Filed under: Hardware, Multimedia
Psystar offers Blu-ray option for Mac clones
Macworld's Jim Dalrymple reports that Psystar, the makers of legally-contested Mac clones, are offering Blu-ray drives for its products.
Two Blu-ray burners can be added to Psystar's Open and OpenPro line of computers, a $310 6x Blu-ray burner, and a $350 6x Blu-ray burner that includes a 16x DVD±RW DL drive. It appears that both can be added to a single system.
Apple has not added Blu-ray to any of its products, and Steve Jobs called the licensing terms for the technology a "big bag of hurt," though Apple is on the board of directors of the Blu-ray Disc Association trade group. Aftermarket, external Blu-ray burners are available for Mac around $450, and internal burners for Mac Pro start around $370. External players start around $270.
Psystar is in the midst of litigation with Apple surrounding its inclusion of Mac OS X with its line of clones.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Philip said 8:08PM on 10-29-2008
Pointless effort by Pystar as the computer will not be able to play Blu Ray disc movies under OSX.
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badweasel said 8:34PM on 10-29-2008
You are misquoting Jobs. He said that BluRay was a big bag of hurt, not that the licensing was. The problem is that there is no player software. Pisstar can put burners in there but it will be data only. Even if you use Toast 9 to burn a playable BD disc there's no way to check it to see if it works.
I think the big bag of hurt is everything involved in getting a simulator working on the current hardware. I suspect that the nvidia thing will advance the efforts.
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Jonas said 12:23AM on 10-30-2008
The actual quote from Steve was:
"Blu-ray is just a bag of hurt. It's great to watch the movies, but the licensing of the tech is so complex, we're waiting till things settle down and Blu-ray takes off in the marketplace."
I interpret this to mean that most of the obstacles are in the licensing.
Rich said 9:54PM on 10-29-2008
Not to be rude or anything, but lately I've been seeing new Apple news on Engadget a day or two before you guys post it. Step it up TUAW!
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SpyBoyCH said 12:20AM on 10-30-2008
Hey folks,
Not sure if anybody else has posted a link to this on any of the posts regarding Psystar, but here you go. This s a link to all the court docs regarding Apple v. Psystar. Interesting stuff really.
http://news.justia.com/cases/featured/california/candce/3:2008cv03251/204881/
I have a question as well: The Intel GMA950 which is in the previous generation Macbook and Current MacMini is capable of output at 1080p, so why would the Nvidia cards make such a huge difference in allowing the possibility of BD playback on mac? Wouldn't it just be a software issue? If you install a BD drive on a Mac Pro and Install Bootcamp with the "V" word, you can play BDs.
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glebec said 2:02AM on 10-30-2008
Are you sure about that? I find that suspect, as the problem isn't display resolution (what computers CAN'T display at 1080p or above these days??) but a graphics card capable of the shear bitrates and decoding involved for real-time BD playback (i.e., a substantial amount of information and calculations per second). Software is NOT a solution in most cases, as you will end up using truly gargantuan amounts of CPU assuming you can get it to work at all.
Practical BD playback uses dedicated graphics hardware. It's not too difficult to include and works fine when it is included, but it is inefficient and resource-hogging if you try to retroactively make any old graphics chip run it.
But if you can run BDs on a Vista-installed Mac Pro, that is very interesting to me and I welcome any confirmation of such.
backdoorman said 2:30AM on 10-30-2008
ATTACK OF THE CLONES!!!
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EMoShunz said 8:16AM on 10-30-2008
i have a question. the reviews i've read of pystar are ok, still require a hackintosh os to be installed. could they not work with efi-x and install those dongles at the factory so one could just buy a legal os x off the shelf and install it?
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Mort said 10:09AM on 10-30-2008
You all are missing the point. pystar is breaking the law and basically "stealing" Mac OSX. If you do not run it on a mac then you have no RIGHT to the software. Just because you pay for a disc that contains the OS does not mean you own it. What you buy is the right to install it on a mac as per the agreement you make when you open the package. If you can't handle that then stay away from Mac OSX. It is no different than when you buy a music CD. You do NOT own the music, that is held by the label, publisher and artist. You have the RIGHT to listen to it and that is all. If you copy it to other media and sell it or redistribute it you are a thief like pystar.
This nonsense of a monopoly is just that. Their hardware and software are mated, how is that a monopoly? Are Macs the only computer? I think not. The cheapskates and open source fanboy's need to grow up and pay their own way. You want Mac OSX, then buy a Mac, simple as that. You want windows, buy a dell, the choice is up to you. So I ask, with about 5% of the computer market, how is that a monopoly.
I hope Apple burns them to the ground and takes every dollar they have. This kind of cavalier attitude toward the law has rotted away the core of our country. Just look at the elections...
