Hackintosh maker rises from the dead
'When life gives you apples, make applesauce'
Psystar, the Florida-based Hackintosher that's been giving Apple fits for over a year, refuses to die.
The Unofficial Apple Weblog (better known amongst fanbois as TUAW), published a copy of the upstart clonemaker's latest newsletter, which announces to its customers that not only is the company preparing to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, but is also offering a new tower based on Intel's quad-core, 2.66GHz Xeon W3520 at the bargain-basement price of $1,499.99.
We won't recount all the twists and turns in the on-again, off-again legal battle between Psystar and Apple - after all, we did that just last week when Apple convinced a Florida bankruptcy court to allow Cupertino to continue its copyright-infringement case against the pesky Hackintosher.
But today's news brings to mind the wisdom of ballpark sage Yogi Berra, who famously said: "It ain't over till it's over."
And it most certainly ain't over - at least from Psystar's point of view.
Psystar's Open(7): $1,499.99 - display not included
The company's newsletter, referring to their May filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, says that Psystar is "now ready to emerge and again battle Goliath."
The Hackintosher's latest weapon in this battle, dubbed the Open(7), is available on the company's website ("In stock") with either 6GB or 12GB of 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM, and either 7,200rpm or 10,000rpm SATA2 drives. Apple's Xeon 3500-series entry-level Mac Pro configuration, by comparison, tops out at 8GB of 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM with 7,200 rpm drives, and starts at $2,499.
The Open(7), according to the newsletter, also benefits from "our innovative three-layer sound-deadening side panels and front door" which make the tower the company's "most quiet computing configuration available."
"Quiet," though, is not a word easily used to describe Psystar's attitude in this ongoing battle, as evidenced by the newsletter's closing line. "When life gives you apples," it reads, "make applesauce." ®
COMMENTS
Then again..
@Psymon Posted Friday 3rd July 2009 10:47 GMT
"Apple have an unethical monopoly over supplying the hardware."
No they don't - they are a hardware company who also make and sell the OS and software to run on it. Apple's business model is to make "the whole widget". This is not illegal, unethical and certainly not a monopoly.
"What they are actually supplying now is a customised flavour of Linux..."
Wrong again, it is a modified version of BSD (Darwin) and related support applications with Apple's own GUI (Aqua). Apple take onboard improvements made by the open source community and fold their own improvements back into the community's work. Apple take but they also give back.
"...Once upon a time, an Apple computer was made by er, Apple..."
And Apple computers are still made by Apple, in so much as IBMs are made by IBM, Dells are made by Dell and HPs are made by HP.
"...running on the same hardware that that every other PC compatible maker uses...
No, wrong again. Outward appearances show a similarity to generic computers. But it is the attention to detail, build quality, materials used, selection of quality components, and minimalist, stylish aesthetics which sets Apple hardware apart from the crowd. People who don't get this need to check their prejudice at the door and actually inspect a Mac in detail.
"...And charging the earth for it."
Spec a Dell or HP to match a Mac and that argument completely falls apart. And only Apple can offer OS X. So you get a better built machine with an OS which is light-years ahead of the competition. In the end, you get what you pay for. I'd rather pay for quality and usability.
"We had a member of staff here that demanded she work only on Macs, so I looked up the specs. I specced up a very mediocre system, and then saw the price!
After I'd finished laughing, I picked myself up off the floor, dried my eyes, and told her in no uncertain terms to take a long walk off a short peer."
Referring to my previous remark, I doubt you seriously made an honest comparison. You certainly were approaching it with a prejudiced attitude. Staff should be given the most appropriate tools for the job to extract the most productivity from a person. But it is amazing the number of companies, well IT Departments, which will cut off their nose to spite their face.
"Perhaps if one of Psystars offerings were around at the time, I might have considered it."
And perhaps your IT department would have had a BLIND FIT that you bought an unsupported computer with unsupported OS from a fly-by-night company of dubious reputation and heritage which is engaged in highly questionable legal shenanigans and has a very uncertain future. Yes, that would certainly endear you to the IT Department.
@Matt 89
>> I hope Apple go at this guy all guns blazing, as it's clear he's cashing in on other people's hard work!
So you don't think an Intel CPU (that Apple used to scoff at) with a 'nix operating system is cashing in on other people's hard work then?
@ Jonathan Adams
I'm looking at a box which seems to contain OS X 10.5 discs... hmm, yes it does! I seem to recall buying it from Amazon... hmm, there's the receipt! Amazon didn't ask me any questions about what machine I planned to install it on. They just sold me the box. I'm looking at another box, which seems to contain OS X 10.4 discs... hmm, yes it does! I seem to recall buying that one over the counter at the Apple Store in Wellington Green here in Palm Beach County... hmm, don't have the receipt handy, that was a few years back, but I _know_ that the Apple Store _still_ carries OS X boxes, just at a higher price than Amazon which is why I bought 10.5 from Amazon.
I'm looking at a computer system which is running OS X 10.5 over in the corner of this room... and instead of an apple logo, it seems to have a big HP on the front. Why, yes it does. Gee. How is that possible? Could it be that I installed OS X on non-Apple hardware? Why yes I did. Does Apple give a damn? No they don't... 'cause I'm not _selling_ the result. If I were to try to put that HP box up for sale with OS X on it, Apple's lawyers _would_ land on me from a great height... and rightly, too. Apple isn't suing HP, despite the fact that many HP boxes can run OS X without problems, because HP _doesn't advertise those boxes for sale as OS X machines_. They are suing Pustar precisely because they _are_ advertising their boxes for sale as OS X machines.
You _do_ see the distinction, don't you? A private individual can do whatever they damn please, Apple will neither know nor care. A company can sell OS X-compatible boxes, Apple will not care... unless they advertise them as OS X compatible and sell 'em with OS X installed. Then they care. If Pustar stopped shipping boxes with OS X and stopped advertising their systems as OS X-compatible, Apple's case would evaporate. But this will never happen, as Pustar's whole business plan is to get a ride on the back of Apple's (and many others, mostly in the free/open software community) work. If they just made a box which would work fine as a Hackintosh but didn't sell it with OS X, no-one would know they existed.
@Psymon
No, it's not Linux, it's Darwin. Darwin is based on the FreeBSD kernel and som of the userspace tools IIRC.
I totally support what Psystar are doing, so long as they give credit where it's due to the hackers that made it possible.
I really don't see that Apple have much of a leg to stand on. Especially know that boot-132 makes it comparatively easy to install unmodified OS X media on a lot of machines, and they don't even have to hack the drivers or kernel. This can mean there is no distribution of modified code, on of Apple's objections.
@ AC (5th July 14:23)
Well said that man :) There is far too much unwarranted Microsoft-bashing by those I shall term "Regtards" who seem to be incapable of writing a comment that is anywhere near related to the article!!
Yet again... the comments on this article have turned into anti-Microsoft bullshit... HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS HAPPEN EVERY TIME???!!
