Dell Studio 17 quickly hacked to run OSx86

Usually it's "only a matter of time" before some new-fangled laptop destined for a Windows kind of life up and gets OSx86 installed on it, but for the Dell Studio, that matter of time was extremely short. Witness a Studio 17 running Leopard out of the box, save for a few minor problems like lack of full video support, sound, WiFi, Bluetooth, and Ethernet. Still, it's pretty encouraging to see the system working at all with such little time and effort put into it. Kind of makes you wish we lived in a super-magical fantasy world where you could run whatever OS you wanted on your laptop, doesn't it?

Update: We had to pull the read link here due to the "Engadget Effect" -- sorry Ken!

[Saad Rabia @ Jul 30th 2008 11:01AM]

That "super-magical fantasy world" is the world of OSX users only. Vista runs on every single laptop out there, including Apple Macs.

[Bender Bending Rodriguez @ Jul 30th 2008 11:05AM]

Vista was designed to be run on all x86-based PCs, OS X was not. Voted you down for not knowing what should be obvious.

[NoAndThen @ Jul 30th 2008 11:09AM]

it's actually the world of *mac* users only, not OS X users, as there are OS X users out there (like this dell Studio) who run OS X86. But, I've had several osx86 machines, and it just really is too much of a pain in the ass as far as drivers, etc. go.

Yeah, it's awesome, and mainly stable (+no viruses, duh), but I always find myself back on my macbook, and use boot camp if i need something else, which I find to be a VERY rare occasion.

apple FTW

[BluesK1d @ Jul 30th 2008 11:14AM]

Im pretty sure it was OSX that had to be hacked, not the laptop.

[Saad Rabia @ Jul 30th 2008 11:16AM]

@ Bender Bending Rodriguez: You've just defined "super-magical fantasy world", thank you.

[High Ranks make you sterile @ Jul 30th 2008 11:18AM]

I plan on getting one of these studios and ripping out Windows Shitsta on it and replacing it with Hardy or openSUSE 11

It isn't that way for OS X users only... Linux fans feel the same way. Dell had only good intentions releasing some Inspirons with Ubuntu on them... and this is just plain cool.

When the newest Windows OS admittedly flopped, it isn't fair that it has a stranglehold on the PC market, and that the vast majority of computers are sold with no choice but to have Windows on it. So people are paying to downgrade to XP, and/or are buying computers with an operating system on it they have no intention of using. Lame.

[peternj @ Jul 30th 2008 11:33AM]

oh yawn, Vista on the new beige boxes from Apple... real choice for all for those with an Aluminum fetish. Anything you want as long as it's Grey what a choice! Though to be fair sometimes you can get black!!! or White!!! wow so cool. Why bother buying anything but Apple? So much choice. Watch the dock bounce.

[retro77 @ Jul 30th 2008 11:44AM]

For all those that think your safe by not running Windows, check out this stuff:
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/111202/mac-and-linux-viruses-to-rise-significantly.html
http://money.cnn.com/2006/04/25/technology/business2_browser0425/index.htm
http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=376

Or just do a Google search and educate yourself. Security through obscurity is not security.

[Kelmon @ Jul 30th 2008 12:09PM]

@retro77

With all due respect, sir, I think I'll wait until a virus or worm appears that is effective against my computer before pushing the panic button. In the meantime these predictions or simply that - predictions.

[Robert Pugh @ Jul 30th 2008 12:50PM]

People have been predicting viruses for OS X since it came out. Eight years later, nothing has changed...

[MBS @ Jul 30th 2008 1:46PM]

@retro77:
1) People have been "predicting" this for years. It still has not happened.
2) There "security" experts obviously have a vested interest here. To stay in business people need to be afraid of malware.

[Kizorblade @ Jul 30th 2008 1:50PM]

@Retro77

Two years of running Macs and guess what...

Nothing.

[kccboy2004 @ Jul 30th 2008 2:09PM]

If you want to run OSX, why not just run some other UNIX based OS like Linux, There is little difference.

Linux + Google Docs / Lotus Symphony is better than OSX and more stable.

So why bother.

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Jul 30th 2008 2:12PM]

retro,

OS X and Linux are far from immune from viruses, you are absolutely right.

Fortunately, in 13 years using Linux and 6 using OS X, I haven't had a single virus, piece of spyware, or any kind of malware. Worst I've had is the occasional pop-up ads, and sometimes Safari downloads some sketchy file that would autorun if I was using Windows. It just sits there on my desktop and I laugh.

It will be a sad day for me when I have to start running AV software on my desktop, and I'm sure that day will come if market share continues to increase.

Until then, I will enjoy having CPU cycles for software I want to run, not software I *have* to run.

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Jul 30th 2008 2:26PM]

kccboy,

OS X does everything my Linux systems ever did, and more -- far more. I run Office 2008 which works great with my corporate Exchange system. I play DVDs without needing special hacks. Every piece of commercial software I've ever needed runs fine on OS X, and the shareware and freeware is both worlds more functional AND more polished than most of the stuff I've used in Linux.

