Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Intel Businesses Apple

Intel Macs May Boot Windows XP After All 486

Posted by Hemos from the the-two-shall-meet dept.
mister_tim writes "While we'll have to wait till someone actually tries it to get absolute confirmation, news coming from Intel in Australia, reported here by Dan Warne in the Australian Personal Computer magazine, is that the new Intel-based Macs may be able to load and boot Windows XP after all. Several of the early stories after the announcement of the MacBook Pro and the Intel-based iMac assumed that Windows XP would not boot on Intel Macs, since XP doesn't support EFI (replacing BIOS in the new Macs), and Apple's statement that they wouldn't prevent the use of XP on Apple hardware didn't really give people much assurance either way. This statement from Intel implies that there is really no issue."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Intel Macs May Boot Windows XP After All More

Intel Macs May Boot Windows XP After All

Comments Filter:

  • Just wait a couple of days! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jellomizer ( 103300 ) * on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:20PM (#14483511)
    Except for hedging your bets. Why not wait at least a week, possible less. I am sure There are Thousands of people who will soon get their iMacI and try to install XP on it and post it for an attempt to have "eternal internet glory" for being the first to get a Production Macintosh to run Windows, along with other people who don't want to get outdone who will Try to have x86 Linux installed, with vmware that will run Windows, and possible OS X(But unlikely until...), then I give 1 month for them to figure out how to get OS X to run on normal PC hardware, and Vmware.
    • This would be an interesting race:

      - Will Windows or Linux be ported to these new MacTel boxes first?
      - Which OS will support 90% of the hardware on one of these boxes first?

      Linux is more modifiable, but Windows has a far larger userbase then Linux on the desktop. Porting "Linux to Mac" doesn't seem to have the same coolness factor of porting Windows to Mac.

    • Re:Just wait a couple of days! (Score:5, Informative)

      by Jeff DeMaagd ( 2015 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:35PM (#14483674) Homepage Journal
      for an attempt to have "eternal internet glory" for being the first to get a Production Macintosh to run Window

      Supposedly that was already done ten years ago for some Macs, when there was a PPC port of Windows NT.

      • Re:Just wait a couple of days! (Score:5, Informative)

        by daveschroeder ( 516195 ) * on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:03PM (#14483981)
        Supposedly that was already done ten years ago for some Macs, when there was a PPC port of Windows NT.

        Yes, I've got one of those boxes in my office (the one on the far left, next to my 128K Mac and NeXT Cube [wisc.edu]). And indeed, it could run Windows NT for PowerPC. It was a Motorola Viper, a prototype of one of the Mac "clones", and was to be the first shipping Common Hardware Reference Platform (CHRP) [wikipedia.org] machine. In theory, it could run Mac OS, Linux, AIX, Solaris, NetWare, and Windows NT. For various reasons, Solaris and NetWare on PowerPC were killed, as was Windows, eventually. Apple killed cloning (for Motorola's part, Apple bought back their Mac OS license for $100M), and the CHRP machines - or the first clone with the G3, the Motorola StarMax 6000 [everymac.com] - never shipped.
      • In my dorm computer cluster in about 1996 there was a Mac that had an x86 processor on it as well as a PPC. It ran Windows natively on the x86 daughtercard. You could run both OSes at once, I didn't think it was a very elegant solution.
        • Elegant or no, this was not an atypical solution. I had catalogs showing available emulator cards for the Apple II (x86 for DOS or Z80 for CP/M) and the TI 99/4A (which was actually an outboard hardware module, not a card)

        • Re:Just wait a couple of days! (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Scoth ( 879800 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @04:05PM (#14485157)
          I recently picked up one of these, a Performa 640CD DOS, at a thrift store for $5. It's actually not a terribly bad setup. It's not too unlike the Classic environment is today. There is a Control Panel that lets you start and stop it, with a few other options. Then you can have a keycode to switch between the two full screen. The one I got was a 486DX2/66, but there was a Pentium model available later on. It actually ran pretty decently, and I could see how handy it'd be to be able to run not only the bulk of Mac OS software of the time, but also any DOS/Windows app.

