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Not even Thurrott is stupid enough to buy an iMac only as a well-designed Winbox. Don't give him the time of day. He's just trolling for hits as usual.

I have been sucked in a little by Thurrott lately. Never again. The idiot now seems to be saying that the only reason he bought the iMac was to run Doze.

"dipshit of the week" ? just one week?

What an id10t.

Apple never said that it would dual boot. What an idiot.

im assuming he hasnt used it yet, if he had he would probably be keeping it

Bet the house he keeps the iMac and uses it.

He'll only be pretending to use a WinBox.

MDN - where's the note regarding Gruber's misstatement?

In fact, Apple has explicitly stated that they would do nothing to prevent Windows from running on Intel Macs.

Thurott's right -- owning an Intel Mac right now is a liability unless you traded up from a 500MHz G4. Rosetta is disappointing (apps are running slower than on the previous generation Macs), Universal binaries are failing to materialize on the promised schedule (probably not Apple's fault, but definitely their problem), the price points are too high, and their "first model in the line" slips are starting to show (problems w/ the graphics, trouble w/ some wireless connectivity, etc.)

The real exciting promise of owning Intel-based Mac hardware right now was dual-booting it. That still may happen, of course, but the goal line has just been officially moved another hundred yards away. I'll stick with my Mirror Door system, thankyouverymuch. Good luck unloading that ol' boat anchor, Paul.

Well Folks,

the GOOD NEWS for that are:
1) If wintel people want to use/try out Mactel, they have to buy the apple hardware.
2)If both systems can not boot vice versa, that we wont face the VISTA (ViruseS, InfectionS, SpywareS, TrojanS, AdS) problems

and the BAD NEWS is:
1) Deng, there are tons of good softwares/games/hardwares (Let's face the truth, folks) we can't run on our beloved Mac.

What say you guys?

Seeing as a small company wrote Virtual PC (and another company developed SoftPC) that emulated a full PC (Pentium & all), is it that unreasonable to expect another company would be able to figure out a way to bridge the bios ---> EFI thing? Maybe not by this Thursday, but sometime soon?

Who want's to dual-boot? Gimme VirtualPC !!! Next we'll hear that MS is cancelling the Mac version of VPC due to "lack of interest" or "no viable market".

Who is this guy at Daring Fireball? Is he deaf? Blind? Can he not read?

We have said over and over again, "WE WILL DO NOTHING TO PREVENT WINDOWS RUNNING ON INTEL MACS!"

What part of nothing does he (and Thurrott) not understand? You think no official support for EFI booting will stop people from doing it?

And just because Microsoft makes an obvious anti-Mac move at this late hour - Or is it they're too incompetent to make it work in a reasonable amount of time? - should be no surprise to anyone.

But to be fair, I don't think Thurrott started out hoping this would happen. I think he's just too sucked into the Microsoft Kool Aide driking crowd to escape the RDF from Ballmer and Bill.

Bill -

Odds are they will. But by then, the intel Mac hardware will be more mature with fewer bugs, more features, and more bang-for-buck. When that happens (or any of a handful of other problems are resolved), these things' value will justify their cost. At the moment, they don't. So he's trying to capitalize on the hype to take as small a loss as possible on it.

"And just because Microsoft makes an obvious anti-Mac move at this late hour - Or is it they're too incompetent to make it work in a reasonable amount of time? - should be no surprise to anyone."

I'll vote for incompetence - or at least, implementing EFI and BIOS booting into Vista without breaking something was proving too hard for them, so they dropped it since the legacy BIOS population is so much larger.

Besides, is this an Anti-Apple move, or an Anti-INTEL move?

Hey Thurrott! Keep this link bookmarked:

http://darwine.opendarwin.org//

Seems like they're close to it now so anyone can run any Windows-programme they want without running Windows at all and isn't that the best of all imaginable worlds, I don't know what is!

I mean, who in their right mind love Windows in itself?

I always wonder why people express opinions on subjects they do not understand.

The fact that Vista won't boot on an Intel Mac does not mean that it won't run on an Intel Mac. It just means that you will have to boot MacOS X as usual and then run a product like VMWare to run Windows at almost native speed.

Do I care? No, this is exactly what I want. I want to always boot into Mac OS X and maybe sometimes run a program or two that doesn't run on the Mac. If I had wanted to boot into Windows I would have bought a Dull.

I recently bought an intel iMac and am completely happy with it. Value for money is a perception thing and I think there is much added value in not having to deal with windoze and all its attendant problems. If I wanted to run Windoze (God forbid) I would have bought a Winbox.

Thurrott is an idiot.

Microsoft don't want to enable EFI in Windows for the simple reason that once 'diehard' Windoze users experience the superiority of OSX on their dual OS Mac then Windows-related software sales will plummit in favour of Mac-related software sales.

The killer move will come with OSX 10.5 when Windows applications can natively run on Intel-based Macs without the 'Windows OS' actually being present.