Plus, I've got X11, and run hundreds of my favorite little Unix utils (rsync, scp, ssh, nmap, nc, ad nauseum) natively.. built-in, or thanks to Fink.

I've never had to worry about printer drivers or mounting my USB drive manually.

No doubt a homemade box with Linux would have been cheaper, but I often keep my systems for 5 or so years, and, frankly, the few bucks extra I paid to Apple is well worth the time I save on a daily basis.

I love Linux and truly enjoy working with it at my job... but it's just that, a job, not a lifelong fascination I want to spend all my free time on. YMMV, but the tradeoff of a few extra bucks for a really polished functional system is well worth it to many in my field. Go to an OSS conference and see how many Macs there are.

You could easily switch the conversation around and ask why you'd put up with Linux as a day-to-day desktop, with all of the compromises involved, just to save a few bucks.

Also, to fan the flames, why is this particularly engadget worthy? I get that it happened faster than usual, but I didn't get the feeling anything about this laptop made it especially hard from a technical standpoint.. no crazy architecture or anything.

[kccboy2004 @ Jul 30th 2008 2:35PM]

@Unixsystemsengineer,

What a great measured response. Intellect exists on Engadget !!

[Lantz @ Jul 31st 2008 5:36PM]

@peternj

You're criticizing Apple for not having a rainbow of color offering for their computers?!? That's so 90s, been there done that. How old are you?

[asdfk @ Jul 30th 2008 10:42PM]

@Kizorblade @ Jul 30th 2008 1:50PM


Five years of running Windows and guess what...

Nothing.

not even antivirus

[neofolklore @ Jul 31st 2008 8:38AM]

I've been running OSx86 for two months as an experiment and never switched back.

It actually gives me a warm fuzzy feeling that Symantic Antivirus for MAC is just to scan files you plan to put on a PC running windows.

[booticon @ Jul 30th 2008 11:01AM]

"lack of full video support, sound, WiFi, Bluetooth, and Ethernet"

Uh. That's not exactly running OSX, is it? ;)

[John @ Jul 30th 2008 11:04AM]

no, that's what running OSX on non Apple hardware is. Apple locks you in to their hardware and so unlike Microsoft, they don't have to support anything else at all. It just works so long as you don't do anything they don't want you to do.

[booticon @ Jul 30th 2008 11:09AM]

No John, that's not exactly what running OSX on non-Apple hardware is like, that's just running OSX with hardware drivers that haven't been patched, probably no kext hacking. I'd look at the Read link, but it isn't loading for me.

[FuzzyCat @ Jul 30th 2008 11:13AM]

I'm running OSX on my Acer Aspire 3690 and pretty much everything (bar the build in camera) works without much of an issue at all. I'm actually quite shocked by how well it runs. The only thing I can't do properly is updates and since this is an sse2 machine there's not update via the usual sources either.

TBH running this faux Mac and playing with OSX is probably likely to get me buying a real Mac in the end.

P.S. I don't like Apple but I do like OSX.

[John @ Jul 30th 2008 11:25AM]

That's what happens when you just install OSX. I know you can make it run regularly with hacking over drivers, but that always happens when OSX is put on a new set of hardware.

[Rick White @ Jul 30th 2008 11:42AM]

Sources say it's actually running Oh Shit X.

[Perrin Goldeneyes @ Jul 30th 2008 9:25PM]

Actually, the sound was working. The Video functioned, but not at native resolution. It 'detected' the Wifi Controller and Internal NIC, but identified them as unknown. Other than that, weird things did work, like the finger print reader, the Web Camera and the SD Reader...

[Perrin Goldeneyes @ Jul 30th 2008 9:53PM]

Allow me to correct myself, we didn't actually check the sound, but Ken has reminded me that the Sound controller went detected as 'unknown' as well.
Thank you,

[Matthew C @ Jul 31st 2008 1:02AM]

But does it have dual core support?

This would be a huge leap for the osx86 project, as almost all dell bioss prevent the osx86 kernel from running with both cores enabled. Its a problem that is specific to dell laptops, and if it were not for this issue, I would be running osx86 right now.

[Jack @ Jul 30th 2008 11:02AM]

Sacrelidge!

[IT-Accountant @ Jul 30th 2008 11:54AM]

fail!
oh, and it's "sacrilege"
double fail!

[billy bob thorton @ Jul 31st 2008 12:55AM]

@Joshua Topolsky

I have OSX on a portable 2.5" usb drive that boots with 95% of systems I plug it into with most if not all "main" features working.

[Patrick @ Jul 30th 2008 11:04AM]

I thought the whole point of a Mac was the stability of a closed architecture. If you thought the nightmare of driver support was bad for Vista.....

[broli @ Jul 30th 2008 11:08AM]

You mean the MYTH of nightmare driver support?

[Pochi @ Jul 30th 2008 2:06PM]

Patrick: Future Mojave lover.

