Mac OS X 10.3 installed on Nokia N900 via PearPC, barely usable for impatient geeks
Curious folks around the world enjoy a bit of hackintosh every now and then (although once is enough for many), but no geek has successfully ventured as far as Toni Nikkanen of Finland, who became the first person to run OS X on a phone -- the Nokia N900. As you can see in the video after the break, Toni's hack relies on PearPC -- a PowerPC emulator -- to install good ol' OS X 10.3 (Panther), but the mammoth sluggishness means it's far from usable. Still, if you can spare 90 minutes for each boot-up plus plenty more for the snail-paced cursor, then head to the source to learn from Herra Nikkanen.
[Thanks, Matija]
[Thanks, Matija]























Soon the N900 can tie my shoes for me!
@HotDog get over it. and about the phone, gotta love linux.
@HotDog
man every day N900 is running something different
just I need it to support att 3g
@00iEye00 Yeah, Jobs DID say that! And no one believed him.
@filjosh
Same here :)
Impressive. 10.3 sucked, just like 10.0, 10.1, and 10.2, but impressive nonetheless. Tiger or Leopard would impress me more.
@Nitesh 10.3 was pretty good. It was probably the easiest on system resources.
10.3 can't even run the latest skype until you install updates to 10.3.9 AND the media framework from 10.4.. Transmission? Safari 4? OpenOffice Aqua?
I didn't find 10.3 very useful at all.
@ethana2
That's kind of like saying you don't find horse drawn carriages useful because you can't go as fast as a car. The software you're using as a comparison to the OS either didn't exist or existed as an older version at the time. Backwards compatibility is, unlike diamonds, not forever.
@Nitesh Now we just need someone to get kexts for this so we can run hackintosh leopard on it and get the full capability of the hardware. Heck, if it can run on some of the old macs, it can run on the n900 eventually.
How much ass could and iPad suck if and iPad could suck ass?
@formetopoopon
hackers will install osx and windows on the ipad, then it will be worth something just like the jailbreak iphone
@formetopoopon Yet another mindless ipad joke for absolutely no one to laugh at....... please grow up..... and if your 40.... please find a way to mentally mature yourself mentally
@ivealwaysgotmail
Please . . . improve . . . your word choice . . . you commenting commenter.
And bravo to the accomplishment.
@formetopoopon to Jailbreak or to Hackintosh, That is the question.
@GeoHot
It is pretty sad when you have to hackintosh an apple product.
Just sayin'
@(Unverified)
iPas wont have much more oomph over N900, so instead of 90 min boot up time you might get 45 min boot up time.
There wont be a usable OSX hack for iPad, but maybe a linux will turn it from lemon to lemonade.
I can name a full desktop OS that you CAN install on ARM :D
@New Reformation
It will be ironic when (/if.....hopefully it doesn't happen) hackintoshers determine that there is no way to get OSX on the iPad, being almost all Apple hardware. Yet a Nokia can do it.
/sigh at least it will make a fun little window to vnc into a bunch of computers with the various OS's on them.
@jedidove Well, bud, They can pull the same ghetto-rigged PearPC trick on the iPad, since it is also running an ARM processor, but it will take some work. It will only emulate a PowerPC processor tho, so the best they can hack onto it is 10.5.
Theres a reason Apple didn't put OSX on it...they didn't want to recode OSX for the ARM architecture, and an x86 chip just wasn't a smart choice.
@samsmith3
Yea, but I'll probably pass on PearPC+10.5. That said, I'll still be happy to see it happen, but of course that article will be plagued by "OMFG LOOK HOW LONG IT TAKES, AND ITS APPLES STUFF OMGMGMG LOLLL"
Their choice of withholding OSX was probably a little deeper than just that though, though I'm sure that was part of it.
@ethana2
iPhone OS?
Windows CE?
@samsmith3
Maybe you should learn a little bit about Apple products before you continue to make a fool of yourself.
iPhoneOS (which is used on the iPad) is a subset of Mac OS X. So Apple already DID code a large portion of the OS to run on ARM. Granted, they would have to port the iApps, but OS X and its apps were designed from the start to be easily portable - which is why it ran on Intel and PPC for so long.
Quite an amazing feat yet not too sure how much practicality there is for it. Might as well buy a computer of some sort.
@CatInTheHat422 the point isn't to be practical. the point is, it happened.
@Jables237
I'm well aware it happened, just throwin my 2¢ at it. Relax, no need to become defensive.
@CatInTheHat422: This article is about the N900, not the iPad.
@Ruben
And your point is? I'm slightly confused as towards what your argument is. I don't remember saying anything bad about the N900 or the iPad, both being pretty nifty devices if you ask me.
@CatInTheHat422 actually people click reply simply so they get to have their comment near the top :D
@brrip
Good point :)
@brrip This is true but I Rueben was referring to the comment that Cain made
"not too sure how much practicality there is for it. Might as well buy a computer of some sort"
I think.
It was just a joke. Jeez.
Its like trying to make an Osama joke during the RNC.
@CatInTheHat422 Hurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
looks rather annoying to use
@M3
Bah stupid engadget killed my sarcasm tags. They have a sarcasm filter now.
@M3
Now it killed the comment. lol
the people at apple should take a look at this
next, windows xp...
@Acey more like 3.1
@JohnSlashRob
almost any medium range phone can tun 3.1
i know the n900 is much more capable
@JohnSlashRob Ugh 3.1 blinds me like nightmares from my childhood.
@JohnSlashRob
n900 already ran 3.1 like half a year ago...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51pX4h-Q2Nc&feature=player_embedded
@Robbie Hottie, runned NT as well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUA78P7gGCQ
@Acey oh gosh i wasn't talking about capabilities; I totally remember it running 3.1. I was trying to be clever and correlate the age of the OS'. Now I just wonder what in the world I was thinking. 2003 does not equal 1992!
Probably posted in my end-of-full-work-day haze.
The exclude Apple homepage is still not working!!!
So now they are using emulators to talk about apple without being excluded from http://www.engadget.com/exclude/apple/ and using a Nokia device: the company that don't want to hear about apple
What a sick phone!!!!!!! Worth every penny!
Now this is news! refreshing! keep up the good work fellow nerds :-)
even the non-Apple posts are about Apple!
but this is cool. i haven't been paying much attention to the N900 but from the little i've read recently it seems pretty sick. so could you multiboot Maemo, OSX and Android?
@kojo87 No, this is an emulation inside Maemo.