          More technically, it was implemented by way of a daughter board plugged into the 68040's CPU socket. On there was the actual 68LC040 (which I swapped for a real 68040) and the 486. There was a separate pair of SIMM sockets for the PC side of things; it had it's own RAM and didn't share the Macintosh's. There were runner ribbon cables that ran the audio over to the Macintosh's audio input plug (shared with, and mutually exclusive with, the Macintosh A/V card), as well as an output for midi/joysticks. All in all it wasn't a bad system, might have been cool if Apple had kept it up longer and perhaps allowed an intermixed interface with a Windows running on the system.

    • Re:Just wait a couple of days! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by NetJunkie ( 56134 ) <jason.nash@nosPam.gmail.com> on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:50PM (#14483848)
      There are already VMWare images of OSX to run out on BT sites. We played with one at work. I'm sure the people running it on normal PCs will just wait a few days to patch the release version and there won't be any issues. The key is to have the hardware that matches the current drivers. There is an HP notebook running around my office I've seen with OSX on it with full wireless and everything going.
      • That's fine for the "developer preview" copies of OSX, but chances are the "release" copies don't support booting from BIOS (which the developer preview Macs had). Given that Apple is now swapping developer PCs for new iMacs for developers, there probably won't be any more releases of OSX that boot on BIOS, only EFI.

    • Mine came this morning . . . (Score:5, Interesting)

      by happyemoticon ( 543015 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:18PM (#14484168) Homepage

      . . . so I can let you know later tonight:). I don't really have any interest in dual-booting per se, but I feel like it's my obligation as a geek.

      Got delivered at about 9:00. I only had a half an hour or so to play with it before I drove to work. I'm currently trying to convert my mother, so I set it up at her place so she could play with it today. Thoughts: Just as snappy as the G5's. Much better than my laptop. My only complaint is the mighty mouse - apparently it uses inductance to determine where your finger is, and normally I have my fingers constantly resting on either side. I only played with Safari, Photo Booth, and the MS Word trial, and I opened up system information to make sure it was the right iMac, of course.

      And now that I think about it, I guess Word was running on Rosetta. Holy shit! I didn't even notice.

  • I give it two hours before somebody tries this and posts results. *starts stopwatch*

  • Some clarification (Score:5, Informative)

    by daveschroeder ( 516195 ) * on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:21PM (#14483527)
    From the artricle:

    However, Intel Australia, while being careful not to comment on Apple's hardware specifically, says motherboards based on the Intel 945 chipset already support EFI and can boot Windows with no problems.

    This cryptic statement can't be taken as full reassurance though: it may be that 945 boards support EFI but do not come with it installed by default.

    [...]

    "For IA 32 systems, the Framework loads itself above the 1MB real-mode memory boundary to accommodate an optional Compatibility Support Module (CSM). CSM implementations can be tailored to platform requirements. A typical CSM is approximately 60KB (~38KB compressed) of firmware that is specific to each Participating Vendor and is based on that Vendor's latest BIOS code base. A contemporary implementation of the Framework on a PC includes a CSM for supplying services to operating systems that do not boot using EFI and for supporting legacy option ROMs on add-in cards. For legacy boot the Framework initialises the platform's silicon and executes EFI drivers. Then control is transferred to the CSM, which supports the legacy OS boot."

    So, as long as Apple has included a Compatibility Support Module, Intel-based Macs should be able to boot XP.

    It seems unlikely that Apple would have left this out. It has already said it isn't doing anything to prevent Windows from booting on a Mac.

    Yes, it's true that EFI has BIOS backward compatibility layer, but it is optional for the vendor to use and provide this. And Apple has no need for legacy BIOS support.

