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Mac OS X 10.6.2 rumored to block Atom support, foil netbook OS X booting

by Steven Sande Nov 2nd 2009 at 11:15AM

In a move sure to rile up the crowds of people (including our very own Erica Sadun) who have converted cheap Intel Atom-powered netbooks into tiny MacBook-like hackintoshes, several sites are reporting that Apple will kill support for the battery-sipping CPU in the next release of Snow Leopard.

For most netbook manufacturers like MSI, Dell, and ASUS, the Intel Atom line of energy-efficient microprocessors has been the perfect CPU due to its low cost. Cheap prices on these netbooks, often below US$300, have made them the choice of many Mac users who want a very portable and affordable laptop solution that they're not currently getting from Apple.

The word from many developers who are testing the most recent build of Mac OS X 10.6.2 Snow Leopard is that support for the Atom CPU is gone. Either the hackintosh owners will have to run Mac OS X 10.6.1 for the foreseeable future, or some enterprising hacker will build a patch to add Atom support back to the upcoming OS release.

Like the current syncing struggle between iTunes 9 and the Palm Pre, this may turn into a tit-for-tat battle between Apple and the hackintosh community -- or it might be the end of the road for Mac OS X on the featherlight PCs.

[via Engadget, OS X Daily]

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In a move sure to rile up the crowds of people (including our very own Erica Sadun) who have converted cheap Intel Atom-powered netbooks...
 

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rc

Pretty simple...if you want an Apple product buy an Apple product. If you don't, quit trying to rip Apple off by using some cheap hardware because you are too cheap to pay for a quality product.

If Apple wants to release a netbook that runs OS X they will, but don't whine about it if your hardware gets blocked when you can't steal from Apple and run their software on unsupported systems.

November 03 2009 at 1:53 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mac Diva

I have the lightweight, fully functional Apple laptop some people merely say they want. It is called the MacBook Air. Seems to me that hackers with their fingers in every pie could afford to buy Airs if they wanted to.

November 03 2009 at 1:24 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
UnaMike

Who cares what some empirical study in Macworld posits?!? If Steve says Snow Leopard is faster then Snow Leopard is faster for me. I don't have to see it. I don't even have to buy it. Snow Leopard is already making my Mac faster and I don't even have it. Steve told me so.

November 03 2009 at 12:35 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to UnaMike's comment
UnaMike

Wow that was weird ... logged into TUAW with the 1Password beta and it re-posted a comment I made months ago. Shook me up so much I completely forgot what I wanted to post here.

Oh well back to your regularly scheduled blog posting. Nothing to see here. Nope, move along.

November 03 2009 at 12:39 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
clint Johnson

I agree with Simone. This could be to elimate competition for a small form factor tablet/netbook mac. Sure it'll be 600+, but it'll also be vastly superior in performance to those crummy netbooks. I also agree this won't necissarily stop OS X from running on any x86 architecture. If it works on AMD it'll work on Atom.

November 03 2009 at 12:29 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Colin

On a sales basis alone this move makes sense. How many hackintosh netbook makers really go out and buy a box copy of OS X? I can't imagine more than 20%

November 02 2009 at 6:02 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Simone

I suppose that this could be for the new coming iTablet that could be in competition with other Netbook. If you want OSX on a tiny pc you will have to buy apple iTablet.

November 02 2009 at 3:28 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Matthew W.

Intentional or not, this is a fight that Apple will not win, unlike the Pre fight, which will probably end up in court if things keep going the way they are. They'll block, a workaround will come out, and that cycle will continue, in a pointless waste of time, money and energy.

November 02 2009 at 2:18 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mentok

How moronic can you people be? And Steve Sande, shame on you for putting words in the mouth of 'Our Lady of Jailbreak'(sm).

If Erica feels that way, I'm sure she'd say something. But I don't see a column here from her, DO I?

I'm pretty sure that she may be helping our NBI friends with bug reports and all that. Also, this won't be a setback for the NBI folks at all.

One of the challenges & rewards of having a Netbook [like my Mini9] is the push and pull from the mothership. Those of us who have them have our Macs and well, but don't feel like paying the stupid tax and/or waiting for Cupertino to make the machine *we* want.

-Drunken Economist
http://mindtaker.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/drunk_economist

November 02 2009 at 2:07 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
tyr.goossens

2 words : voodoo kernel ( http://code.google.com/p/xnu-dev/ )
This devil ain't going back in its box.

November 02 2009 at 1:54 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Aaron

I guess no one noticed that the illustration crossed out the north bridge chip, not the Atom chip (the rectangular one to the right).

November 02 2009 at 1:48 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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