bothering to respond?
@ Flashpoint
seriously WTF did anything you say have to relate to Chris' post
"Weak...this guy is profiting from all the hard work the OSx86 people have done, and risking the whole community on top of it."
And why are you talking about Leopard Server? It's not even in the picture for the post. What can i expect from a guy that was looking into using Time Capsule to backup your school's important documents.
Stop trying to impress everyone on the tech blog with constantly posting your credentials and your literary vomit.
I always feel so bad correcting you. Its makes me feel like the a$$hole who yells at a mentally challenged person, but you leave me no choice.
@Jason
"I don't see why this is 'profiting off the work of OSx'. Technically OSx and the Mac hardware are two separate entities and products. You can buy OSx separately."
Chris isn't talking about profiting off of OSX operating system, which i guess they are cuz the main reason they are moving units is because they are shipping them with OSX, hes talking about the OSx86 community. It's an open community of people that donate time and funds to research and reports findings as to which Intel based hardware and PC hardware you can use in combination to build yourself a computer that will run OSX. Chris is saying that its pathetic that Psystar is taking free knowledge from a community of people that others have put time and personal funds into and selling that knowledge for personal gains.
http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
wow, styrofoam peanuts. gripping story.
You're supposed to make a flipbook out of the gallery images.
Dont support these scammers!! If you want OSx86 do it yourself. Its not like apple updates arent going to break this in a few weeks anyway and require you to learn how to hack osx yourself anyway. Ordering this will only give more money to people too dumb to do something with there life
Well, they managed to found a company and get shipments of a new product out the door. What have you done?
And you might want to proofread before you go calling anyone stupid. "do something with there life"... clever.
What's with all of the complaints from the OSx86 crowd? Isn't OSx86 licensed under the GPL?
How would apple updates go about blocking this? They're using genuine OS X Leopard.
I'd get it if it didn't look so bad.Seriously, id rather get a dell and put Leopard on it.
Well, it's definitely not packaged as beautifully as the Mac. This should be interesting. I cannot wait to see some test results.
how well does FCP run
Well this model has no firewire, it should be interesting to see them try to capture with FCP!
is there any open slots to drop a Firewire card into?
OMG ANOTHER Mac unboxing article, why don't you change your name to MacGadget, blah blah blah, whine whine bitch bitch cry cry... oh wait.
IT'S NOT A MAC THOUGH!!!
I KNOW!!1!!1!!!!1one!!twelve
And for whoever low ranked me, read my post again - all of it this time, including the last two words. And consider getting your irony detector fixed, lol.
Zak: I think people are low ranking you because, well, your post was stupid.
Who the hell thinks the !!111eleven thing is still funny?
Thanks for the insight Captain Obvious, I never would have been able to figure that out without your help. And people are low ranking my posts because I'm the one posting. It's just reactionary, it's not because of what I'm saying.
And if you think my post was stupid, it's because you haven't seen the hundreds of crybaby whine posts from all the Apple haters every time Engadget has an Apple product unboxing of some kind. It's pathetic to the point of hilarity.
But your post was INCREDIBLY stupid...
I'm aware of the whiners you speak of and its still not funny. Not even a little bit. In other news, please stop perpetuating the myth of the pompous mac zealot. I'm a mac user myself and it makes us look bad.
lol http://Zak.justgotowned.com
nice work guys!
I Low Ranked you just for fun!!
ZAK - You've made 3 posts in a little side-forum and already you have people that don't like you. Yes, I know I don't know you, but I'm pretty darned sure I would never hang with you, loan you money, or help you in any way. Kill yourself; you have no friends.
@ David Reynolds: "Kill yourself"?
you know... you don't have to be a total douchebag just to insult someone. I'm sure you could be clever if you only put a little effort into it.
fyi.
Luigi - more stupid than commenters here crying their sad little eyes out every time an Apple related article is posted?
Zoroaster - since my post was a parody of all the crybabies on engadget, I fail to see how it makes "all mac users" look bad. Strawman much?
David Reynolds - Thanks for the info, but since I wasn't planning on borrowing money from you anyway it's a moot point. It is just adorable that you think I care what these morons on Engadget think of me though. Really, it's cute.
Zac, if you don't like the unboxing articles stop posting in them, you're only encouraging Engadget to do them.
You don't need to get riled up so easily. Why do you?
Ugh, it looks like an HP.
After you do your benchmarks, I say see how hard it is to "break" it (how many updates will it take before going black).
Can you put up any photos of the manuals -- the fact that they included any is hysterical to me.
I don't think those are manuals for the system. The orange one is the Gigabyte motherboard manual, and the white one looks like the processor flyer. The two b/w ones are probably something that has to do with the case.
I'd like to see some manual images too.
I liked you better in the red top days. :)
What a shitty case.
Cheap steal and plastic FTW! Then again a good aluminum case would push it over $400/
Heh, I have that case and its not a bad one. I'm running an 8800 GTS, high-end PC in this thing and its nice-'n'-cool.
Pretty bog-standard, but hey, its got stealth drives, its modest - not many cheap cases can say that about themselves.
@maty -- I actually kinda like that case. Care to share what it is?
It's an Asus case, actually pretty decent.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811173013
At last..., please let this be the begining of the clone MAC's....!!
There already were clone Macs. Umax, Motorola, Daystar Digital and Radius all made Mac clones. And of course, the clones cut directly into Apple's existing customer base, making them lose money almost instantly. Apple makes money on hardware sales, so when people aren't buying Apple hardware, Apple isn't making money. Apple is a business, not a charity.
