InfiniteMac OSx86  


Reply
 
Thread tools Display modes
  #1  
Old 02-11-2009, 12:59 PM
R0GUE's Avatar
R0GUE R0GUE is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 581
German Mac clone maker claims immunity from Apple

Taking a page from U.S. Mac clone maker Psystar Corp., a German company is selling Intel-based computers with Mac OS X pre-installed, possibly putting it on collision course with Apple Inc.

HyperMegaNet UG, based in Wolfsburg, sells Intel-powered computers under the PearC brand at prices starting at $643. Like Florida-based Psystar, HyperMegaNet installs a copy of Mac OS X 10.5, a.k.a. Leopard, on the machines it sells.

The lowest-priced PearC Starter system sports a 2.2-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB of memory, a 250GB hard drive, an optical drive and an Nvidia GeForce 7200GS graphics card with 256MB of video RAM. Other systems, dubbed the PearC Advanced and PearC Professional, are priced at $1,029 and $1,930, respectively.

HyperMegaNet adds Leopard to its computers, even though Apple's end-user licensing agreement (EULA) forbids users from installing the software on non-Apple hardware. The same practice has embroiled Psystar in a seven-month legal battle with Apple, with the latter suing in July 2008 and the former retaliating with an antitrust countersuit in August. That case is currently set to start trial in November.

HyperMegaNet, however, said it believes it is immune from Apple's legal attacks. According to a translation of an FAQ on its site, HyperMegaNet said it's on safe ground. "German legislation is in this case on the side of the final consumer," the company's site said, claiming that under German law, a license agreement is valid only if it was visible, and agreed to by the buyer, prior to purchase. "We are convinced of the fact that our product is legal in Germany."

The company did not address how it would defend itself from Apple in the other countries where it plans to sell its computers. That same FAQ noted that PearCs will be sold in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden and the U.K.

Apple could be faced with even more clone makers in the coming months if it loses to Psyster in U.S. court. Last week, as a federal judge ruled that Psystar can continue its countersuit against Apple, he also noted that if Psystar won its misuse-of-copyright claim, others would be free to follow. "If established, misuse would bar enforcement (for the period of misuse) not only as to defendants who are actually party to the challenged license but also as to potential defendants not themselves injured by the misuse who may have similar interests," said the judge.

Psystar and HyperMegaNet share several similarities. Not only are their lowest-priced systems nearly identical -- the only difference is that Psystar's features a larger hard disk drive -- but HyperMegaNet, like its American cousin in its first days of sales, does not accept credit cards or take orders over the phone. For a time last year, Psystar only accepted payments via PayPal, the online payment service popular with online auctions. In its FAQ, HyperMegaNet said it only accepted bank transfers or cash-on-delivery.

HyperMegaNet's appearance may also fuel suspicion that there is a concerted effort by several companies to sell Intel-based computers preloaded with Mac OS X -- a charge that Apple made in documents filed in U.S. federal court. In November 2008, Apple said that "persons other than Psystar are involved in Psystar's unlawful and improper activities described in this amended complaint."

Psystar has denied the allegations.

HyperMegaNet did not respond to a request for comment or answer other questions e-mailed to an address posted on its Web site.

[Via computerworld.com]
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 02-11-2009, 04:47 PM
naquaada's Avatar
naquaada naquaada is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Germany
Posts: 1,216
Read my experiences I made with this company already yesterday. By the way, the system configuration begins much lower than a Core 2 Duo, read the specs selector.

2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interfaceBehringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64

Last edited by naquaada; 02-11-2009 at 04:55 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 02-11-2009, 05:05 PM
Taisto's Avatar
Taisto Taisto is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: TriCity, Poland
Posts: 517
Huh, if i choose best options + wifi etc. it would cost almost the same price as new iMac :S hope we`ll have Euro here soon :/


www.ultimae.com
Panoramic music, for panoramic people.

AMD Phenom II X6 3.5Ghz
AMD 990FX Chipset
Kingston HyperX 16GB 1600Mhz
AMD Radeon HD6850 X2 CrossFire
Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 02-11-2009, 09:21 PM
throttlemeister throttlemeister is offline
Jaguar
 
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 56
Quote:
Originally Posted by R0GUE View Post
HyperMegaNet, however, said it believes it is immune from Apple's legal attacks. According to a translation of an FAQ on its site, HyperMegaNet said it's on safe ground. "German legislation is in this case on the side of the final consumer," the company's site said, claiming that under German law, a license agreement is valid only if it was visible, and agreed to by the buyer, prior to purchase. "We are convinced of the fact that our product is legal in Germany."

The company did not address how it would defend itself from Apple in the other countries where it plans to sell its computers. That same FAQ noted that PearCs will be sold in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden and the U.K.
This legislation is actually accurate for the entire EU, as far as I know. An electronics EULA presented on screen after purchase is not considered legally binding. Also the fact that nobody reads these things and is just clicked away made lawmakers decide it holds no legal basis.

If you want someone to keep to a licensing agreement, you will have present them with a paper copy and have them sign it before you hand over the software.

As long as they install and sell a legal copy of OSX, I think they have a very good case against Apple in EU. Although, a court of justice may decide at some point the referred law applies to consumers, not companies.