"The killer move will come with OSX 10.5 when Windows applications can natively run on Intel-based Macs without the 'Windows OS' actually being present."

Agree, with one correction. 'Windows XP/2000 application'. It should not run applications that require Vista.

EFI must be a problem for MS. Once EFI become norm, MS may need to start working on multiple platform OS again (intel X86, Itanium). They did not do so well developing a multi-platform OS last time, Windows for X86, Alpha, PPC. Apple already has multi-platform OS, PPC+X86. They probably have one running on Itanium too. It will be interesting, if Apple introduces Xserve with dual Itanium and Universal Application supporting three platforms?

What?! FISTA's not going to boot on Intel Macs?! Oh my goodness, holy feakin crap - oh man - my whole vision for my new Mac has been completely and totally ruined!

Y a a a wwwwwnnnnnn...

I'll give him 1/2 what he paid for it--provided it has NO microsh-t on it.

2 years ago Microsoftopoly announced at WINHEC (Windoze Hardware Engineering Conference) that the minimum specs to run Vista would be a dual core CPU, EFI, etc. Since then they have removed feature after feature and scaled back their plans for VISTA that is nothing more than a Service Pack for XP with a changed GUI.

Micro$oftopoly was so afraid that VISTA would bomb by requiring a hardware upgrade cycle that they have dumped a anywhere between half and 2/3rds of what was supposed to be the primary reason for the OS overhaul in the first place.

Talk about putting lipstick on a pig.

Wish I caught that one.

Do you know how hard it is to implement EFI? Damn you guys, we should reprogram the DOS kernel, we bought and have been using ever since.

You know, Longhorn should have shipped 3 years ago. Now it will ship this year and it will be great! We will have new eh.. and eh... Whatever, Vista ROCK! Whieee, I LOVE THIS COMPANY...

PC Apologist, there's a difference between "not preventing" users installing Windows and "supporting" it.

Oh, by the way, people buy Macs to run Mac OS X, not Windows.

Connor -

Agree. But the DF statement clearly implies that Apple has said the iMac hardware will not "support" Windows.. not that Apple won't "support" a Windows installation on Mac hardware. In fact, Apple has suggested that the iMac and other intel hardware COULD "support" Windows, and they would do nothing to stand in the way of that.

Turd-rot is a f@$king moron!!!!

Dearest Paul -- Worry not! Intel Mac Minis are selling at a rapid pace. You'll have no problem finding a buyer, IF YOU REALLY WANT TO SELL IT!

PC Apologist,

Congrats, you've proven yourself to be almost as ignorant as Thurrott himself (who has been showing so much progress lately, but has sadly had a relapse).

"Thurott's right -- owning an Intel Mac right now is a liability unless you traded up from a 500MHz G4. Rosetta is disappointing (apps are running slower than on the previous generation Macs),"

You make the assumption that everyone who has purchased an Intel Mac uses pro apps. The fact is, aside from the MacBook Pro, Apple has only released consumer models with Intel chips so far. Many consumers won't even need any additional software besides what the computer ships with, all of which are already Universal. For the MacBook Pro folks, if they were PowerBook users, the Macbook Pro in Rosetta is going to be similar (or even better depending on which model of PowerBook they had) to what they were used to with the promise of being unbelievably better. Just take a look at the reviews for the MacBook Pro. No one seems to be complaining.

"Universal binaries are failing to materialize on the promised schedule (probably not Apple's fault, but definitely their problem),"

How do you figure this? Apple announced last June that they would have Intel computers "by this time next year". I'll double check my calendar if need be, but I think June is still nearly three months off, so how you can state that developers have been too slow is beyond me. The developers are not behind schedule, Apple is ahead of schedule.

"the price points are too high,"

They are competitively priced with similarly outfitted machines from other companies. This is the same old tired argument. Everybody knows, you get what you pay for, and those $399 Dell boxes actually end up costing you closer to $1,000 by the time you upgrade them to actually be usable.

"and their 'first model in the line' slips are starting to show (problems w/ the graphics, trouble w/ some wireless connectivity, etc.)"

This happens with any mass produced product, whether it be computers, cars, whatever. Don't think for a second that other vendors don't suffer from this too. Besides, Apple already fixed the graphic issue. I'm not aware of the supposed connectivity issue, but they will surely fix it soon if they haven't yet.

"The real exciting promise of owning Intel-based Mac hardware right now was dual-booting it."

No, actually the real excitement of owning an Intel-based Mac is the same as it was for all previous Macs: running OS X - a secure, productive, beautiful, extremely powerful operating system on a box to match. The idea of dual-booting is intriguing, sure, but anyone who has actually used Mac OS X knows that running Windows would be done only out of necessity. Besides, even if there is no way to bridge the BIOS to EFI gap, there is still (even more ideally) emulation, and Darwine that will unfold this year.

Since when is this Apple's problem, or fault?? We all know Micr$s**t can refuse to cooperate any time they want to. What's the big frikkin' deal? Games?? Office?? some narrow-targeted specialty, trade-related super expensive program for business?? I don't use any of those, so screw it.