    Some further discussion of the general topic of windows booting can be found here: Will an Intel-based Mac run Windows? [appleintelfaq.com]

    The more interesting possibility for many users will not be directly booting or dual-booting Windows XP, but rather running Windows XP at essentially the full speed of the underlying hardware in a virtual machine, right alongside Mac OS X. Sure, for some game and direct hardware access applications, you would want to - or you may have to - boot Windows directly. But for the vast majority of access to Windows productivity and/or other software not available on Mac OS X, running Windows alongside Mac OS X is likely more desirable than dual-booting anyway.

    As has been noted, however, it is indeed extremely likely that Windows Vista will directly boot on Intel-based Macs with EFI.

    • Re:Some clarification (Score:5, Informative)

      by MsGeek ( 162936 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:59PM (#14483930) Homepage Journal
      The more interesting possibility for many users will not be directly booting or dual-booting Windows XP, but rather running Windows XP at essentially the full speed of the underlying hardware in a virtual machine, right alongside Mac OS X.

      This is actually the absolute best possible scenario for running Windows on a MacIntel. The untrusted OS (Windows XP) would run sandboxed in a virtual machine. It would get access to the internet and to hardware, but not "bare metal" access. It would all be mediated through Mac OS X and the virtual machine technology. It would have a "C drive" that is basically a file on the Mac OS X filesystem. And most importantly it would not get root access on the machine. At all. Do you see how this would be a better scenario than dual-booting?

      Intel has been working on virtualization technologies for years. The new Yonah/Core chips have that capability. Apple went Intel at the right time.

    • But for the vast majority of access to Windows productivity and/or other software not available on Mac OS X, running Windows alongside Mac OS X is likely more desirable than dual-booting anyway.

      I agree, but there's another issue you're neglecting: I think it's actually very important to Apple that their x86 machines be able to run Windows, because it allows them the chance to sell a lot more hardware (which is their bread and butter). There are some people who like OS X but need Windows apps, and the W

  • Does anyone think these articles are nuts? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dada21 ( 163177 ) * <adam.dada@gmail.com> on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:21PM (#14483529) Homepage Journal
    For years Mac users wanted cheaper hardware -- Apple is finding a way to provide lower prices by jumping on the most popular PC processor company's ability to consistently make quality products are reasonable prices. Mac users love the OS, I don't know of on Machead friend who would ever run XP, even under penalty of death.

    Only on slashdot do I honestly think we'll see people buying $1000 worth of Apple Intel hardware for $2000, and put XP on it. OK, so dual booting might have SOME value to certain people. Doesn't anyone feel we'll see better Windows emulation on the Mac OS if there is an Intel processor to fall back on?

    Other than that, what is the point of running XP on a Mac/Intel box? To be cool?
    • i'd imagine as soon as this hardware gets into the right developers hands a wine port should follow pretty quick. indeed i think darwine has already done most of the legwork needed to get an initial working relase (i imagine it will be X11 based at least to start with).

    • Re:Does anyone think these articles are nuts? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by gunpowda ( 825571 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:28PM (#14483602)
      I can think of a few reasons. Firstly, any Mac OS is going to be locked-down to their hardware, so if someone wants to experience that famed GUI, buying Apple hardware is the only option.

      The second main reason would be gaming, and simply so one could run popular Windows applications.

    • Where is this cheaper Intel hardware? (Score:5, Informative)

      by bogie ( 31020 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:31PM (#14483643) Journal
      "Apple is finding a way to provide lower prices by jumping on the most popular PC processor company's ability to consistently make quality products are reasonable prices."

      No they aren't. They switched processors but are keeping the same prices.

      "New Intel iMac: Same models 17 and 20, same prices"
      • Most computer companies have specific price points. Apple always charges the same amount for a specific level of machine. It's what you get at that price point. If you look at prices over the last several years, the professional desktop's (3 levels) haven't changed prices, just the speed and memory, etc... The same it true in the laptops. Dell, etc. do the same thing (although they have more models so can span a greater gamut of prices), and their XPS is the same price as the one I bought in the office last
        • > Most computer companies have specific price points.

