Submitted by We reported on the lack of Atom support in development builds of Mac OS X 10.6.2, but a more recent build re-enables support for Intel’s Atom line, popular in netbooks. “In the latest development build Atom appears to have resurrected itself zombie style in 10C535. The Atom lives another day, but nothing is concrete until the final version of 10.6.2 is out.”
It seems like everyone is making a big deal out of nothing. If they were going to do a crackdown on Hackintosh computers. I would think there would be better ways then trying to target the net book market. I think it is probably a case they were trying to fix an issue and if they blocked that CPU support the feature might work.
I think they’re targeting Atom because the largest audience for Hackintosh’s are people that want cheap hardware (like a Netbook) to run OSX on.
or that since their tablet would run the iPhone os and be arm based there is just no need for Atom in apples product line. with the next line of chips being 32nm and themal output in comparison to preformance is a complete non issue currently there is just no room in apples product line for atom.
Edited 2009-11-05 00:29 UTC
I think I agree with this. It is interesting that they did that, despite all their foo-foo-ing and battling with Psystar, I think Apple WANTS people running OS X as widely spread as possible.
So, for all this hype over Apple’s evilness, chances are this is simply a bug in one version due to Apple not testing on unsupported Atom, and fixed once they found out about it?
Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get ya…
Yep, it looks the Atom breakage was merely sloppiness/incompetence rather than evilness.
Hello Storm, let me introduce you to my good friend Tea cup…. quality^H^H^H^H^H^H crappy news reporting prevails again with regards to the previous story then…
Edited 2009-11-05 01:24 UTC
Why is it crappy reporting to inform my readers that an upcoming operating system update might break their legally installed operating systems?
Well, not everyone who builds a hackintosh has a legal copy of OS X. I know quite a few people who simply download one of the hacked ISOs from their favorite bittorrent mirror and never buy a license at all. So, whether it’s legal or not isn’t something you can say, Thom. More to the point, though, I’d say this is supposed to be reported here since it’s news about an operating system and this is osnews. Imagine that. Perhaps a bit less sensationalism in the original article when Atom support was removed would’ve been better though, you made it sound like Apple was intentionally breaking hackintosh netbooks. I’d not put it past them to do such a thing, but it’s always best to have proof first.
And I could have shoplifted my copy of Snow Leopard or Windows, so what point are you trying to make? That bad people do bad things, and we shouldn^aEURTMt report on things that affect the good people because of that? I^aEURTMll personally agree that it was sensationalist (Oh noes, something breaks that Apple was never testing with in the first place), but then that^aEURTMs all down to whoever picks up the story here at OSAlert.
I’d mod you up but I already commented. I ran a “hackintosh” with my legally obtained Family Pack of Leopard first, then Snow Leopard. Everyone *I* know would use an Apple-store-bought version if they were to create a hackintosh.
I’m getting sick of that stupid sensationalism claim. These days it is used whenever someone dislikes an article – merit, or no merit.
Explain to me: what is the sensationalism? The article was careful, and clearly stated that Apple has no obligation to maintain Atom support. The article also made NO mention about intentional breakage.
Seriously dude, where’s the sensationalism? Back up those frakking claims, for god’s sake.
Edited 2009-11-05 10:40 UTC
But how do we know for sure (confirmed) that it was the Atom processor at fault here? For what I know, the built was tried on a Hackintosh so lots of things could go wrong. Apple doesn’t support all kind of hardware last time I’ve checked.
I have an Amstrad machine (uses floppy,2 actually) and I can confirm that it doesn’t run the latest OS X build.
Edited 2009-11-05 11:10 UTC
That’s almost as bad an analogy as the imagined scenario about people complaining that OS X won’t run on their toasters.
Let me spell it out:
Most generic x86 hardware == compatible with OS X, with the exception of a few artificial barriers put in place by Apple.
Armstrads, and toasters, and pretty much everything else == fundamentally incompatible with OS X in just about every way possible.
See the difference?
Thom – pretty much all of your articles read like blog posts to your personal blog these days. I also note, you haven’t posted to your blog in months (or at least that was true when I looked a couple of days ago..)
People claim “sensationalism” because when ever you report anything recently, it reads like your own opinion, not objective reporting. That is all.
As an example : I had the perception that you had a complete and utter anti-iPhone stance, but you recently did a 180 on! A month ago you were obsessing about the Pre and pretty much sounded like the iPhone was the devil’s own device.
Anyway, I think the phrase that best describes my own personal feelings about OS News recently is – “quality, not quantity”. I’d rather have little or no news, but well reported and balanced reporting rather than hundreds of articles that read like personal vendettas* and opinion pieces**.