Licensed clones are not going to happen again. Not any time in the near future anyway.
Hey Zak, Microsoft seems to be doing well as a software "charity". Apple just couldn't compete with the same business model.
Really? Microsoft is a charity? That's funny, I seem to recall having to actually pay for Windows It's more expensive than OS X, you know. Yes, Apple's OS marketshare is very small and they don't make money on OS sales, so they wouldn't be able to support themselves that way. That's why I pointed out that Apple makes money on hardware.
And it wasn't a matter of competition. Apple was making the hardware and the OS long before Windows existed. Apple and MS really don't have the same business model, do they? MS licenses their OS, Apple doesn't. Wouldn't that be a fairly key difference in business models, since Apple sells hardware to make money?
Apple and Microsoft are not in direct competition. Apple is a hardware company and Microsoft is a software company. Sure Apple makes software, but it is only available on their hardware to they still remain a hardware company with a strong software side to them.
In any case since they do not support running their software on anything but their own hardware they are NOT a direct competitor to Microsoft. Rather they compete with the likes of Dell.
Unfortunately people seldom can see past the OS X vs Windows side of the reason to pick a Mac.
We don't need Mac clones. What we need is Apple to offer a consumer-grade upgradeable tower.
If you think the Mac Pro is overpriced, try building your own dual-processor Xeon Harpertown rig. You'd need two of these, for starters:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117137
I hope Apple or the OSx86 guys will squash Psystar for trying to profit off their hard works. I also hope Apple learns that there is a huge demand for a modest Mac tower.
Zak @ Apr 30th 2008 12:46PM
There already were clone Macs. Umax, Motorola, Daystar Digital and Radius all made Mac clones. And of course, the clones cut directly into Apple's existing customer base, making them lose money almost instantly. Apple makes money on hardware sales, so when people aren't buying Apple hardware, Apple isn't making money. Apple is a business, not a charity.
Licensed clones are not going to happen again. Not any time in the near future anyway.
Low Ranked or not them's tha facts.
@Raptor:
For starters the Macs use core 2 duo, not xeon processors. Which actually means you'd need something more along the lines of this:
http://www.smksuperstore.com/catalog/viewitem.asp?ID=34597
(Sorry, but first one I found came with a motherboard). I've actually run OSX(very, very smoothly) on my core 2 quad machine that, in total, cost roughly $1300. ($400 for motherboard and CPU, $110 for ATI HD-2600XT graphics card, ~$100 for the case, ~$100 for harddrive, $80 for speakers and $500 for 32 inch HD-TV for the monitor)
Mark - raptor was referring to the Harpertown Mac Pros, which do use Xeons. That's why he linked to those processors.
@Mark, Mac Pros have never used anything but xeons with ECC FB DIMM ram. So they are very much high-end hardware. They have been either double dual core xeons, or double quad core xeons, although now you can get a single quad core configuration.
The rest of the intel Mac line is using mobile intel chips, even the desktops.
I've got a question - what Gigabyte mobo is it using? Looks like it has a VGA port so it can't be the P35-DS3L.
looks like a gigabyte ga-g31m-s2l from the manual...
GA-G31M-S2L
Thanks, couldn't really read it. Interesting that it only has 2 RAM slots.
I hope the people who get this are prepared for zero updates from Apple. You'll be stuck at 10.5.2 with no bug fixes, security updates, etc. And I'm sure Apple will just update the Mac firmware to make the 10.5.x update not work on any other systems. What a great solution for the tight-wads!
Great, how much fun to be perpetually stuck in April 2008.
But it's an Apple, they don't have any bugs or security flaws because they're perfect, why would you even bother downloading patches?
Why would you think they don't get updates? They get at least 10 per major OS X revision. 10.4.0, .1, .2, .3, .4, .5... Apple is not allowed to improve things?
I know you're just being an asshole, but, still, part of me thinks you actually believe this.
Don't mind ron, he's just being an ass.
Also, Fun Fact: there were 12 revisions of Tiger. They went to ".11".
I'd rather have one of their ubuntu pcs but thats just me.
Yes, it is just you. :¬P
just list the internal hardware for us, for some reason you can't get the straight dope from their website.
;-)
that is one expensive paper weight..... imagine sometime next week, when 10.5.3 comes out and your computer won't boot anymore... you just spent $700 on a very expensive Windows machine..... LOL
or linux.... and "700 on a very expensive".... what planet are you from? are you running one of those $300 walmart e-machines? 700 bucks isn't all that much for a middle of the road machine with a decent graphics card and a lightscribe drive these days. I built mine for 600, granted, it has much better hardware/case than this thing, but compared to how much real macs cost, I think the price of this is worth the shot in the dark if an inexpensive mac clone is your goal... then again, you could just get a mac mini and have a real mac... call it a day... but then there would be no progress and no upgrade path in the future.
I can't believe I spent all that money on my 20" iMac and it didn't even come with a Parallel port OR a Serial port!!!! What a ripoff...
Yeah because those are things that you use at home everyday in 2008!
Obvious sarcasm is obvious.
Did you guys install the OS, or did you have them do it?
I find some of the feedback from some of these people a bit funny. I think this is a great price point for someone who is interested in a mac. I could care less about how the case looks, I'd be more concerned about how it performs. I bet you that if Vista was shipped in nice looking cases like the ones that Macs come in, they'd see just as well. Makes you wonder..
Makes you wonder why MS hasn't simply decided to start making their products look nice.
That should be MS, Dell, HP, Toshiba, and so on. I know MS doesn't design the cases...
Weak! A "Mac" without a Firewire port.