          Acutally, with Dell, you can pretty much pick your price point in $1 increments anywhere between $300 to $3000. Every single machine seems to have a half-dozen CPU and video options. Meanwhile, Apple still has large several hundred dollar gaps between their models. (although that will probably change with Intel)

          That's why if you start with a Mac base configuration, the price usually compares within only 20% with the Dell. But if you start with most Del

      • Re:Where is this cheaper Intel hardware? (Score:5, Informative)

        by poot_rootbeer ( 188613 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:05PM (#14483996)
        They switched processors but are keeping the same prices.

        But on the other hand, the new Intel-based models have much higher performance than the last PPC models.

        On the other other hand, the last PPC models were logging behind Moore's Law as it was, due to market conditions.

        On the fourth hand, Apple has probably reduced the COST of a Mac computer, if not the price.

        Okay, I'm out of hands.

    • Re:Does anyone think these articles are nuts? (Score:5, Informative)

      by CerebusUS ( 21051 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:33PM (#14483662)
      Games and work.

      Individuals would love to be able to play any windows-only game without having to shell out an additional $1000 for a gaming rig.

      Work-stuff is more likely to be covered by a vmware-like os-inside-an-os solution, but it could still be handy to boot natively into XP for some work-related activities.

      Basically, you'd dual-boot OS X with Windows for the same reasons you'd dual-boot Linux and Windows. It's just that OS X windows aren't quite as hardcore in their geekiness as the Linux dual-booters.

      Of course for those of us who use all three OSes regularly, the ability for one box to run all of them is a bit of a dream come true.
    • For years Mac users wanted cheaper hardware -- Apple is finding a way to provide lower prices by jumping on the most popular PC processor company's ability to consistently make quality products are reasonable prices.

      You _really_ think Apple will be lowering their prices? Check on the prices of the new MacBook Pro and iMac; those don't look like lower prices to me.

      Lower prices for the customer isn't the reason for Apple moving to Intel.

    • Re:Does anyone think these articles are nuts? (Score:5, Funny)

      by bitkari ( 195639 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:40PM (#14483736) Homepage
      Other than that, what is the point of running XP on a Mac/Intel box? To be cool?

      So that we can play CounterStrike.

    • Other than that, what is the point of running XP on a Mac/Intel box? To be cool?

      I have a small apartment. My G5 tower and WinXP/Linux PC take up way too much of that small apartment. If I could get rid of the PC by getting a Mac that would natively run Windows and x86 Linux I would be a very happy person.

      I am a "Machead", but not all software runs on a Mac... I probably spend 90% of my time on the G5 and 10% of my time on the x86 machine.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Doesn't anyone feel we'll see better Windows emulation on the Mac OS if there is an Intel processor to fall back on?

      Yeah probably. WINE or VMWare or VPC. But the big #1 thing that VMWare and VPC have issues with is hardware graphics acceleration. If either of those can manage DirectX 9c or whatever it is that newer games need, at close to full speed, then then would rock the dualbooting idea totally. But until that day, people like me who want to play games that likely won't get ported (Rome Total War
    • If you can dual-boot (which shouldn't be any harder than getting Windows to boot at all), you need one fewer computer. Or you might want $1000 of thermal engineering and design. How many vendors are selling Intel hardware in consumer-level packaging that puts the entire computer inside a flat panel display? Chances are that the iMac is also the quietest off-the-shelf Intel machine available now.
    • There are an enormous amount of people who develop for windows, either native client or web and often with a DB that has only a Windows Installer. Doing this in an emulator might work some of the time, but it sure as hell won't work all of the time.

      In my job I develop for both a huge legacy ASP application and Java. Running a complex ASP application in an emulator is a torture and unusable for work. Therefore I need a Windows machine, even though I already have a powerbook. Give me a Mac that I can dualboot

    • Not nuts -- hackers (Score:5, Insightful)

      by fm6 ( 162816 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:50PM (#14483851) Homepage Journal
      I was wondering how long it would take somebody to ask this question. (Two minutes after the story was posted, big suprise.) The answer is that economics is irrelevent.