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Jul 30th 2008 2:32PM]

You got low-ranked for this? I say, spot-on old chap. If I wanted to spend all my free time messing with drivers for my machine, I wouldn't have bought a Mac.

[Zak @ Jul 30th 2008 2:32PM]

No broli, it's not a myth. I have hardware that STILL doesn't work in Vista. Because MS requires certification for all Vista drivers, it can be a real pain to make them available.

[Mark Anderson @ Jul 30th 2008 2:54PM]

@cockboy

Two points:

1) Ditch the tape deck. You don't need them for PCs any more.
2) Certified drivers? My beta forceware would like to talk to you.

[Zak @ Jul 30th 2008 3:38PM]

Oh good, I like how your "solution" to Vista's ongoing issues with drivers is to hack it. That's awesome, and it completely absolves Microsoft of any culpability for these aforementioned ongoing driver issues.

Oh wait, no it doesn't. Apparently my point still stands. Oh, and it's not a tape deck. Nice try though. Care to try again when you have something worthwhile to say?

[Pochi @ Jul 30th 2008 7:34PM]

@Zak

Jesus Christ you really are like 13 aren't you...?

[Chris Macdonald @ Jul 30th 2008 11:04AM]

In general in he - only " the occasion of the time has " up to the modern transportable computer for which First-class Windows of the life precertainly, he also comes in the surgical system X-ый gets the century, he was organized in it, but for the study Делл, this occasion of the time was short very much. 17 témoine of the study the leopard which is unterpulled except the box, the awake soldier for some repeated problems like the absence of the support, the sound, WiFi, Bluetooth,

[Chris Macdonald @ Jul 30th 2008 11:06AM]

ahaha translated to spanish, to fench, to spanish again, to russian, to german back to english.. and we lost a few sentences somewhere along the line...


god i'm fucking bored

[kjb434 @ Jul 30th 2008 11:05AM]

That's the magical world I want to live in where i chose the OS i want. If i buy a computer, i should have the option to have all the OS's on the market.

Which means if you buy a Mac you should have the option of a LINUX or Windows OS.

If you by a PC, you should have the option of OSX (and have it worked).

It seems like Apple is the problem point though.....

[booticon @ Jul 30th 2008 11:14AM]

I seem to recall a time where Apple tried that whole licensing MacOS to other OEMs in the past...

[quag @ Jul 30th 2008 11:15AM]

> If you by a PC, you should have the option of OSX (and have it worked).

Apple invested billions of dollars developing Mac OS X. It is their intellectual property, which they license to users for a fee.

One of the terms of their license is that you can only run the Mac operating system (which, to remind you, is their intellectual property) on Mac hardware.

Running Mac OS X on any other hardware is a violation of their license agreement.

Why is that so hard for you to accept?

[kjb434 @ Jul 30th 2008 11:22AM]

quag...Did you read my comment or are just quick to defend Apple?

I was suggesting in a magical world everybody would have the choice of the operating system they like on the hardware they like.

That's why Linux and Windows are so good in this aspect.

I know many people who like OSX, but would love to build their own system to run it they way they want.

[quag @ Jul 30th 2008 11:38AM]

kjb434... Yes, I did read you comment, but I didn't take the "magical world" part literally since I don't live in a magical world.

But, if I did live in a magical world the whole point would be moot because I wouldn't do any work that required a computer. I would just sail around the Caribbean on my magical, 70-foot sailboat and dine on unicorn steaks every night.

kjb434, I suppose my mistake was taking you seriously.

[Skyride @ Jul 30th 2008 11:48AM]

@quag

Im sure you know already but the EULA dosen't say Mac hardware. It Says Mac BRANDED hardware. Put an apple sticker on it and its 100% legal.

I do wish this world existed. I am using vista and happy with it but if Apple were to release OSX to use on any PC then I would certainly look into it.

[quag @ Jul 30th 2008 12:02PM]

@Skyride

Actually, I wasn't sure, so I looked it up and here's what Apple's EULA says:

"This License allows you to install and use one copy of the Apple
Software on a single Apple-labeled computer at a time."
http://store.apple.com/Catalog/US/Images/MacOSX.htm

Frankly, I am surprised at how loosely worded this is, but Apple does own the trademark for the use of the word "Apple" in the field of computers so they seem to have that angle covered.


>Put an apple sticker on it and its 100% legal.

Interesting theory... one could argue that slapping a white Apple logo sticker on a Dell computer would then legally enable you to install Mac OS X on it. It's silly, but would seem to meet the terms of the EULA.

The real question, though, is who want to test this in court?

[phanbouy @ Jul 30th 2008 12:00PM]

quag, don't fuck with the unicorns or we'll have perpetual winter and the legend Tom Cruise will come kick your ass

[Ray-- @ Jul 30th 2008 12:07PM]

this is why Apple is talking about dumping Intel as their chipset now... too much of this thinking outside the Mac box and hacking the OS to work on your own hardware.... shame on your guys for wanting to think different!

http://atlanta.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2008/07/28/daily44.html?ana=yfcpc