I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if thousands of Apple fanboys suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.
When I bought my MacBook Pro, my brother Steven had once question for me. “Can you play Counter Strike: Source on it?” Because without that ability, it was worthless in his eyes.
Yes, I get to have my cake and eat it too. And I’m sure hardcore Mac zealots have been throwing up in their mouths a little today, while the uber-geeks are celebrating.
Three months ago at the Macworld Expo, Apple introduced Macs based on Intel processors. This brought with it the potential to run Windows natively on the machines rather than emulating Intel / Windows (at horribly slow speeds), which was previously a Mac user’s only option to run Windows software on a Mac. Apple’s position at that time was that they would neither hinder the installation of Windows on a Mac nor would they facilitate it.
Next, a contest started by a user who wanted to use a MacBook Pro for work, and do to so he needed it to run Windows XP in addition to Mac OS. A few weeks ago someone one the contest when they got XP dual-booting along side Mac OS X. It was only a partial solution though as there was still an issue of getting proper drivers, etc… (ie I still wouldn’t have been able to play the latest games with that solution) and it was still a pretty in depth process to get Windows running on a Mac (including modifying the Windows XP installation disc, etc.)
Today Apple announced that they were officially supporting the installation of Windows XP on Intel-based Macs. This means they were providing all the tools for a Mac to run Windows, as well as (almost) al the drivers needed for it to run at full speed– no more hacking and tinkering to get things working.
I’m sure Steve Jobs has been shooting for this for a long time… Apple will make a load of cash now that people who were contemplating switching now have nothing to really prevent them from doing so, they can still use all their Windows software. It just reminds me of how the iPod began to explode as soon as it was available in a universal Windows / Mac version. Now they can sell their computers based on a similar premises.
I know what I’ll be doing tonight 😉
Comments
5 responses to “A tremor in the Force”
wow, that’s pretty amazing news. it’ll be interesting to see how it all plays out. Ideally i’d like a windows system allowing a dual boot with the macOS (too bad it’ll never happen), that way i could build by little computer and load mac stuff on it. but this is the next best thing.
Yeah technically you *can* load Mac OS on your computer, but it’s the long, hacker way where you have to find drivers for all your hardware. There’s a hacker out there that seems to release patches each time a new version of OS X comes out so that people can run the latest version on a regular PC.
i’m sold. but, i was already sold on having one of each. i mean, who doesn’t have 2 or 3 computers at home? i already have 2 pcs, with a mac on the way in the summer. and i’m NOT a tech geek.
Let me ask you a question Josh. Have you ever built your own computer? If so I think you’re leaning towards the tech geek side. That aside, it’s logical for you to jump on board considering the software side of things, work flow, etc. It’s clearly a wise choice 😉
i don’t think building your own computer demonstrates a tendency toward being a tech geek. ok, maybe you’re right… but i’m NOT a band geek. i was FORCED to take marching band in college!