      Every time we get a story of the form "I hacked A to run on B" or "I hacked C to do E", somebody always asks whether it wouldn't be more cost effective to buy something off-the-shelf. The answer is almost always "yes". Even if the hacker is saving money on hardware, he's expending a lot of his well-paid time. But that just doesn't matter.

      A good hack is pretty much an end in itself. It might satisfy the hacker's curiousity, or improve his professional skills. Or it might add some minor functionality that the hacker's geeky priorities can't live without. But these are all secondary goals. The big goal is a sense of accomplishment, of having done something special. Asking a hacker why he doesn't just buy an off-the-shelf solution is like asking a Marathon running why he doesn't just call a cab.

      • ...like asking a Marathon running why he doesn't just call a cab.
        Except marathon runners don't spend their time boring everyone else telling them how much more expensive a cab is.
    • OS X on commodity PC hardware is what the world needs. Mac users will get cheap hardware, the world will get a decent OS, and there will be peace on earth and goodwill towards men.

      Or we can run Windows on a Mac, and worship the Beast.

      Tough call.
    • The mini mac was supposed to be the risk free way that someone could cheaply try out a mac with little risk, but an Intel Mac dual booting windows is an even better trial and transition machine.

      Naturally you only plan to dual boot with a few key apps and seldom may soon become never, but it gives piece of mind about leaving behind your windows software.

      I am waiting for the Intel Mac Mini as my first potential Mac.
    • "Doesn't anyone feel we'll see better Windows emulation on the Mac OS if there is an Intel processor to fall back on?"

      Well, yes. In fact on a PPC every instruction needs to be emulated, whereas on the new systems the Windows emulation can just run natively until it does something requiring privileged instructions (such as I/O).

      This is, in fact, the ONLY advantage I can see for this switch. Post after post people are wallowing in the mythology of Intel chips being cheaper, faster, cooler and no doubt are p
    • Only on slashdot do I honestly think we'll see people buying $1000 worth of Apple Intel hardware for $2000, and put XP on it. OK, so dual booting might have SOME value to certain people. Doesn't anyone feel we'll see better Windows emulation on the Mac OS if there is an Intel processor to fall back on?

      Business switchers. I know of dozens of small businesses that ask me to help with their computers and software. I usually decline to do so, because most are running Windows.

      Most of them are unwilling to switc

  • ....aaaaand? (Score:4, Funny)

    by pspalmer ( 900269 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:24PM (#14483556)
    So what? This is tantamount to saying something like "Hey, I just got a new Ferrari and the engine bay will accept a four-cylinder Chevrolet engine...." OK, OK....Perhaps a bit overstated, but still.....

    • This is tantamount to saying something like "Hey, I just got a new Ferrari and the engine bay will accept a four-cylinder Chevrolet engine...."

      Your analogy is not very apt. Computers are made to run OS's and programs. Cars are made to drive on roads. Your Ferrari will drive the same places with either engine. The computer will be able to run completely different software. Allow me to attempt a better analogy. Hey, I can detach the Ferrari's suspension and reattach to a tracked vehicle system. Now I can

      • Even better, you could say that I have this great Ferrari, but I can replace the body and interior with that of a Ford Taurus! A Ferrari drive train will operate in much the same way, regardless of whether you have a Ford body around it or the original Ferrari body.

        In the case of running Windows on an Intel Mac, you would be changing the user interface, mostly. The APIs could conceivably be emulated either way.

        The roads are more of an example of what the processor supports. Change the processor and you c

  • sure xp probably won't (Score:4, Funny)

    by jack_call ( 742032 ) * on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:24PM (#14483560) Journal
    ... but vista should http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10794396/from/RS.3/ [msn.com]

  • Yeah, but... (Score:2, Funny)

    by MarkGriz ( 520778 )
    does it run Linux?
    *ducks*

  • Is this a dupe? I can't tell anymore. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by TripMaster Monkey ( 862126 ) * on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:25PM (#14483571)

    Honestly...on the 12th we had a story [slashdot.org] on whether of not the Intel Mac would run Windows...a story that said nothing more definite than 'perhaps'. And now, today we get another story with essentially the same message...nothing definite, just useless speculation.