Apple Macbook Pro 15" 2.93GHz | Apple 24" LED Cinema Screen

iAtkos v5i 10.5.6 Vanilla

Machine: Acer 7730G
Memory: 4GB DDR2/667
Storage: 2x 250GB
Display: nVidia GeForce 9300M GS
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 02-12-2009, 10:44 AM
Taisto's Avatar
Taisto Taisto is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: TriCity, Poland
Posts: 517
Im really green at law but it reminds me of the case with iPhone`s simlock - in that case EU law took advantage over the Apple license...so who knows, maybe companies like PearC ( is it company name ? ) know what they`re doing ? Anyway it`d be really nice to buy nice, cheap Mac clone for all those who dont have money for real Macs ( lets be honest, they`re really expensive, at least in europe )


www.ultimae.com
Panoramic music, for panoramic people.

AMD Phenom II X6 3.5Ghz
AMD 990FX Chipset
Kingston HyperX 16GB 1600Mhz
AMD Radeon HD6850 X2 CrossFire
Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 02-14-2009, 09:16 AM
monsieur.d monsieur.d is offline
Jaguar
 
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: France
Posts: 40
It's not that bad guys...

Guys, I don't think this is as bad as you think.

It could even be a good thing: If more and more companies start to make money with OSx86 and Apple can't stop them with law suits, then Apple might finally be forced to make their system compatible with PCs.

Nobody wants other people to profit from their efforts, that's a given. For that reason, I believe that once OSx86 PCs become popular, Apple will also not want to waste potential profits. Once Apple makes OS X natively compatible with PCs, all of us would benefit.
Reply With Quote
  #7  
Old 02-14-2009, 11:58 AM
throttlemeister throttlemeister is offline
Jaguar
 
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 56
I think it is more likely Apple will put in more checks to make it even harder to run OSX on a regular PC for us. They do not want their reputation tarnished by unstable systems and crappy drivers. Keep in mind this is the biggest problem of Windows: it needs to support just about every single piece of hardware anyone ever thinks of.

Apple Macbook Pro 15" 2.93GHz | Apple 24" LED Cinema Screen

iAtkos v5i 10.5.6 Vanilla

Machine: Acer 7730G
Memory: 4GB DDR2/667
Storage: 2x 250GB
Display: nVidia GeForce 9300M GS
Reply With Quote
  #8  
Old 02-14-2009, 12:59 PM
naquaada's Avatar
naquaada naquaada is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Germany
Posts: 1,216
I don't think Apple could add some more protections, they will be skipped sooner or later. Problematic could be programs which using special instructions sets. Intel CPUs have SSSE3 and SSE4, AMD has SSE4a. But if they would use them, the programs wouldn't work on earlier models with older Intel CPUs.

I'm against these clone producers, because they will make OSx86 to a problem for Apple. The people who are buying these computers were potential Apple consumers which are now lost for Apple. I would like to have a kind of OSx86 license. Apple does not develop its own OSx86 and has to give no support. But with this license it's possible to run OSx86 legally on private computers. That would be no big costs for Apple, a sheet of paper with a watermark and a hologram would be enough. And I think the most of the OSx86 users would pay f.e. 120 Euro if they can run their favourite OSx86 legally now. It will still not become a big thread to original Macs or other OS' because of the problematic installation - it's still not as easy as Windows or Linux - and there will be always some restrictions for AMD users.

2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interfaceBehringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64
Reply With Quote
  #9  
Old 02-14-2009, 02:27 PM
throttlemeister throttlemeister is offline
Jaguar
 
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 56
They could do something like a BIOS probe. If they find something, shut down or KP. You can't block something like that with the bootloader, and though , a coder could probably find it in the kernel source and remove it, it would make life a whole lot harder. They could also stop making the kernel sources available, or make some essential parts propriety code without source available. They could numerous things to make life very hard for enthousiasts and retailers like this if they want to, leaving us effectively stuck with 10.5.6, which will sooner or later obsolete our systems. Even if it does get cracked eventually, it will really frustrate the community and most likely only leave the most hardcore users to run OSx86.

Apple Macbook Pro 15" 2.93GHz | Apple 24" LED Cinema Screen

iAtkos v5i 10.5.6 Vanilla

Machine: Acer 7730G
Memory: 4GB DDR2/667
Storage: 2x 250GB
Display: nVidia GeForce 9300M GS
Reply With Quote
  #10  
Old 02-14-2009, 08:15 PM
naquaada's Avatar
naquaada naquaada is offline
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Germany
Posts: 1,216
I think things like these could easily get fixed. The original Intel Macs even have a hardware protection, the TPM Chip (Trusted Platform Management). And if a retail installation is possible, even this protection is canceled. On Intel CPUs even a vanilla kernel works, no they don't need a kernel sourcecode. But anyway, take a look at the history of OSx86. I don't think that Maxxuss had the sources for the 10.4.4 kernel, and he broke the EFI barrier, the TPM chip and integrated an SSE3 emulator. The Voodoo kernel is also much more powerful than the original Apple kernel, so I think we will stay up to date. By the way, it mustn't run the newest kernel on the system.



💡 Deploy cloud instances seamlessly on DigitalOcean. Free credits ($100) for InfMac readers.


2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interfaceBehringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64
Reply With Quote
Reply
Thread Tools
Display Modes