Things used to be a lot better. I’m sure you can return to that if you stop making OS News feel like your personal blog. I’m sure you’ll feel I’m being unreasonable and attack me for having an opinion that differs from your own on this subject, I await the rebuttal ;-P But, I *am* a long term reader though – I started reading OS News when Eugenia moved here from BeNews. I’m not just saying this to be annoying or get you mad – it’s the truth from where I’m sitting. Weigh that up and do whatever you see fit with it. Only *you* can make the necessary changes.
* Of course, it is not necessarily always true – even when claimed. That is just my perception of your general writing recently.
** ditto.
That’ll teach you a harsh lesson : blogging is not journalism and people that blog are not necessarily journalists. I’m ready to bet here 5 euros that all hackintoshers will eventually buy an Apple product that their hackintosh was supposed to replace.
Yes. Again I agree… People seem extra sensible today!
Ah, so this is not about the article at all. I figured as much.
This is just what OSAlert is these days. Things change. We used to be a glorified RSS feed. Those days are long over. We announced so clearly in January. We are no longer what we were.
You like it, or you don’t. We can’t be everything to everyone.
I’ve one about the article. this is not about OSAlert directly, but nearly every media. SO don’t take it personally.
Peon A finds a sensationalistic news (YES. I wrote sensationalistic!) and figure out his own media/site/whatever didn’t report it.
Peon A quickly make up an article about it without any second though.
Appears that a horde of Peon A’s actually copied an article stating that:
In an INTERNAL DEVELOPER RELEASE support for a functionality is bugged and wrongly state (while it’s his own judgement at best) support will be removed from future versions.
Of course, the bug been fixed and the report irrelevant.
That’s not your fault. That’s humanity, medias, whatever. Point is, it is still a sensationalistic news item, with worthless info inside. It gives ad clicks I suppose.
yes, my words sound harsh, but some days i’d like people to wake up and use their own “fking” common sense instead of following the crowd.
Legal – such an illusive concept.
Well I don’t know about the legality of installing Mac OS X on non-Apple hardware, but since Thom seems to think he knows what’s up and down on this matter, why doesn’t he go ahead and make a ruling on that pathetic matter of Apple vs. Psystar, while he’s at it?
Any interesting development whilst reading through the usual channels I subscribe to; build 10C540 has been released:
http://news.worldofapple.com/archives/2009/11/04/mac-os-x-1062-buil…
It appears that 10.6.2 is turning into Apple’s very own Service Pack 2 – packed with a tonne of fixes across the board. An interesting thing that has happened, the X3100 GMA is now 64bit, so I guess gradually we’re seeing Apple migrating their own drivers to 64bit during 10.6 release cycle in time for going fully 64bit when 10.7 is released – I’m sure they’ll keep the 32bit kernel/support around for a while.
Edited 2009-11-05 01:39 UTC
intel is the one creating and providing the GMA drivers to apple, they are the ones dragging their feet with the 64bit versions of their drivers.
not that it matters anyways since there is pretty much no real reason a machine with a GMA card could really take advantage of what a 64bit kernel provides.
That makes absolutely no sense what so ever – you need a 64bit GMA extension so that the kernel can run in 64bit mode; it has nothing to do with whether or not the GPU takes advantage of a 64bit kernel. The GPU is absolutely irrelevant to what is being discussed.
I think what he is saying is that the Macs that do come with the GMA card aren’t really all that powerful, and also do cannot access more than 4GB memory.
As such running Snow Leopard with the 64bit Kernel isn’t going to make much of a difference in performance.
64bit kernel allows better randomisation for ASLR thus improving security, there is a performance penalty running 64bit on a 32bit kernel; there are many other benefits outside simply addressing more than 4GB of memory.
actually the point i was trying to make was that Intel was responsible for maintaining and creating the drivers, not apple.
however as indicated above, machines that shipped with a GMA were pretty low end machines to begin with and wouldn’t take advantage of the additional memory from a 64bit kernel.
and while there are some improvements, performance wise all benchmarks indicate marginal improvements in some cases.
again, my original point was to correct the statement that Apple creates all drivers, they don’t. When they order certain hardware, they also get the drivers with the features they request.
I never really got the big deal about NDAs, but I finally get it now after this retardation.
The interesting thing is that bug, no bug, evil, or no evil, the original announcement was on Page 1.
This, the “correction”, however, is on page 2.
It’s still got 25+ response, but, still. Interesting.