    Please don't post another story on this subject until a story surfaces about someone who's actually tried installing a Windows OS on an Intel mac, and can actually say something definite on the matter.

    Corroboration of the findings by another party or three would be nice, too.

    Oh, and this is the fourth Apple story today. Slow news day?
    If so, then why is the story I submitted at 8:26 am EST still 'pending'?

  • Awesome (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Vokbain ( 657712 )
    I know a ton of people who will buy an iMac if it can boot Windows for gaming. If this turns out to work right out of the box, a few of them will probably order their new Macs in a couple days. =)

  • mother of all articles (Score:5, Funny)

    by revery ( 456516 ) <<ten.2cac> <ta> <selrahc>> on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:30PM (#14483623) Homepage
    Just when I thought we had hit the cap on stories posted concerning Microsoft, Apple, and Intel, we get one that could reasonably be filed under Microsoft, Windows, Apple, Intel, News, etc.

    well maybe not News...

  • But will it boot TRSDOS or CP/M? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:35PM (#14483679)
    Will it boot up TRSDOS or CP/M?

    I like my machines old school.

    Real old.

    Wish I had moderator points to mod this up to out of sight.

    y'all

  • Dell is the only one who should be concerned (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jtkooch ( 553641 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:39PM (#14483726)
    Assuming you're a "Good Person"(tm), none of the companies directly involved should care if you could boot XP onto a Mac.

    You've bought the hardware from Apple, and part of your purchase price included the OS. So long as your check clears they don't care if you ever turn the damn thing on.

    You've purchased XP from Microsoft (and likely paid more for it than if it came OEM) so they don't care if you try and install it on your toaster.

    Dell would be the big loser in this scenario as they failed to sell you a PC.

    Now if someone should get WINE running under OS X, or get OS X to easily install on a generic PC then you will see an unholy alliance of MS and Apple attempt to destroy the persons responsible.
    • Now if someone should get WINE running under OS X, or get OS X to easily install on a generic PC then you will see an unholy alliance of MS and Apple attempt to destroy the persons responsible.

      Half right. MS would care about WINE, but they'd care only slightly more than they care about it on Linux. Apple wouldn't mind WINE (for the reasons you described), and would prolly be just as happy if you used it, as it is less money going to MS. But you're right in that a OS X on a generic box would mean such a
    • And this might be the biggest reason why Dell should jump ship to AMD..... just in case.

  • Article says nothing new. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Vellmont ( 569020 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @01:55PM (#14483893) Homepage
    There's no news here. I was expecting someone to have actually installed XP on an x86 mac. It's been known for quite a while that EFI would have backward compatility with BIOS. This entire article boils down to this quote:

    It seems unlikely that Apple would have left this out. It has already said it isn't doing anything to prevent Windows from booting on a Mac.

    I can think of reasons why Apple would have left this out. Why would they want to support this legacy support code for OSX as it gives them nothing? It makes supporting the boot ROM cleaner, and I'm sure the code is smaller by leaving it out. The only reason they might leave it in is if they get the example code from Intel, and it'd be more trouble than it's worth to take it out.

    As to Apple saying they wouldn't do anything to prevent Windows from booting on a Mac, well that sounds more like they won't actively prevent Windows from booting like by putting in code to detect Windows, and then booting it. If they take out the legacy BIOS compatibility code for other reasons I just don't see that as preventing Windows from booting, since Vista is supposed to support EFI.

    So, I think the question is still very open. Until I see someone with an x86 Mac running Windows natively, the jury is still out.
  • So we can stop seeing this argument every couple of days?
  • ... are we gonna be running Windows on a Mac, or Mac(OSX) on a PC?

    (or linux on a mac but with pc hardware.. but you could do that before, only now it's on x86 hardware.. so it'd be a x86 linux distro but running on a mac... er.. aghh.. my head hurts..)