I do use win2k on a laptop - actually have it working real good, ain't gonna ever upgrade it, and using MacOSX on a mini. My laptop running windows can be bought on eBay well equipped for under $400, and with a stablized win2k (all necessary patches, no continuous connection to the net, no anti-virus software, being smart), which leaves me free to pursue all the other stuff on a nice, new Mac. Why the hell would I want to dual-boot?? Let me keep the two OS's as far apart as I can.

Actually, I would like one feature from windoze to be added to MacOSX - when closing the last window of an app, it quits the app. I hate having to take the extra step of 'quitting' a program, and sometimes find I have several running which I forgot to 'quit' from several days ago.

Also, a few more tools for administering user accounts and internet connections would be welcomed on MacOSX. I now have two user accounts, and one of them can't connect to the internet via Safari or iTunes, yet it has no problem with the same connection running Firefox. Can't figure out where to tweak the settings, or see what's wrong.. nothing's perfect, folks.

Finally, why bother booting Vista on a new mac anyway? All supposed 'legacy' apps you'd probably want are most likely not Vista-ready anyway? If you really want Vista, buy a new pc. Probably won't run on you old one...

"EFI must be a problem for MS."

Getting Vista to run on regular-issue PC's has been a problem for MS.

Surely nobody thought MS could handle something challenging like EFI...

As for Thurrott, what a bozo. Maybe he'll sell his new iPods too because they won't run Windows CE. Buying hardware in anticipation of an unsupported hack is the height of stupidity.

I don't get dual booting anyway. If you need to run Windows that damned bad, why not just get a PC. Keep your Mac for when you've had enough.

run a Mac mini and a microATX PC...use a KVM switch to change over ...with Mac mini's and microATX boxes using relatively low power, both on would still draw less than a full tower.

another little addition like a NAS drive will allow you to share files.

Interesting Microsoft are incapable of introducing even a moderately modern replacement fo the pathetic BIOS and it seems that this is Apple's fault. The only fault there is that they may have considred even Micosoft might be able to introduce yesterdays technology today in place of the last (two) decades technology.

Never underestimate Microsoft's ineptitude, is the obvious lesson here (and the apologists ability to try to spin the truth), or maybe they are just running scared and deliberately crippled it. One thing is for sure it sure doesn't look too good for Microsoft's efforts at introducing other relatively modern technology in Vista. Funny I always thought 'NT' stood for new technology, the full irony of that is clear when the second (some might say third) attempt at a successor still can't quite make the grade expected back in those far off days.

Once Macs get BACK up to 64-bit after this downgrade, the 64-bit version of Vista, which DOES support EFI, will work.

Here are my 2 reasons as to why Microsoft made this decision:

1) To put a damper on Intel-Mac sales.
2) Microsoft will sell more versions of vista this way. If they went to EFI, then it would only run on new pc's that supprorted it.

Mark

"The real exciting promise of owning Intel-based Mac hardware right now was dual-booting it."

I thought the real excitement was the possibility of using Darwine to run the rare Windows program for which Mac versions/equivalents are not available WITHOUT having to run the Windows OS at all.

2) Microsoft will sell more versions of vista this way. If they went to EFI, then it would only run on new pc's that supprorted it.

--

Chicken and the Egg... as usual... the PC industry taking years to make a move

Floppy drives anyone?

Thurrott=A$$H013!!

This is what he really meant to say.

"A combination of factors changed our plans," Microsoft development manager Andrew Ritz said in a session at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco, according to APCmag.com.
"The big one, in my opinion, was The Intel Macs rely on EFI and lack a Bios. This so-called double booting would allow gaming enthusiasts to use Apple hardware to play PC games that are not available on the OS X platform.

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2151778/microsoft-axes-bios-replacement

I tried to imagine what kind of stuff is running through the heads of "PC Apologist", Thurrott and the like.

I got so scared, I literally felt a shiver run down my spine.

So, no EFI, no new file system, and various other improvements are now all out. They added an aqua-like GUI, Spotlight-like searches, expose-like program switching, and a dashboard-like layers for widgets (oh, I mean gadgets). Wow, where do they get their ideas? They took any new technology out of the OS and just tried to make is like OSX. Is it just me or does this seem like an updated version of Microsoft Plus for Windows XP?

When innovation simply won't do....there will always be Microsoft.

That's a bit harsh on Paul. He's a Windows guy so of course he's disappointed Windows won't run on his Intel-based Mac. Also, Apple never explicitly said (at the time Intel Macs were launched) that they -wouldn't- dual-boot Windows. In fact, on the contrary, they said they 'weren't doing anything to prevent' Windows from booting. Apple knew full well that they wouldn't boot Windows because they are 32 bit machines, and EFI is tied to 64 bit. So effectively they did mislead people... it would have been much more ethical to simply come out and say that although they are not actively stopping Windows from booting, it's also not going to happen on current models due to limitations of the technology.