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Orion said 11:01AM on 10-30-2008
Couldn't agree with you more. I'm also tired with how companies, and for that matter people, keep bending the law and it's perfectly ok when they do. You bought the right to use the software on a Mac. If you can't handle that, learn to love Linux or Windows.
Pystar's defense doesn't make much sense. They say they have a "monopoly" not so much as a company, but in the OS itself. That's like saying that Nintendo has a monopoly because I can't play Wii games on a PS3. It's called dedicated software. If people sold PS3 systems with installed Wii games on the hdd, they would be in the same type of trouble, so I just don't see why it's so hard for people to understand this concept.
Just because you bought the software doesn't mean you can shove it on whatever you like and sell it as a new type of package to people for profit.
Thomas said 11:42AM on 10-30-2008
Some of the processing has to be done in the kernel in ring 0 due to fears that people would hack into it. Ring 0 is not a good place to add unnecessary code!
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SpyBoyCH said 5:02PM on 10-30-2008
About using boot camp and vista, you can look here:
http://discussions.apple.com/search.jspa?search=Go&q=blu+ray
on the support discussion pages there are several people who cite this as an option. Furthermore, people over at http://www.insanelymac.com/ (huge place for info on osX86 and Hacintoshing) mention the option of using bootcamp to run windows and then getting BD playback.
Not sure about the GMA950 thing still looking up stuff just to be sure, but Intel's site does mention that it is capable of HD playback:
http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/gma950/index.htm
I have read over all the court docs and it's pretty funny. on Psystar's first response they basically try to plead ignorance nad say, "we don't understand what you mean by offical copy of OS X or Officail Apple Hardware." (not exactly their words, but their sentiment).
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glebec said 7:53PM on 10-30-2008
Thanks SpyBoyCH, I had no idea that the GMA950 could be capable of BD playback... mildly surprising. Cheers.
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Matt said 10:14AM on 12-20-2008
I appreciate all the comments here. As for the Blu0Ray stuff...not interested. I'd rather burn the Blu-Ray and watch it on a TV than a computer, so it's no big deal to me if I have the latest greatest eliteness that would allow me to view on the Mac at all. My personal opinion is that people seem to be jumping on a bandwagon of a technology that is way too expensive at this point and not refined enough yet to make it worth my consideration. Hey if yer rich and have to have the latest new thing that hits the market then God Bless You.
As for the opinions that include statements like "The cheapskates and open source fanboy's need to grow up and pay their own way....", I have something to say to that end.
First of all...I am a Mac user and have been since 1989, I'm a very loyal Mac user, I've converted many people from "the other side" to using Macs and I love Macs.
Second...it's time for me to upgrade the Mac I use is just too slow for some things I'd like to do. I want a Mac Pro. Great machine, no doubt. Mac OS X is the finest OS ever created. No question there at all.
Third, I make about $22k a year. I've been shopping for a Mac now for 2 months. It's pretty damn hard to just pull appr $3500 out of my pocket for a new Mac Pro from Apple. Yeah maybe a little less depending who I get it from and options. Still talking $3k.
Because I'm just like 95% of the people in this country who is more or less just getting by and don't happen to have a big nest egg sitting in the bank that I can just go buy toys with, that amount seems too much to spend on a Mac. Maybe in 6 months if I ate Ramen noodles every day.
So the price and performance of the OpenPro looks extremely attractive to me. $1500 and quite a few of the early issues (like software update not working) are corrected. Not to mention if I want to upgrade the video card, for example, I won't be tied to buying one from Apple or some other "Mac retailer" that wants to RAPE Mac users for 300-400 for a video card. I find that outrageous and the cost of upgrades at purchase time is like 5-10 times higher than you can get the component (ram, video, HD) and put in yourself. How can that be justified? There is absolutely no acceptable reason or excuse for it.
So what if a future Apple update breaks it and you can't update? A Core2Quad with OS X 10.5.5 would last me for at least 2-3 years.
So excuse me if I take issue with this cheapskate and fanboy statement and this "pay your own way" statement, because Apple DOES charge too damn much. I love the elegance and design of Macs for sure. What I can't justify is paying at least $1000 more than I should to get the functionality just to look at a pretty aluminum box design.
I won't get an OpenPro though until I know ALL the under-the-hood specs...and my purchase decision will be made based on how willing Psystar is to provide me with detailed technical specs of EVERY component, bus speeds, what kind of ram they install etc. Because those details aren't visible on their site.
All I can say is...I'd pay 500 more for a real Apple, but not 1000-1500 more for the same performance. And it's definitely STUPID to pay the unreal prices for any "upgrade at sale" items.
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