  • Dumb assumption (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Andy Dodd ( 701 ) <atd7@@@cornell...edu> on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:05PM (#14483999) Homepage
    "It seems unlikely that Apple would have left this out. It has already said it isn't doing anything to prevent Windows from booting on a Mac."

    They have said they won't actively take any measures to prevent Windows from booting on an Intel-based Mac, but they've also made it clear they have no intention of actively supporting Windows on a Mac.

    It's not like removing the CSM would require any additional work, considering that unless it's written for the platform in question, the CSM doesn't exist in the first place! From the documentation I've seen, the compatibility module is not a generic off-the-shelf component that you can just compile in - It has to be custom-built for the platform, just like legacy BIOS is always specific to a particular platform (usually specific to only one single motherboard design.) Adding legacy compatibility to their Intel products would require a LOT of development work on Apple's part.

    In short, Apple will take the easiest and cheapest route. If it were harder to release an EFI system without legacy compatibility, Apple would just leave the compatibility module in. Unfortunately, it's almost guaranteed that it will be the other way around - putting in the optional compatibility module will require significant effort.

  • One word: laptop (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sunderland56 ( 621843 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:08PM (#14484043)
    A decently packaged dual-processor laptop for Windows XP for $2000 doesn't sound like a bad deal to me.


    Since I write Windows software during the day and play Windows-based games at night, OSX has zero appeal to me; but Apple's packaging is reasonably good, and the price is in the ballpark of high-end Dell and HP laptops. So, what's wrong with running the OS I want on the box I want?

    • Re:One word: laptop (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Budenny ( 888916 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:14PM (#14484122)
      "So, what's wrong with running the OS I want on the box I want?"

      You are right of course, running the OS of your choice on the box of your choice is the way the industry is going. But a lot of the mac people are stuck in the past. The reason they ask the question, why would anyone want to run Windows on a Mac, is that they do not realise what has happened with this move. You won't be, in the old sense, running Windows on a Mac. You'll be running it on an Intel machine branded Apple. Its perfectly reasonable thing to do, as reasonable as running it on any other Intel machine with any other brand. As reasonable as running it on one branded Dell. Probably came out of the same factory in fact.

      • Re:One word: laptop (Score:4, Insightful)

        by aristotle-dude ( 626586 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @03:58PM (#14485099)
        I don't know where you are stuck but most mac users know it is the OS and the software that you run that defines a machine's usefulness. The hardware fanboys may argue over what hardware is the best but all of that hardware is completely useless to a user without decent software to run on it.

        To me, the software is the most important part of the system.

  • Is that such a hot idea? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Doctor Faustus ( 127273 ) <Slashdot@@@WilliamCleveland...Org> on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:17PM (#14484163) Homepage
    From TFA: EFI allows devices in the PC to be initialised before the operating system boots, and has features like full network support before the PC has even booted, allowing drivers to be downloaded and updated before an operating system loads.

    I hope someone has thought through the security issues of that. Are EFI boards required to have hardware firewalls on the motherboard like the nForce 4 boards do?

  • Partitioning: GPT vs. APT vs. MBR (Score:5, Informative)

    by niclas.l ( 145733 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:36PM (#14484333) Homepage
    What people in general seems to be disregarding is the partitioning-style that the new Intel-Macs are using.

    Old Macs use a clean, simple, nice and flexible partitioning-system called Apple Partition Table. PPC-Mac OS can read those disks and boot from them. Intel-Mac OS can read them, but not boot from them (EFI does not like APT). Windows XP can neither read not do anything else with it.

    New Intel-style Macs use Intel/Microsofts new GPT, GUID Partition Table. It is a clean, simple and flexible way of partitioning the disks. Intel-Mac OS can read and boot from drives partitioned with GPT. PPC-Mac OS can not boot from them (but it might be able to read them with an update, although Apple says to use APT on all external drives to avoid such issues). Windows XP can read and boot them, but only the 64-bit version of Windows XP.

    Intel-PCs of today use MBR-partitioning. The MBR-way of booting and partitioning is a general pain in the butt, but it is what Windows XP (32bit) can understand and boot from.

    Of course, there might be a way to make Mac OS boot from MBR-disks, since it did in the developer-intel-version, and so it would be possible to runt Windows XP and Mac OS from the same MBR-partitioned disk, but I would not really feel at ease running my Mac-partition as one of the four primary partitions on the weird old legacy MBR-disk-system.

    Anyway. The iMacs with Intel CPUs have been out a couple of days now. Kodawarisan has even posted images of the insides of it, so if it was all that easy to run Windows, why have no one posted any pictures yet?

    Of course, there may be a way to get 32-bit windows to boot from GPT-drives. Please correct me if I am wrong.

  • Is cooling controlled by hardware or software? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by bedouin ( 248624 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @02:45PM (#14484431)
    I know that some PPC Linux distros had trouble controlling the fan speed on G5 PowerMacs, causing the fans to run at full-speed continuously. If cooling is maintained by OS X on these machines, would one really want to bother installing Windows on them?
    • Probably hardware (I'm not sure). TFA [apcmag.com] hints that Intel's 945 chipset is used. Intel Precision Cooling Technology [intel.com] has been a feature of Intel chipsets, but I'm not sure if it's used in the notebook chipsets in the MacBook Pro and iMac.

      From that Intel link:

      Intel® Precision Cooling Technology is available on selected Intel® Desktop Boards and is OS-independent; it works on Windows* or Linux* based systems. Here are just a few of the advantages of Intel® Precision Cooling technology:

      • Fan spe

  • Why we want a box that will run both OS X and XP (Score:3, Insightful)

    by geemon ( 513231 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @03:03PM (#14484620)
    Many of these comments are back and forth of "why would anyone want/need to run both OS X and Win XP/2000/2003 Server/etc"? Quite simply, I believe there is a large market of folks out there that would shell out the dollars for a nice Mac, particularly in the notebook realm, in order to be able to run OS X for personal preference but must carry a laptop that boots Windows in order to work on any number of enterprise applications. Take anyone out of a consulting or services business. Its a virtual guarantee that in day to day work that they will need to interoperate with one or more applications that reside on Windows but the footprint is too large to be workable under virtualization. (I know - I've tried to use Virtual PC on a loaded Powerbook to run a local copy of an enterprise app and the performance was dismal.)

    However, you give this market the choice of a laptop that can span both worlds equally well, Apple will sell a bunch.

  • Just got my iMac, some info (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hkb ( 777908 ) on Monday January 16, 2006 @03:32PM (#14484892)
    1. The new iMacs don't include the shell component of EFI. So no EFI shell.

    2. The command-line utility, bless, has a bunch of new stuff to enable multi-OS booting. Take a look at the manpage for bless(8):

    http://absent.org.nyud.net:8090/~jgw/stuff/bless8. txt [nyud.net]
    • TThhaatt wwaass aa vveerryy iinntteerreessttiinngg aarrttiiccllee..

      II wwoonnddeerr iiff iitt wwaass wwrriitttteenn iinn MMiissssiissssiippppii.

      WWhhyy ddoo ssoommee ddoouubbllee--ssttrriikkee sseenntteenncceess // wwoorrddss llooookk ssoo ffrreeaakkyy??

  • VMWare (Score:3, Insightful)

    by PhunkySchtuff ( 208108 ) <kai@automatica.c[ ]au ['om.' in gap]> on Monday January 16, 2006 @04:16PM (#14485261) Homepage
    What I'm _far_ more interested in is: rather than booting Windows on an Intel Mac, running Windows (or Linux, or Solaris, or...) in a VMWare style environment. This will be far more versatile as I don't have to quit my OS X apps, yet I can run Windows (etc) apps at pretty much full speed.

Slashdot Top Deals

My sister opened a computer store in Hawaii. She sells C shells down by the seashore.

Close